In the context of Work (painting), explore the Intellectuals of the Characters and action.
At the right the workers are being watched by two intellectuals who "seem to be idle but work". They are described as workers in their minds and as "the cause of well ordained work in others". In fact these are portraits of Thomas Carlyle and F. D. Maurice. The latter was the founder of Christian socialism; he established worker's educational institutions for which Brown worked. Carlyle was the main inspiration behind the picture. His books Past and Present and Latter-Day Pamphlets had criticised the laissez faire economic system and political corruption. He was known for his so-called "gospel of work", which described work as a form of worship. He wrote in Past and Present,It has been written, 'an endless significance lies in Work;' a man perfects himself by working. Foul jungles are cleared away, fair seedfields rise instead, and stately cities; and withal the man himself first ceases to be a jungle and foul unwholesome desert thereby. Consider how, even in the meanest sorts of Labour, the whole soul of a man is composed into a kind of real harmony, the instant he sets himself to work! Doubt, Desire, Sorrow, Remorse, Indignation, Despair itself, all these like helldogs lie beleaguering the soul of the poor dayworker, as of every man: but he bends himself with free valour against his task, and all these are stilled, all these shrink murmuring far off into their caves. The man is now a man. The blessed glow of Labour in him, is it not as purifying fire, wherein all poison is burnt up, and of sour smoke itself there is made bright blessed flame!
In the same book Carlyle creates the character of Bobus Higgins, a corrupt sausage maker who uses horsemeat in his product to undercut competitors. In Latter-Day Pamphlets Bobus is portrayed as a populist manipulator who is going into politics. In the painting his agent appears behind Carlyle's head, prodding local "idlers" to walk through the streets carrying signs with his name on them. At the left a "Vote for Bobus" poster has been hit by a ball of mud or faeces and has "don't" chalked onto it.
F. D. Maurice Latter-Day Pamphlets Christian socialism right laissez faire Thomas Carlyle left