This little jewel—called "The Lover's Complaint"—is ascribed by some to Herrick. They are wrong. It proceeds from a younger but already faltering pen.

I introduce it only at the head of this to illustrate the singular depth, the weight, the value of the word "and." Even in the English tongue, the noblest vehicle of expression (but in this point weak), the word "and" plays its subtle parts.

We lack the double "and" of antiquity—that subtle repetitive effect in which the classics abound. We have no "que" to our "et"; we have no te [Greek: te] to our ?a? [Greek: kai] we have only our plain "and." But even so, our plain "and" has much diversity about it: a versatile, mercurial word: a knight in the chess play of prose.

"How is this?" you say. "'And' would seem to be but a redundant word to express some addition already apparent."

"'He was drunk, disorderly!' 'And' would seem to be stuck in between the two affirmations from a sort of laziness of the mind."

You are wrong. It is a great pleasure to me to tell you that you are wrong.

Even if "and" only pursued this function of letting the mind repose it might be welcomed as a bed; but it does much more. It introduces emphasis, as in the poignant sentence: "Their choice was turbot—and boiled." It also has an elevating effect, hooking up something to the level of the rest; as where it is written:

The little brown bowl would have come in absurdly: it would have jolted the mind like a bump in the road, were it not for that precious little "and," which catches it neatly up, putting upon one level that which goes before with that which comes after.

"And" is also indicative. Thus a man whom you meet talks glibly upon one subject after another, rapidly, yet more rapidly, tumbling over himself, desiring to avoid your eye. But he must take breath. You seize your moment and you say, "And what about that five pounds?" The "and" makes all the difference. It makes your remark part of the conversation. A gesture, not a blow.

In the same way you can recall an omitted name. When you have praised Tom, Dick, Harry, you add gently, "And Jack, what about Jack?" It is a pleasant, easy reproach or a reminder. Very much nicer than saying, "Why not a word about Jack?"—which would be brutal.

"And" is also what the older grammarians have called stammerative—that is, it fills a chasm in the public speeches of public men, though here it is not so useful as certain other sounds. I have made a study of the sounds common to politicians in distress. I find that out of one hundred occasions "er—er" will come in eighty times; "I—I—I" eleven times; the less graceful "and ..., and ..., and" during periods of embarrassment only accounts for five. Moreover, the repeated "and" is hardly ever used in the absolute; by public speakers it is nearly always used with "er."

"And" also has the value of an affix. It comes before a lot of little phrases, where it acts like glue, sticking that little phrase on to the rest—"and" if, "and" even, "and" though; a humble use, but necessary enough, allowing the mind to work in a soft material.

"And" has various rhetorical uses which are to be admired—you can make long lists with it.

So attractive is "and" to the human mind that it will often expand itself, developing like a lot of soap bubbles—"and so," "and moreover," "and also." But the best of all these phrases—the king of them—is "and also, what is more." It is the most familiar of all phrases in the mouths of politicians. Do violence to yourself, force yourself to listen to a politician making speeches in private conversation as is the politician's way. You will hear that phrase repeated. "And also, what is more." It is native to the tub-thumping fraternity. These things give a sentence the advantage of piling up wordy wealth, as it were, very satisfactory to the fatigued or the empty or the hesitant.

Those great men, our fathers, felt about "and" something reverend or peculiar, so that they hardly thought of it as a word, but as a sort of symbol. They put it at the end of the alphabet, calling it "ampersand." It is one of the worst things about our detestable time that this ancient national thing "ampersand" is forgotten. The old refrain used to be: a, b, c, ..., x, y, z, ampersand—that long word "ampersand," that fine ritual title, referred to the symbol "&" which "and" alone of words possesses. You find it in the old horn books. The children of England knew it by heart for centuries. But the modern flood came: it is gone.

The enemies of "and" will have it that a good style in English is to be obtained by cutting out "and." These are the same people who say that a good style is to be obtained by cutting out adjectives. There are no such short cuts. Also, to be an enemy of "and" is to be an enemy of all good things. It is to fear exuberance, which is the tide of life.

"And" has, again, rhythmical value, as in the ecclesiastical or liturgical line:

—with hosts of other lines which dignify the vast storehouse of the English lyric.

Of the modern masterpieces there is one—the best known of all, perhaps—where "and" does an enormous amount of work, which is the poem of Innisfree. It gives the rhythm as well as the mystery. I should like to see what the fools who are for cutting out "and" would make of that poem.

But the most sublime use of "and," alas! we have not. It is the "and" disjunctive; on which turned one of the great moments of history.

For you must know that when the second Council of Nicea finally condemned the monstrosities of the Iconoclasts, a saintly bishop from Cyprus wrote his opinion in Greek saying, "I revere, I embrace the sacred images, ?a? [Greek: kai] I give worship to the Life-giving Trinity"—which is as much as to say, that he would be polite enough to an image, but his worship he reserved for the only true object of worship.

Now, this pronouncement was carried to a Council of the West, sitting at Frankfort, where there were bishops of the Pyrenees, of Gaul, of the Rhine Valley, of the Low Countries, of the Burgundian Hills, of the Swiss Mountains—indeed of all parts whatsoever that owed allegiance to Charlemagne.

At that moment Charlemagne was already wishing to be an emperor in the West. Those who served him were only too glad to find the Empire of the East—which claimed to be universal—making a howler. But the swarm of holy and unholy men at Frankfort were abominably ignorant of Greek. They did not understand the disjunctive value of ?a? [Greek: kai]. They thought it a mere barbaric "and." They translated this famous phrase "I jumble up in one worship God and images." They rushed out with some fury against such a doctrine. They registered their hatred of it. On this point also Gibbon has (as one might expect) abominably falsified history.... But no matter.

The Bishops of Frankfort said what they had to say. In vain did those of Rome, who were acquainted with Greek, tell them that they had taken the sentence exactly upside down—that it meant "I do not worship the images. I distinguish the observance I give them from the worship I offer to That which alone is worthy of worship." They still clung to their primitive error. With difficulty were they led back into the right fold.

What great consequences their ignorance might have had! We might to-day be deprived of the Bambino. We might have lost Brou (but not Santiago, I think; for the Spaniards, and in particular the Galicians, are of a temper which will stand no nonsense. Though 1462 General Councils had condemned images, the Spaniard would have had them all the same: in which I praise him. Honour to the Pilar!).

Now, though it does not concern the little word "and," yet I am reminded (by this mention of the Second Council of Nicea) of a certain story which, as you may not previously have heard it, I will now proceed to relate. With that story I shall conclude; nor will your prayers and entreaties, however loud and passionate, move me to continue. I will tell you the story; then I will have done.

The story is this. As the Eastern bishops were travelling to the second Council of Nicea, the more worldly of them (these were the greater part) were very much disgusted to meet one particularly good bishop who had been bred a shepherd. He was poor. His manners were bad. He did not shave regularly. He was badly dressed. He was what they call in Birmingham "no class."

They jeered at him a little, but more than their jeering was their fear lest they should lost caste by entering the Imperial City in such company. So after this saintly man had made himself quite intolerable at dinner, they cast up a plot against him.

He had come with only one deacon, sitting each of them upon a mule, the one a brown mule, the other mottled. The mules were stabled in the great inn of the village where all were assembled. When the saintly, but not smart, bishop had gone to his rest, the smart bishops secretly sent a bravo into the stable to cut off the heads of the two mules. "In this way," said these wicked, worldly bishops, "we shall be spared the humiliating presence of the boor when we enter the imperial town; nor will men ever know that we kept such low company."

Long before it was dawn the poor Bishop's deacon, like a good deacon, a good rustic deacon, shook himself out of sleep. He went down to the stable with a lantern to get ready the beasts against the morning journey. With what horror did he not see there two heads lying upon the ground! The one was of his own mottled mule, the other of his master's brown mule. The mottled head lay severed upon the straw beside the brown head, the headless trunks leaning all collapsed against the stall sides.

The deacon, rushing up to his master, banged at the door, saying, "My Lord! My Lord! Evil men have cut off our mules' heads!" The Right Reverend, only half awake, said, "Sew them on again! When I wake I will attend to it."

The deacon went down to the stable. With many tears he sewed on the two heads of the dead mules. The Bishop, when he had risen from sleep, said his prayers, came down into the stable, where, he having blessed the two mules, they came to life again in the most natural manner in the world. When he had breakfasted, he rejoined his deacon. Mounting the two beasts, they rode out into the break of the day. But, the light broadening as they approached the city gate, the crowd saw with astonishment a brown mule with a mottled head abreast of a mottled mule with a brown head, for the deacon, confused in the half darkness of the morning, had sewed the wrong heads to the wrong bodies.

Note the effect—as the veracious chronicler gives it. "Thus by that very action whereby these evil men had hoped to bring their companion to shame they did but the rather thrust him into glory; for their cruelty to the dumb beasts did but serve to heighten his holiness, making proof of God's power through him who could bring the dead to life."

Many are the morals of this tale, one of which is that it is silly to take more trouble than is necessary. For if the wicked Bishops had only drugged the mules instead of cutting their heads right off there would have been no miracle, nor glory to their despised colleague. Another is that if a thing is true you must believe it, however astonishing and unlikely it may sound in the ear of the unbeliever. Another is that a bishop has the right to get up rather later than the lower branches of the hierarchy. There are many other morals; but I will end. For if I go on I shall certainly bring "and" into my own sentences, which up to this point I have managed to avoid. "And" is not really necessary at all.