Worcester? Here is eternal freshness of conviction and ardour for reform;
great keenness of perception in spots, and in other spots lacunae and
impulsive judgments; distrust of tradition, of words, of constructive
argument; horror of vested interests and of their smooth defenders; a love
of navigating alone and exploring for oneself even the coasts already well
charted by others. Here is romanticism united with a scientific conscience
and power of destructive analysis balanced by moral enthusiasm. Doubtless
Locke might have dug his foundations deeper and integrated his faith
better. His system was no metaphysical castle, no theological acropolis:
rather a homely ancestral manor house built in several styles of
architecture: a Tudor chapel, a Palladian front toward the new
geometrical garden, a Jacobean parlour for political consultation and
learned disputes, and even--since we are almost in the eighteenth
century--a Chinese cabinet full of curios. It was a habitable philosophy,
and not too inharmonious. There was no greater incongruity in its parts
than in the gentle variations of English weather or in the qualified moods
and insights of a civilised mind. Impoverished as we are, morally and
humanly, we can no longer live in such a rambling mansion. It has become a
national monument. On the days when it is open we revisit it with
admiration; and those chambers and garden walks re-echo to us the clear
dogmas and savoury diction of the sage--omnivorous, artless,
loquacious--whose dwelling it was.


[1] Paper read before the Royal Society of Literature on the occasion of
the Tercentenary of the birth of John Locke.

[2] See note I, p. 26.

[3] See note II, p. 29.