Goldwin Smith

“If it were a real effort to live in the Middle Ages, your life would be one perpetual prevarication.”

“Art is expression, and to have high expression you must have something high to express.”

“The materials of the novelist must be real; they must be gathered from the field of humanity by his actual observation.”

“Who can doubt that between the English and the French, between the Scotch and the Irish, there are differences of character which have profoundly affected and still affect the course of history?”

“It is evident that in the period designated as that of the kings, when Rome commenced her career of conquest, she was, for that time and country, a great and wealthy city.”

“Never had there been such an attempt to make conquest the servant of civilization. About keeping India there is no question. England has a real duty there.”

“There is a spell in mediaeval Art which has had power to bewitch some people into trying, or wishing to try, or fancying that they wish to try or making believe to fancy that they wish to try, to bring back the Middle Ages.”

“The Romans, we are told, were by nature a peculiarly warlike race.”

“But if anyone supposes that there was no commercial fraud in the Middle Ages, let him study the commercial legislation of England for that period, and his mind will be satisfied, if he has a mind to be satisfied and not only a fancy to run away with him.”