We are always in these days
endeavouring to separate the two; we want one man to be always
thinking, and another to be always working, and we call one a
gentleman, and the other an operative; whereas the workman ought often
to be thinking, and the thinker often to be working, and both should be
gentlemen, in the best sense. As it is, we make both ungentle, the one
envying, the other despising, his brother; and the mass of society is
made up of morbid thinkers, and miserable workers. Now it is only by
labour that thought can be made healthy, and only by thought that
labour can be made happy, and the two cannot be separated with
impunity. It would be well if all of us were good handicraftsmen in
some kind, and the dishonour of manual labour done away with
altogether; so that though there should still be a trenchant
distinction of race between nobles and commoners, there should not,
among the latter, be a trenchant distinction of employment, as between
idle and working men, or between men of liberal and illiberal
professions. All professions should be liberal, and there should be
less pride felt in peculiarity of employment, and more in excellence of
achievement. And yet more, in each several profession, no master should
be too proud to do its hardest work. The painter should grind his own
colours; the architect work in the mason's yard with his men; the
master-manufacturer be himself a more skilful operative than any man in
his mills; and the distinction between one man and another be only in
experience and skill, and the authority and wealth which these must
naturally and justly obtain.
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