BOOKS.
THE LATE W. T. ARNOLD.*
THE singularly interesting literary monument which in the introduction to this volume has been raised to the memory of the late William Arnold by the affection of his distinguished sister, and by the whole-hearted comradeship of a fellow- worker of many years, will be Welcome to the numerous friends whom he has left behind him. But the value of this combined Memoir will, unless we mistake, not be altogether transitory. For though William Arnold's life was what "indolent reviewers" are apt to term uneventful—we cannot all of us discover the South Pole, or find our way to Mecca in dis- guise—it was all of a piece, and has left its mark on the pro- fession to which he belonged and in which he took pride. During the last thirty years it has become more usual than it was in Arnold's earlier days for scholars and men of "science to devote to journalism the fullness of energies first called forth and set to work by the best academical training that the country is enabled to afford. In Arnold's case a choice of calling necessarily in some measure due to external causes was justified, not only by the success which attended his labours as a writer for the Press, but also by the sense of aspirations fulfilled which that success brought to him. Both the love of movement and the desire to achieve were in the Arnold blood, and they alike found their opportunities in the arduous effort and in the. public responsibility proper to the work of a journalist who takes himself seriously. Thus a proud ambition, far removed from the megalomania which the Romans despised in the Greeks, was not left out altogether in the career, cut short all too soon, of a "provincial" journalist.
As a matter of course, however, this journalist could not have become what he was—always a full writer ais well as a ready, and serenely conscious not only of his knowledge, but of his cont;o1 over it—bad be not always remained a scholar. And here, again, it was not in Arnold to work—and bow unceasingly. he toiled in the desire to give completeness even to the smallest book undertaken by him all those acquainted with any of his Vorarbeiten can testify—without desiring to achieve. The real subject of his heart was, he once wrote, "the history, of the world under Rome." The magnum opus of his life remains a fragment,sbut one of which he would have desired no higher praise than that it is worthy of its theme. Thanks largely to the assiduous care and accurate learning of his friend Mr. Edward Fiddes, of which an illustration or two will be given below, the Studies of Roman Imperialism are now published in a form enabling us to judge, not only of the scope of their author's design, but of the powers as an historian and equipment as a classical scholar and archaeologist which he possessed for its execution. Memoir and Studies together thus make up a record of a strenuous life animated by high purpose. We may perhaps be allowed to dwell for a moment longer on some of the conditions under which it was led.
William Thomas Arnold was the grandson of the great Head-Master of Rugby. A glance at the admirable portrait prefixed to this volume will show how strongly Dr. Arnold's grandson resembled him in face; indeed, his bust by Mr. Alfred Gilbert in Westminster Abbey owes some touches to sittings given to the sculptor by William Arnold. To his descendant Dr. Arnold transmitted, with something of the high moral courage which, take it for all, was the most dis- tinctive feature in his character, a disdain of things petty and frivolous; it was his constant 'aim to keep the conduct of his life and the spirit of his actions on a high -level, just as he said he had striven to find a proper pitch for the style of his Roman history. No wonder that William Arnold, under the influence of such traditions, brought near to him by the * Studies of Boman fmperialism. By W. T. Arnold. Edited by Edward Fiddes. With Memoir of the Author by Mrs. Humpliry Ward and C. E. Montague. Manchester : at the University Press. 1.78. 6d. net.] • tenius loci of Fox How, where they were so faithfully kept alive by the gracious influence of Mrs. Arnold and her daughters, should have grown up a scbolar in his intellectual tastes, and a Liberal in his political aspirations. His own parental home • had been a migratory and a distracted one, and, owing to the transitions in his father's religious wander- ings, he bad been a schoolboy at the Birmingham Oratory before he was sent to Rugby. The perplexities of the gentle and sweet-natured Thomas Arnold's own inner and outer life were too many to leave him able to control the mental growth of his children, and deeply troubled the more energetic nature of their mother. But the affection of the brothers and sisters
• for each other stood them in good stead throughout the unusual experiences of their youth, and as time went on William Arnold was to find a special satisfaction in watching the progress of the literary fame of his eldest sister, whose love for him knew no change. As a matter of course, a strong influence was exercised upon the development of his critical faculty by the genius of an uncle to whom be was warmly attached, and in whom he was justified in recognising the most original and effective critical writer of his own age— perhaps of any age—of English letters. It was probably through this influence that in his last years of suffering William Arnold came to occupy himself so much with Goethe, and to draw from him unconsciously the supreme consolation of an unselfish hopefulness.
At Oxford William Arnold fell short of that kind of academical success the measure of which then even more than now seemed to decide the future of many reckoned among the flower of our studious youth. His failure—it was only the failure to secure a First Class in "Mods," for he hardly seems to have expected one in "Greats "—even at the time impressed upon him the necessity of concentration in reading, and of the consequent qualities of speed and precision in writing. But, though really more than made good by his success as- the winner of the Arnold Prize by an essay of laating value, in so far as it weakened the hold upon him of Oxford as the obvious sphere of his activity, it proved a blessing. in disguise. Another experience, on which he entered in the year after that of his degree, more' directly determined him to take a wider and a bolder view of the possibilities of life. Arnold's early marriage aseured to him unbroken happiness at his own hearth, whithersoever he might move his penates, and a sympathy—indeed, a co-operation— which, while lightening many of the labours, strengthened and heightened the aspirations of his career. Thus, when in 1879—three years after that of his degree—the opportunity came, he seems to have quickly resolved upon taking the step which virtually settled the question of his future. Leaving Oxford, he became a 'member of the staff of the Manchester Guardian, with which he remained associated till, after the malady to which. he ultimately• succumbed had overtaken him in two years previously, be was compelled to sever his connexion with the paper in 1898.
The sum total of the results of the services rendered by William Arnold and his fellows to the Manchester Guardian and its readers cannot be reckoned up ; but some notion of the spirit in which he carried on his journalistic labours, and even of the methods that commended themeelves to his mind and were matured by his experience, may be formed with the aid of the subtly analytical contribution of Mr. C. E. Montague to this Memoir. It would be quite out of place to attempt here an estimate of the guiding principles of a great news- paper whose influence upon the political life of a considerable part of the nation during the last quarter of a century it would be futile to gainsay. But it would be not less futile to ignore the fact that one of the sources of that influence was the high character of the paper. The ardent Liberalism of Arnold never failed the Manchester Guardian in its consistent adherence to the political principles with which it was identi- fied; and the loftiness of his own ways of thought and feeling was attracted by, and in its turn materially helped to main- tain, in the discussion of political and social questions, and in the general conduct of the- paper, a moral as well as intellec- tual standard honourable ,to it and to English journalism.
The literary criticism of the Manchester Guardian was systematically organised at an earlier date than that of the chief London daily newspapers ; and here Arnold felt thoroughly at home. From his Oxford days onwards he was a. remarkably widely read man, and continued so to the last.
This is attested by his library, the greater part of which is now incorporated in the University Library at Manchester, and which, like Freeman's, that stands side by side with it, was the working library of a literary man. His intimate knowledge of English poetry is attested by his critical edition of Keats. Art criticism had been one of his hobbies as an undergraduate; at Manchester, where music had long claimed a prerogative before the sister arts, he did real service by insisting upon their importance in the higher life of the community. Hp and his friends also did something to keep up the standard of the theatre in Manchester; if in their criticisms (which they afterwards collected) they followed French models rather closely, they had a good excuse, for dramatic criticism cannot do solid work without at least one stock company of actors.
From all this work, and much else unintermittently carried on by Arnold for the better part of two decades, his study of Roman history stood apart. He deliberately devoted to it an allotted portion of his time, generally the morning hours of each working day, and addressed himself to , it as whole- heartedly as he did to his journalistic labours. His holidays —short or long—his Saturday afternoon bicycle rides from Manchester, and his travels in France and other countries— his pilgrimage to the Pont du Gard, and his inspection of the Igelsiiale, near Trier—were all made subservient to this master study. Nothing was hurried, nothing was done by halves ; and the result was designed to be the crowning achievement of his life. The form which this result should ultimately take was long a matter of debate with him. His Oxford prize essay on Roman Provincial Administration was, as it were, always with him, and a second edition in constant preparation; now this edition is at last about to appear, enlarged with the aid of his own notes, and revised by the friendly care of. a Cambridge scholar whose own distinguished career has quite recently been terminated by death. A student's manual under the late Dr. William Smith's general editorship was abandoned. The project of editing, with an introduction, the whole of Dr. Arnold's well-known History of Rome was also given up,— wisely, we think, for with all its merits (and some are lasting) this work, written under the full inspiration of Niebuhr's great book, belongs to a past era of Roman, historiography. Instead, William Arnold brought out with a most valuable commentary those chapters in his grandfather's work which dealt with the "Second Punic War," an episode admirably lending itself to elaborate geographical and archaeological illustration. But the magnum opus of the younger scholar and historian's life was intended to. cover ground which the elder had not been able to approach ; it was to be, in the words which he used not long before—alas !—his, health gave way, "an accurate modern book on the Roman Empire."
What-this book might have been the fragment now before us remains to show. A fragment it must be called, inasmuch as it treats only particular aspects of the, history of the early Empire, and only by incidental proleptic touches shows how. wide was the ground covered by the author's knowledge, and how far he reached forward into the later centuries of the growth which he was.desirous of delineating. From the brief but lucid introduction prefixed by Mr. Edward Fiddes to the chapters which Arnold left behind him, it appears that not one of these had actually received the author's last touches, while one, which has been wisely left unpublished, was in a less advanced state of preparation. This should be borne in mind by the student, whom Arnold's clearness of statement and vigour of style might otherwise incline to accept as proved, propositions which the historian might possibly have reconsidered and revised. The care and the learning of the editor have not failed to direct attention to such passages as that in which the Imperial designation of princeps is derived from the purely conjectural title of princeps civium, or that which assumes as established the completion of the survey of Gaul before the arrival of Augustus in that country. There are other passages which show bow eagerly Arnold's inquiring spirit was forging ahead among the materials of his narrative; but the boldness of his advance rarely affects the steadiness of his step and the circumspection of his progress.
The first two of these chapters deal with the foundations of the Imperial power, and the gradual collapse of the. other factor in the dyarchy,—to use the ugly word invented by Mom msen to describe that division of power between Emperor and Senate which, as Arnold ventured to maintain, "never in reality existed!' These are most luminous chapters. The drift and spirit could not be more clearly indicated than by the observation that "if we represented Augustus to ourselves as a finished hypocrite who gave with one band only to take away with the other, and who had the fixed design all through of concentrating all power in his single person, we should be greatly mistaken."
In a later chapter, "The Domestic Policy of Augustus," Arnold shows that his eyes were not shut to the personal side of things, without regard to which the history of monarchies, and especially that of successions, refuses to be written; but the most interesting part of the chapter is that which refers to the administration of Rome and Italy, though here again the editor's notes should not be overlooked. But, as might have been expected from the special bent of Arnold's studies, and from his characteristic tendency of mind to view a political or historical problem under its widest aspects, the most interesting of these chapters are those which survey some of the chief provinces of the Roman Empire. For it was the provinces for whose sake that Empire may be said to have been founded, and in whose interests the municipal foundations of the Republic were overthrown. Though Arnold was not to complete even this part of his task, he deals with it as a master. We come to understand what Gaul and Spain were to the Empire—not only as taxpayers—and to see how it happened that while Gaul was conquered in less than a century, two centuries were needed for the conquest of Spain. Further chapters treat of Arabia, Egypt and Greece, and of Asia Minor, and discuss such matters as the paradoxical fact that, unlike Asia Minor, Greece was unable to recover ; and that yet its Greek character was the cause of that separateness of the East "which was one day destined to tear the Empire in twain."
It was such historic issues as these that occupied the mind and the imagination of William Arnold when he was pros- trated by the first serious attack of the illness from which he never recovered. The last eight years of his life were, with intervals of hopefulness, a long period of suffering through which he was sustained only by the self-sacrificing love that clung to him, and by the high courage that was in his soul. He was mourned by many whom he had befriended, and by not a few to whom his life remains an example of noble aims never abandoned.
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