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THE
INTELLECTUAL LIFE,
BY
PHILIP GILBERT HAMERTON,
AUTHOR OF “A PAINTER’S CAMP,” “THOUGHTS ABOUT ART,”“THE UNKNOWN RIVER,” ETC.
NEW YORK
HURST & COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
TO EUGÈNIE H.
We have shared together many hours ofstudy, and you have been willing, at the costof much patient labor, to cheer the difficultpaths of intellectual toil by the unfailing sweetnessof your beloved companionship. It seemsto me that all those things which we havelearned together are doubly my own; whilstthose other studies which I have pursued insolitude have never yielded me more thana maimed and imperfect satisfaction. Thedream of my life would be to associate youwith all I do if that were possible; but sincethe ideal can never be wholly realized, let meat least rejoice that we have been so little separated,and that the subtle influence of yourfiner taste and more delicate perception isever, like some penetrating perfume, in thewhole atmosphere around me.
PREFACE.
I propose, in the following pages, to considerthe possibilities of a satisfactory intellectuallife under various conditions of ordinaryhuman existence. It will form a partof my plan to take into account favorable andunfavorable influences of many kinds; andmy chief purpose, so far as any effect uponothers may be hoped for, will be to guardsome who may read the book alike againstthe loss of time caused by unnecessary discouragement,and the waste of effort which isthe consequence of misdirected energies.
I have adopted the form of letters addressedto persons of very different position in orderthat every reader may have a chance of findingwhat concerns him. The letters, it is unnecessaryto observe, are in one sense as fictitiousas those we find in novels, for theyhave never been sent to anybody by the post,yet the persons to whom they are addressedare not imaginary. I made it a rule, fromthe beginning, to think of a real person whenwriting, from an apprehension that by dwellingin a world too exclusively ideal I mightlose sight of many impediments which besetall actual lives, even the most exceptional andfortunate.
The essence of the book may be expressedin a few sentences, the rest being little morethan evidence or illustration. First, it appearsthat all who are born with considerableintellectual faculties are urged towards theintellectual life by irresistible instincts, aswater-fowl are urged to an aquatic life; butthe lower animals have this advantage overman, that as their purposes are simpler, sothey attain them more completely than hedoes. The life of a wild duck is in perfect accordancewith its instincts, but the life of anintellectual man is never on all points perfectlyin accordance with his instincts. Manyof the best intellectual lives known to us havebeen hampered by vexatious impediments ofthe most various and complicated kinds; andwhen we come to have accurate and intimateknowledge of the lives led by our intellectualcontemporari