Fors Clavigera (Volume 2 of 8): Letters to the workmen and labourers of Great BritainRuskin, John
General
Fors Clavigera (Volume 2 of 8): Letters to the workmen and labourers of Great Britain
Ruskin, John
Aesthetics; Conduct of life; Great Britain -- Social conditions -- 19th century; Social problems; Working class -- Great Britain
So much for cheap literature; not that I like cheap talk better, mind
you; but I wish I could get a word or two with a few honest people,
now, face to face. For I have called the fund I have established
The St. George's Fund, because I hope to find, here and there, some
one who will join in a White Company, like Sir John Hawkwood's,
to be called the Company of St. George; which shall have for its
end the wise creating and bestowing, instead of the wise stealing,
of money. Now it literally happened that before the White Company went
into Italy, there was an Italian Company called 'of St. George,' which
was afterwards incorporated with Sir John's of the burnished armour;
and another company, called 'of the Rose,' which was a very wicked and
destructive one. And within my St. George's Company,--which shall be
of persons still following their own business, wherever they are, but
who will give the tenth of what they have, or make, for the purchase of
land in England, to be cultivated by hand, as aforesaid, in my last May
number,--shall be another company, not destructive, called of "Monte
Rosa," or "Mont Rose," because Monte Rosa is the central mountain
of the range between north and south Europe, which keeps the gift of
the rain of heaven. And the motto, or watchword of this company is to
be the old French "Mont-joie." And they are to be entirely devoted,
according to their power, first to the manual labour of cultivating
pure land, and guiding of pure streams and rain to the places where
they are needed: and secondly, together with this manual labour, and
much by its means, they are to carry on the thoughtful labour of true
education, in themselves, and of others. And they are not to be monks
nor nuns; but are to learn, and teach all fair arts, and sweet order
and obedience of life; and to educate the children entrusted to their
schools in such practical arts and patient obedience; but not at all,
necessarily, in either arithmetic, writing, or reading.
That is my design, romantic enough, and at this day difficult enough;
yet not so romantic, nor so difficult as your now widely and openly
proclaimed design, of making the words "obedience" and "loyalty"
to cease from the English tongue.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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