The generous host courteously refused a second
glass, saying, "You see I am an amateur of these things, and I am
capable of leaving you not sufficient." Now, I shall concern myself
here principally with literature, because, in England at all
events, literature plays the largest part in general culture. It
may be said that we owe some of the best literature we have to
amateurs. To contrast a few names, taken at random, Shakespeare,
Dryden, Pope, Dr. Johnson, De Quincey, Tennyson, and Carlyle were
professionals, it is true; but, on the other hand, Milton, Gray,
Boswell, Walter Scott, Charles Lamb, Shelley, Browning, and Ruskin
were amateurs. It is not a question of how much a man writes or
publishes, it is a question of the spirit in which a man writes.
Walter Scott became a professional in the last years of his life,
and for the noblest of reasons; but he also became a bad writer. A
good pair to contrast are Southey and Coleridge. They began as
amateurs. Southey became a professional writer, and his sun set in
the mists of valuable information.
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