88 ONE THOUSAND FAMOUS THINGS
The Disgrace
IT does not disgrace a gentleman to become an errand-boy or a day
labourer; but it does disgrace him much to become a knave
or a thief. John Ruskin
The Richest Country and the Richest Man
npHEEE Is no wealth but Life—Life including all Its powers of love,
JL of joy, and of admiration.
That country is the richest which nourishes the greatest number
of noble and happy human beings ; that man Is the richest who,
having perfected the functions of his own life to the utmost, has also
the widest helpful influence, both personal and by means of his
possessions over the lives of others. John RusMn
A Mistake of Good People
T^YERY day I am more sure of the mistake made by good people
Jti universally in trying to pull fallen people up instead of keeping the
yet safe ones from tumbling after them ; and In always spending their
pains on the worst Instead of on the best materials. John Ruskin
Our England from a Garden
TK London I am but a bird of passage, I own no house ; I am not
J[ a tenant, I just live in a house from which I can be ejected any
moment without compensation.
From It I can see the Horse Guards Parade, which reminds me of
the General Strike ; the Foreign Office* which reminds me of trouble
in China and Mr Chen ; the India Office, which reminds me of the
Swarajists ; the War Office and the Admiralty, which remind me
of Estimates.
And then I think of what I can see from my own garden in the
most beautiful view In all England. I see the hills known to all of
you, beginning in the north-east, the Clent; and beyond, in Warwick-
shire, Edgehill, where the English squire passed with horse and
hounds between the two armies ; Bredon, the beginning of the Cots-
wolds, like a cameo against the sky* and the wonderful straight blue
line of the Malvems, little shapes of Ankerdine and Berrow Hill, and,
perhaps most beautiful and graceful, his two neighbours Woodbury
and Abberley; and Clee Hills, opening up another beautiful and
romantic world and presenting a circle of beauty which I defy any
part of England to match.
There are our possessions. There is no need among ourselves to
tell of them: they lie in our hearts, and I think possibly one of the
reasons that we love them so much is that so little is known of them
outside our otra country. Stanley Baldwin when Prime Minister