[Footnote 1:  ‘The Expansion of England,’ p. 10.]

The history of England, and later of the British Empire, constitutes a tale so amazing that he who has the welfare of the nation as a whole at heart—­that is to say, the true patriot—­is justified in entertaining the most optimistic thoughts for the future.  He should not be indifferent to the past:  he should bear it in mind all the time.  Patriotism may not often be otherwise than misguided if no study of history has been made.  The patriot of one nation will wish to procure for his country a freedom which history would show him to have been its very curse; and the patriot of another nation will encourage a nervousness and restraint in his people which history would tell him was unnecessary.  The English patriot has a history to read which, at the present time, it is especially needful for him to consider; and, since Egyptology is my particular province, I cannot better close this argument than by reminding the modern Egyptians that their own history of four thousand years and its teaching must be considered by them when they speak of patriotism.  A nation so talented as the descendants of the Pharaohs, so industrious, so smart and clever, should give a far larger part of its attention to the arts, crafts, and industries, of which Egyptian archaeology has to tell so splendid a story.

As a final argument for the value of the study of history and archaeology an aspect of the question may be placed before the reader which will perhaps be regarded as fanciful, but which, in all sincerity, I believe to be sober sense.

In this life of ours which, under modern conditions, is lived at so great a speed, there is a growing need for a periodical pause wherein the mind may adjust the relationship of the things that have been to those that are.  So rapidly are our impressions received and assimilated, so individually are they shaped or classified, that, in whatever direction our brains lead us, we are speedily carried beyond that province of thought which is common to us all.  A man who lives alone finds himself, in a few months, out of touch with the thought of his contemporaries; and, similarly, a man who lives in what is called an up-to-date manner soon finds himself grown unsympathetic to the sober movement of the world’s slow round-about.

Now, the man who lives alone presently developes some of the recognised eccentricities of the recluse, which, on his return to society, cause him to be regarded as a maniac; and the man who lives entirely in the present cannot argue that the characteristics which he has developed are less maniacal because they are shared by his associates.  Rapidly he, too, has become eccentric; and just as the solitary man must needs come into the company of his fellows if he would retain a healthy mind, so the man who lives in the present must allow himself occasional intercourse with the past if he would keep his balance.