The Living Principie' E N G L I S H ' AS A D I S C I P L I N E

OF THOUGHT

ByF. R. L E A V I S

NEW YORKOXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS

1975

Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank the following for permission toreproduce copyright material:Faber & Faber Ltd. and Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc.,New York, for extracts from Four Quartéis by T. S. Eliot,from Collected Poems 1909-1962. Copyright 1943 by T. S.Eliot; copyright 1971, by Esme Valerie Eliot.

The author, Faber & Faber Ltd. and Basic Books, Inc., NewYork, for extracts from The Knowerand The Known by MarjorieGrene. Copyright 1966 by Marjorie Grene.

The Trustees of the Thomas Hardy Estate, Macmillan Co.Ltd. of London and Basingstoke, The Macmillan Companyof Canada Ltd. and the Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc. of NewYork for 'After A Journey' from Collected Poems by ThomasHardy. Copyright 1925 by Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.

The Society of Authors as the literary representative of theEstate of A. E. Housman, Jonathan Cape Ltd. and Holt,Rinehart and Winston, Inc. for an extract from 'Reveille' inA Shropshire Lad from The Collected Poems of A. E. Housman.Copyright 1939, 1940, 1965 by Holt, Rinehart and Winston,Inc. Copyright 1967, 1968 by Robert E. Symons.

The Estate of the late Mrs Frieda Lawrence, Wm. HeinemannLtd., Laurence Pollinger Ltd. and The Viking Press, Inc., for'Piano' from The Complete Poems of D. H. Lawrence edited byVivian de Sola Pinto and F. Warren Roberts. Copyright 1964,1971 by Ângelo Ravagli and C. M. Weekley, Executors ofthe Estate of Frieda Lawrence Ravagli.

Give up literary criticism! W I T T G E N S T E I N .

I knew then, and I know now, it is no use trying to doanything-I speak only for myself-publicly. It is no use tryingmerely to modify present forms. The whole great form of ourera will have to go. And nothing will really send it down but thenew shoots of life springing up and slowly bursting the founda-tions. And one can do nothing, but fight tooth and nail todefend the new shoots of life from being crushed out, and let themgrow. We can't make life. We can but fight for the life thatgrows in us. D. H. L A W R E N C E , Note to ''The Crown".

There's no redeeming the democratic mass university. Thecivilization it represents hás, almost overnight, ceased tobelieve in its own assumptions and recoils nihilistically fromitself. If you believe in humanity at ali you will know thatnothing today is more importam than to keep alive the ideaof the university-function—the essential university-functionand what goes with it: the idea of an educated public. Mypreoccupation is to ensure that the living seed exists and thatthe life in it hás the full pregnancy. Just how it will strike andtake and develop, as it must if there is to be a human future,one can't foresee. Change is certainly upon us, menacing andcertainly drastic; to meet it, there must be opportunism-theopportunism that answers to a profound realization of the need.Prelusive remarks before giving 'Thought, Language andObjectivity' in lecture-instalments at the University of York.

Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank the following for permission toreproduce copyright material:Faber & Faber Ltd. and Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc.,New York, for extracts from Four Quartéis by T. S. Eliot,from Collected Poems 1909-1962. Copyright 1943 by T. S.Eliot; copyright 1971, by Esme Valerie Eliot.

The author, Faber & Faber Ltd. and Basic Books, Inc., NewYork, for extracts from The Knowerand The Known by MarjorieGrene. Copyright 1966 by Marjorie Grene.

The Trustees of the Thomas Hardy Estate, Macmillan Co.Ltd. of London and Basingstoke, The Macmillan Companyof Canada Ltd. and the Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc. of NewYork for 'After A Journey' from Collected Poems by ThomasHardy. Copyright 1925 by Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.

The Society of Authors as the literary representative of theEstate of A. E. Housman, Jonathan Cape Ltd. and Holt,Rinehart and Winston, Inc. for an extract from 'Reveille' inA Shropshire Lad from The Collected Poems of A. E. Housman.Copyright 1939, 1940, 1965 by Holt, Rinehart and Winston,Inc. Copyright 1967, 1968 by Robert E. Symons.

The Estate of the late Mrs Frieda Lawrence, Wm. HeinemannLtd., Laurence Pollinger Ltd. and The Viking Press, Inc., for'Piano' from The Complete Poems of D. H. Lawrence edited byVivian de Sola Pinto and F. Warren Roberts. Copyright 1964,1971 by Ângelo Ravagli and C. M. Weekley, Executors ofthe Estate of Frieda Lawrence Ravagli.

Give up literary criticism! W I T T G E N S T E I N .

I knew then, and I know now, it is no use trying to doanything-I speak only for myself-publicly. It is no use tryingmerely to modify present forms. The whole great form of ourera will have to go. And nothing will really send it down but thenew shoots of life springing up and slowly bursting the founda-tions. And one can do nothing, but fight tooth and nail todefend the new shoots of life from being crushed out, and let themgrow. We can't make life. We can but fight for the life thatgrows in us. D. H. L A W R E N C E , Note to ''The Crown".

There's no redeeming the democratic mass university. Thecivilization it represents hás, almost overnight, ceased tobelieve in its own assumptions and recoils nihilistically fromitself. If you believe in humanity at ali you will know thatnothing today is more importam than to keep alive the ideaof the university-function—the essential university-functionand what goes with it: the idea of an educated public. Mypreoccupation is to ensure that the living seed exists and thatthe life in it hás the full pregnancy. Just how it will strike andtake and develop, as it must if there is to be a human future,one can't foresee. Change is certainly upon us, menacing andcertainly drastic; to meet it, there must be opportunism-theopportunism that answers to a profound realization of the need.Prelusive remarks before giving 'Thought, Language andObjectivity' in lecture-instalments at the University of York.