Page:A protest against the extension of railways in the Lake District - Somervell (1876).djvu/34

 in the multitude of its 'materially prosperous' inhabitants; while its capital city, in spite of 'its unutterable external hideousness, and with its horrible internal canker of publicé egestas, privatim opulentia, may still be styled, in the words of the late Professor Cairnes, 'a mighty monument of Economic achievement.'

But, at the same time, every step of its advancing career is marked, in its 'materially prosperous' districts, by the darkening of the light of heaven, and the defilement and destruction of the beauty of the earth. Sneer as we may about 'sentimentalism' and 'utopian ideas,'—and talk of the grandeur of industrial achievement, and the triumphs of commerce,—it remains, and will remain for ever true,—the curse of thorn and thistle and sweat of brow notwithstanding, that the glory of the Divine work is intended for the joy and for the instruction of men; for their contemplation, and not for their contempt. And year by year, as the Divine ordinance is set at defiance, and the people are farther and farther separated from these holy influences, the 'materially prosperous' individuals, for whose welfare we are so solicitous, find themselves surrounded by an increasing crowd of lunatics, drunkards, and criminals. Surely it is idle to urge the development of 'material prosperity,' as in itself a sufficient argument for turning, if it were possible, this Lake Country into a mining region.