Breeding (in the sense of civility) is a complex and predominantly uncommon training. There are no books; instead it is upbringing. It is a prolonged tutelage not unlike that of clerks at the Inns of Court. It is refinement to which few have been exposed and which fewer have engineered with skill. It is a model from which one occasionally tumbles, at times with calamitous result. Its ignorance spells more than lack of polish or pedigree. Its precarious absence denotes a lapse into the vernacular, a descent into plain bad manners and vulgarity. What however makes the absence of breeding most incompatible is its reflection of underlying distortions and inadequacies which invariably render a fetid vapour.
The Inns of Court in London are the professional associations for barristers in England and Wales. There are four Inns of Court: Gray’s Inn, Lincoln’s Inn, Inner Temple and Middle Temple. All barristers must belong to one of them. They have supervisory and disciplinary functions over their members. The Inns also provide libraries, dining facilities and professional accommodation. Each also has a church or chapel attached to it and is a self-contained precinct where barristers traditionally train and practise.
In the 16th century and earlier, students or apprentices learned their craft primarily by attending court sessions and by sharing both accommodation and education during the legal terms. Prior to the outbreak of the English Civil War in 1642, this training lasted at least seven years; subsequently, the Inns focused their residency requirements on dining together in the company of experienced barristers, to enable learning through contact and networking with experts. In the mid-18th century the common law was first recognised as a subject for study in the universities, and by 1872 bar examinations became compulsory for entry into the profession of law.
The precipitous consequence of vulgarity is often resort to the most elemental visceral conduct, detached completely from the fog of social propriety. Clearly the issue is not what one says, rather how one says it. There is no denying there are instances when each of us is motivated for cause by less than distinguished energy. The reaction may be purely biological, the native expression of oneself. But in the absence of priming or inculcation, the performance can be utterly distasteful and off-putting. The lapse into the vernacular is a blunt instrument, the use of which seldom if ever (except perhaps to the uninitiated) hides or escapes its true purpose and intent.
A lapse into the vernacular is thus a signal, a warning of impending peril. Regrettably the weaponry is the literature of instruction. When once one is pricked by the pointed object of undisguised intent, the result is harmful and poisonous, a lesson to the wary and to those whose objects are not similarly ill-conceived.
Featured image by
British Landscape Painter David Inshaw
Two Women Dancing on a Beach
As he says: ‘Women are a mystery. I’ve been looking for the right one for a long time. I’ve not found her yet.’