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development in England. Hitherto men had been more or less governed by the
narrow, isolated standards of the Middle Ages, and when they differed they
fell speedily to blows. Now for the first time they set themselves to the
task of learning the art of living together, while still holding different
opinions. In a single generation nearly two thousand public coffeehouses,
each a center of sociability, sprang up in London alone, and the number of
private clubs is quite as astonishing.[183] This new social life had a
marked effect in polishing men's words and manners. The typical Londoner of
Queen Anne's day was still rude, and a little vulgar in his tastes; the
city was still very filthy, the streets unlighted and infested at night by
bands of rowdies and "Mohawks"; but outwardly men sought to refine their
manners according to prevailing standards; and to be elegant, to have "good
form," was a man's first duty, whether he entered society or wrote
literature. One can hardly read a book or poem of the age without feeling
this superficial elegance. Government still had its opposing Tory and Whig
parties, and the Church was divided into Catholics, Anglicans, and
Dissenters; but the growing social life offset many antagonisms, producing
at least the outward impression of peace and unity. Nearly every writer of
the age busied himself with religion as well as with party politics, the
scientist Newton as sincerely as the churchman Barrow, the philosophical
Locke no less earnestly than the evangelical Wesley; but nearly all
tempered their zeal with moderation, and argued from reason and Scripture,
or used delicate satire upon their opponents, instead of denouncing them as
followers of Satan. There were exceptions, of course_;_ but the general
tendency of the age was toward toleration. Man had found himself in the
long struggle for personal liberty; now he turned to the task of
discovering his neighbor, of finding in Whig and Tory, in Catholic and
Protestant, in Anglican and Dissenter, the same general human
characteristics that he found in himself. This good work was helped,
moreover, by the spread of education and by the growth of the national
spfrit, following the victories of Marlborough on the Continent. In the
midst of heated argument it needed only a word--Gibraltar, Blenheim,
Ramillies, Malplaquet--or a poem of victory written in a garret[184] to
tell a patriotic people that under their many differences they were all
alike E