M JiKARY OF THK University of California. OIKT OK Mrs. SARAH P. WALSWORTH. Received October, i8g4, t/lccessions No. Sy^(p f • Class No. yS^^ 7 ^^^^ Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2008 with funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation http://www.archive.org/details/biographicalliteOOfostrich D. APPLETON & COMPANY, HAVE JUST PUBLISHED, MISCELLANEOUS ESSAYS ON CHRISTIAN MORALS, EXPERIMENTAL AND PRACTICAL, ORIOINALLT SKLIVKRED AS LKCTURES AT BROADMEAD CHAPEL, BRISTOL, BY JOHN FOSTER. One Volume) 18mo, of near 300 pages, 50 cents. This volume contains twenty-six subjects : I. The New Year. II. Spring and its Moral Attributes. — III. Autumn and its Moral Attri- butes. — IV. Winter and its Moral Attributes — V. Supreme Attachment due to Spiritual Object^. — VI. Spiritual Freedom produced by know- ledge of the Truth. — VII. Christ, though invisible, the object of devout affection. — VIII. Fallacies operating against Earnestness in Religion. IX. Earnestness in Religion enforced. — X. Comprehensiveness of the Di- vine Law. — XI. Self.Discipline suitable to certain Mental States.— XII. Characteristics of Vain Thoughts. — XIII. Correctives of Vain Thoughts. XIV. Necessity and Right Method of Self. Examination. — XV.Uses and Per- version of Conscience. — XVI. Formality and Remissness in Prayer. — XVII. Watchfulness and Prayer. — XVIII. Sober-Mindedness. — XIX. False Grounds of Superiority in Holiness. — XX. Right Mode of giving zind receiv- ing Reproof. — XXI. Noah and the Deluge. — XXII. Destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. — XXIII. Elijah's Sacrifice and the Priests of Baal. — XXIV. Ignorance of our Mode of Future Existence. — XXV. Christian Doctrine of the Perfectibihty of Man.— XXVI. End of the Year. The renowned Essayist, by the request of his friends, delivered at Bris- tol some years since a series of Lectures which are now issued under the title of Essays. The volume comprises twenty-six topics, combining in an unusual degree both novelty and variety. Among the attractive works of more recent publication this ranks of the very superior order. It is issued as a pocket companion and as the disquisitions are both concise and animating, few books can be named which are more suited to arrest the attention of the traveller and to occupy the occasional leisure of the store and counting room. For youth, and Sabbath school and district Li- braries, probably not one book of its class can be selected which has stronger claims than this volume. BIOGRAPHICAL, LITERARY, AND PHILOSOPHICAL E S SAYS: CONTRIBUTED TO THE ECLECTIC REVIEW. By JOHN FOS TER, Author of Essays on "Decision of Character, Popular Ignorance, and Christian Morals." WITH AM INDEX OF THE PRINCIPAL SUBJECTS, PREPARED FOR THIS EDITION. NEW. YORK: D. APPLETON 6c COMPANY, 200 BROADWAY, PHILADELPHIA.* GEORGE S. APPLETON, 148 CHESNUT-STREET. 1844. 4. 9 57^*f H. LUDWIO, PRINTER, 70 & 7a Vesey-Bt. CONTENTS. PAGE I. Chalmers's Astronomical Discourses .... 13 II. John Home Tooke 54 III. Coleridge's Friend , . 88 IV. Fox's James II 1 113 V. Edgeworth's Professional Education .... 147 VI. British Statesmen 173 VII. Lord Kames 199 VIII. Defence of the Stage 217 IX. Benjamin Franklm 231 X. James Beattie 249 XI. Fashionable Life, 265 XII. Hugh Blair 275 Xin. David Hume 288 XIV. Philosophy of Nature 303 XV. Ireland 317 XVI. Epic Poetry 332 XVII. Superstitions of the Highlanders 339 XVIII. Ecclesiastical Biography 356 XIX. Spain 370 XX. Modem Egyptians 390 I PREFACE. ** The Eclectic Review was commenced in January, 1805, by a number of gentlemen, of whom William Alers Hankey is believed to be the only survivor. Their object was to provide an antidote to the irreligious spirit which then pervaded the periodical press of the country* Episcopalians and dissenters were united in its* early conduct ; and for some years it maintained an absolute neutrality on those ecclesiastical points wherein they differ from each other. To such an extent was this neutrality observed, that some historical questions of general interest, and of great importance, were designedly avoided, lest they should lead to the expression of opi- nions which by implication might be deemed incompatible with it. An illustration of this is afforded in the review of MacdiarmicCs British Statesmen, where Mr. Fos- ter remarks, in reference to the lives of Strafford and Clarendon — Viii, PREFACE. " ' By the principles of our undertaking, we are pledged not to advance any opinions on the grand controversy be- tween the religious establishment of our country and the dissenters from its communion ;— or more precisely, we are engaged to avoid discussing the abstract propriety of an establishment, and also the propriety of that form of it now existing in the country. These are ques- tions, it is true, quite distinct from the conduct of the establishedchurch, or any of its distinguished members, as political agents in the transactions of a history. Viewed in this light, their operations, their influence, their vir- tues, or their vices, are just as fair subjects of observation as those of any other of the agents, involved in our na- tional history. But it is not certain that we can exercise our right to this undoubted extent without giving consider- able offence. Even at this liberal period, there are some whom it would be hard to avoid offending, and in whose opinions we should scarcely seem to preserve our pledged neutrality, while condemning the violent and fatal intoler- ance of the church during the reigns of the Jameses and Charleses, though it be evidently impossible to discuss the merits, or even to narrate the events of those reigns without it.' " It was however ultimately found impracticable to continue the compromise involved in the original constitu- PREFACE. IX. lion of the journal, and the Eclectic Review therefore became the avowed advocate of those principles of eccle- siastical polity which are held by the Congregationalists of this country. " Mr. Foster's connexion with the Review commenced in 1806, his first paper being published in the November number of that year. From that period to the close of 1818, he was a stated and frequent contributor', after which he remitted his labours in this direction, furnishing only thirteen papers from 1819 to 1828 inclusive. On the journal passing into the hands of the present editor, in January, 1837, he made application to Mr. Foster for literary assistance, and was authorized to announce him as one of the stated contributors to his work. The im- paired condition of his health did not however permit him to do much. An occasional article was all which could be looked for, the fastidiousness of his taste concur- ring with the cause just named, to indispose him to ^frequent composition. His last contribution appeared in October, 1839. "Writing to the Editor, January 28, 1841, Mr. Foster says : ^ With my want of memory, and miserable slowness in any sort of composition, I am very many degrees below the mark for any thing of material account — any thing requiring much reading, or laborious consideration. As »» ESSAYS, BIOGRAPHICAL, LITERARY, AND PHILOSOPHICAL. CHALMERS'S ASTRONOMICAL DISCOURSES, Discourses on the Christian Revelation viewed in Connexion toith the Modern Astronomy. By Thomas Chalmers, D.D., Minister of the Tron Church, Glasgow. If infidelity is so busily and zealously intent on its purpose, that no means of offence against Revelation can be too incon- siderable to be eagerly seized for the use of the warfare, it may be conceived what a value will be set on any reinforce- ments that can be obtained from the dignified resources of the sublimest science. If the pettiest quibbles, if witticisms, smart or dull, or the lying wonders of popery, or Chinese chro- nology, or the virtues of Mahomedans and Pagans, are all welcome for the array against Christianity, what proud exulta- tion may well be felt at the view of any possibility of engag- ing "the stars in their courses to fight against" it ! Any possible result of this ambitious attempt, maybe await- ed by the believer in Christianity, with perfect tranquillity. He stands on a ground so independent of science, that nothing within the possibility of scientific speculation and discovery can essentially affect it. A train of miracles, attested in the most authoritative manner that is within the competence of history ; the . evidence afforded by prophecies fulfilled, that the author of Revelation is the being who sees into futurity ; the manifestation, in revealed religion, of a super-human knowledge of the nature and condition of man ; the adaptation of the remedial system to that condition ; the incomparable excellence of the Christian morality ; the analogy between the Works of God and what claims to be the Word of God; 14 CHALMERSES ASTRONOMICAL IDISCOXTUS^S^ and the interpositions with respect to the cause and the adhe^ rents of religion in the course of the Divine government on the earth : — this grand coincidence of verifications has not lef^ the faith of the disciple of Christianity at the mercy of optics and geometry. He may calmly tell science to mind its owns affairs, if it should presume, with pretensions to authority, ta interfere with his religion. He may content himself thus to repel the arrogance of sci- ence, when it intrudes in the spirit of a proud and inimical inter- ference^ But ifi in a large and enlightened contemplation, it is found that science comes to be in harmony with religion, and even to subserve and magnify it, such tribute and alliance are? by all means to be accepted. All wise men will protest against that feeling which some good men seem willing to en- tertain, as if the more limited and exclusive a thing religion could be made, the better ; a feeling which may have some- times been heard to utter itself in expressions like these : " Beware of losing your religion in those delusive vanities to which you give the denomination of enlarged views, sublime contemplations, and the like. What have we, or our religion, to do with the universe, or its fancied inhabitants ? The busi» ness of religion is the salvation of our souls ; and if we are duly attentive to that concern, we shall have no time or in- clination for vain speculations about the economy of other worlds and races, about the moral condition of people in the stars." It is easy to reply, by remarking, that the amazing fact, placed within the evidence of our senses, of the existence of a countless and inconceivable multitude of worlds, each of them of a magnitude to which ours is but an insignificant ball, cannot be thus lightly disposed of, but demands a sentiment corresponding to such a fact ; that, as one Being has created and sustains them all, they may rationally be conceived to con- stitute one system, in the sense of being formed and arranged on a scheme which combines them all in a relation to one another, in reference at least to an ultimate effect or object which they are co-operating to accomplish ; that, if any prin- ciples or illustrative phenomena of this grand union can be descried, they are obviously available for the loftiest purposes of religion ; that, whether they can or not, the amazing vision of the universe simply, in its mere mass and infinity of magnifi- cence, tends mightily to exalt our conception of the Divinity ; and that, therefore, to affect to render so much the greater Chalmers's astroin^omical discourses. 16 homage to the principle and purpose of religion, in regarding the grandeur of the universe as quite foreign to it, would more justly incur the suspicion of contractedness of intellect, than claim to be regarded as a concentration of piety, too intent on the personal interest of religion to go so far abroad in imagina- tion. In this series of discourses, it appears to be quite as much the eloquent author's object to co-extend the truths and feel- ings of revealed religion, with the demonstrations and specula- tions of astronomy, to the utmost vastness of its field, thus at once giving the amplitude of the science to religion, and the sanctity of religion to the science, — as to defend religion against the objections attempted to be drawn from the dis- coveries of astronomy.* * This topic, especially in this latter view, has been treated at consider- able length, and with great ability, by the late Andrew Fuller, in a chap- ter entitled. The Consistency of the Scripture Doctrine of Redemption with the modern opinion of the Magnitude of Creation^ in his book, The Gospel its own Witness. In that chapter are to be found, in a brief con- densed form, several of the arguments and illustrations so ingeniously and splendidly amplified in the discourses of Dr. Chalmers, and it may be re- commended to accompany the study of the Doctor's work. Very forcible in argument as that essay is, in parts it appears to us, nevertheless, to be marked with the characteristic defects of the strong and excellent writer, — a want of comprehensive expansion of thought, and an unwarranted positiveness in assumptions and inferences. Throughout the discussion, it is evident the writer has a most inefficient conception of the magnifi- cence of the Universe. The idea does not in the least either elate or overwhelm his mind. There is no earnest, exulting, still confounded, still renewed endeavour to go out in contemplation of the stupendous and awful vision ; no amazement or rapture at this manifestation of the im- mensity of the creating and sustaining power ; no full impression of the demonstrated and almost infinite insignificance of this planet, as a material object. He admits, in terms marked by no emphasis, and betraying no delight, that there may be probability in the theory of '*a multiplicity of worlds, inhabited by intelligent beings," but seems unwilling that proba- bility should have its full effect, for he throws in, for the purpose of coun- teraction, the loose and not very pertinent remark that, "it is an opinion that has taken place of other opinions, which in their day were admired by the philosophical part of mankind as much as this is in ours." — Even setting aside the idea of inhabitants, and a moral economy of so many worlds, he no where uses language implying any thing at all approaching to a proper recognition of the plain facts and certainties of modern astrono- my, as to the mere extent of the Creation. It may be suspected that he had a degree of horror of so vast a contemplation. If we are correct in these remarks, it follows that the acute author was not well qualified for the discussion, since he could not be adequately U Chalmers's astronomical discourses. The first half of the performance, however, keeps in view the argument against Christianity, which "does not," our au- eensible of the extent of the difficulty, as arising from the stupendous magnitude of the Universe. For the extent of view that he takes, he reasons with great force, and some parts of his reasoning will justly ap- ply to the subject in the amplest view in which it is possible to contem- plate it ; but in estimating the whole effect of the essay, we are constrain- ed to feel that millions of worlds, or rather miUions of systems of worlds, are not to be wielded by that kind of short straight forward logic, by which the excellent author was so successful on some subjects. His facility and confidence of assumption are shown in some most un- qualified, unhesitating assertions, (in the way of interpretation of, or in- ference from, some passages of Scripture, of uncertain extent of meaning,) that the attention of the whole intelligent creation is occupied with the condition and salvation of the human race : and the assertions are made in that easy tone in which we pronounce an ordinary and unquestionable truth which involves no manner of difficulty. It appears to us one of the most obvious characteristics of Mr. Fuller's mind, that he was but little sensible of the mystery of any subject, or of the difficulties arising in the view of its deep and remote relations, — or if we may use the fashionable term, bearings. To a certain extent, and that unquestionably a respectable one, he apprehended and reasoned with admirable clearness and force ; and he could not, or would not, surmise that any thing of importance in the rationale of the subject extended be^ yond that compass : he made therefore his propositions, his deductions, his conclusions, quite in the tone of a complacent self-assurance of being perfectly master of the subject : while in fact the subject might involve wider and remoter considerations, not indeed easily reducible to the plain tangible predicaments of his rough, confined logic, but essential to a comprehensive speculation, and very possibly, of a nature to throw great dubiousness on the judgment which he had so decidedly formed, and positively pronounced, on a too contracted view of the subject. The last paragraph but one of this essay, or section, affords a striking example of the cool confident facility with which this respectable author could sometimes dispose of the most mysterious and awful subjects, by the help of a false analogy. Observing that the final misery of the wicked is, as a part of the Divine Government, satisfactorily accounted for on the prmciple of the necessity of an example of justice, for the contemplation of God's other intelligent subjects, even though there should not be so many of them as to inhabit a multiplicity of worlds, — he adds, that neverthe- less that part of the Divine Government is placed in a still more satisfac- tory light, if it be true that there is such a vast population of the universe, for that then the disproportion may be so much the greater between the number of the beings who eternally suffer, and the number of the other beings who are to benefit from those sufferings : insomuch that *' to those who judge of things impartially, and upon an extensive scale, this final perdition will appear to contain no more of a disparagement to the govern- ment of the universe, than the execution of a murderer, once in a hun- dred years, would be to the government of a nation." It is very wonderful how so acute a writer should deem such a compari- CHALMEES'S ASTRONOMICAL DISCOURSES. 17 thor says, " occupy a very pre-eminent place in any of our Treatises of Infidelity, but is often met with in conversation ; and we have known it to be the cause of serious perplexity and alarm in minds anxious for the solid establishment of their religious faith." *' This ar^ment involves in it an assertion and an inference. The assertion is, that Christianity is a religion which professes to be designed for the single benefit of our world : and the inference is, that God cannot be the Author of this religion, for he would not lavish on so insignificant a field such peculiar and such distinguishing attentions as are ascribed to him in the Old and New Testament." To meet the objectors in the fullest, boldest manner, but also with the further and higher purpose, no doubt, of aiding the mind in its apprehension of that Spirit who is the sovereign possessor of all existence, the preacher commences with a magnificent view of the Modern Astronomy. Great indeed may well be the dismay of those religious persons who dread and detest being disturbed in the indolent quietude of their lit- tle homestead of thought, the narrow range of ideas which can be surveyed without an effort, — at hearing it demanded that the theory of religion be expanded to the compass of talking account of the Universe, a scene which, whatever may be its limits, is, as to the human power of comprehension, much the g^me as infinite, and demanded for the plain reason, that reli- gion being the intellectual apprehension and the moral senti- ment due to God, and this idea and sentiment being justly re- quired to correspond to the whole of the manifestations which that Being has made of his glory, the lustre and immensity of son adapted for a triumphant close of the discussion. How did he fail to perceive the enormous fallacy introduced by adding rare and momentary occurrence to diminutivencss of number ? how fail to perceive that any analogy must be infinitely absurd which should not include perpetual suf- fering, and that in the identical being ? The case indeed admitted of no analogy ; since no parallel rcpresentaticp could be made without intro- ducing the impossible supposition of a mortal criminal, kept perpetually alive to undergo the pains of a perpetual execution. In closing this note, we do not think it requisite to use many words in avowal of our high estimate of the intellect and the general energy of mind of the distinguished and lamented divine : who, indeed, has any other estimate ? But neither can there need any apology to even his warmest friends, for the expression of an opinion in which probably more than a few will coincide, that his writings are too often marked with an assumption, and an air of having perfectly disposed of the matter, which could barely be allowed in a mind of the very largest comprehension. 18 Chalmers's astronomical discourses. such manifestations, presented through the entire visible crea- tion, place all that creation within the cognizance of religion : so that a religion which should decline to include these innu- merable and far-off displays of Deity within its comprehension, in forming its conception of the attributes, the works, and the government of the Almighty, would therein choose to content itself with a less glorious idea of him, and to offer him a less sublime worship, than that Being has given us the means to form and to offer. While, however, such a representation may be received un- graciously by minds that have never once surmised such a thing as an obligation enforced upon our religion, as to the extent of its contemplations, by the remotest stars discovered by the telescope, we are very confident that many serious but partially-cultivated persons, w^ho have been impatient of the conscious narrowness of the scope of their religious ideas, will be greatly and devotionally benefited by this sublime introduc- tory discourse of Dr. Chalmers. In advancing into the regions of astronomy, in the spirit of religion, he takes both his text and his tone from a writer in whose mind the magnificence of the modern astronomy, could its wonders have been revealed to him, would have but inspired a so much the more exalted devotion. "The Psalmist takes a still loftier flight. He leaves the world, and lifts his imagination to that mighty expanse which spreads above it and around it. He wings his way through space, and wanders in thought over its immeasurable regions. Instead of a dark and unpeopled solitude, he sees it crowded with splendour, and filled with the energy of the Divine presence. Creation rises in its immensity before him, and the world, with all which it inherits, shrinks into littleness at a contemplation so vast and so overpowering. He wonders that he is not overlooked amid the gran- deur and the variety which are on every side of him ; and passing upward from the majesty of nature to the majesty of nature's Architect, he ex- claims, * What is man that thou art mindful of him, or the son of man that thou visitest him V " There is much in the sceg^ery of a nocturnal sky, to liftthe soul to pious contemplation. That moon, and these stars, what are they ? They are detached from the world, and they lift you above it. You feel with- drawn from the earth, and rise in lofty abstraction above this little theatre of human passions and human anxieties. The mind abandons itself to reverie, and is transferred in the ecstasy of its thoughts, to distant and un- explored regions. It sees nature in the simplicity of her great elements, and it sees the God of nature invested with the high attributes of wisdom and majesty. " J3ut what can these lights be ? The curiosity of the human mind is insatiable, and the mechanism of these wonderful heavens, has, in all ages, CHALMERS'^S ASTRONOMICAL DISCOURSES. 19 been its suTjject and its employment. It has been reserved for these latter times, to resolve this great and interesting question. The sublimest pow- ers of philosophy have been called to the exercise, and astronomy may now be looked on as the most certain and best established of the sciences." The rapid and comprehensive " Sketch," which is quite in the manner of a, person familiar with the speculations and facts of astronomy, begins with the planets of our sun, and the philo- sophic divine illustrates the very strong probability of their be- ing inhabited. He argues from their magnitude, and their several striking points of analogy to this world of ours. They have their movements on their own axes, their regular periodical revolu- tions round the sun, and their vicissitudes of seasons. Seve- ral of them have moons to alleviate the darkness of their night. " We can see of one, that its surface rises into inequalities, that it swells into mountains and stretches into valleys ; of another, that it is surround- ed with an atmosphere which may support the respiration of animals ; of a third, that clouds are formed and suspended over it, which may minis- ter to it all the bloom and luxuriance of vegetation ; and of a fourth, that a white colour spreads over its northern regions, as its winter advances, and that on the approach of summer this whiteness is dissipated — giving room to suppose, that the element of water abounds in it, that it rises by evaporation into its atmosphere, that it freezes upon the application of cold, that it is precipitated in the form of snow, that it covers the ground with a fleecy mantle, which melts away from the heat of a more vertical sun ; and that other worlds bear a resemblance to our own in the same yearly round of beneficent and interesting changes." We will acknowledge some little defect of sympathy with the delight which Dr. Chalmers expresses at the ascertain- ment of so very close an analogy as indicated in this last in- stance. Really this downright "fleecy" phenomenon of win- ter falls somewhat chilly on that animated visionary and half poetical idea, which we should have been better pleased to have been permitted to entertain of the physical condition of the inhabitants of these other worlds. This hemisphere of snow not only shuts down too much in the way of an extinguish- er on that enchanting imagery of a local economy in which the imagination would have loved to place those unknown races of beings, and forcibly suggests ideas of dreariness, hardships, and even morbid physical affections, and hostility to life ; it would also, as possibly or probably accompanied by these physical evils, seem too ominous of something much worse. The mind is forced to admit some fearful surmise of the too possible existence, in those worlds, of that horrible thing which has blasted the natural beauties and delights, and 20 Chalmers's astrot^onomical discourses, mainly created the natural evils, of these terrestrial scenes. An analogy so very close to an order of elemental nature which in this world inflicts so much inconvenience and suffer- ing, in which suffering, though immediately inflicted by the instrumentality of the elements, we have the effect of sin, must throw us on the ground of some abstracted moral consid- erations, to maintain our obstinate hope that this infernal plague has not invaded the people of those abodes. The passage we have transcribed is followed by one in which, highly picturesque as it is, the doctor's elated imagi- nation has carried him into a very palpable extravagance, in conjecturing such possibilities of improvement in the artificial subsidiaries to sight, as shall bring at last to our perception the green of the planetary vegetation, the dead wintry hue in- duced by its disappearance, the marks of cultivation extending over tracts previously wild, and even the cities forming the central seats of mighty empires. Were we obliged to go the whole length which analogy might seem to lead in shaping to our imaginations the economy of those regions, might we not reasonably be glad that such distinctness of detection as our author is willing to anticipate, is physically impossible, lest there should otherwise have been some danger of our having at length the mortification to descry such things as munitions of war, or idols' temples, or popish cathedrals 1 There can be no scruple in assuming, a general principle, that it is in the highest degree improbable the Almighty Spirit should have constructed vast fabrics of Matter, to remain dis- connected from Mind, as a conscious power to which those fabrics may be available for use. Useless to the Creator himselfj they would be useless absolutely, if not serving to the purpose of the occupancy, and support, and activity, and con- templation, of sentient intelligent creatures. Prodigious orbs, disposed too in the order and movement of system, but thus desolate, and dead, and merely running vast circles in space, would really suggest something like the idea (we speak with reverence) of the Creator's amusing himself with an ingenious contrivance. — ^Any notion that the other planets of the solar system were created for the use of this earth, would be now too ridiculous for the grossest ignorance to dream. When to this consideration, of the extreme improbability of immense conformations of matter being made to be devoid of the occupancy of mind, is added the whole account of the ascer- Chalmers's astronomical discourses, 21 tained points of analogy between the other planets and our own, we think that, excepting to minds repugnant to magnifi- cent ideas, the probability that the other orbs of our system are inhabited worlds, must appear so great, that a direct revelation from heaven declaring the fact, would make but very little dif- ference in our assurance of it. Following the discoveries of science no further than the limits of this solar system, we behold them, says Dr. Chalmers, — " widening the empire of creation far beyond the limits which were for- merly assigned to it. They give us to see that yon sun, throned in the centre of his planetary system, gives light, and warmth, and the vicissi- tude of seasons, to an extent of surface several hundreds of times greater than that of the earth which we inhabit. They lay open to us a number of worlds, rolling in their respective circles round this vast luminary — and prove that the ball which we tread upon, with all its mighty burden of oceans and continents, instead of being distinguished from the others, is among the least of them ; and, from some of the more distant planets, would not occupy a visible point in the concave of their firmament- They let us know that though this mighty earth, with all its myriads of people, were to sink into annihilation, there are some worlds where an event so awful to us would be unnoticed and unknown, and others where it would be nothing more than the disappearance of a little star which had ceased from its twinkling." But how humiliating it is to the proud ambition of the human faculties, that thus we are already almost ovenvhelmed with images of grandeur when we have hardly made a first step, hardly an infant's step, in that stupendous excursion to which the mind is summoned forth, — summoned, not by wild fancy or poetry, but by grave peremptory science, with a plain austerity as if in scorn that such a thing as poetry should have been suffered to pretend to a loftier sublimity than truth and fact. It is indeed most striking to observe how all the sublimities of imagination and invention dwindle and grow dim as placed in comparative measurement against the virtual infinity of the system of visible existence ; as brought into the converging light of indefinite millions of suns. It is not only that this immensity of splendid material substance has, simply so contemplated, an overpowering magnificence, rendered in- conceivably more august by the accession of the idea that in- telligent beings in multitudes beyond all knowledge, or calcu- lation, or conjecture, of any intelligence but One, dwell in the universe of daylight emanating from all these luminaries ; the ultimate sublimity of all this glory of material existence is, that it gives the sign every where, through its immeasurable 2* 22 Chalmers's astronomical discourses. extent, of the presence of another Existence. The mystery of a pure Spirit, infinite, and yet bearing no relation to place, so confounds the understanding, and something at least analo- gous to vast extension is so necessary to our conception of mag- nitude of being, that the mind is glad, in essaying to contem- plate the greatness of the Divine Essence, to accept in aid tJie effect of boundless local extension, in the way of a distinct recognition of that Essence as present in one, and in another, and in each, and in all, of the material glories of an indefinite universe : and this it can in some measure do, or at least is beguiled to feel as if it could, without directly attributing to that Spirit a physical mode of extension from one part and one limit of the creation to another and the opposite. Thus the mate- rial universe, with all its splendours and magnitudes, "ascer- tained, conjectured, or possible, may be regarded — not as a vehicle, not as an inhabited form, or a comprehending sphere, of the Sovereign Spirit, but as a type, which signifies, though by a faint, inadequate correspondence after all, that as great as the universe is in the material attributes of extension and splendour, so great is the Divine Being in the infinitely transcendent nature of spiritual existence. The least and nar- nowest idea to be entertained is, that in this spiritual and transcendent mode the predominating intelligence has the ex- tension of the universe. What emphasis will such a view give to the sentence of the poet, *' An undevout astronomer is mad !" And yet how seldom do we find the magnificent images of astronomy brightened into still nobler lustre by the spirit of piety which gives them so consecrated a character in the work of Dr. Chalmers. From the solar system the inquiring contemplation is car- ried to those other countless luminaries, all shining from such an inconceivable distance. The preacher passes rapidly, and with a commanding reach of thought, over the most wonderful facts and speculations of the subject. The distance is the first of the facts which so defy human comprehension. " If the whole planetary system were lighted up into a globe of fire, it would appear only a small lucid point from the nearest of the fixed stars. If a body were projected from the sun with the velocity of a cannon ball, it would take hundreds of thousands of years before it described that migh- ty interval which separates the nearest of them from our sun and our sys. tern. If this earth, which moves at more than the inconceivable velocity Chalmers's astronomical discourses. 23 of a million and a half miles a day, were to be hurried from its orbit, and to take the same rapid flight over this immense tract, it would not have arrived at the termination of its journey after taking all the time which has elapsed since the creation of the world. These are great numbers, and great calculations, and the mind feels its own impotency in attempt- ing to grasp them. VVe can state them in words ; we can exhibit them in figures ; we can demonstrate them by the powers of a most rigid and in- fallible geometry. But no human fancy celu summon up a lively or an adequate conception." The immense magnitude, so demonstrated, of those stars ; their shining with their own light ; the " periodical variations of light" observed in some of them, as probable indication of a revolution, as in case of our own solar stars, on their axes ; authorize a most undoubting assumption, (opposed by no argu- ment, and confirmed by the consideration that so much the mightier is the display of the Creator's glory,) that they are all the central lights of so many systems. As to their number, "the unassisted eye can take in a thousand, and the best telescope which the genius of man has constructed, can take in eighty millions.^^ And nothing, as our author suggests, could be more irrational than to fancy that the utmost number of such luminaries comprised in the universe, may be just that number which the people of one of the planets of one of the suns, have, at a particular period of time, contrived optical instruments competent for descrying. Quite as reasonable would the assumption have been upon the discoveries by means of the first telescope that was made, as upon those of Herschel. When we reflect what kind of crea- ture it is to whose view thus much of the universe has been disclosed, — that the physical organ of this very perception, is of such a nature that it might, in consequence of the extinction of life, be reduced to dust within a few short days after it had admitted rays from the stars ; while, as to his mental part, he is, besides his moral debasement, at the very bottom of the gradation of probably innumerable millions of intellectual races (certainly at the bottom, since a being inferior to man in intel- lect, could not be rational) — when we think of this, it will ap- pear utterly improbable that the portion of the universe which such a creature can take knowledge of, should be more than a very diminutive tract in the vast expansion of existence. And if the subject be considered in reference to the Supreme Ori- ginating Power, the probability becomes indefinitely stronger, that beyond the sphere of our perceptions, enlarged as it is by 94 pHALMERs's ASTKONOMICAL DISCOURSES. artificial aids, there is all but infinitely more of material exis- tence than there is within its compass. It being demonstrated by that vastness of material glory which is ascertained to exist, that magnitude and multitude were of the essence of the Cre- ator's plan, we are well authorized in the assurance that the magnitude and the multitude must be on the most transcendent scale, a scale approaching as near toward a correspondence to the infinite supremacy of his own nature, as finiteness of one nature can (if we may be pardoned such expedients of ex- pression) towards infiniteness of another. It is therefore but little to say, that the material creation is probably of such an extent that the greatest of created beings not only have never yet been able to survey it all, but never will to all eternity. For must it not be one great object in the Creator's design, that this magnitude should make a sublime and awful impres- sion on his intelligent creatures? But if the magnitude is to make this impression, what would be the impression made on created spirits by their coming to the end, the boundary, of this magnitude ? It is palpable that this latter impression must counteract the former. So that if the stupendous extension of the works of God was intended and adapted to promote, in the contemplations of the highest intelligences, an indefinitely glo- rious though still incompetent conception of the Divine infin- ity, the ascertaining of the limit, the distinct perception of the finiteness, of that manifestation of power, would tend with a dreadful force to repress and annihilate that conception ; and it may well be imagined that if an exalted adoring spirit could ever in eternity find himself at that limit, the perception would inflict inconceivable horror. — In short, this is the subject on which it is purely impossible to be extravagant, in the way of simple amplification and aggravation of thought. And there is not the slightest transgression of sobriety in the language of our author, when he speaks of " those mighty tracts, which shoot far beyond what eye hath seen or the heart of man conceived — which sweep endlessly along, and merge into an awful and mysterious infinity;'' — or when he adopts the con- jecture, in explanation of the nehulcB, that the fixed stars, — *' instead of lying uniformly, and in a state of equi-distance from each other, are arranged into distinct clusters ; that in the same manner as the distance of the nearest fixed stars, so inconceivably superior to our plan, ets, from each other, marks the separation of the solar, so the distance of two contiguous clusters may be so inconceivably superior to the reciprocal distance of those fixed stars w^hich belong to the same cluster, as to mark Chalmers's astronomical discourses. 25 an equally distinct separation of the clusters, and to constitute each of them an individual member of some higher and more extended arrange- ment." — Or when, admonishing the philosopher against pride in the great discoveries of astronomy, he reminds him that there is — •" an unsealed barrier, beyond which no power either of eye or of teles- cope shall ever carry him ; that on the other side there is a height, and a depth, and a length, and a breadth, to which the whole of this concave and visible firmament, dwindles into the insignificancy of an atom ; and though all which the eye of man can take in, or his fancy grasp at, were swept away, there might still remain as ample a field over which the Di- vinity may expatiate, and which he may have peopled with innumerable worlds, if the whole visible creation were to disappear, it would leave a soUtude behmd it — but to the Infinite Mind, that can take in the whole system of nature, this solitude might be nothing, a small unoccupied point in that immensity which surrounds it, and which he may have filled with the wonders of his omnipotence. Though this earth were to be burned up, though the trumpet of its dissolution were sounded, though yon sky were to pass away as a scroll, and every visible glory which the finger of the Divinity has inscribed on it, were to be put out for ever — an event, so awful to us and to every world in our vicinity, by which so many sims would be extinguished, and so many varied scenes of life and of popula- tion would rush into forgetfulness — what is it in the high scale of the Al- mighty's workmanship ? a mere shred, which, though scattered into nothing, would leave the universe of God one entire scene of greatness and of majesty." We may be sure, as we have already suggested, that each of the elements of the manifestation of an Infinite Being, will do him justice thus far, that it will have a practical infiniteness relatively to the capacities of his intelligent creatures ; that the utmost that will be permitted to the comprehension of these intelligences, will be the mere abstract truth that some of these elements cannot, from their very nature, be literally infi- nite ; that their amazement will be eternally augmented by the very circumstance of this sublime enigma, of an element which must thus by its nature be limited, and yet leaves them all, through the eternity of their experiments and excursions, as far from any sensible approach to the verification of the limit, as at the first step they made into the mysterious expansion. But if we take our conjecture of the intellectual magnitude, and the probable excursive powers, of the highest of the cre- ated beings, from the consideration of the infinite power and beneficence of the Creator, and of what it is rationally probable that such a Being would create in the nature of mental exist- ences, to admire, adore, and serve him, we shall be warrant- 26 Chalmers's astronomical discourses. efl to imagine beings to whom it may be possible exultingly to leave sun-beams far behind them in the rapidity of their career, from systems to systems still beyond. And if we add to the account the equal probability of a perpetual augmentation of their powers in a ratio correspondent to a magnitude already so stupendous, and crown it with the idea of an indefatigable exertion of those powers in discovery and contemplation of the Creator's manifestations through everlasting ages — there will then be required a universe to which all that the telescope has descried is but as an atom ; a universe of which it shall not be within the possibilities of any intelligence less than the infinite to know, *' where rears the Terminating Pillar high Its extramundane head." We need not dwell on the considerations, on the ground of which Dr. Chalmers insists it would be most absurd to disbe- lieve, absurd even to doubt, that this boundless multitude of worlds, this scene of almighty power and glory, is populous through all its systems with contemplators and worshippers of the Divinity. If such a representation give, after all, but an infinitely fee- ble glimmer of the truth, respecting the magnitude of the crea- tion, we may, in the name of both sense and piety, assume, with the utmost confidence, to repeat our reprehension of that mode of religious faith and sentiment, which would pretend to have so much the more of celestial light for excluding the beams of all the stars. What is it, we would ask, that comes upon us in those beams, — in the beams of those luminaries which are beheld by the naked eye, next of those countless myriads beheld by the assisted eye, and then of those infinite legions which can never be revealed to the earth, but are seen by an elevated imagination, and will perhaps burst with sud- den and awful effulgence on the departed spirit ? What is it, but the pure unmingled reflection of Him who cannot be be- held in himself, who, present to all things, is yet in the dark- ness of infinite and eternal mystery, subsisting in an essence unparticipated, unapproached by gradation of other beings, impalpable to all speculation, refined beyond angelic percep- tion, foreign from all analogy — but who condescends to be- come visible in the effects of his nature, in the lustre of his works ? And is it not, we ask again, one of the grand diffi- culties in religion, and one of the things most ardently to be Chalmers's astronomical discourses. 27 desired, to obtain a glorious idea of the Divinity, passing afar from that littleness and anthropomorphism which so confine and degrade our contemplations and devotions ? It cannot but be one of the plainest duties of religion, to aspire to the attain- ment of such an idea. And therefore a strong remonstrance may justly be directed to the conscience of a professed wor- shipper who cares not how little of the element of sublimity there may be in his conception of the adorable object, — who feels no religious mortification to think that the grandest idea of the Almighty which he does eflTectually realize in his mind, is in all probability prodigiously below what would be the true and full representative idea of one of the highest angels. We have expatiated thus out of all proportion on the first part of this interesting volume, from a consideration of the un- questionable fact, that there is among serious persons a quite irreligious neglect of one of the two grand forms of divine revelation, the Word and the Works of the Almighty ; and that even among Christian teachers there is often a very un- thinking and ill-discriminating mode of depreciating the latter, in the comparison ; a practice against which they might have been warned by observing the endless references in the Word of that Being to his Works ; and by observing how very often the Word rests the fulness of the meaning of its dictates and illustrations upon an adequate view of the Works. They might have been made aware to what a littleness of signifi- cance a thousand expressions in the Bible, relating to the Deity himself, are reduced by a want of extended and admiring ideas of the labours, if we may so express it, and the magnifi- cent empire, of the Sovereign Spirit. They might have been taught to suspect that it must be a very doubtful Christian ex- cellence to be but little in sympathy with those devout minds which, in the very condition and act of being the channels of divine communication to mankind, were so often elated at the view of suns and starry heavens, even at a period when the vision of those wonders was littleness itself in comparison of that magnificence to which science has now expanded it. Not, assuredly, that Christian teachers should become deep students in science, or lecturers on astronomy ; but the great elementary views of the universe are of easy attainment, and have a simplicity readily available for magnifying our contem- plations, and our representations, of the divine majesty. We 28 Chalmers's astronomical discourses. trust Dr. Chalmers's work will prove in this respect of very eminent value and use to the religious public. Such a view of the magnitude of the creation shows the in- conceivable insignificance of this our world ; insomuch that, according to our author's simile, its total annihilation would be no more sensible a loss to the universe, than the falling of a leaf into a stream which carries it away, with a destruction of all its multitude of microscopic animalculae, would be to an ample forest. Such is the importance in the universe, of the globe which appears so wide a scene to its intelligent inhabit- ants, baffling by its long succession of region after region, the realizing power of their imagination ; — the globe of which the most protracted journeying life would suffice but for the survey of a very small portion ; — for the ascendency over nar- row sections of which, opposed millions have, through every age, been inflamed to mutual bloodshed and extermination ;-'^~ for the acquisition of little specks of which, in an appropria- tion through a few fleeting years, innumerable individuals are at all times toiling with an ardour which merges all other interests ; — of which, in short, its transient inhabitants are seeking to make a Heaven and a God. Such, relatively to the grand whole, is the importance of this orb, and of the creatures to whom it appears so immense and interesting an object. Truly, it was reserved for the Modern Astronomy to supply an adequate commentary on our author's text : " Lord, what is man that thou art mindful of him ? and the son of man that thou visitest him ?" But here, instead of a humble and adoring gratitude that the Almighty does, nevertheless, visit man, in ways of mar- vellous condescension and benignity, there comes in the ma- lignant suggestion, that our world being so trivial an object in the creation, it is absurd to imagine that the Being who pre- sides over it all should give such attention to this atom of ex- istence, as the Christian religion represents him to do, and therefore the religion that so represents cannot be true, " Is it likely, says the infidel, that God would send his eternal Son, to die for the puny occupiers of so insijofnificant a province in the mighty field of his creation ? Are we the befitting objects of so great and so signal an interposition ? Docs not the largeness of that field which astronomy lays open to the view of modern science, throw a suspicion over the truth of the gospel history ; and how shall we reconcile the greatness of that wonderful movement which was made in heaven for the redemption of fallen man, with the comparative meanness and obscurity of our species ? Chalmers's astronomical discourses. 29 " Such a humble portion of the universe as ours, could never have been the object of such high and distinguishing attentions as Christianity has assigned to it. God would not have manifested himself in the flesh for the salvation of so paltry a world. The monarch of a whole continent would never move from his capital, and lay aside the splendour of royalty ; and subject himself for months, or for years, to perils and poverty, and persecution ; and take up his abode in some small islet of his dominions, which, though swallowed by an earthquake, could not be missed amid the glories of so wide an empire ; and all this to gain the lost affections of a few families upon its smrface." How little apprehension our author, as a Christian advo- cate, felt at meeting this objection, appears from the ambitious delight with which he has dilated the view of that grandeur of the Universe, on which the objection is founded. He pro- ceeds to the argument for silencing it, in the Second Dis- course, which commences with some striking observations on the imperfect community of feeling and of intellectual percep- tion between human beings. These are made to bear on the character of Sir Isaac Newton, in the way of representing that the generality of even cultivated men are perfectly unap- prized of, and incapable of adequately estimating, some of the most important circumstances in the agency of that philoso- pher's mind. They look at his brilliant discoveries, and ad- mire, in a general way, the mighty force of genius and intel- lect so obviously manifested in them ; but have no comprehen- sion, and from the nature of the case can have none, of that absolutely sublime self-command and self-denial which ac- companied, in continual exercise, the process which resulted in so vast an extension of the dominion of science. They cannot be aware what a course and what a magnitude of achievement it was, of self-emancipation from all pre-occupy- ing systems and notions ; of calm endurance of the hostility of those who could not be so emancipated ; of repression of all temerity of speculation that might have sprung from con- scious power and success ; of invincible coolness and perse- vering labour amid the dazzling disclosure of magnificent novelty ; of resistance to all the beguilement of the splendid plausibilities which must oflen have presented their sudden fascinations to such a mind in such a career ; in short, of in- corruptible reason, which never lost sight of the tests of truth, nor failed to acknowledge submissively the limits to the range of the human intellect. An entire exemption from arrogance and presumption, and an invariable, inviolable fidelity to the 30 Chalmers's astronomical discourses* principle of admitting nothing but solid evidence as the founda- tion of any part of his theories, are described as the distinc- tive qualities of what may be called the moral government of Newton's intellectual powers and operations. With just in- dignation therefore our Author reprehends the ignorant arro- gance of pretenders to philosophy, who, come into possession of Newton's grand discoveries, with an ease which might have precluded, but does not preclude, any indulgence of such an impertinent feeling as pride, avail themselves in the pro- secution of other speculations, of these great conquests of science, in a spirit perfectly the reverse of that of the mighty thinker who made them: of which anti-philosophical, and anti-Newtonian spirit, one of the most remarkable samples is this argument against Christianity. Dr. Chalmers exposes, with great force of aggravating illus- trations, the total baselessness and extravagant arrogance of the assumption that the dispensation of the Messiah does in no manner involve or affect any other tribes of beings than the human race. It must be confessed that the matter is car- ried somewhat to the extreme in supposing, as a parallel case, such a hardly possible absurdity as that of a man's gravely delineating, on the ground of assumptions drawn from some general analogies among the planetary worlds, a scheme of a department of the natural history, — of the botany, for in- stance, of some of the planets, and proceeding to the length of theorizing on the moral temperament of their inhabitants. There is some trifle less temerity in hazarding negative gene- ral assertions, than in hazarding positive specific statements, respecting the unknown economy of other worlds. The par- allel holds, however, in the essential point of absolute want of all evidence, and therefore of all reasonable ground for the assertions. *• How do infidels know that Christianity is set up for the single benefit of this earth and its inhabitants ? How are they able to tell us that if you go to other planets the person and the religion of Jesus are there unknown ? We challenge them to the proof of this said positive announcement of theirs. We see in this objection a glaring transgression on the spirit and the maxims of that very philosophy which they profess to idolize. They have made their argument against us out of an assertion which has positively no feet to rest upon — an assertion which they have no means whatever of verifying — an assertion, the truth or the falsehood of which can only be gathered out of some supernatural message, for it lies com- pletely beyond the range of human observation." Chalmers's astronomical discourses. 31 Those who raised the objection were aware that, to give it full effect, it was necessary the religion itself should be made accessary to its own intended humiliation ; that the Book pro- fessing to be a comprehensive revelation of its constitution, should be understood to avow, or most decidedly imply, that the pretended mediatorial economy of the Son of God, is limit- ed exclusively to the human race. It was obvious that, un- less this were understood, the hostile argument must, in every way, and in every part, be founded on a pure assumption. But it is curious to observe, how easily and unceremoniously this prerequisite fact was taken for granted ; and without, probably, one hour's impartial inquiry how the Bible does ac- tually represent the matter, it was confidently affirmed, as a thing liable to no question, that the pretended dispensation of the Messiah is, by the import of its own declaration, restricted from any wider sphere than that of man and his interests. Now, it is positively denied that the Scriptures make any such representation ; it is next asserted without contradiction, that no such information has come by any other superhuman communication ; and when it is added that there is nothing in the nature of the case to justify or countenance any such as- sumption, the infidel's asserted fact, from which he infers that Christianity is an imposture, is exploded away. The argu- ment is the simplest and the shortest possible ; but it is ampli- fied with great force of imagination by Dr. Chalmers, in a series of bold suggestions of what may be true, as to the ex- tent of the Christian economy, for any thing the infidel can know to the contrary. '* For any thing he can tell" [and with this precise phrase are pointed a whole quiver of assailant sentences, — no less than ten in immediate suc- cession] " sin has found its way into other worlds. For any thing he can tell, their people have banished themselves from communion with God. For any thing he can tell, many a visit has been made to each of them, on the subject of our common Christianity, by commissioned messengers from the throne of the Eternal," &c. &c. &.c. And is it not about as silly as it is arrogant, in these infi- dels, to affect to dictate to religion what they choose it shall 6e, that they may have the greater advantage against it ? It seems much of a piece with that memorable proceeding of certain of the fraternity, the decreeing death to be an eternal sleep, — which made just no difference at all in the real attri- butes of death, and made a difference but so much for the a2 Chalmers's astronomical discourses. worse in the feelings of whoever could, in such self-betraying folly and presumption, advance the more carelessly and con- fidently to the encounter with that formidable power. Neither death nor religion will consent to forego its qualities in obse- quiousness to the arbitrary definitions of man ; nor submit to the circumscription which it might be commodious to him to impose. The advocate of Christianity, then, confidently repels the assumption of its enemies as to the limitation of its sphere ; but at the same time he is hardly less confident in the assur- ance that even were the assumption conceded to them, and were it avowed by the Christian revelation that the economy therein declared, in terms importing so marvellous an inter- vention of Deity, does really concentrate all these glories of grace and power on man exclusively, — even then it could easily be shown that the notion of this being so immeasura- bly out of all proportion to the despicable insignificance of this spot of earth and its inhabitants, that it is irrational to believe it, is a notion betraying great narrowness of mind,-^-proud as its entertainers are of this fancied elevation of thought. On this lower ground Dr. Chalmers powerfully maintains the argument in the third Discourse, " On the Extent of the Divine Condescension." " Let us," he says, " admit the as- sertion [of the confined scope of the Chjristian economy] and take a view of the reasoning which has been constructed upon it." The exposure of this reasoning begins with the remark, (which expresses the essential principle and force of the whole refutation,) that this doctrine of disbelief arises entirely from the combined feebleness and arrogance of the conception en- tertained of the Deity. It is a conception which presumes to limit the powers of that Being, and which takes its authority to do so from the very fact of the demonstrated immensity of those powers. By practically demonstrating his ability to make and sustain a system so ajnazingly vast, he has demon- strated his inability to give a distinct and perfect attention to each part. We cannot comprehend the possibility of the combination or union of this immense generality, and this ab- solutely perfect particularity, of the exercise of intelligence and power, — and therefore it is impossible, even to the Su- preme Mind. In other words, that Mind has been too ambi- tious of being the God of an indefinite multitude of worlds and races, to be a God, in the fulness and perfect exercise of the Chalmers's astronomical discourses. 33 divine attributes, to any one of them in particular. The ex- ceedingly monstrous absurdity, as well as presumption, of thus inferring littleness from greatness, and on the very ground that that greatness is proved to be infinitely transcendent, is exhibited in its just character, and with just reprobation, in several powerful and eloquent passages, too long to be tran- scribed. Who can think of the subject without being con- founded at the dire perversity of the human mind, that thus, instead of following forth the plain, rational indication afford- ed by the fact of infinite perfection evinced in one mode, to the delightful, and sublime, and adoring efiect of attributing per- fection in all modes, would choose to violate the clearest rules of sense in order to degrade and eclipse the glorious idea of the Divine Nature ; — as if to indemnify and avenge itself for the insignificance of its own ! — God shall not in every way in- finitely surpass man, and defy his comprehension. This is the principle. Dr. Chalmers says, of the kind of infidelity under consideration. " To brinor God to the level of our comprehension, we would clothe him in the impotency of a man. We would transfer to his wonderful mind all the imperfection of our own faculties. When we are taught by astronomy that he has millions of worlds to look after, and thus to add in one direction to the glories of his character, we take away from them in another, by saying that each of these worlds must be looked after imper- fectly. The use that we make of a discovery that should heighten our every conception of God, and humble us into the sentiment that a Being of such mysterious elevation is to us unfathomable, is to sit in judgment over him, ay, and to pronounce such a judgment as degrades him, and keeps him down to the standard of our own paltry imagination ! We are introduced by modern science to a multitude of other suns and other systems ; and the perverse interpretation we put upon the fact that God can diffuse the benefits of his power and his goodness over such a variety of worlds, is that he cannot, or will not bestow so much goodness on one of those worlds, as a professed revelation from Heaven has an- nounced to us." The argument might be authoritatively insisted upon, and without fear of rational contradiction, that the exercise of in- telligence and power manifested to demonstration in main- taining the system of the amazing w^hole, does necessarily in- clude a distinct attention to all the constituent parts, down to the minutest. For, in the most general and the simplest no- tion possible of that comprehensive exercise, we make it take distinct account of the great leading and immediate constitu- ents or components of the system, with their relations and 34 Chalmers's astronomical discourses. adaptations ; but these have also their constituents, by means of which they are what they are in themselves, and what they are relatively to the whole system ; and then these again, these subordinates, have their constituents also, with their re- lations and adaptations ; and so downward in an indefinite gradation. Now, it is evident that, throughout this retiring series, the state or constitution of things at each further re- move, must depend on the state or constitution of things at the next remoter condition of their existence ; and so onward, to that state of things, whatever it is, in which created existence has its essence and its primary constitution : so that the ulti- mate state of things, as appearing in a perfectly constituted universe, depends, through a long and continuously depend- ent gradation, on the nature and adaptations of their primary constituents. And how, therefore, can a given state of things in their ultimate constitution be secured without a certain con- dition of things being maintained in the primary mode of their existence ? And how can this be without the divine inspec- tion and power being constantly exerted on them all in that, their original mode ? But not to seek the aid of these subtleties : — It is immedi- ately obvious that an incomparably more glorious idea is enter- tained of the Divinity, by conceiving of him as possessing a wisdom and a power competent, without an effort, to maintain an infinitely perfect inspection and regulation, distinctly, of all subsistences, even the minutest, comprehended in the uni- verse, than by conceiving of him as only maintaining some kind of general superintendence of the system, — only general, because a perfect attention to all existences individually would be too much, it is deemed, for the capacity of even the Su- preme Mind. And for the very reason that this would be the most glorious idea of him, it must be the true one. To say that we can, in the abstract, conceive of a magnitude of intelli- gence and power which would constitute the Deity, if he pos- sessed it, a more glorious and adorable Being than he actually is, could be nothing less than flagrant impiety. On even such general and a priori grounds the preacher is authorized to meet the infidel objection by the following posi- tion : " That God, in addition to the bare faculty of dwclh'ng on a multipli- city of objects at one and the same time, has this facult}^ in such wonder- ful perfection, that he can attend as fully, and proyide as richly, and Chalmers's astronomical discourses* 35 manifest all his attributes as illustriously, on every one of these objects, as if the rest had no existence, and no place whatever in his government or his thoughts." But, he insists chiefly and wisely on the strong and accu- mulated proofs offact^ that the divine intelligence and energy are thus all-pervading and all-distinguishing. He appeals, in the first place, to the personal history of each of his hearers, and of each individual of the species, as most simple and per- fect evidence that God is maintaining, literally without the smallest moment's intermission, an exercise of attention and power inconceivably minute, and complex, and as it were con- centrated, on each unit. Each is conscious of a being totally distinct from all the rest ; as absolutely self-centered and circumscribed an individual as if there were no other such be- ing on earth. And thus distinct is each as an object of the divine attention, which in a perfect manner recognizes the in- finite and to us mysterious diflerence between the greatest possible likeness and identity. But think of the prodigious multitude of these separate beings, each requiring and mono- polizing a regard and action of the Divine Spirit perfectly dis- tinct from that which each of all the others requires and en- gages. A mere perception of every one of the perhaps thou- sand millions of human beings, — a perception that should simply keep in view through every moment each individual as a separate object, and without distinguishing any particulars in the being or circumstances of that object, — would evince a magnitude and mode of intelligence quite overwhelming to reflect upon. But then consider, that each one of these dis- tinct objects is itself what may justly be denominated a system, combined of matter and spirit, comprising a vast complexity of principles, elements, mechanism, capacities, processes, liabil- ities, and necessities. What an inconceivable kind and meas- ure, or rather magnitude beyond all measure, of sagacity, and power, and vigilance, are required to preserve one such being in a state of safety, and health, and intellectual sanity ! But then, while the fact is before us, that so many millions are every moment so preserved, and that during thousands of years the same economy has been maintained, and that not a mortal has the smallest surmise but that it can, with perfect ease, be maintained for ages to come, — ^the suggestion that all this is too much for the Almighty, never once obtruding itself to disturb any man's tranquillity — while there is before us the /" 36 Chalmers's astronomical discourses. practical illustration of a power combining such immense com- prehension with such exquisite discrimination, how well it becomes our intellect and our humility to take upon us to de- cide what measure and manifestations of his attention such a Being may or may not confer upon one world, in a consistency of proportion with the attention which is to be perfect in its exercise on each and all ! The argument from the demonstrated perfect and continu- ous attention of the Divine Mind to objects comparatively in- significant, becomes indefinitely stronger when carried down to those forms of life which are brought to our knowledge by the utmost powers of the microscope. A doctrine or a disbe- lief founded on inference from one view of the works of God, must, to be rational, comport with the just inferences from eve- ry other. Yet those who justify their infidelity by the discov- eries of the telescope, seem to have chosen to forget that there is another instrument, which has made hardly less wonderful discoveries in an opposite direction ; discoveries authorizing an inference completely destructive of that made from the astronomical magnitudes. And it is very gratifying to see the lofty assumptions drawn, in a spirit as unphilosophical as irreligious, from remote systems and the immensity of the uni- verse, and advanced against Christianity with an air of irre- sistible authority, — to see them encountered and annihilated by evidences sent forth from tribes and races of beings, of which innumerable millions might pass under the intensest look of the human eye imperceptible as empty space. No need, for the discomfiture of these assailants making war in the pomp of guns and systems, of any thing even " so gross as beetles," or as the hornets, locusts, and flies, which were arrayed against the pagans of former ages and other regions. In all their pride they are " crushed before" less than " the moth," beyond all conception less. Indeed the diminutiveness of the victori- ous confronters of infidel arrogance, is the grand principle of their power ; insomuch that the further they decline in an attenuation apparently toward nothing, the greater is their efliiciency for this controversy ; and a might altogether incal- culable and unlimited, for this holy service, resides in those beings of which it is no absurdity nor temerity to assume that myriads may inhabit an atom, itself too subtile for the percep- tion of the eye of man. Let a reflective man, when he stands in a garden, or a Chalmers's astronomical discourses. 37 meadow, or a forest, or on the margin of a pool, consider what there is within the circuit of a very few feet around him, and that too exposed to the light, and with no veil for concealment from his sight, but nevertheless invisible to him. It is certain that within that little space there are organized beings, each of marvellous construction, independent of the rest, and en- dowed with the mysterious principle of vitality, to the amount of a number which could not have been told by units if there could have been a man so employed from the time of Adam to this hour. Let him indulge for a moment the idea of such a perfect transformation of his faculties as that all this population should become visible to him, each and any individual being presented to his perception as a distinct object of which he could take the same full cognizance as he now can of the large living creatures around him. What a perfectly new world ! What a stupendous crowd of sentient agents ! What an utter solitude, in comparison, that world of living beings of which alone his senses had been competent to take any clear account before ! And then let him consider, whether it be in his pow- er, without plunging into gross absurdity, to form any other idea of the creation and separate subsistence of these beings, than that each of them is the distinct object of the attention and the power of that one Spirit in which all things subsist. Let him, lastly, extend the view to the width of the whole ter- restrial field, of our mundane system, of the universe, — ^with the added thought how long such a creation has existed, and is to exist! And now, with such a view of what that Spirit is doing, has been doing through an unimaginable lapse of ages, and may do through an unbounded fliturity, — is it within the possibili- ties of human presumption and absurdity, vast as they are, to do any thing more presumptuous and absurd, than to pretend to decide beforehand what is beyond the competence of the power, or out of proportion for the benevolence of that Spirit ? Yes, it is within those possibilities ; for the presumption and absurdity may be inconceivably aggravated by that decision being made in express and intentional contradiction to a pow- erful combination of evidence, that he actually Jms done a given work of signal mercy to the human race. The topic of the infinite multitude of beings impalpable and invisible from their minuteness, attesting, in every spot of the earth, a Divine care and energy indefatigably acting on each, 3 88 Chalmers's astronomical discofrsus, is vigorously illustrated and applied by our author, who con* siders the infidel objection as by this time fairly disposed of. It is hardly necessary to recapitulate ; but the argument stands briefly thus : No inference drawn from the stupendous extent and magnificence of the whole creation, is of the slightest au- thority, unless it consists with the inferences justly to be drawn from what we know of particular parts ; the antichristian in- ference drawn from that magnificent whole is decisively con- tradicted by the known facts in this particular part that we in- habit, which give such a demonstration of infinite greatness fixed in benevolent attention on indefinite littleness, while, su- perintending the mighty aggregate of all things, as to leave no ground for a presumption that such an interposition as that affirmed by Christianity, implies too great a measure of Divine attention and action toward man, to be believed : therefore it may be believed, and authoritively demands to be believed, if it comes with due evidence of its own. The whole object of the argument is to show that the ground is perfectly clear for that evidence to come with its full appropriate force: the statement of that evidence was no part of the author's object. At the close of this argument, one or two considerations may deserve to be briefly adverted to. The infidels whose objection the Doctor is resisting, would never have thought of raising that objection as against that theory of Christianity which has in recent times assumed to itself, as its exclusive right, the distinction of "rational." And to professors of that system our author's whole eflfort of argument and eloquence appears, with the exception of the display of the Modern As- tronomy, little better than a piece of splendid impertinence ; since there could be nothing very wonderful or mysterious in the circumstance of God's appointing and qualifying, among any race of his rational but fallible creatures, a succession of individuals, of the mere nature of that race, to be teachers of truth and patterns of moral excellence to the rest, and in distin- guishing one of them by the endowment of a larger portion of light and virtue than any of the others. It is only against what we shall not hesitate to denominate the evangelical theory, which is founded on the doctrine of a divine incarnation and an atoning sacrifice, that the objection in question can be ad- vanced with any serious force. And this suggests another consideration. This being as- sumed as the true theory, a doubt may perhaps be raised, Chalmers's astronomical discourses. 39 whether the preacher's argument from the astonishing extent and distinctness of the attention and care exercised by the Deity on this most inconsiderable of his creatures, be availa- ble or strictly applicable ; whether there be any thing so anal- ogous between the natural and providential economy and a dispensation so signally peculiar as that of redemption, as to admit of an argument from the evidence of the one to the probability of the other. The Doctor fully assumes this anal- ogy. For our feeble powers of contemplating the government of the Almighty, and for facility of proper instruction, there may be an advantage in our usual mode of viewing that government as distinguished into separate departments, as of nature, provi- dence, and grace. But we should greatly doubt whether, in a higher contemplation, this notion of separate departments would not vanish away. For if, in the first place, we endeav- our to elevate our thoughts to the divine nature, in contempla- tion of any of the attributes, — ^the power, for instance, or the goodness, — we cannot conceive of that attribute in any other way than as a perfectly simple quality, than, if we may pre- sume to apply such an expression, a homogeneous element ; capable of an infinite diversity of modes of operation and de- grees of manifestation, but not consisting of a combination of several distinguishable modes of the quality, each specifically applicable to a distinct department of the divine government. If, in the next place, we descend to the view of this world as a scene of that government, we may, on a slight general in- spection, seem to distinguish several departments so dissimilar to one another, as to have but a very partial relation or mutual dependence ; each existing as if chiefly for itself, and each re- quiring not only an appropriate mode of the operation of the divine power or goodness, but an appropriate modification in the attributes themselves ; and we shall speak accordingly, of the kingdom of nature, providence, and grace. But, if we think long, and comprehensively, and deeply, these artificial and arbitrary lines of demarcation will gradually melt from sight ; while instead of them there will become visible the grand lines of one vast system, lines running throughout it in all directions, evincing a perfect relation through all that we had regarded as almost independent parts ; or rather evincing a uniiy of economy, consisting of an infinity of particulars com- bined with divine art. And therefore, though some of these 40 Chalmers's astronomical discourses. particulars will appear prominent, by a richer lustre of the di- vine goodness, they will stand in an inseparable relation to all the other particulars in which that goodness is manifested, while all these other particulars stand in a contributive con- nexion, and a relative value, to those richest and best. It must follow, that it is incorrect and absurd to say, that the striking manifestations of the divine power and goodness in a department of what we call the world of nature, are of an order so perfectly foreign to the principle of a certain other and far greater affirmed manifestation of those attributes, as to furnish no analogy by which to combat the objected improbability of that greater manifestation. But suppose we place out of the argument, the marvellous evidences, revealed by the microscope, of the determination of the attributes of the Infinite Spirit to the most diminutive ob- jects, and consider only the exquisite minuteness of their unre- mitted exercise towards man. He, at least, is a system, in which each part and circumstance is in strict relation to all the other parts and circumstances. Both from the nature of the case, and from numberless illustrations of fact, it is evident that the apparently slightest circumstances of his being and condi- tion may have a vital connexion with the most important. There is no dissevering the human individual into independent portions, to be the subjects, respectively, of unconnected economies of divine government. It may be assumed that God does nothing for him purely and exclusively as an animal^ but that his whole combined nature is kept in view in the di- vine management. The natural providence, if we may so call it, and the moral government, must be inseparably combined in one process, which cannot leave untouched the spiritual part. But then, it cannot be alleged that the astonishingly condescending and minute attention, which we see to be exer- cised by the Divine Being upon a thousand small particulars in the nature and condition of man, is an agency so foreign to the interests of his soul, that no inference can be drawn from it relative to the probability of the highest possible expedient adopted for those interests by that Being. While, however, we think our author is perfectly warranted in the course of argument he has pursued, it is not to be denied that in a few instances he has, inadvertently, fallen into ex- pressions which do injustice to the surpassing degree and the transcendent mode of the manifestation of the divine goodness Chalmers's astronomical discourses. 41 as given in the great expedient of redemption. The relation prevailing through all the agencies of the divine goodness, comports, it is unnecessary to say, with a stupendous superi ority of degree in which that goodness is manifested in some parts of the government of the Almighty. One of the expres- sions we allude to occurs in the following passage : **Let such a revelation tell me as much as it may of God letting him- self down," [this refers to the economy of Mediation] ** for the benefit of one single province of his dominions, this is no more than what' I see lying scattered, in numberless examples, before me ; and running through the whole line of my recollections ; and meeting me in every walk of observ- ation to which I can betake myself ; and, now that the microscope has unveiled the wonders of another region, I see strewed around me, with a profusion which baffles my every attempt to comprehend it, the evidence that there is no one portion of the universe of God too minute for his no- tice, or too humble for the visitations of his care." — p. 116. We have justly ascribed such expressions to " inadverten- cy," for the Doctor loses no occasion for enforcing the glo- rious supremacy of the dispensation of Christ over the other illustrations of the divine benignity ; nor can any terms be more animated than those which he has employed to this ef- fect, in some passages of the discourse on the argument of which we have so very disproportionately enlarged. The direct and conclusive argument against the infidel objection closes here. It rests its strength on indisputable matters of fact. And it leaves the infidel literally not an atom to stand upon ; for it animates even atoms to an implacable hostility against him. In drawing towards an end of our analysis ofthese Discourses, we think it may not be amiss to repeat that Dr. Chalmers uniformly recognizes the complete sufficiency of the evidences for Christianity, independently, altogether, of the questions which he is discussing : insomuch that that evidence would remain invincible if his whole argument were judged or prov- ed to have failed ; — that is to say, if it were judged or proved, in the first place, that the astonishing expenditure, shall we call it, by the exercise of the Divine Attributes upon the indi- viduals of an inconceivable multitude of the most diminutive beings, and upon an inconceivable number of minute particu- lars and circumstances relating to man, (beings and circum- stances so stupendously small as parts of the universal system), is not enough to furnish any argument against the improbability 42 CHALMERS S ASTRONOMICAL DISCOURSES. of such an expedient for human happiness as that which reve- lation declares ; — and if it could be proved, in the next place, that this revealed economy of redemption disclaims any exten- sion, or, at least, is silent as to any extension, of its relations and utilities to any other portion of the great system extrane- ous to the sphere of human existence. Supposing the matter to be acknowledged to be thus, and supposing it to be then acknowledged, that we cannot under- stand how it can consist with the rules of proportion in the government of so vast a whole, for the Governor to do so great a thing for a most inconsiderable part, — this leaves the positive evidence in undiminished authority. This acknowledgment of ignorance amounts to this and no more, — that we cannot advance a certain philosophic argument, a priori, in corrobor- ation of that evidence. The absence of that argument de- tracts not a particle from the arguments which are present, and on which alone the cause ever professed to rest its demon- stration. This acknowledgment of ignorance is simply a confession that there is utter mystery on a side of the subject where it would have been gratifying to be able to find the means of raising a philosophic argument in favour of Chris- tianity. And, verily, mystery, as relative to the human under- standing, forms a marvellously pertinent allegation against an asserted and strongly evidenced fact in the Divine government of the universe ! The case is quite changed, if a man, instead of this ac* knowledgment of ignorance of the rule of proportion in that government, makes an avowal of knowledge ; if he says he can judge of that rule, and can see that the asserted fact in question is incompatible with it, and therefore must disbelieve that assertion, in contempt of all the alleged positive evidence. But we have then " a short method " with him. We have to tell him that he is to take the consequences of a flagrantly ir- religious, if not unphilosophical presumption ; for that he can^ not judge of that rule, and therefore it must be at his peril, that in the strength of his ignorant assumption to do so, he dares make light of that evidence. Perhaps it was not strictly necessary to make these remarks at this length ; Dr. Chalmers has several times used expres- sions to preserve it clearly in the reader's recollection, that the Christian evidence is not to be implicated in any way of dependence, in the smallest degree, in a course of argument Chalmers's astronomical discourses, 43 which is purely subsidiary ; but it may not be impertinent to have marked the distinction in a somewhat more formal man- ner in the above sentences. That Christianity is in no possi- ble degree committed to hazard upon the force or failure of the pleading, is the more necessary to be kept in view in reading the latter discourses in the series, because in them the au- thor indulges in a train of speculation, supported in a great de- gree upon conjectures and a looser kind of analogies than those which have served him so well in the preceding part of the course ; conjectures, however, and analogies, which he does not mistake for certainties and direct proofs. It might have been a sufficient service to Christianity, to make good the negative argument in its favour, — to show the futility of attempting to support against it a charge of being absurd and incredible, even though it did, by the necessary constitution of such an economy, and by avowals in its own professed revelation, confine itself exclusively to the interests of man. But the preacher concludes his Third Discourse with the assertion, that the vindication may be carried forward to a positive argument, confronting the infidel objection ; for that revelation avows, what reason might well surmise of such an economy, that it extends, in very important relations, to a much wider sphere, than that of the exclusive human interests. Accordingly, the Fourth Discourse proceeds to " The know- ledge of man's moral history in the distant places of the Cre- ation ;" and it is followed by another on " The sympathy that is felt for man in the distant places of creation." The wide sweep of reasoning and imagination over the distant regions of the moral world, terminates in the Sixth Discourse, " On the contest for an ascendency over man, amongst the higher orders of intelligence." With regard to the general object pursued through this lat- ter part of the course, we shall acknowledge at once that we are extremely sceptical, while we do most willing justice to the ingenious argumentation, and picturesque illustration, and buoyant and soaring fancy, which the preacher has so largely displayed in his progress. On a cool consideration of the sub- ject, it would seem that the scriptural grounds for supporting the speculation, are very slight ; and it may perhaps be sus- pected, that in the weight which our author rests on these, and in the degree of confidence with which he adduces arguments from analogy, and surmises of general probability, he may 44 Chalmers's astronomical DiscotJRSirs. have a little transgressed the rigid rules of speculation so just* ly applauded in the earlier discourses. The P'ourth and Fifth Discourses have for their texts, — "Which things angels desire to look into ;" and, " I say unto you, that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons which need no repentance." No fact beyond the limits of our world is more prominent in the declarations of the Bible, than the existence of a high order of intelligences denominated angels. The equivocal and the lower application of the term in a num- ber of instances can deduct nothing from the palpable evidence of the fact. But who and what are angels ? The effect of an assemblage of passages relating to them in the Bible, the de- scriptions, narratives, and allusions would seem to give an idea widely different from that of stationary residents in particular parts of the creation, — an idea, rather, of perpetual ministe- rial agency, in a diversified distribution of appointments, many of them occasional and temporary, in the fulfilment of which numbers of them visit or sojourn in this world. On the ground of analogy we may be allowed to surmise, that there may be spiritual ministers of this sublime order appointed to all other worlds in the creation. Now, as to the angels, that portion of them at least whose appointments have a relation to this world, there cannot be a moment's question whether they are acquainted with the condition of man, and take an interest in the economy of God's moral government over him. The Scriptures directly affirm it and in many ways imply it. But this proves nothing as to the knowledge or interest concerning man among the respective inhabitants of the distant parts of the creation. It is conceivable that there may be an indefinite reciprocation of intelligence among some of the angels commis- sioned to many regions of the universe, and they may, for any thing we can know, impart, in the scenes of their ministry, some portion of the intelligence thus reciprocated : on the con- trary, they may maintain an inviolable silence. But, indeed, though this inter-communication of these diversely commis- sioned agents may be conceived possible to some extent, no notion can be entertained of its approaching to completeness and universality. This would be to attribute faculties too vast for created intelligences, — too vast, because commensurate, in each individual, with the whole creation of God, if there be such ministerial agents deputed to every part of that creation. Chalmers's astronomical discourses. 45 And however stupendously capacious their faculties might be, it is not conceivable that such a boundless diversity and mul- titude of contemplations and interests could consist w^ith the devoted unremitting attention to the specific objects of their respective appointments. Next, with regard to the inhabitants, properly so denomin- ated, of the unnumbered millions of distinct worlds in the cre- ation, (the truth of that theory being assumed,) there would seem to be insurmountable objections to the notion of their all receiving large information and feeling deep interest concern- ing the people and transactions of this planet. Let it be con- sidered, that it is beyond all doubt that in every world where the Creator has placed intelligent beings, (we leave out of the account whatever region it may be to which the fallen angels are consigned,) he has made successive, diversified, and won- derful manifestations of his attributes in the peculiar economy of that world itself. It is not conceivable that he should not have made continually such disclosures of himself to them, car- ried on such a government over them, furnished so many proofs and monitions of their relation to him, summoned their powers so imperiously to the utmost service to him of which they are capable, that they will have, within their own peculiar sphere, copious interest and employment for their faculties during a large portion of their time. It is even reasonable to suppose that, be these distinct inhabited spheres as numerous as the most ambitious conjecture of an angel can make them, there have been, in the history of each one of them, without excep- tion, some extraordinary and stupendous events and moral phe- nomena, standing in majestic pre-eminence for the contempla- tion of the inhabitants, and involving, as interventions of the Almighty, such glory, and miracle, and mystery, that " angels may desire to look into them." Why should it not be so ? It plainly gives a loftier idea of that Being, that he should do such great things in all the worlds of his dominion, than that he should do them in only a few instances, or in only one, and that he should do them in an endless diversity of form and mode, than in only one. But if the fact should be so, consid- er what a countless multitude of things will deserve, perhaps equally deserve, as signal manifestations of the Divinity, to be brought within the view of those tribes of intelligent creatures, whose expanded faculties and exalted position render it possi- ble for them to extend their adoring contemplations afar over 3* 46 Chalmers's astronomical discourses. the dominions of God. It would follow, that their regards cannot be fixed on the economy of this world with so much of a concentration of attention and interest, as our author seems inclined to represent. As to the conjecture that many, or that all the worlds of the creation may have sl direct interest in the economy of redemp- tion, as having, possibly, like our race, incurred the crime and calamity of a moral lapse, the preacher only throws it out as one among a variety of imaginative surmisings, and is evidently not desirous to make it the basis, or a part of any positive the- ory. We think it cannot be entertained for one moment. The most submissive humility on all subjects relating to the divine government, and its mysteries and possibilities, cannot pre- clude an irresistible impression that the idea of so wide a preva- lence of evil in the universe, is absolutely incompatible with faith in the goodness of its Creator and Governor. Let any devout mind dwell awhile on the thought, and try whether it is not so. The prevalence of evil in only this one world, is an inexpressibly mysterious and awful fact ; insomuch, that all attempts to explain how it is consistent with the perfect good- ness of an Almighty Being, have left us in utter despair of any approach toward comprehending it. A pious spirit, not delu- ded by any of the vain and presumptuous theories of philosoph- ical or theological explanation, while looking toward this un- fathomable subject, can repose only in a general confidence that the dreadful fact, of the prevalence of evil in this planet, is in some unimaginable way combined with such relations, and such a state of the grand whole of the divine empire, that it is perfectly consistent with infinite goodness in Him that made and directs all things. But therefore this confidence cannot subsist on any supposition that the other regions of that empire, are also in any great proportion ravaged by this dire- ful enemy and destroyer of happiness. On any such suppo- sition, mystery changes into horror. By the way, this topic supplies a mighty argument for that theory of an ample plurality of worlds of intelligent beings, so probable on philosophic grounds, and so consonant with sub- lime ideas of the Creator's power and glory. Unless we ad- mit that theory, we assign to evil such a fearful proportion to the good in the condition of the intelligent creation, as to dark- en into intolerable gloom the collective view of its economy. How vast must the moral system be, to contain such a magni- Chalmers's astrot^omical discourses. 4T tude of good as to reduce this horrible mass of evil, existing and accumulating through thousands of years, to a mere cir- cumstance, scarcely discernible as an exception to the esti- mate, that " all is good," merged and lost in the glory of the comprehensive whole ! — ^Not, indeed, that by a reference to that unknown whole, we can in the smallest degree diminish the mystery of the existence of evil in this one world, — of its existence at all in the creation of an infinitely good and pow- erful Being ; but we do, in this idea of the immensity of that creation, obtain a ground for the assurance, that the propor- tion of good among the creatures of the Almighty, may all but infinitely transcend that of evil. While we acknowledge that, for ourselves, we feel it neces- sary to entertain this idea of the immensity of the intelligent creation, in order to the full and consolatory effect of our faith in the goodness of the Supreme Being, we shall naturally wonder at the happier temperament of those theologians, if such there be, who meet with no very disquieting difficulty on this whole field of speculation ; who, while limiting their view of the intelligent creation to this world, (combined with the assemblages of angels and departed human spirits) and seeing in this world, through its whole duration hitherto, such a preva- lence of moral evil, that they deem an immense majority of the race consigned to eternal destruction, can yet, by the aid of some superficial theory of human volition, and some lightly assumed and presumptuous maxims respecting penal example in the or- der of the divine government, escape, with great apparent fa- cility, into great apparent complacency, from the overwhelm, ing awfulness of the economy. We should crave excuse for repetition while we try to select terms somewhat more precise, to say, that upon the theory of the immensity of the intelligent creation, we may take ground for the presumption that the rectitude and happiness, either ab- solutely perfect, or but slightly defective, of an inconceivable number of rational creatures, constitutes, over the vast gener- al scene, a direct and infinitely clear manifestation of the Cre- ator's goodness, leaving the solemn mystery, in this respect, to rest chiefly on this one small province of the universal do- minion ; that presumption aiding our adoration, though it does not extenuate the gloom of this mystery as respecting this world considered exclusively. But to return, for a moment, to the more immediate topics 48 Chalmers's astronomical discourses, of the Discourses. They glow with eloquent, poetical, strik- ing representations of the earnest impassioned interest with which all the good beings, of even so stupendous a multitude of worlds, may be conceived to regard our race, as a family lapsed from their allegiance and their felicity, and under a dis- pensation of recovery. There is no pretending to know how much it is reasonable to conjecture on such a subject. A great deal of generous regard for the human race, may, with sobriety of imagination, be attributed to those ministers of the Almighty, who are charged with beneficent offices in the econ- omy of this world. But when we think of the inhabitants of the universe, according to the computation all along maintain- ed, or rather the theory, which defies all computation ; when we consider that self-love must be the primary law of all cre- ated conscious existences, and that in all their localities and states this self-love will have its immediate sphere ; when we seek to imagine a medium of anouncement or representation by which our transactions and concerns should be vividly and protractedly impressed on the intellect and affections of the remotest foreigners of the creation ; and when we refliect, ac- cording to what we have already suggested, that for the con- templation of those tribes or orders, whose faculties may be of a capacity to admit, and whose happiness may be made great- ly to consist in their receiving, a sublimely enlarged know- ledge of the creation, there will be an infinity of memorable and amazing facts of the divine government, — when we con- sider all this, we confess we cannot, without being haunted with an invincible sense of very great extravagance, listen to a strain of eloquence which would go to the length of represent- ing all the wise and amiable intelligences of all the systems of the universe, as employing a large proportion of the energies of their being on the history and destiny of our race. The grand argument for assuming such a concentration of attention and interest upon this world, is the extraordinary and transcendent nature of the expedient for human redemp- tion. And well may that argument be urged to the extent of an assurance, that if the Blessed and Only Potentate wills that the most signal facts of his government in one world should be celebrated in others, this expedient must stand in the most em- inent order of the facts so celebrated. But when that ar- gument is pressed to so extreme a consequence, as in our Chalmers's astronomical discourses. 49 author's fervid conjectures and assumptions, one or two con- siderations will suggest themselves. In the first place, there seems to be some inadvertency, common to him with many divines ajid pious men, in express- ing the mode of apprehending the interposition of Deity, as manifested in the person of the Messiah. He sometimes falls into language which would do little less than imply that the Divine Nature, as subsisting in that mysterious connexion with the human, subjected itself to a temporary limitation, and, if we may apply such a term, monopoly, to that one purpose and agency of human redemption ; as if Deity, so combined, con- tracted, and depressed itself from the state of Deity in the ab- stract, sustaining some suspension of the exercise of those in- finite attributes which can be limited to no one object, or op- eration, or world, for one instant. — Not that any such limit- ation is intended so to be implied ; but, under the defective ef- fect of a language which bears a semblance of such an import, the argument in question (that from the pre-eminent marvel- lousness and benevolence of the expedient for redemption) is carried to an exaggerated conclusion. Of this deceptive cha- racter, we think, is the parallel which begins in page 150, be- tween this great act of Divine interposition, and the supposed instance of a monarch of an extensive empire, who should, for a brief space of time, a few hours, or a day, (which would, as the author remarks, be infinitely longer in proportion to the whole time of his reign, than the duration of the mediatorial period on earth as compared with the eternity of the divine government,) lay aside the majesty and the concerns of his general government, to make a visit of compassion to the hum- ble cottage of some distressed or guilty family. It is obvious that this illustration should imply (or the virtue of the parallel is lost) that "in turning him to our humble habitations," (page 152) " the King, Eternal, Immortal, and Invisible," (in these absolute terms of Divinity, the visitant is designated,) did in some manner withdraw and descend from the full amplitude of the glory and exercise of the unalienable attributes of Deity. But surely, whatever was the mode of that mysterious com- bination of the divine with an inferior nature, we are required religiously to beware of all approach toward such an idea as that of a modification of the Supreme nature, and to preserve the solemn idea of a Being, absolute, unalterable, and necessa- rily always in entire possession and excercise of all that consti- 50 Chalmers's astronomical discourses. tutes its supremacy and perfection. But the divine nature "manifested" in the human, in the person of the Messiah, con- tinued then and ever in such an unlimited state of glory and ac- tion, that it might be then, and at every moment of the media- torial dispensation, making innumerable other manifestations of itself, and performing infinite wonders of grace and power altogether foreign, are the remote scenes of their display, from this world and the interposition for its redemption ; an inter- position, which could in no manner interfere with any other interpositions, of a kind indefinitely dissimilar from it and one other, which the Sovereign Agent might will to effect in other regions. Since, therefore, the inexplicable indwelling in the person of the Mediator, could in no manner affect the plenary presence and energy of the divine Nature, as while so indwelling, per- vading also all the other realms of the universe ; and since, while that mighty essence imparted immeasurable virtue to the mediatorial work and sacrifice, it yet could not sustain any dif- ficulty, degradation, or injury ; — as the griefs, the dreadful in- flictions for the sin of the world, fell exclusively upon a subor- dinate being, belonging to our own economy ; — there would not seem to be an imperious reason for the universality of the inhabitants of the creation to be occupied with a paramount in- terest in the transaction, though so illustrious a display of the Almighty's justice and mercy toward one section of his domin- ion. In the next place, we would notice a still more striking inad- vertency in our excellent author's representations. In main- taining the probability of the knowledge and celebration of the wonderful expedient for the redemption of man, far through the numberless abodes of intellectual existence, he indulges habitually a strain of descriptive sentiment which would be precisely applicable, ifthat economy were designed to be, or were in fact, redeemingly comprehensive of the whole world of men. But then, is it applicable, as the awful truth stands dis- played before us ? He keeps quite out of view what that divine intervention was not designed to accomplish, as made evi- dent in the actual state in life, and after death, of a dread pro- portion of the human race ; and forms his conceptions of the manner of interest with which innumerable pure and happy tribes of the universe may be imagined to contemplate our world, as if this reality of things should not be apparent to them. Chalmers's astronomical discourses. 51 It is too obvious how deeply this reality affects the ground of his sanguine and exulting presumptions of such an immensely extended interest and gratulation. We should advert to those passages of Scripture which he has collected in page 147. " And while we, whose prospect reaches not beyond the narrow limits of the corner we occupy, look on the dealings of God in the world, as car- rying in them all the insignificancy of a provincial transaction ; God him- self, whose eye reaches to places which our eye hath not seen, nor our ear heard of, neither hath it entered into our imagination to conceive, stamps a univei-sality on the whole matter of the Christian salvation, by such revelations as the following : — That he is to gather together, in one, all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are m earth, even in him ; — and that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth ; — and that by him God reconciled all things unto himself, whether they be things in eaTth, or things in heaven." We do not know where to seek a rule of interpretation for these passages, the most essential expressions of which — " all things" — and " things in heaven" — are among the most inde- finite phrases in the Bible. It cannot be proved that their meaning does not comprehend more than such a portion of su- perhuman beings as may be placed within a circumscribed economy appropriate to our world — as some of the angels evi- dently are. But the circumstance which is fatal to every am- bitious interpretation of them in their higher reference, is, the necessity of putting an exceedingly restricted one on them in their lower. How greatly less must be intended than the lit- eral import of the expression, " all things in earth," is shown in the history and the actual and prospective state of the earth's inhabitants. We must not prolong a course of remarks in which we are sensible of having been unpardonably prolix, by commenting on the Discourse, " On the contest for an ascendancy over man, among the higher orders of intelligence. The first part of it is employed, at rather perhaps too great a length for a printed work, in repetition and recapitulation ; but this might be highly proper in the discourse as delivered, at a consider- able distance of time from the former ones in the series. The exhibition of the warfare is in a high tone of martial energy. And what cause we have to wish, as Dr. Chalmers did in an able sermon, published a few years since, that the spirit and splendour of oratory and poetry might, through a heaven-in- 52 flicted fatally, desert, henceforward, all attempted celebrations of any other warfare than that between the cause of God and the power of evil, as put forth in infernal or in human agency. We have no disposition to accompany this portion of our ardent speculator's career, with exceptions to what we may deem its excesses of sentiment, and imagery, and confident conjecture. What we are most tempted to remark upon, in the description of the great contest carrying on between the in- telligent powers of light and darkness, for domination over the destiny of man, is a something too much like an implica- tion that this destiny can really be, in any possible measure, a depending question between created antagonists, or that it can appear to them, on either side, to be so, while both of them must be aware of the absolute certainty that the will of the Al- mighty is infinitely sovereign over all things. Indeed, this consideration renders it profoundly mysterious that there can be any contest at all. And to say that the existence of the con- test is mysterious, is saying in eflTect, that it is impossible to attain a probable conception how the parties are actuated. The sense of this has always, with us, interfered with the in- terest of the former part of the Paradise Lost. There appears an enormous absurdity in the presumptions and calculations on which the delinquent spirits adopt and prosecute their enter- prise ; an absurdity, we mean, on the part of the poet, in mak- ing them to act from calculations, which it w^as absolutely im- possible their enlarged understandings could entertain. Nevertheless, we have the testimony, express and by diver- sified implications, of the Holy Scriptures, for the fact of a for- midable moral dissension among the higher order of intelli- gences, in which the condition of the human race has been awfully involved. The concluding Discourse is on a topic of very serious and melancholy interest, — the possibility to minds of feeling, and taste, and imagination, of being elated to noble contempla- tions, and aflfected by fine emotions, of a nature that shall seem to be intimately related to genuine piety, and may easily be mistaken for it, while yet the heart is destitute of all that is es- sential in the experience of religion. Nothing could be better judged than the placing of this subject in broad and promi- nent view at the close of such a train of contemplations. How possible is it that hundreds of readers may have expatiated in thought with emotions of sublime and delightful solemnity, on Chalmers's astronomical discourses. 53 the scene of astronomical magnificence displayed in the intro- ductory Discourses ; and inasmuch as the glory of that scene is the glory of the Almighty Creator, may have deemed their emotions to partake of, or be identical with, religious devo- tion, — a sentiment and a state to which there were tests exist- ing to convict them of being strangers. The preacher has forcibly illustrated, in many other forms, this treacherous sem- blance of religious vitality. And the feeling awakened at the view of so many interesting emotions, still useless, and by their deceptive influence, worse than useless, to the subjects of them, is so mournflil, that the reader is almost impelled to re- lieve himself by seeking cause to think that some of the repre- sentations are over- wrought, and some of the decisions too severe ; and he is tempted to be gratified at obtaining an al- leviation of the painful effect of some of the stern adjudgments, at the expense of the judge, whose occasional violences of ora- tory, and negligences of discrimination, afford a hint that his sentence cannot be without appeal. Much important and alarm- ing truth, however, there is in this Discourse. It contains the elements of an eminently useful and warning instruction. But the subject requires a much more elaborate and definite discussion ; and we wish Dr. Chalmers may take another op- portunity of treating it formally with the deliberate, best exer- tion of his mind. On the merely literary character of his composition we shall content ourselves with a very few words. We cannot dissemble that we wish he would put his style under a strong- ly alterative discipline. No readers can be more sensible to its glow and richness of colouring, and its not unfrequent hap- py combinations of words ; but there is no denying that it is guilty of a rhetorical march, a sonorous pomp, a " showy same- ness ;" a want, therefore, of simplicity and flexibility ; withal, a perverse and provoking grotesqueness, a frequent descent, strikingly incongruous with the prevailing elatedness of tone, to the lowest colloquialism, and altogether an unpardonable li- cense of strange phraseology. The number of uncouth, and fantastic, and we may fairly say barbarous phrases, that might be transcribed, is most unconscionable. Such a style needs a strong hand of reform ; and the writer may be assured it contains life and soul enough to endure the most unrelenting process of correction, the most cumpulsory trials to change its form, without hazard of extinguishing its spirit. 54 JOHN HORNE TOOKE. 11. JOHN HORNE TOOKE. Memoirs of John Home Tooke, interspersed with Original Docu- ments. By Alexander Stephens, Esq. That eager desire which the decease of very distinguished men so commonly excites among the inquisitive part of the community, to obtain ample memoirs of their lives and illus- trations of their opinions and characters, must have been greatly repressed with respect to the very extraordinary indi- vidual who is the subject of these volumes. There cannot but have been a very general conviction, that it was as much in vain to expect a really faithful history and impartial estimate of him as of Oliver Cromwell or the French Revolution. Even if such a book were to appear, it is probable it would have but few approving readers. In the minds of a very large proportion of reading Englishmen, the name of Home Tooke awakens ideas of almost every thing hateful or dreadful in politics and morals. A more moderate class, though giving him some considerable credit for honesty of intention, and su- periority to the lowest sort of self-interested motives — adopting too, to a limited extent, the principles on which he waged his political wars, and regarding him with something of that kind- ness which we are disposed to indulge toward men in adver- sity — feel nevertheless such disgust at some of the connexions in which he acted at some periods of his career, at the incon- sistency of his character with his spiritual profession while he exercised it, and at that later licentiousness of which his irreli- gion tended to secure him from being ashamed, that they can- not with any complacency hear him praised, while they see and despise the injustice of that undiscerning and unmixed opprobrium with which they hear him abused. There may be a small party ready to make light of all his faults and vices, and to extol him as the mirror of integrity, an apostle of liber- JOHN HORNE TOOKE. 55 ty, a model of orators, a prince of philosophers. — ^Not one per- son, probably, of these different classes, will ever alter his opinion of this remarkable character. The subject is old, the impression has long been made and settled, and just according to that impression will the biographer's performance be pro- nounced upouj instead of the impression itself being changed by the biographer's representations. Though we should be glad, certainly, that there were any chance of our ever obtaining, however unavailing it might be for rectifying public opinion, a perfect life of. this extraordina- ry man — a work written by a contemporary, endowed with great sagacity, a rational lover of liberty, a zealous friend of learning, and a true disciple of Christianity, and privileged, if such a man could have been so, with a long personal acquain- tance with his subject — ^yet we can make ourselves tolerably content under the certainty that such a work will never appear. The subject in question will not long continue to excite any considerable interest. There is a vast number of things the world can afford to forget. The train of events and of tran- siently conspicuous personages is passing on with such impe- tuous haste, and the crowd of interesting or portentous appear- ances is so multiplying in the prospect, that our attention is powerfully withdrawn from the past : and there is something almost melancholy in considering how soon men of so much figure, in their time, as Home Tooke, and even his greater contemporaries, will be reduced to the diminished forms of what will be regarded with the indifference, almost, of remote history. In the mean time, we might be tolerably satisfied with the information conveyed in the present work, if it were not so unconscionably loaded with needless matters. The author, though too favourable to his subject, is however much nearer to impartiality than probably any of the enemies of that sub- ject will ever be, in recording the life, or commenting on the principles. The work begins with the introduction of names which some ingenuity might be thought requisite to connect with the subject, if we were not aware that writing biography is an undertaking of such very questionable legitimacy, as to make it, in setting off, highly politic, in order to get fairly and unob- structed into the course, to stun and quell the prepared cavillers with the imposing sound of such names as Plutarch, Tacitus, 56 JOHN HORlSrE TOOKE. Bossuet, and "our own Bacon Lord Veruiam."* Several pages are then employed on the subject, apparently, of show- ing that the rank to be assigned, in biography, to distinguish talents, should not depend on the aristocratic or plebeian de- scent of their possessor. The author manages this topic so laboriously as to excite some little suspicion that he would, after all, have been better pleased to tell that his subject, John Home, was the son of a duke, than that he was the son of a poulterer in Newport Market. A paragraph like the following does not exemplify exactly the right way of effecting what it appears intended for. ** A tradition still exists in the family, that their ancestors possessed great wealth, and were settled on their own lands at no great distance from the metropolis. A more ingenious biographer, by a plausible refer- ence to county histories, might have been able, perhaps, to have traced their origin to a pretty remote period, and, w^ith a little reasonable con- jecture, it would have been easy to have ascertained the loss of the patri- monial estates during the wars between the rival Roses. Or the industry of a modern genealogist might have contrived, from the identity of names, in addition to some trivial and incidental circumstances, to have shed the lustre of episcopacy on their race, and, by means of Dr. George Home, Bishop of Norwich, reflected a borrowed renown on his new relatives. But such arts, even if allowable, are unnecessary here ; for the gramma- rian, who forms the subject of the present volumes, is fairly entitled to be considered as a noun substantive^ whose character and consequence might be impaired, rather than increased, by the addition of any unnecessary adjunct." As to the latter of these supposed expedients for conferring adventitious consequence on that proud " substantive," we should have thought that no one who had been a personal ob- server of his moral temperament, could have entertained the idea, long enough to put it in words, of importance being added to him by even a real relationship to the Bishop of Norwich, without being rebuked by the image of that bitterly sarcastic look with which the said " substantive" would have heard any such suggestion. He was born on the 25th of June, 1736. Whatever other reasons he might have for complacency in his parentage, there was one that could not fail to be always peculiarly grati- fying to him. His father's premises were contiguous to those of Frederick, Prince of Wales, the father of the present King. The officers of the Prince's household thought it would be a * When will writers learn to sweep their pages clear of idle expletives ? JOHN HORNE TOOKB. 57 great convenience to them to have an outlet to the street through a certain wall which belonged to the poulterer. With- out ceremony therefore they ordered a door- way to be broken in it, and paid no attention when he went to remonstrate. He at last boldly appealed to the law, and found its administration upright enough to defend him against the encroachment. Be- ing, however, zealously attached to the house of Brunswick, he had no sooner obtained this decision than he handsomely gave the Prince the desired accommodation. John, being a favourite and a boy of promise, was placed at Westminster school, and afterwards, for five or six years, at Eton ; where, however, it has not been discovered that he gained any literary honours, or made any efforts to gain them. There are traces of evidence, nevertheless, of great prematu- rity. " On interrogating," says our author, " an old lady, with a view of discovering if any thing remarkable had occurred during his childhood, I happened to ask, whether she had known Mr. Home Tooke when a boy." " No !" was the re- ply, " he never was a boy ; with him there was no interval between childhood and age ; he became a man all at once upon us !" He is believed to have become a diligent student at college, where he passed several years ; and whence he removed to undertake, to the great surprise and regret of his biographer, the office of usher in a school at Blackheath. It was at the " earnest request of his father, who was a zealous member of the church of England, that he entered, at length, into holy orders, and was ordained a deacon. It was not till a subsequent period that he qualified himself for holding preferment by passing through the usual ceremonies incident to the priesthood." And in the interval between the two points in his progress, and after he had made a commence- ment as a curate, he entirely abandoned all clerical intentions, and determined to enter on the law. At the Inns of Courts he had for contemporary students and familiar associates Dunning and Kenyon, the one of whom was afterwards to be his defender and the other his judge, but whose more prosperous fortunes of subsequent life could not then have been prognosticated on any ground of family, or tal- ent, or literary attainment. In this last particular both are asserted to have been very greatly his inferiors. And, to judge of their command of money by their almost rival frugal- 68 JOHN HORNE TOOKE. ity, we may conclude they were all under an equal necessity of submitting to calculate their future successes solely on their abilities and exertions. In the point of frugality it should be mentioned that there was a small difference in favour of the individual who was so very eminent for that virtue in later life. ** I have been repeatedly assured, by Mr. Home Tooke, that they were accustomed to dine together, during the vacation, at a little eating house, in the neighbourhood of Chancery. lane, for the sum of sevenpence half- penny each. * As to Dunning and myself,' added he, * we were generous, for we gave the girl who waited on us a penny a-piece ; but Kenyon, who always knew the value of money, sometimes rewarded her with a halfpenny, and sometimes with a promise !' " But in spite of his strong inclination to the law, the singular adaptedness of his powers for the most successful prosecution of it, this formal preparation for it, and this companionship with some of the most fortunate of its young proficients. Home was the captive, beyond redemption, of another destiny. " His family, which had never sanctioned this attachment," (to the law) " deemed the church far more eligible as a profession, and he was at length obliged to yield, notwithstanding his relutance, to the admonitions, the entreaties, and the persuasions, of his parents. It seems not at all improbable that a friendly compromise took place on this occasion ; and that an assurance was given of some permanent provision, in case he con- sented to relinquish his legal pursuits. "Acccordingly, in 1760, Mr. Home was admitted a priest of the church of England, by Dr. John Thomas, Bishop of Sarum ; and in the course of the same year he obtained the living of New Brentford, which was purchased for him by his father." — *' It is said to have produced be- tween jC200 and .£300 per annum. This income he enjoyed during elev- en years, and in the course of that period he not only did duty at Brent- ford, but also preached in many of the churches of the metropolis." In 1763, he was prevailed upon to become what he was ac- customed to denominate a bear-leader, that is, the travelling tutor of a young gentleman. With a son of the famous Elwes he passed more than a year in France, with vastly higher gratification, no doubt, than any that could have been afforded by the occupations of a parish priest. It is not, however, to be understood that he scorned all the proprieties of his profes- sion. We may transcribe without being bound to feel any great reverence for the biographer's judgment in theology, his account of Mr, Home's clerical ministrations. We need not remark on the extreme ignorance betrayed in JOHN HORNE TOOKE. 59 a passage which represents a man as avoiding controversial points, and keeping clear of mystery by— confining himself to "the truths contained in the Scriptures, and the received opinions of the Anglican church !" But whatever may be thought of that portion of Home's ser- vices to his people which he performed under a solemn eccle- siastical obligation, he claims the most animated praise for what he did beyond the terms of this obligation. " He actu- ally studied the healing art, for the express purpose of reliev- ing the complaints of such as were unable to pay for the assis- tance of an apothecary. To attain this end he carefully studied the works of Boerhaave, and the best practical physi- cians of that day ; and having learned to compound a few me- dicines, he formed a little dispensary at the parsonage -house, where he supplied the wants of his numerous and grateful pa- tients." It is added, that " he was accustomed, at times, to plume himself on the cures he had performed, and often ob- served, ' that though physic was said to be a problematical art, he believed that his medical were far more efficacious than his spiritual labours.' " — Sufficient care, however, was taken that these occupations should not trench on the time and atten- tion due to the "Rule and Exercise" of gentility and fashion. He was fond of gay company ; and as some slight drawback from the praises earned in his theological and medical capaci- ty, it is in the softest, gentlest form of blame acknowledged, " that he was, at one period, accused of being too fond of cards, and of spending too much of his time at ombre, qua- drille, and whist." The biographer did not think himself called upon to tell that the clergyman used to spend the Sun- day afternoon in this canonical employment, with a preference, for honesty's sake, of a room looking to the street, and with every kind of blind removed from the windows. But then what an excellent chance we have of knowing, from biogra- phers, all that is material to an estimate of men's characters. Friends will not make plain confessions of things which we know not whether we ought to believe when asserted in the accusations of enemies. Our author observes that a man of Mr. Home's opinions might perhaps have been expected to " lean to the Dissenters," on account of the more republican cast of their church econo- my, and their entertaining a spirit favourable to civil liberty. No. He deemed the gradation of ranks in the national 60 JOHN HORNE TOOKE. establishment well calculated for the production, as well as the reward, of " merit and virtue ;" and, ** Notwithstanding the charges afterwards adduced asfainst him, on the score of orthodoxy, no one was more violent against schismatics of all de- scriptions." *' Out of the pale of its faith" (that of the established church) *' he never was very ready to admit of any ecclesiastical desert whatever." —Vol. i. p. 39. Mr. Stephens could perhaps have explained on what theory of the subject the established church could have a strenuous advocate in an utter contemner of its creed. But that a man holding such notions concerning religion as Mr. Home Tooke notoriously did, should be violent against schismatics, is one of the most scandalous inconsistencies in the whole records of human perversity. To think that a man so fierce (and surely we do not censure this animosity) against meanness, hypocri- sy, time-serving, and treachery, could also find an object of antipathy and reprobation in that conscientiousness which would not dishonestly and treacherously profess and take the emolument of an adherence to a church, while seriously disap- proving its tenets or institutions ! and that he could, the while, give himself all manner of credit for rectitude of judgment and moral feeling ! But it is thus that irreligion is very apt to become an occultation of common sense in matters where reli- gion is concerned. Possibly, however, there was somewhat more sense in this than may be obvious just at first sight. It would not be very strange if a man who rejects religion should be very desirous to obtain that sort of countenance to his rejection, which he would seem to receive from the character of those who pro- fessed to espouse it, while they were all found devoid of prin- ciple. He may therefore very naturally be vexed there should be men to prove by example that Christianity is a promoter of integrity of conduct. Reverting to the biographer's assertion, that Mr. Home Tooke thought the hierarchy " well calculated to incite to," as well as " reward, virtue and merit ;" we may very fairly make it a question whether we do not get nearer his real opinion in the following extract from a letter he wrote to Wilkes, from one of the stages of his first journey to France. "You are entering into a correspondence with a parson, and I am greatly apprehensive lest that title should disgust ; but give me leave to JOHI»f HORNE TOOKE. gl assure you I am not ordained a hypocrite. It is true I have suffered the infectious hand of a bishop to be waved over me ; whose imposition, like the sop given to Judas, is only a signal for the devil to enter. *• I allow, that usually at that touch — * fugiunt pudor verumque, fidesque. In quorum subeunt locum fraudes, dolique, insidiaque," &c. &c., but I hope I have escaped the contagion ; and, if I have not, if you should at anytime discover the black spot under the tongue, pray kindly assist me to conquer the prejudices of education and profession." — p. 76. We have little doubt that this indelible record may be taken as the genuine expression of his estimate of the institution to which he belonged, and was always mortified to belong ; and therefore as a measure of the honesty, the equity, and the de- corum with which he could be "violent against schismatics." He boldly declared there was nothing in this letter which he should be ashamed to have generally known, when he under- stood that the worthy friend to whom it had been addressed threatened to publish it, in revenge of some offence he had chosen to take at the writer. But nevertheless, he must have been excessively vexed at his own indiscretion, even though he had not entertained (it does not appear whether he ever did entertain) any ambitious designs on the higher stations in the church, designs to which the public disclosure of such senti- ments would inevitably be fatal. He would be more mortified at being exhibited in this attitude of humiliation. A proud man, an able man, a learned man, and a knowing man, thus al- most prostrate before such a piece of human nature as Wilkes ! indignantly but impotently endeavouring to tear off his sacer- dotal vestments ; making a bitter but poor jest of ceremonies which he had been obliged to maintain the utmost gravity while undergoing; earnest to divert the anticipated sneer from himself to his fraternity and sacred vocation ; eager to prove that though he had professed to be " moved by the Holy Ghost," he was not, he really and in good faith was not, unworthy of the friendship of one of the most abandoned profligates on earth ; entreating to be allowed to make a sacrifice of whatever in his educa- tion and chosen profession might be displeasing to this regent of doctrines and morals ; and hoping to be at length, through his auspicious influence, redeemed from the degradation at least, if he could not be delivered from the fact, of being a priest ! His feelings with regard to his profession would be com- bined with many other sentiments to make him exult in the prospect of another travelling adventure, which was to extend 4 62 JOHN HORNE TOOKE. through the most interesting parts of France and Italy. He went again in the capacity of tutor to a young man of fortune. He left his canonicals at Dover, and " assumed the habit, ap- pearance, and manners of a private gentleman." " Nor ought it to be omitted," says the biographer, " that, on both this and the former occasion, the young gentleman entrusted to his care, never once dreamed that he was under his in- spection ; but deemed himself honoured, as well as obliged, by the permission to accompany him in the capacity of a friend." Wilkes, in one of the letters in which the grand quarrel between the two friends was publicly fought out, al- ludes to Home's residence in Italy, with strong intimations respecting his morals, and challenges him to venture a refer- ence on that subject to an — " Italian gentleman now in Lon- don," a challenge which the clergyman does not notice in his reply. However this may be, he seems, on his return, to have taken to the pulpit with a considerable degree of activity, and with a distinction which might soon have grown to popularity and celebrity. " There is abundance of proof, indeed, that Mr. Home was now con- eidered an admirable preacher, and that his eloquence only wanted culti- vation, to place him among the most successful of our English divines. But it was in orthodox and doctrinal discourses that he chiefly excelled, and he is accordingly reported to have distinguished himself greatly by his exhortations before confirmation, on which occasion, by mingling Bound argument with kind and affectionate persuasion, he never failed to make a suitable impression on all who heard him. In short, he might not only have been greatly respected, as a popular pastor, but was still in a fair way to become one of the pillars of the Anglican church, when a me- morable event occurred in the political world, and proved an insurmounta- ble, though not, perhaps, an unexpected obstacle to his future preferment.'* This event was the famous Middlesex election, in which the government was braved, encountered, and defeated by a daring mock patriot, of ruined fortune, obnoxious to the laws, and of infamous morals. The leading facts of that transaction are sufficiently known. Wilkes, though he carried the election, was rejected by the House of Commons. He had the same success a second, third, fourth, and fifth time, in quick succession, and still met the same repulse. Colonel Luttrell was his opponent in the fifth election, and was declared duly elected, though he had only about a fourth part of the votes. It is stated that tho JOHN HORNE TOOKE. 69 mob became so furious on this, that the Colonel would have lost his life but for the personal interposition of Mr, Home, who rescued him and conducted him to a place of safety. Our author observes, " This generous conduct must surely be allowed to have been worthy of applause ; but, such is the deadly enmity of political contests, that it rendered him ever after suspected by many of that party, and, on a future occasion, was frequently quoted agamst him as an indelible disgrace." Home put forth the whole force of his mind in the prepara- tion for this great contest, and in the management of it ; and to his able and indefatigable exertions the biographer mainly attributes the energy and success of the popular cause. His courage, which was of the coolest and firmest kind, shrunk from no hazard : his resources of argument and declamation were inexhaustible : his personal applications had every diver- sity of address and persuasion : his very moderate pecuniary means were freely devoted : and his measures and exertions to preserve good order, and prevent all violence, beyond that of language, on the popular side, proved how well he was qualified to manage the populace, and how much influence he must have previously acquired over their minds. This care to prevent violence was strongly contrasted with the conduct of the government party, who hired and embodied a gang of ruffians for the purpose of perpetrating it. In consequence, several unoffending persons were desperately wounded, and one man was killed. Home's zeal and intrepidity were emi- nently displayed in his unsuccessful efforts to bring to justice the criminals in this and one or two other deeds of partly sim- ilar nature. Why such efforts should be unsuccessful, when those criminals were ascertained, it is not difficult to conjec- ture. The share he took in this contest would be to him of the nature of an experiment on his own powers ; and the manner in which he had borne himself through so various and turbu- lent a warfare, would greatly confirm and augment his con- sciousness of extraordinary strength. While this would tend to impart a tone of provocation and defiance, the exercise of so ardent, and in his constant opinion, so virtuous an hostility, excited a passion for war which could not in a mind constituted of such " stern stuff" as his, become extinct as soon as the particular occasion was past. A heated piece of iron retains 64 JOHN HORNE TOOKE. its power to burn longer than slighter substances. The pas- sion was prolonged in a keen watchfulness to find an ene- my, and a tierce promptitude to attack him. When we add to this, that from his childhood his hatred had been directed against the sins of governments, we shall not wonder to find him, from the period in question, the unrelenting persecutor of statesmen, and their corruptions, and their adherents. Among the first objects of this inextinguishable spirit of war was a Right Honourable person of the name of Onslow, a member of administration, who was publicly called to account for an imputed delinquency in so peremptory a style, that he was provoked to make his ultimate answer by a prosecution. Home, defeated at first, stoutly fought the matter through the courts to a third trial, in which he was completely victorious ; and it was a victory over a much greater personage than his immediate antagonist, for he defeated Lord Mansfield, and in a manner so marked and decisive that it must have caused that personage extreme mortification. This was a proud commencement of that series of interviews which Home was destined to have with his lordship, under the relation of judge and culprit, and might contribute not a little to his maintain- ing ever afterwards such an attitude of intrepidity and equality as no other man did, in the same relation, to the great despot of law. There awaited him, however, a much more vexatious, and less eventually prosperous contest, in his public correspondence with Wilkes. It will depend on the various degrees of inter- est felt by readers about Home's history and character to be grateful to the biographer, to forgive him, or to condemn him, for inserting nearly the whole of this correspondence, occupy- ing about a hundred and forty pages. We profess to place our- selves, not without a very great effort, in the middle class of these three. We think a short analysis might have competently exhibited the merits of the question, and would have satisfied at least half of the readers of the work. If it was presumed that a considerable number would really wish for more, the entire correspondence might have been printed separately for their sake. But probably it is a better trade calculation to load every copy with the additional cost of this republished correspondence, than to sell the work for so much less, and leave it to the option of the purchasers to send also for this supplemental part. JOHN HORNE TOOKE. 65 It contains a great deal of able writing, but is so completely of a personal nature as that it would require the combatants to be of much greater historical importance to give it any per- manent interest. It explains why they became virulent and implacable enemies, and exhibits a graceless picture of strong talent on the one side, and alert talent on the other, earnestly exerted and delighted to tear, and stab, and poison, and ready, apparently, to join in a most devout prayer to the nether world for more efficient implements of offence. Home's letters are composed with a grave, intense argumentative acrimony* Wilkes's, with still more deadly rancour, are more volatile, satiric, affectedly careless, and captiously smart : they display the boldest impudence of depravity, with wit enough to render it both amusing and mischievous. In point of success, relative- ly to the main matters in dispute, there is no manner of com- parison between the two. Home's part of the correspondence, though it may not completely vindicate himself in all points, perfectly explodes his opponent to atoms. It proves this noisy demagogue, who scorned the people as much as he gulled them, and hated men in the proportion in which he had re- ceived any favours from them, was one of the most worthless articles ever put in the human figure. Nevertheless, it seems that, in general estimation, Wilkes was the victor. We cannot comprehend on what ground " superior skill" is attributed to Wilkes in this conflict ; nor should we have known where to seek a proof of his " more intimate knowledge of mankind," if something like such proof had not presented itself in the circumstance of his confidence, that he should be able to maintain himself in favour with the multitude in spite of those exposures by which his adversary probably expected, though perhaps with less confidence, to destroy his popularity. Indeed Home did himself, a little while afterwards, almost acknowledge that his enemy was the more knowing man, when he said, in one of his letters to Junius, " I am sometimes half inclined to suspect that Mr. Wilkes has formed a truer judgment of mankind than I have." But really, in glancing through the controversy now, in the indifference of feeling with which matters so long past and comparatively unim{)or- tant are regarded, we think almost every reader will allow that Home might, without forfeiting much of his high reputa- tion for shrewdness and knowledge of the world, have presum- ed that his statements could not fail, at the least, greatly to 66 JOHN HORNE TOOKE. moderate the popular idolatry of his opponent. Unless they regarded the series of allegations as a string of absolute fab- rications and falsehoods, and that too in spite of the evidence by which many of them would be substantiated, it it impossi- ble to understand how the public could resist the conviction, that tffis champion of liberty and justice was destitute of con- science and shame ; that he was selfish and ravenous to the last possible excess ; that he cared for no public interest but so far as he could turn it to his own advantage ; that in virtue of his acting the patriot he arrogantly demanded, of a party of public-spirited men who were associated for political ob- jects, to be supported, by subscriptions, in a sumptuous style of living, while his immense debts also were to be liquidated from the same source ; that he was indignant when any por- tion of the pecuniary liberality which had from the first been intended for more purposes than merely aids to him, was pro- posed to be applied to any one of those purposes, however ur- gent and important ; that he had thus become a burden and nuisance to his generous supporters, as intolerable as the ma- gician or demon that fixed himself on the shoulders of Sinbad ; that his capacity and fame for daring exploits did not preclude the meanness that could descend to the most paltry tricks ; that, in short, the sooner the public cause could be totally dis- severed from his interests and character, the better. To con- vince the people of the necessity of this separation, we can believe to have been really the leading object with Home in this ferocious controversy; though his own vindication and revenge came in, of course, for a considerable share of his concern. Perhaps it is allowable to receive with some degree of scepticism Home's declarations that he had never lent his aid to the mock patriot from any personal partiality to him, but always exclusively on public grounds ; having, he says, very early in their acquaintance, been led to conceive " an infinite contempt for the very name of Mr. Wilkes." If, however, he did, almost from the first, estimate the man at his true worth, we know not how it is possible to excuse him for being con- tent, during so considerable a space of time, that the public cause should be identified with the character and interests of such a man. It is true that the man, however bad, had a just quarrel against the government ; the nation had also its just quarrel ; and the prosecution of both these quarrels coalesced JOHN HORNE TOOKE. 6T into one action. But it was of little consequence what became of so profligate and worthless a person : and one really should have been glad if the nation could have found any other possible means of asserting its rights, than by identifying those dignifi- ed and sacred objects, justice and liberty, with a compost of vices that proclaimed itself for their apostle and martyr. Doubtless it must be acknowledged that such a case would, to a man of public spirit, and at the same time refined and reli- gious conscience, present a choice of two evils. It is, on the one hand, a great evil for a nation to suffer, for a year or a month, an infringement of any one of its rights. It is a very great evil, on the other hand, that the most momentous national interests and political principles should, in order to their being defensively maintained, be suffered to be, as it were, person- ated by a character that will throw and fasten upon them all the associations of vice and dishonour, a character strongly tending to give the scrupulous and the virtuous a loathing of politics and almost a disaflTection to the very name of liberty, and to supply the advocates of arbitrary and slavish principles with a topic, or rather a whole volume of topics, by which to give their children, their neighbours, and their countrymen, a degraded representation of the doctrines of liberty. — Either Home or Junius, we really forget which, somewhere says, that if the very devil himself could be supposed to put himself in the place of advocate and vindicator of some point of justice, he ought to be, so far, supported. We cannot agree to this, for the simple reason, that the just cause would ultimately suffer greater injury by the dishonour it would contract, in the gen- eral estimation of mankind, from the character of its vindica- tor, than probably it would suffer from the wrong against which it would be vindicated. It must be a case of a most perilous urgency indeed if it will not be more politic to wait a while, and ransack the whole nation for an honest man to be put to the service, rather than employ an agent, whose quali- ties make even ourselves sometimes sick of the very business in the prosecution of which we support him. The power of an infamous character to defile and depreciate whatever is associated with it, was exemplified in the case of Home himself, in the permanent injury which his moral and political reputation sustained from his temporary connexion and co-operation with Wilkes. Whether he was aware of it or not, the fact was, that the suspicious and undervaluing esti- u JOHN HORNE TOOKE. mate, we may say in plain terms the bad opinion, enter- tained of him throughout the sequel of his political life, by the more moral and cautious part of society, was in no small de- gree owing to this association. His declarations were per- haps accompanied by evidence enough to entitle them to credit, that his co-operation had been exclusively for public interests, and not a step beyond what he thought those interests demand- ed. He rendered some unquestionable services to public justice and popular rights. He gave uncommon proofs of dis- interestedness, at least of superiority to all the sordid kinds of self-interest. He was free from some of Wilkes's vices. But all this was unavailing. The stain was indelible. And the fatal mischief thus done to his character extended to his polit- ical doctrines : insomuch that they had the less chance of be- ing listened to with candour and respect, and of convincing in proportion to the force of argument, as they came from him ; — and others taught them with less success because he taught them too. There was, however, as we have already noticed, a short season of fermentation in the public mind, during which he suffered the most violent opprobrium, not for having co-operated with Wilkes, but for having renounced the connexion, clearly not with any desertion of principles or public objects, but for the very sake of those principles and objects. We do not wonder that we find him afterwards rating popular favour very low, and uniformly holding forth, that, if he had not stronger and better motives than any wish to obtain it, he should be a fool to undergo any more political toils, or expose himself to any more political dangers. To be sure one does think very meanly of whatever portion of the popular mind could be en- thusiastic for Wilkes afler Home's plain statements of facts concerning him ; but the most scandalous thing of all was that Junius, whatever he might have a right to think of Home's integrity, should make light of the facts proving the utter want of it in Wilkes. If that mysterious personage had been universally accepted as the oracle of morality, we should, by this time, have been sunk even much deeper than we are, in that political corruption which raised so great a tempest of his indignation. He might perhaps have contrived to keep on some decent terms with morals, in attempting to maintain that the national politics were in such a crisis as to reduce the people to the alternative of supporting, to every length, a very bad JOHN HORNE TOOKE. 69 man, or surrendering their own rights for ever, — had he, with- al, expressed the strongest reprobation of the man's profligacy, and deplored this wretched necessity of "rallying round" so worthless a principal. But instead of such a proceeding, we behold this austere censor flinging away with scorn a grave indictment which proved the incurable depravity and worth- lessness of the person in question, and railing at the equal folly and malice that could pretend to make the man's personal vices a disqualification for the office of champion of public jus- tice. The whole correspondence between Home and Junius is inserted, though it is to be found in every copy of Junius, that is, in the hands of almost every reading person in the country. This is a glaring specimen of book-making assurance. There is, we suppose, a general agreement of opinion with the biographer, that Home had decidedly the advantage in the substantial matters in dispute, that is, the merits of himself and Wilkes ; while as to Junius, there could not well be a stronger testimony to his powers, than to say that in the gene- ral force of writing he as decidedly appears the superior man. One or two of his retorts, particularly, are deadly and irre- sistible. About the time of Home's public quarrel with Wilkes, and in the interval between that and his combat with Junius, he was rendering considerable service in matters of national right and privilege ; first in resisting what, if quietly suffered, might soon have grown to a most iniquitous and star-chamber practice, the attempt to compel a man arraigned as a culprit to answer interrogatories tending to make him criminate him- self. This attempt was made by Lord Mansfield in the case of Bingley, a printer, who was prosecuted for a libel, and whom the evidence was not sufficient to convict. Home at once continued to excite the national attention to this alarm- ing innovation and its natural consequences, and confirmed, and procured to be ultimately rewarded, the courageous obsti- nacy of the printer in refusing to answer the interrogatories. The haughty judge had the mortification of discharging at last the man whom a considerable length of imprisonment had not in the smallest degree intimidated from defying him. Home was extremely and very justly zealous and anxious that this man should, for the sake of example, receive the most marked tokens of public favour. 4* iO JOHN HORNE TOOKE. His next effort was to maintain the right of the nation to be made acquainted with the proceedings of the legislature. By many of those who can never hear his name without some reproach of his factious spirit, it would nevertheless be deem- ed a great violation of public rights, if the debates in parlia- ment were to be suddenly forbidden, by authority, to be pub- lished. They are probably but little aware, how much the nation, in obtaining the practical concession of this as a right, is indebted to him. No such thing, except under some fictitious form, of little real use to the public, had been allowed before the period of his political activity. The House of Commons indignantly and pertinaciously resisted the attempts to assume it as a right : and though the prohibition must have been taken off some time, it was owing very much to his management and energy that it was effectually broken through about forty years since. It appears to have been, in a considerable measure, in consequence and in execution of a plan laid by him, that several spirited printers dared, nearly at the same time, to bring the question to issue by boldly publishing some of the debates : and in consequence of his in- fluence with the city magistrates, that these delinquents were enabled to brave or elude the utmost exertions of the House to punish them. And ever since, that liberty has been held by the people so much in the form and spirit of an absolute right, that there has been no material effort to take it from them. Mr. Stephens informs us that, at length, at the age of thirty- seven. Home "resigned his gown;" which we can well be- lieve he had for a good while worn with sensations but little more enviable than those inflicted on Hercules by the Cen- taur's shirt. In throwing it off he assured and congratulated himself that he was escaping into an unlimited freedom, the first luxury of which would be to adopt, without any further interference, a profession congenial to his taste and ambition, and in which he had apparently very good reason to flatter himself he should attain the highest distinction and emolu- ment. The latter of these, indeed, was very far from being an object of eagerness in any part of his life ; but so many expenses incurred in prosecuting public objects, and in resist- ing or sustaining the effects of political and legal revenge, oflen gave him cause to feel the narrowness of his pecuniary resources. JOHN HORNE TOOKE. 7X We have a somewhat entertaining account of his frugal do- mestic economy, while preparing himself for the bar, after the resignation of his vicarage of New Brentford — ^the highest ground in official rank, strictly so denominated, which was destined to be attained by one of the strongest and most am- bitious spirits of the age, whose juvenile and inferior associates were seen scaling, and taking a firm position on the heights of ecclesiastical and legal dignities and wealth. In this state of seclusion and severe study he was, nevertheless, always ready at a moment's warning, to spring like a royal tiger from his thicket, on the agents and abettors of any public delin- quency. Mr. Tooke, a moderate wealthy political friend, whose name he was afterwards authorized to assume, sought his advice in a case that appeared desperate. In consequence of purchasing an estate called Purley, (from which Home's great philological work took its title) he had been involved in a vexatious litigation about manorial rights with a neighbour- ing gentleman of great influence, who had betaken himself at last to the decisive expedient of an act of parliament. The bill which was in progress was highly unjust ; but through some such fatality, as would never have happened before or since in such a place, it was going forward with the most per- fect success, in contempt of every efibrt made to place the mat- ter in its true light ; and appeared certain of the final sanction of the House of Commons on the third reading — appointed for the very next day to that in which the case was despond- ingly stated to Home. His answer was, " If the facts be as you represent them, the House shall not pass that bill." He immediately suggested an expedient which would per- haps have occurred to no other man in England, and took on himself the execution at a hazard which very few would have been willing, for the sake of either friendship or public justice, to share. He immediately wrote, in language the most point- edly oflensive, an attack on the Speaker of the House of Com- mons, the noted Sir Fletcher Norton, with reference to the bill in question ; and obtained its insertion in the newspaper, ren- dered so popular by the letters of Junius, on the condition, of course, that the printer, when summoned to account, should produce the author. The object of this proceeding was, to compel the House to a much more full and formal attention to the subject of the bill, than it had previously been induced to give ; and at the same time, as an equally necessary thing, to W JOHN HORNE TOOKE. give its virftie the benefit of having the censorial attention of the public strongly fixed on its conduct. He was confident that by doing this he should frustrate the parliamentary mea- sure, and then, for the consequences to himself, he had courage enough to take his chance. The next day a great sensation was manifest in what might be called the political public ; and, as he had foreseen, the attention of a full House was called, in precedence to all other business, to the flagrant outrage on its dignity — a dignity so vulnerable by a plain charge of miscon- duct, though it had not been injured in the least by the mis- conduct itself. After a fine display of generous indignation, a summons was sent for the instant appearance of the printer. He obeyed, and, as he had been directed, immediately gave up the name of the criminal in chief, who had taken care to be already in the House, prepared to confront, probably with very little trepidation, the whole anger of the august assembly. A momentary silence of surprise and confusion followed the announcement of his name, which was come to be almost synonymous with that expression of recognizance, "the ene- my." On being called forth, he disavowed all disrespect to the Speaker whom he had libelled, calmly explained the mo- tives of the proceeding, and then made such a luminous state- ment of the case of his friend, that the schemers and adrocates of the injustice were baffled, the obnoxious parts of the bill were immediately thrown out, and, several resolutions were moved and carried " to prevent all such precipitate proceedings for the future." There is no punishing conquerors, however of- fensive may have been their conduct. After a very slight for- mality of detention in custody, he was set at liberty, on some pretended inconclusiveness of proof against him. The next thing that brought him out again conspicuously before the public, was an advertisement in the newspapers, signed with his name, proposing a subscription for the families of the Americans who were slain at Lexington, a fact which he pronounced, in the most explicit language possible, (and which he repeated in a second publication,) a murder commit- ted by the king's troops. He wished and hoped by some such act of daring and notoriety, to rouse the attention of the na- tion to the infatuated proceedings of the government with re- spect to the American colonies. For a good while no vindic- tive notice was taken of this wicked libel, as it was found to be when the minister was become stronger in the parliament. JOHN HORNE TOOKE. 73 In the second year after its publication, the writer suddenly and unexpectedly found himself within the iron grasp of the attorney-general, Thurlow, with his information ex-officio, and had another opportunity of evincing his courage and resources in a trial before Lord Mansfield, and a personal contest with him. The speeches in defence are given, and characters of the judge and attorney-general. There could be no manner of uncertainty as to the result of such a prosecution against Home. Though he was, it seems, the only man in the country that incurred any punishment on account of opinions avowed against the American war, he could not in the least wonder that in his case they were to be expiated by a fine and twelve months residence in the King's Bench prison. He might however, notwithstanding all he had seen of the management of public concerns, feel some de- gree of surprise, as we suppose most of the readers of the de- scription will, at the benevolent care which had been taken that the imprisonment should not involve a complication of evils unknown to the laws, and beyond the purposes of justice. *' Conversant as he was in the ordinary transactions of human life, his surprise cannot be supposed trifling, when, after being consigned to this jail, by the special command of the Chief Justice of England, he had still a habitation to seek ; for, after stopping a few minutes in the lodge, he was conducted to a vacant space within the walls, and there left, in utter ignorance of his future fate, and an entire stranger to all around him ! It may be supposed, perhaps, by the sons and daughters of afflu- ence, who reside in splendid apartments, and repose every night on beds of down, that even for the most wretched prisoner there is due provision in respect to a decent lodging ; where poverty, sorrow, or misfortunes may be secluded from the gaze of mankind, and find an asylum at least, if comfort be denied them. But this would prove a grand mistake, for the captives being generally more numerous than the apartments, it is by seniority alone that the unhappy inmates succeed to the occupancy of a small bed-chamber, totally devoid of any furniture or conveniency what- ever. All this, as Mr. Home solemnly assured me, he learned, for the first time, on the parade, whither he proceeded in charge of two tipstaves, who took their leave without condescending to give him any information what- ever. On his distress being made known to the spectators, a person, who proved to be a Jew, offered, for a sum of money, to accommodate him imme- dately. Ten guineas were accordingly depobited in his hands ; but it was speedily discovered that this son of Israel had not any apartment at his command, being only the joint-tenant of a miserable little room, in com- mon with four or five other debtors. To the honour of the prisoners, how- ever, they immediately interposed, and obliged him to restore the money to the stranger, who, being charmed with their love of justice, and deter- mined not to be outdone by them in point of generosity, divided the sum 74 JOHN HORNE TOOKE. in question among the poorer sort of the inhabitants. The clerk of the papers, on learning this anecdote, immediately made his appearance, and offered, for jive hundred pounds^ beforehand, to accommodate him with a small house, situate within the rules, during the whole period of his con- finement; but as the payment of a weekly sum was preferred, the nego- ciation was instantly concluded on that basis." He sustained very material injury, both in his property and his health, from this imprisonment ; but the most vexatious circumstance of his whole life was to be encountered soon after his restoration to liberty. He had kept the number of terms requisite as a qualification for being called to the bar, and proceeded to make application for this formality of admit- tance, without, it seems, the slightest suspicion that an insu- perable obstacle was to rise up suddenly, as if from the ground, at his approach. The first and a second application were re- sisted by a majority of the benchers of the Inner Temple, and with such circumstances as to convince him that any further prosecution of the object would be vain. " This refusal," says the biographer, " was a cruel and severe blow. Indeed it was struck at a vital part ; and, I am persuaded, contributed not a little to sour and embitter the remaining portion of his life." The repulse is attributed in part to the "mean jealousy of some practising-lawyers, who were afraid of being eclipsed by a new competitor." Some other reason, however, for the rejection, was to be pretended ; and the only thing that even lawyers could found an exception upon, was the circumstance of his having been a clergyman. Thus rejecting one profession — rejected by another — in- jured in his small fortune — but elate with the proudest con- sciousness of talent, he was to commit himself under inauspi- cious omens, for the remainder of his life, a very protracted remainder, as it proved, to the course of events and chances in a turbulent and changing state of the times. He was, how- ever, certain that no man could have greater promptitude and courage in seizing events, and he might be acquitted of any great excess of vanity if he even flattered himself he could sometimes create them. No disappointments, nor the com- paratively humble rank in society in which he was condemned to continue, could, in the smallest degree, repress the tone in which he had assumed to be the censor of the conduct of the uppermost people in the state, whether taken as individu- als, or in the imposing pomp of official or legislative combina- JOHN HORNE TOOKE. 75 tion. Probably no man ever did, on the strength of what he possessed in his mere person, and in the destitution of all ad- vantages of birth, wealth, station, or connexions, maintain, with such perfect and easy uniformity, so challenging and peremptory a manner towards great and pretending folks of all sorts. This arose from the consciousness that at all times he dared to fight any of them, on any subject, at a moment's warning, in writing, in personal dispute, in courts of law, or even, we fear, in that wwlawful mode which it is the disgrace of this nation to tolerate. In 1780 he wrote, in conjunction with Dr. Price, a tract against the American war, which is here represented as hav- ing contributed materially to its termination, by hastening the downfall of the wretched statesmen who were carrying it on. When the nation was restored to peace, he seems to have felt an unusual desire to taste it himself. He purchased a small estate near Huntingdon, and applied himself zealously to the study and practice of agriculture, to which he had long had a partiality, as what he regarded as " an useful and liberal science." A violent ague compelled him to a speedy retreat from the reclaiming of marshes, and threw him back on the great town, where he recovered his health, took a house, and fairly closed with his destiny to be for life a wit, scholar, philosopher, and politician, without affluence, or power, or any effectual favour of those who possessed them. He soon entered with great ardour into the cause of parlia- mentary reform ; by coming forward as the champion of which, in 1782, William Pitt attained little less than the highest pitch of his father's popularity. Home published a curious and in- genious scheme of a reformed representation and mode of election, of which an outline is here exhibited. But he was so really intent on the substantial object, that he made no difficulty of dismissing any peculiarity of his own speculations and projects, and coalescing in the apparently more practica- ble ones of Mr. Pitt — " ingenuously preferring," says Mr. Stephens, "that gentleman's plan to his own." He became an intimate, earnest, indefatigable co-operator with this youth of promise, in the preparation of the plans and means of purifying the legislature ; and entertained the high- est respect for his political integrity so late, at least, as 1788, in which year he published, under the title of "Two Pair of 76 JOHN HORNE TOOKE. , Portraits," an extended and very pointed contrast between Pitt and Fox, greatly to the disadvantage and depreciation of the latter, who was never forgiven by Home for that decided hostility to popular interests with which he had begun his po- litical career, and his subsequent coalition with Lord North. "While others objected to the inexperience of Mr. Pitt," says our author, " Home referred to his talents, his candour, his ingenuousness, and augured the happiest results from his labours. He never, it is asserted, carried his principles of political reform beyond those avowed by that statesman, and constantly opposed the doctrines of annual parliaments and universal suffrage,* which were maintained by some of the zealous advocates of the cause, and which, Mr. Stephens says, contributed to defeat that cause by exciting an excessive alarm in the aristocratical part of the nation. It appears that the subject of these memoirs was for some time, notwithstand- ing all his knowledge of men and politicians, very sanguine in his confidence of its substantial success. It sunk into lan- guor, however, even before the paragon of political virtue ascended into the better light which shines on the high places of the state. How it fared then, and ever since, nobody needs to be told. "The Diversions of Purley," a book of very moderate size at its first appearance, was published in 1786. We have in the memoirs a whole needless chapter, in the form of an unsatisfactory analysis, instead of a brief general explanation in two or three lucid pages, of the object of the book, and of that peculiarity of its theory in which its acknowledged origi- nality consisted. In the following year he resumed his pen on a subject which made a great noise in its day, though now gone to its place among forgotten trifles. He vindicated, on the ground of law and general propriety, the reported marriage of the Prince of Wales with Mrs. Fitzherbert, assuming the fact of the mar- riage as undeniable. His next production was the "Por- traits," already noticed, which concluded with these two ques- tions : First question. Which two of them will you choose to hang up in your cabinets, the Pitts or the Foxes ? * At a somewhat later period it is said that he '* hesitated as to the pro- priety of annual parliaments." JOHN HORNE TOOKE. 7t Second question. Where, on your conscience, should the other two be hanged ?" The author remarks what a prodigious alteration there would have been in at least one of the delineations, if the artist had brought the subjects again under his pencil a few years afterwards. The celebrated trial of Mr. Hastings is mentioned as, with- in the whole extent of Home's active life, the only great na- tional concern in which he was content to be neutral ; and even in that he strongly censured the mode of proceeding, — the multitude of the charges, the long speeches, the appeals to the passions, and the ruinous protraction. He thought if guilt existed it might be ascertained by a very short inquiry ; and in that case he was " for punishing the receiver, and restoring the stolen property to the right owners." This might be very- excellent doctrine : and therefore it was for owners de facto to beware of even permitting, much more of hastening, any decisive proof of the guilt. A pleasing circumstance is related of his being applied to for advice relative to an Englishman taken by a corsair and detained in slavery at Algiers, but liberated in consequence of Home's benevolent exertions. This very circumstance was the cause of his being brought into a certain degree of con- nexion with the famous and obnoxious London Corresponding Society, of which the biographer relates the very humble ori- gin and the early history. He made a distinguished figure in the year 1790, by con- testing, with Mr. Fox and Lord Hood, the election for West- minster, with the greatest ability, and with no small measure of popularity, which he augmented by turning to the utmost account the refusal of his eminent antagonist to give a pledge for parliamentary reform. His failure, however, was a matter of course, and which he foresaw from the first; but he made it contribute even more than success would have done to his fame, by means of that memorable petition to the House of Commons, which contained certain bold and contemptuous expressions of crimination that have ever since been employed as the most pointed common-places in the censures of its cor- rupt constitution. The petition was read to the assembly, and received with as much displeasure as it is becoming and dig- nified for conscious and lofty integrity to manifest, under calumnies which it can calmly defy. The petition was readi- 78 JOHN HORNE TOOKE. • ly voted "frivolous and vexatious ;" but it is perhaps to be re- gretted, nevertheless, that it could not comport with the in- sulted dignity of the House to vouchsafe, in a very few words, such a notice and specific falsification of the following passage, as to prevent its being so often triumphantly repeated by the factious and the wicked. " The said scrutiny was, by the direction or approbation of the House of Commons, relinquished, without effect, after having lasted ten months, and with an expense to Sir Cecil Wray of many thousand pounds more than appears by some late proceedings in Chancery to be the allowed average price of a perpetual seat in the House of , where seats for legislators are as notoriously bought and sold as stalls and standing for cattle at a fair." Vol. i. p. 94. The expense occasioned to the other candidates by this petition brought on Home an action for debt, in which Mr. Fox was successful, notwithstanding the singularly able and animated exertions of the defendant, who could not fail to take full advantage of such an opportunity of throwing out a number of bold and important observations on the rights of juries, and on the flagrant corruptions in the representation, particularly of Westminster. In 1792, he became impatient of the pure breezes and ex- hilarating odours of the metropolis, and removed his residence to the village where he continued all the remainder of his life. It is not, to be sure, a very lengthened apology, and depre- cation of loyal and aristocratical anger, that the biographer is disposed to make for the animated interest taken by Mr. Home Tooke* in this prodigious event (the French Revolution) ; but even still fewer words might have sufficed. Previously to it the unanimous voice of Englishmen, in notes alternately of scorn and commiseration, had pronounced the French people a nation of slaves ; and nothing on earth could be more palpa- ble, than that the slaves of a government have no chance for freedom but through the energy and assertion of their own will. When such a grand national assertion was successfully taking place, to have been otherwise than gratified in behold- ing it, would have betrayed, in any pretended friend of liber- ty, a meanly-constituted mind — unless he were a prophet ; and we have lio faith in any man's intelligence having been, * He had assumed this additional surname in 1782, at the request of the gentleman of that name whose heir he was now understood to be. • JOHN nORNE TOOKB. 79 at the commencement of that revolution, so prophetic of the sequel as to justify him in refusing, on the whole, his congra- tulations. Doubtless a man who could form no judgment on such a subject without the intermingling and influence of re- ligious ideas, and the most refined order of moral principles, would have had, on this great occasion, some perceptions and fears to which our ex-clergyman was a stranger. Such a man might at some moments have feared it was too much to hope, that so depraved and irreligious a people should sudden- ly receive an immense and unmixed favour from the Divine Governor. He might have surmised with alarm some possi- ble consequences of the sudden breaking loose of millions of ignorant papists and oppressed indignant semi-barbarians, in- cited, directed, represented, by thousands or myriads of infi- dels. His exultation, therefore, would have been greatly modified ; but still the appearances were such as to justify a preponderance, for a season, of the hopeful and complacent feelings, in a mind confident that a grand melioration of the human condition, in these latter ages, is among the appoint- ments of the Divine Goodness. Though it is probable Home entertained, notwithstanding any unfavorable omens from the quarter of religion and reli- gious morality, an almost unmixed confidence in the happy re- sults of this portentous movement in the civilized world, it uniformly appears that he had no wish for the revolutionary part of its agitations to be extended to this country. Amid all his zeal for reforms he had invariably, and we believe sincere- ly, declared for our old constitution ; and that not under any illusory shape of approving certain abstract principles, sup- posed to be embodied in that constitution, and yet capable of taking a very diflferent practical form ; but with the most ex- plicit approbation of an effective royalty and aristocracy. He was even solicitous that the approving good wishes, and the congratulations, conveyed to the French revolutionists from the friends of liberty in this country, should not go unaccom- panied with some expressions of satisfaction with our own political system. When, in a meeting convoked to celebrate the event, Mr. Sheridan moved a resolution, " Highly complimentary to the French revolution, Home expressed a strong desire that some quahfying expression might be added to this gene- ral motion of approbation, and insisted ' that the English nation had only to maintain and improve the constitution which their ancestors have trans- 80 JOHN HORNE TOOKE. mitted to them.* This position, although at first opposed, with tumult and vehemence, in consequence of his arguments and perseverence, was at length carried unanimously, — in the following form ; ' We feel equal satisfaction that the subjects of England, by the virtuous exertions of their ancestors, have not so arduous a task to perform as the French had, ' but have only to maintain and improve the consttution which their forefathers have transmitted to them.* ** It would be possible for captiousness to go the length of affecting to discover in all this an artful contrivance for be- guiling away loyal suspicion and vigilance from his deep-laid and pernicious designs. But we believe every one of the few candid and impartial readers of his life will be fully convinced, that this abhorred and pestiferous anarchist held most firmly the principles of a constitutional patriot, and never formed any projects inconsistent with that character. As much candour, at the least, as this would require, is dis- played on the other side by our author, when, in approaching the memorable period in Home Tooke's life in which he him- self anticipated a speedy surrender of that life on the gallows, the following admission is made in favour of the main mover of the famous prosecutions for treason in 1794. ** It is not to be supposed that Mr. Pitt, whose father had been the original author, and himself the prime mover, of a parliamentary reform, would have been so lost to all sense of shame, as to attempt to commit a legal murder on those who had followed his own example, and merely persevered in those plans which he himself had broached, matured, and abandoned! The minister never conceived the idea of a public prosecu- tion, until he was firmly persuaded that a treasonable plot existed for the overthrow of the state, aad that, under a popular pretext, a revolution was actually meditated, on the same principles, and with the same designs, as had been so recently effected in France.'* Mr. Stephens gives a very curious account of a proceeding of Home Tooke's at this period of loyal alarm and almost frenzy ; a proceeding which formed, certainly, a most capital joke, but which, just at that crisis, involved some possibilities of mischief which would have been a greater price than even so excellent a joke was worth. The ministry employed and entertained a multitude of " reporters," — a genteel denomina- tion for spies ; and a proportion of these were persons not of the meanest class, in the ordinary sense of that description. *' Some of these were actuated by zeal ; while others, who would have spurned the idea of pecuniary gratifications, were influenced solely by the hopes of offices and appointments. One of the latter had for some time JOHN HOKNE TOOKE. 81 attached himself to Mr. Tooke, and was a frequent visitor at Wimbledon. His station and character were calculated to shield him from suspicion, but his host, who was too acute to be easily duped, soon saw through the flimsy veil of his pretended discontent. As he had many personal friends, in various departments of government, he soon discovered the views, con- nexions, and pursuits of his guest ; but, instead of upbraiding him with his treachery, and dismissing him with contempt, as most other men in his situation would have done, he determined to foil him, if possible, at his own weapons." — " He accordingly pretended to admit the spy*into his en- tire confidence, and completed the delusion, by actually rendering the person who wished to circumvent him, in his turn, a dupe. Mr. Tooke began by dropping remote hints relative to the strength and zeal of the popular party, taking care to magnify their numbers, praise their unanimi- ty, and commend their resolution. By degrees he descended to particu- lars, and at length communicated confidentially, and under the most solemn promises of secrecy, the alarming intelligence that some of the guards were gained ; that an armed force was organized ; and that the nation was actually on the eve of a revolution After a number of inter- views, he at length affected to own, that he himself was at the head of the conspiracy, and boasted like Pompey of old * that he could raise le- gions merely by stamping on the ground with his foot.' " All this the miserable dupe, whose name we presume Mr. Stephens could have given, eagerly reported to his shrewd patrons, who could estimate so correctly the faculties of the two men, and were doubtless, among their other cares, begin- ning to consider which of the sinecures was likely to fall, or what new office they could invent, to reward so honourable a patriot. What was a joke at Wimbledon was a serious and awful thing at Whitehall. The gull's stories came in thicker and darker. Other ominous signs were reported by other expect- ants of places, or earners of fees. A trivial note, containing the query, " Is it possible to get ready by Thursday ?" was in- tercepted on its way to Catiline. The accidental scrawl of a child becomes portentous if an assembly of conjurers is convened to decipher it ; the alarm grew to terror ; and a few days afterwards the house of a friend where Home was sitting at dinner was invested by a section of the British army, and he was carried to the Tower. After several months of confinement, with all the rigour compatible with the absolute demands of ill health, he was transferred to Newgate and the Old Bailey, to act a more conspicuous part than even in any former period of his life. During his imprisonment he did not know what was to form the matter of the charges against him, or what would be the mode of proceeding ; but was per- 82 JOHN HORNE TOOKE. suaded that his destruction was determined on, and that means would not fail to be found or made to effect it with a semblance of legality. He was prepared therefore, as he said, to enter the court with the spirit of a tiger ; to throw off all restraint, and to fight the administrators of law and their superiors in the manner of a man who has but once to fight, and is resolved to signalize his fall by an exemplary and de- served vengeance on his persecutors. As a commencement of this last of his labours, he composed, in the interval between the charge, by Lord Chief Justice Eyre, to the grand jury and his arraignment at the bar, a speech to be addressed to the court. Of this speech " a correct copy," says Mr. Stephens, " is here inserted from the only document now in existence." This very extraordinary composition is a most daring and almost savage assault, with the charge of political and legal iniquity, on the Lord Chief Justice " and those by whom he was employed." The most deliberate and unfeigned defiance susta-ins the writer through every part of it. It was his intention to have inserted a copy of this speech in each of the London newspapers ; previously, we suppose our author means, to the trial ; but on due reflection he was in- duced to forbear so flagrant a provocation ; it may well be believed that his spirit did not at any moment sink below the pitch of intrepid defiance ; but it would have been a wanton display of bravery to aggravate unnecessarily every prejudice and danger he had to confront ; and it even might occur to him, that such an eager commencement might seem to betray something like a defect of confidence in himself to retain the full command of his powers of oflfence through every part of the subsequent proceeding, and at its expected fatal termina- tion. He slightly moderated down his spirit to the convenient temper for action. It was but an inconsiderable reduction, however, and his first interlocutions in the court were quite in the tone of a man ready for battle. But early in the proceed- ings his highly- stimulated and completely-armed hostility was somewhat mitigated by the complaisance and respectful atten- tion shown him by the court ; in their progress it was almost beguiled away into wit and good humour ; and at the conclu- sion he expressed himself in the strongest terms of grateful acknowledgment to the court, to his defenders, and to the jury. The pacific feeling was very much promoted by his gratifica- tion in perceiving with what a predominating vigour and de- JOHN HORNE TOOKE. 83 cided success his cause was advancing, under his own exer- tions and those of his advocates. It was so bland a mood that even Mr. Pitt, though he did not, our author says, escape through the " fiery ordeal" quite " unscorched," was treated with comparative lenity. ** After his " (Pitt's) ** examination, it was observed by Mr. Tooke's nephew, on their return from the court, * that he had got Pitt down, and might have done more with him.* * Yes, I might, John,' was the reply, * but never in my life did I choose to trample oh a fallen foe.* " We are not called to make any remark on those celebrated state prosecutions, in which a haughty, arbitrary, and vindic- tive administration were so notoriously deceived in their calcu- lation and baffled in their design : — a defeat, however, which they took care to repay to the country and its liberties by a pernicious innovation on the fundamental laws relative to po- litical crimes. As to Home Tooke, who was important and obnoxious enough to be, on a subsequent occasion, legislated against as an individual, nothing could be more complete than the tri- umph he obtained in this prosecution over all the calumniators who had charged him with anarchical principles. But, though gratified by this opportunity of taking his right ground, in sight of the nation, and pleased, in one view, to find that the admin- istration of the law retained so much justice even toward men suspected and detested by the ruling powers, it appears, nev- ertheless, by the testimony of his biographer, and is sufficient- ly probable from the character of the man, that his satisfaction was not unmingled with an opposite sentiment with which very few persons will sympathize. Mr. Stephens says, " I was assured by him, more than once, * that he had been ever anxious to offer his life up as a sacrifice to his opinions ;* and he appeared to me, toward the close of his existence, to be disappointed at the event, wishing rather to fall gloriously in what he considered to be the cause of the pub- lic, than perish ignominiously by the lapse of time or the pressure of dis- ease." — Vol. ii. p. 53. We cannot follow out the narrative of his life, which was perhaps somewhat less eventful, though the account of it is still more interesting, in what may be called its last though very protracted stage, from about the age of sixty to that of seventy-seven. Its most marked events were, another most vigorous contest for the representation of Westminster, ren- 84 JOHN HORNE TOOKE. dered famous in the records of political warfare by his humor- ous and most biting comments on the phrase " domestic ene- mies," employed by his opponent Sir Alan Gardner, — and his short occupation of a seat in the House of Commons for Old Sarum, an honour from the re-possession of which he was pre- cluded, as is well known, by all the warlike formality of an act of parliament, which was levelled solely at him though it did not mention his name. During the short period of his privilege he was distinguished by the moderation, as much as by the good sense, of his speeches. And indeed, though in his addresses to the people at the Westminster election, and in the printed address in which, after being debarred any further admittance into the sanctuary at St. Stephen's, he seemed to fling that high honour with bitter scorn in the teeth of those who had decreed him incapable of it, there appears not the smallest diminution of the accustomed invective boldness, our author affirms that his trial had the effect of permanently modi- fying his language. The latter half of the second volume is a very entertaining miscellany. There is a rather long series of brief notices of distinguished men, of various ranks, accomplishments, and professions, who held an acquaintance, more or less intimate, with Mr. Home Tooke. It contains some curious anecdotes : but none, perhaps, more curious than the ugly one of Professor Porson's threatening, at Tooke 's own table, to " kick him and cvff him," and Tooke's insisting on their fighting out their quarrel in a "couple of quarts" of brandy^ a kind of duel suffi- ciently to the Professor's taste, but which soon laid him sense- less on the floor. *' On which the victor at this new species of Olympic game^ taking hold of his antagonist's limbs in succession, exclaimed, ' This is the foot that was to have kicked, and the hand that was to have cuffed me !' and then drinking one glass more, to the speedy recovery of his prostrate ad- vesary, ordered, ' that great care should be taken of Mr. Professor Por- son ;' after which he withdrew to the adjacent apartment, in which tea and coffee had been prepared, with the same seeming calmness as if nothmg had occurred." A number of the particulars in the philosopher's domestic arrangements are strongly illustrative of what was peculiar in his character, while the details concerning the painful diseases which oppressed him severely during many of his latter years, give the highest possible idea of that most extraordinary JOHN HOENE TOOKE. Qj^ strength of mind which would maintain in spite of them an ani- mated and generally cheerfiil temper. Home Tooke was unquestionably one of the half dozen best talkers of his age ; but Mr. Stephens was a very inferior Boswell ; though he has given a few tolerably good things from the notes which he says he was several years in the habit of making of conversations in which he heard Home Tooke display himself. It is not so much, however, the smart or fine sayings that he seems to have recorded, as his grave opinions on questions, books, and men. Judgments are pro- nounced on several distinguished writers of this and other countries ; brief notices are recorded of discussions or dictates on points of literature, politics, law, history, agriculture, and a still wider extent of subjects, on which it would have been highly interesting and improving to hear this powerful thinker exert his acuteness and display his knowledge. A number of these fragments and relics retain a measure of the luminous appearance which we can well believe to have been very striking in the complete original exhibition. If in conversation Home was oftener allowed to dictate than compelled to argue, it was not his fault, as no man ever more promptly welcomed a challenge to debate ; and the more pow- erful his opponent, the more he was gratified. He had a con- stitutional courage hardly ever surpassed, a perfect command of his temper, all the warlike furniture and efl^iciency of prompt and extreme acuteness, satiric wit in all its kinds and degrees, from gay banter to the most deadly mordacity, and all this sus- tained by inexhaustible knowledge, and indefinitely reinforced, as his life advanced, by victorious exertion in many trying sit- uations. Such a man would be made a despot whether he would or not, by the obsequiousness of those who were either by choice or necessity placed in his immediate sphere ; and it would depend on his temper whether he would be a tyrant. He had a manner, it seems — a Sultanic look — ^which could instantly impose the silence of death if he willed any matter of inquiry to be made an end of. There is one instance of this which appears somewhat mysterious and somewhat foolish. The conversation had been about Junius. He had laughed at some of the claims to the honour of being that personage : ** One of the company now asked if he knew the author. On the ques- tion being put, he immediately crossed his knife and fork on his plate, and 5 86 JOHN HORNE TOOK^* assuming a stem look, replied * I do !' His manner, tone, and attiftjde were all too formidable to admit of any further interrogatories." We are at a loss to conceive what there could be in the question to bring up all this majesty, and it seems rather a pitiable pusillanimity that durst not say one word to maintain the innocence of asking it, and even following it up with a second. Mr. Stephens allows that, notwithstanding his hero's zeal- ous habitual love of truth, he would sometimes, in disregard of it, fight for mere victory ; a very superfluous expense of am- munition, it may be thought, to give it no worse character, in a man whose actual belief and unbelief included so many things to be maintained in hostility to prevailing opinions. A worse thing, however, than the folly of the practice was its immo- rality ; and yet it is this, we presume, that the biographer means to extenuate by adding, as if it were an unquestionable proposition, this most thoughtless solecism, — " the ablest and BEST of men frequently fight, like gladiators, for fame, without troubling themselves much as to the justice of the cause." It would be but impertinent, however, to affect to call such a character as that of John Home Tooke to account for this or the other particular culpability. It would be something like attending to criticize the transactions of a Pagan temple, and excepting to one rite as ungraceful, perhaps, and to another practice as irreverent ; like as if the substance of the service were of a quality to deserve that its particular parts should be corrected. His whole moral constitution was unsound, frontthe exclusion, as far as can be judged from this work, or as there are any other means of judging, of all respect to a future account, to be given to the Supreme Governor. Towards the conclu- sion of his life, he made calm and frequent references to his death, but not a word is here recorded expressive of anticipa- tions beyond it. The unavoidable inference from the whole of these melancholy memorials is, that he reckoned on the impunity of eternal sleep. Not, however, that he was willing to acknowledge any obligations to that protective economy ; for he is known to have insisted, in a tone of the utmost con- fidence, in a very serious conversation not very long before his death, that if there should be a future life and retribution, he, of all men, had no reason to be afraid of it, for that he had even greater merit than could be required for his acquittal before a just Judge. The grand rule of moral excellence, even JOHN HORNE TOOKE. 87 according to the gospel, he observed, was, to do to others as we would they should do to us ; but he had gone much beyond this. From Mr. Stephens's record it would not appear that he would very often formally and gravely talk on religion, though he would advert to it in the incidental way of satire and swears ing. One particular conversation is alluded to in which his opinions were more disclosed than on any other remembered occasion. But with the nature of these avowed opinions the readers were not to be entrusted, further than some trifling hints, by implication, that he was not a polytheist ! — In one conversation, not long before his death, he enlarged on the di- vine goodness, as manifest in the constitution of the world, and as having been amply experienced by himself. He maintain- ed a wonderful serenity, a very signally philosophic tone, amidst his complicated and often oppressive bodily sufferings. At one time, however, it appears he consented to live only in compliance with the entreaties of his friends, having, as it seems, determined to withdraw himself from the burden by declining all sustenance. He advanced to the close of his life with a self-complacent mixture of pride and gayety. A thoughtful religious reader will accompany him with a sentiment of deep melancholy, to behold so keen, and strong, and perverted a spirit, triumphant in its own delusions, fearlessly passing into the unknown world. In closing this article, and wishing we knew how to apolo- gize for its unpardonable prolixity, we are bound to repeat that, as a political man, we think it evident that Home has ex- perienced the utmost degree of injustice ; that his speculations and projects were moderate, that they uniformly aimed at the public good, that they were maintained with a consistency which put most of his distinguished contemporaries to shame, and that this very same inflexible consistency was a principal cause of the opprobrium with which time-serving politicians loaded him, in their own defence. 88 Coleridge's friend. III. COLERIDGE'S FRIEND The Friend; a Literary^ Moral, and Political Weekly Paper ^ excluding personal and party politics, and the events of the day. Conducted by S. T. Coleridge. It was with no small pleasure we saw any thing announced of the nature of a proof or pledge that the author of this paper was in good faith employing himself, or about to employ him- self, in the intellectual public service. His contributions to that service have, hitherto, borne but a small proportion to the reputation he has long enjoyed of being qualified for it in an extraordinary degree. This reputation is less founded on a small volume of juvenile poems, and some occasional essays in peri- odical publications, than on the estimate formed and avowed by all the intelligent persons that have ever had the gratifica- tion of falling into his society. After his return, several years since, from a residence of considerable duration in the Southeast of Europe, in the high- est maturity of a mind, which had, previously to that residence, been enriched with large acquisitions of the most diversified literature and scientific knowledge, and by various views of society both in England and on the continent ; his friends promised themselves, that the action of so much genius, so long a time, on such ample materials, would at length result in some production, or train of productions, that should pay off some portion of the debt due to the literary republic, from one of the most opulent of its citizens. A rather long period, how^ever, had elapsed, and several projects had been reported in the usual vehicles of literary intelligence, before this paper was undertaken. An idea of the mental habits and acquire- ments brought to its execution, will be conveyed by an extract from the prospectus, which was written in the form of a letter to a friend. Coleridge's friend. 89 •* It is not unknown to you that I have employed almost the whole of my life in acquiring, or endeavouring to acquire, useful knowledge, by study, reflection, observation, and by cultivating the society of my supe- riors in intellect, both at home and in foreign countries. You know too, that, at different periods of my life, I have not only planned, but collected the materials for many works on various and important subjects ; so many indeed, that the number of my unrealized schemes, and the mass of my miscellaneous fragments, have often furnished my friends with a subject of raillery, and sometimes of regret and reproof. Waiving the mention of all private and accidental hindrances, I am inclined to beheve that this want of perseverance has been produced in the main by an over-activity of thought, modified by a constitutional indolence, which made it more pleasant to me to continue acquiring, than reduce what I had acquired to a regular form. Add too, that edmost daily throwing off my notices or re- flections in desultory fragments, I was still tempted onwards by an in- creasing sense of the imperfections of my knowledge, and by the convic- tion that, in order fully to comprehend and develope any one subject, it was necessary that I should make myself master of some other, which again as regularly involved a third, and so on, with an ever- widening hori- zon. Yet one habit, formed during long absences from those with whom I could converse with full sympathy, has been of advantage to me — that of daily writing down in my memorandum or common-place books, both incidents and observations ; whatever had occurred to me from without, and all the flux and reflux of my mind within itself. The number of these notices, and their tendency, miscellaneous as they were, to one common end ('* quid sumuSy et quidfuturi gignimur^" what we are, and what we are to become : and thus from the end of our being to deduce its proper objects)^ first encouraged me to undertake the Weekly Essay of which you will consider this letter as the prospectus.'* Being printed on stamped paper, these essays were convey- ed by the post, free of expense, to any part of the country. In the mode of publication, therefore, and what may be called the exterior character of the project, " The Friend" was an imita- tion of those sets of essays which, from the Tatler down to the Rambler, and several much later w^orks, had first supplied en- tertainment and instruction in small successive portions, during several months or years, and then taken their rank asled perfecticm, but from a corrupt and wicked administration, which all the so much ad- mired checks of our constitution were not able to prevent. How vain, thiMi, how idle, how presumptuous is the opinion that laws can do every thing ! and how weak and pernicious the maxim founded upon it, that measures, not men, are to be attended to !" — P. 20. The historian appears to have examined a great deal of evidence on the subject of the pretended popish plot, as the pox's JAMES THE SECOND, 139 result of which he gives it as his opinion, that the greater part of those who were concerned in the iniquitous prosecu- tion of the papists, were rather under the influence of "an extraordinary degree of blind credulity," than guilty of " the deliberate wickedness of planning and assisting in the per- petration of legal murder." It is most melancholy to contemplate a great nation, which not very long before had been animated, in however rude a manner, and however ill-instructed in political science, with a high spirit of liberty, which had raised its strong arm against the impositions of a monarch who thought it necessary for a go- vernor to be a despot, and had prostrated him and his armies in the dust, submitting at last to the unqualified despotism of a much more odious tyrant. The view is still more mortifying, when we consider that this tyrant had never performed any one great action, and possessed no one virtue under heaven, to palliate even in appearance his depravity, and lessen, to the people, the ignominy of being his slaves. But it is most mortifying of all to find that these slaves were beaten and trodden into such fatuity, that they voluntarily abdicated all the rites of both men and brutes, and humbly lauded the master who sported with their privileges, their property, and their blood. No inconsiderable part of this volume consists of descriptions of such national humiliation ; and we trans- cribe a short specimen, immediately following the account of Charles's turning off his last parliament, with the full resolu- tion never to call another ; " to which resolution, indeed, Louis had bound him, as one of the conditions on which he was to receive his stipend." " N't msasiire wis ever attended with more complete success. The most flittenngr addresses poured in from all parts of the kina^dom ; divine risrht and indiscriminate obedience were every where the favourite doc- trines ; and men saemad to vie witli each other who should have the hnnour of the greatest share in the glorious work of slavery, by securing to the king, for the present, and, after him, to the duke, absolute and un- c jntrollable p >wer. They, who, either because Charles had been called a forgiving prince by his flitterers, (upon what ground I could never dis- cover) or from some supposed connexion between indolence and good nature, had deceived themselves mto ah')pe that his tyranny would be of the mildjr sort, found th^m^nlves much disappointed in their expectations. The whole history of the remaining part of his reign, exhibits an uninter- rupted series of attacks upon the liberty, property, and lives of his sub- jects."— P. 43. 140 fox's JAMES THE SECOND. The most outrageous operations of Charles's tyranny were carried on in Scotland. This work exhibits, in considerable detail, the horrible system of proscription and murder, which has given him a very reasonable claim to the company, in history or any where else, of Tiberius ; for so we must be al- lowed to think, notwithstanding Mr. Fox has taken exception to Burnet's classing these two names together, forgetting that he himself had done the very same thing in an earlier page. The scene becomes more hatefiil at every step ; till at length we behold one general spectacle of massacre, in which the most infernal riots of cruelty to which military ruffians, fully let loose, could be stimulated, were authorized and ap- plauded by a government, which colleges, and dignitaries, and a large and preponderating part of the nation, adored as of divine authority, and really deserved, as a reward of such a faith, the privilege of adoring. It is after viewing such a course of transactions, that we want expressions of someAvhat more emphatical reprobation, in closing the account with this wicked monarch, than those, though very strong and com- prehensive, which Mr. Fox has used in the concluding de- lineation of his character. It was very proper to notice his politeness and affability, his facility of temper, and kindness to his mistresses ; but we think they should not have been so mentioned, as to have even the slightest appearance of a set off against the malignity of his wickedness and the atro- cities of his government. The manner in which Charles's kindness to his mistresses is mentioned, is a remarkable illustration of the importance of personal morality to a historian, as well as to a states- man. "His recommendation of the Duchess of PortFmouth and Mrs. Gwyn, upon his death-bed to his Fuccessor, is much to his honour; and they who censure it, seem, m their z( al to show thcmsi Ives strict moralis-ts, to have suffered their notions of vice and virtue to have fallen into strange confusion. Charles's connexion with those ladies might be vicious but at a moment when that connexion was upon the point of being finally and irrevocably dissolved, to concern himself about their future welfare, and to recomn)end them to his brother with earnest tenderncFS, was vir. tue It is not for the interest of morality that the good and evil actions of bad men should be confounded." — P. 64. We do not know that any moralist ever bade a departing fox's JAMES THE SECOND. 141 Griminal to be concerned for the welfare of his surviving com- panions in guilt, only it would be enjoined that shame and penitence should mingle with this concern ; but every moralist will be indignant at this gentle equivocal mode of touching that vice, by which it is notorious that the example of the king contributed to deprave the morals of the nation, as much as his political measures to exterminate its freedom. It is most signally remarkable what a careful silence is maintained, in this work, respecting the state of morals during this reign. Is it then no business of history to take account of such a thing ? Even regarding the matter in a political view, is the depravity of a people never to be reckoned among the causes, and the most powerful causes, of their sinking quietly under despotism ? The commencement of James's reign, as far as the work before us has illustrated it, was a mere continuation of the preceding, as James, at his accession, graciously promised his subjects it should. This promise was received with grateful joy by a large proportion of the English nation, and by the governing party even in Scotland, whose fulsome abominable address of congratulation is given in this work. Their joy and loyalty were carried to the height of enthusiasm, no doubt, when they found the same infernal work of massacre ani- mated to redoubled activity, and were honoured with the charge of executing an act, which extended to all persons hearing conventicle preaching, the punishment of death. Though James was a papist, Mr. Fox has proved, by the most decisive arguments, that his grand leading object was the establishment of an absolute despotism ; and that any designs he might entertain of introducing popery, would have been kept in reserve till this was accomplished. Meanwhile he much courted the zealous adherents of the established church, and he plainly intimated that they had been found the firmest friends of such government, as that of his father, his brother, and himself. It is strange that a man of Mr. Fox's candour should, throughout the book, have contrived to find the very same thing. It surely became him, in the justice of history, to have particularized the many noble efforts made by the churchmen of those times, in resistance of the doctrines and the practices of despotism. He ought to have taken no- tice of what was so zealously done and written, by eccle- siastical dignitaries, in behalf of liberty of conscience, and in 7* 142 fox's JAMES THE SECOND. prevention of all persecution for religious opinions and me- thods of worship. A large space is occupied with the invasions and proceed- ings of Monmouth and Argyle. The account of the exe- cution of Monmouth is finely written ; but the most interest- ing part of the whole volume, is the account of the last days and the death of Argyle. It is a picture drawn with the hap- piest simplicity, though with one slight blemish, of one of the most enchanting examples of heroic virtue that history or poetry ever displayed. It is closed with what we felt to be the most eloquent sentence in the whole work. After his capture, as Mr. Fox relates, "Argyle was imme- diately carried to Renfrew, thence to Glasgow, and on the twentieth of June was led in triumph to Edinburgh. The order of the council was particular ; that he should be led bareheaded, in the midst of Graham's guards, with their matches cocked, his hands tied behind his back, and preceded by the common hangman ; in which situation, that he might be the more exposed to the insults and taunts of the vulgar, it was directed that he should be carried to the Castle by a cir- cuitous route. To the equanimity with which he bore these indignities, as indeed to the manly spirit exhibited by him throughout in these last scenes of his life, ample testimony is borne by all the historians. Speaking of the supineness of his countrymen, and of the little assistance that he had receiv- ed from them, he declares with his accustomed piety, his re- signation to the will of God, which was that ' Scotland should not be delivered at this time nor especially by his hand.' He then exclaims with the regret of a patriot, but with no bitterness of disappointment — ' But alas ! who is then to be delivered ? There may,' says he, ' be hidden ones, but there appears no great party in the country who desire to be relieved.' " When he is told that he is to be put to the torture, he neither breaks out into any high-sounding bravado, any pre- mature vaunts of the resolution with which he will endure it, nor on the other hand, into passionate exclamations on the cruelty of his enemies, or unmannerly lamentations of his fate. After stating that orders were arrived, that he must be tortured, unless he answers all questions upon oath, he simply adds, that he hopes God will support him ; and then leaves off writing, not from any want of spirits to proceed, but to enjoy the con- fox's JAMfiS THE SECOND. 143 solation which was left him, in the society of his wife, the Countess being just then admitted. " Religious concerns, in which he seems to have been very serious and sincere, engaged mi eh of his thoughts ; while he anticipates, with a hope approaching to certainty, of a happy futurity, he does not forget those who had been justly dear to him in this world. He writes on the day of his execution to his wife, and to some other relatives, for whom he seems to have entertained a sort of parental tenderness, short but the most affectionate letters, wherein he gives them the greatest satisfaction in his power, by assuring them of his composure and tranquillity of mind, and refers them for further consola- tions to those sources from which he derived his own. He states that those in whose hands he is, had at first used him hardly, but that God had melted their hearts, and that he was now treated with civility. Never perhaps did a few sentences present so striking a picture of a mind truly virtuous and hon- ourable. Heroic courage is the least part of his praise, and vanishes as it were from our sight, when we contemplate the sensibility with which he acknowledges the kindness, such as it was, of the very men who are leading him to the scaffold ; the generous satisfaction which he feels on reflecting that no confession of his had endangered his associates ; and above all, his anxiety, in such moments, to perform all the duties of friendship and gratitude, not only with the most scrupulous ex- actness, but with the most considerate attention to the feelings as well as to the interests of the person who was the object of them. Indeed, it seems throughout, to have been the peculiar felicity of this man's mind, that every thing was present to it that ought to be so ; nothing that ought not. Of his country, he could not be unmindful ; and it was one among other con- sequences of his happy temper, that on this subject he did not entertain those gloomy ideas which the then state of Scot- land was but too well fitted to inspire. In a conversation with an intimate friend, he says, that though he does not take upon him to be a prophet, he doubts not but that deliverance will come, and suddenly, of which his failings had rendered him unworthy to be the instrument. In some verses which he composed on the night preceding his execution, and which he intended for his epitaph, he thus expresses this hope more distinctly : 144 fox's JAMES TH^ SECOND* ** * On my attempt though Providence did frown, His oppress d people God at lenL^th will own ; Another hand, by more successful speed, Shall raise the remnant, bruise the serpent's head.* " For constancy and equanimity under the severest trials, few men have equalled, none ever surpassed the Earl of Ar- gyle. The most powerful of all tempters, hope, was not held out to him ; so that he had not, in addition to his other hard tasks, that of resisting her seductive influence ; but the pas- sions of a different class had the fullest scope for their attacks. These however would make no impression on his well-disci- plined mind. Anger could not exasperate, fear could not appal him ; and if disappointment and indignation at the mis- behaviour of his followers and the supineness of the country, occasionally did cause uneasy sensations, they had not the power to extort from him one unbecoming, or even querulous expression. Let him be weighed ever so scrupulously, and in the nicest scales, he will not be found, in a single instance, wanting in the charity of a Christian, the firmness and benev- olence of a patriot, the integrity and fidelity of a man of hon- our. " In order that the triumph of injustice might be complete, it was determined that without any new trial the Earl should suffer upon the iniquitous sentence of 1682. Accordingly on the thirtieth day of June, 1685, he was brought from the Cas- tle to the Laigh Council House, and thence to the place of execution. Before he left the Castle he had his dinner at the usual hour, at which he discoursed not only calmly but even cheerfully. After dinner he retired to his bed-chamber, where he slept quietly for about a quarter of an hour. While he was asleep, one of the members of the Council came and inti- mated a desire to speak with him. Upon being told that he was asleep, the manager disbelieved the account. To satisfy him the door was half opened, and he then beheld in a sweet and tranquil slumber the man who, by the doom of him and his fellows, was to die within the space of two hours. Struck with the sight, he hurried from the room, quitted the Castle with the utmost precipitation, and hid himself in the lodgings of an acquaintance, flung himself upon the first bed that pre- sented itself, and had every appearance of a man suffering the most excruciating torture. His friend offered him some wine. He refused, saying — * No, that will not help me ; I have been fox's JAMES THE SECOND, 145 with Argyle, and saw him sleeping as pleasantly as ever man* did, within an hour of eternity. But as for me' What a satisfactory spectacle to a philosophical mind, to see the op- pressor in the zenith of his power envying his victim ! What an acknowledgment of the superiority of virtue ! What an affecting and forcible testimony to the value of that peace of mind which innocence alone can confer ! When we reflect that the guilt which agonized that man was probably incurred for the sake of some vain title, or at least of some increase of wealth, which he did not want and possibly knew not how to enjoy, oiir disgust is turned into compassion for that very fool- ish class of men, whom the world calls wise in their genera- tion. " Soon after his short repose, Argyle was brought to the Council-House, from which place is dated the letter to his wife, and thence to execution. On the scaffold he had some discourse with the two ministers, Mr. Annan and Mr. Char- teus. He desired both of them to pray for him, and prayed himself with much fervency and devotion. The same mixture of firmness and mildness is conspicuous in every part of the speech which he then made to the people. He said — -*' We ought not to despise our afflictions, nor to faint under them. We must not suflfer ourselves to be exasperated against the in- struments of our troubles, nor by fraudulent, nor pusillanimous compliances, bring guilt upon ourselves. Faint hearts ordi- narily, are false hearts, choosing sin rather than suffering.' Having then asked pardon for his own failings both of God and man, he would have concluded ; but being reminded that he had said nothing of the Royal family — he adds, that he prayed, that there might never be wanting one of the Royal family to support the Protestant religion ; and if any of them had swerved from the true faith, he prayed God to turn their hearts, but at any rate to save his people from their machina- tions. He then turned to the south side of the scaffold, and said — ' I pray you do not misconstruct my behaviour this day ! I freely forgive all men their wrongs and injuries done against me, as I hope to be forgiven of God.' Mr. Annan repeated those words louder to the people. The Earl then went to the north side of the scaffold, and used the same or like expres- sions. Mr. Annan repeated them again, and said — ' This nobleman dies a Protestant,'^ — The Earl stepped forward again,, and said — ' I die not only a Protestant^ hut with a hearts 146 fox's JAMES THE SECOND. hatred of Popery ^ Prelacy, and all superstition whatsomever.^ He then embraced his friends, gave some tokens of his re- membrance to his son-in-law, Lord Maitland, for his daugh- ter and grand-children, stripped himself of part of his apparel, of which he likewise made presents, and laid his head upon the block. Having uttered a short prayer, he gave the signal to the executioner, which was instantly obeyed, and his head was severed from his body. — Such were the last hours, and such the final close of that great man's life. May the like HAPPY SERENITY IN SUCH DREADFUL CIRCUMSTANCES, AND A DEATH EQUALLY GLORIOUS, BE THE LOT OF ALL WHOM TYR- ANNY, OF WHATEVER DENOMINATION OR DESCRIPTION, IN ANY AGE, OR IN ANY COUNTRY, SHALL CALL TO EXPIATE THEIR VIRTUES ON THE SCAFFOLD !" — History, Chapter HI., year 1685. edgewoeth's professional education. 147 EDGEWORTH'S PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION. Essays on Professional Education. By R. L* Edgewortk, Esq., F.R.S., M.R.I. A. Ix literary partnership with a female relative, this author has become sufficiently well known to the public, to enable it to prejudge with tolerable confidence the general qualities of any work he might write, especially on the subject of educa- tion. His book will be opened with the expectation of a very good share of valuable instruction, the result of a long and careful exercise of sound sense on the habits of society, on the experience of education, and on a great multitude of books. There will be no hope of convicting the author of enthusiasm for a system, or servility to any distinguished authority. It will be expected that good use will be made of the opinions of the most opposite speculatists, and that most of the opinions that are approved will be supported by some reference to ex- periments by which they have been verified. It will be ex- pected that, while a philosophic manner and diction are avoid- ed, and all speculations are constantly applied to a practical purpose, full advantage will yet be taken of those explana- tions which the laws of our nature have received from the best modern philosophers. The reader will reckon on find- ing it constantly maintained, that the influence of facts has fully as efficient an operation as instruction by words, in form- ing the human character ; and he will not be surprised at a tone of somewhat more positive confidence than himself is happy enough to entertain, of the complete and necessary success of the process, when it unites the proper facts and the proper instructions. As a moralist, it will perhaps raise no wonder if the author should be found so much a man of the world, as to admit various convenient compromises between the pure principles of virtue, and the customs and prejudices of society; 148 edgeworth's professional education. and as to religion, no man will expect bigotry, or ascetic and incommodious piety, or any sort of doctrinal theology. There will be an agreeable and confident expectation of a great va- ri^y of pertinent anecdotes, supplied from history and obser- vation, at once to relieve and illustrate the reasonings. The reader will be prepared to accept this mode of infusing both vivacity and instructive force into the composition, instead of brilliance of imagination ; comprehensive knowledge instead of argumentative subtlety ; and perspicuity of language instead of elegance. The first essay, or chapter, proposes principles and plans for those stages of education, which, preceding the direct training for a particular profession, admit of a discipline in many points common to the children destined to all the professions. And yet, as parents are urged to fix at a very early period the future profession of each of their sons, they are properly recommended to introduce at an early stage of this general discipline a specific modification of it, prospec- tive to the profession selected. In advising parents to this early choice, the author explodes, in a great measure, the popular notion of a natural inherent determination toward some one pursuit more than another, commonly called " pecu- liar genius," "impulse of genius," "bent of mind," "natural turn," &c. In attacking this notion, he calls in the power- ful aid of Johnson, who always manifested an extreme antipa- thy to it. " I hate," said he, " to hear people ask children whether they will be bishops, or chancellors, or generals, or what profession their genius leads them to : do not they know, that a boy of seven years old has a genius for nothing but spinning a top and eating apple-pie ?" Mr. Edgeworth condemns the folly of waiting in expectation that the supposed natural genius will disclose itself, or be drawn forth by some accident ; during all which time the general discipline of edu- cation will probably be very remiss, the specific training pre- paratory to professional studies will be systematically avoided, and the youth is either growing up to be fit for nothing, or is per- haps determined at last by a casual event, or unfortunate ac- quaintance, to the very worst selection that he could have made in the whole catalogue of employments. It is insisted, that methods which will generally prove effectual may be adopted by parents, to give the child a preference for any de- partment of learning or action they choose, and to make him edgeworth's professional education. 149 sedulous to acquire the requisite qualifications. The author notices some of the most remarkable instances recorded of persons being determined by a particular accident to the pur- suits in which they afterwards excelled ; as Cowley's passion for poetry originated from his meeting with^the Fairy Queen in his mother s window ; and Sir Joshua Reynolds's tor paint- ing, from his chancing to open a book by Richardson, on that subject, at a friend's house. Mr, Edgeworth observes, that the effect produced by reading these books would not have been less if they had been laid in the way by design ; and that, besides, when an impression is to be made by design, the effect is not left to depend on a single impression, since by a judicious management the child may be subjected to a combination and a series of impressions, all tending to the same point. The manner of conducting this process is sketched with a great deal of knowledge and judgment in these essays. If the magnitude and certainty of the effect to be thus produced are assumed in terms rather too little quali- fied, it is an error on the right side ; since it will invigorate the motive by which parents and friends are to be prompted to design and perseverance, and since nothing can be practi- cally more mischievous, than the fancy that all is to be done by some innate predisposition and adaptation, aided by fortui- tous occurrences. At the same time, our author does not need to be reminded, that, as a thousand boys of the same ages as Cowley and Reynolds might have met with, and partly read, the Fairy Queen, and the book on painting, without re- ceiving from them any strong determination to poetry or painting ; so, from the same cause, — the same intrinsic men- tal difference, whatever be the ultimate principle of that diflerence, — the proposed discipline of multiplied and succes- sive impressions, passing just an equal length of time on a thousand youthful minds, will eventually leave, notwith- standing, all imaginable varieties in their dispositions and qualifications. Nevertheless, there Avill be many more heroes, or orators, or engineers, than if no such process had been employed ; and those who fail to become heroic, or eloquent, or scientific, will yet be less absolutely the reverse of those characters, than they would otherwise have been. Our author touches but briefly on the nature of that undenia- ble original distinction which constitutes what is denominated genius ; and maintains, very reasonably, that whatever might 150 edgeworth's professional ebucation. have been the nature, the cause, or the amount, of the inhe- rent original difference between such men as Newton, Milton, and Locke, and ordinary men, that original difference was probably far less than the actual difference after the full effect of impressions, cBltivation, and exertion. He suggests some very useful cautions to parents, against treating their children according to the mysterious and invidious distinction of " ge- nius" and "no genius." The defects and the cultivation of memory are shortly noticed ; and it is maintained, that any memory may be so disciplined, as to be quite competent to the most important matters of bu- siness and science. In proof of this, and as a lesson on the best mode of cultivation, the example of Le Sage, the philoso- pher of Geneva, is introduced, and would have been very in- structive if his method of retaining his knowledge by connect- ing it with a set of general principles, (a sort of corks to keep it in buoyancy) had been more precisely explained by means of two or three exemplifications. There are some very useful observations on the several relations of ideas which are the instruments of recollection ; as resemblance, contrariety, con- tiguity, and cause and effect ; it is strongly and justly insisted, that the memory which operates most by means of the last of these relations is by far the most useful, and therefore that the best mode of cultivating it is a severe attention to this relation. Mr. Edgeworth censures, but not in illiberal language, the system which prevails in our public schools, and our colleges, in which so disproportionate a measure of time is devoted to classical studies, and in the former of which the course of in- struction is the same for all the youth, though they are intend- ed for all the different professions. He advises not to force any violent reforms on these ancient institutions, but to induce their gradual and voluntary melioration, or, if that be possi- ble, to superannuate them, by means of new though smaller seminaries, in which a much greater share of attention shall be given to science, to studies of direct moral and political utility, and to the peculiar preparation for professions. He adverts to the system of education adopted by the Jesuits ; and the plans devised by Frederic " the Great," as he is here designated ; and reviews at some length the succession of magnilicent schemes projected by the French philosophers before and in the course of the revolution. Some of these schemes were practically attempted, and they failed, partly edgeworth's professional education* 151 from being on too vast a scale, and beginning with too high a species of instruction, and partly from that state of national tumult which withdrew both the attention and the pecuniary support indispensable to these great undertakings. At length, a party of philosophers obtained the complete establishment of a more limited, but as far as it extends, more effective in- stitution, under the denomination of Ecole Polytechnique. In the general course of education in France, however, our au- thor observes, classical literature has of late years been re- garded with such indifference or contempt, as to have threat- ened a depravation of taste and of language ; the studies of youth having been directed with incomparably the most emu- lation and ardour, to the branches of knowledge relatpd or capable of being applied to the art of war. He relates how the men of science rose to the highest importance at the very period at which it might have been previously imagined they must have sunk into utter obscurity, the hour of revolutionary violence and terror. Our author's scheme for the formation of an improved order of elementary and superior schools in this country, is laid down with much good sense, and without visionary extrava- gance, particularly without the extravagance of expecting any assistance from the legislature. He would create and sup- port them simply by the conviction, in the minds cf parents in each town and village, of the usefulness and even necessity of such a mode of instruction as he advises ; a mode which should include, without any ostentation, an attention to more branches of knowledge than are usually acquired in schools. Or, if it were desirable there should be any expedient more formal, for promoting such schools, than merely the wish of parents to obtain such instruction, he recommends there should be an association of gentlemen in London to patronize their formation in any part of the country to which they can extend their influence and aid. But the only efficacious power to create competent seminaries, is the concurrent will of a toler- able proportion of the parents, in any place, to have their children instructed in the rational manner proposed. The second essay is on Clerical Education. Considering the expensiveness of a residence at college, and the very in- adequate salaries of curates, the author dissuades parents who have not such connexions as may assist their son's success in the church, from choosing this profession for him ; unless they 152 EDGE worth's PROFESSIONAL EDUCATIOIS'. have fortune sufficient to contribute to his support for perhaps many years after his entrance on it, or he has ah^eady ac- quired a very strong determination of mind towards it, accom- panied by such proofs of application and unusual talent as may warrant a presumption that he will make his way through all difficulties by the force of conspicuous merit. By making his way J is meant, of course, his attaining the emoluments and honours of the church ; and it is obvious enough, that a young man who has no means of doing this but his personal qualities and conduct, has little ground for such a presump- tion, when it is considered how much the disposal of the ecclesiastical good things is regulated by parliamentary in- terest, and the favour of persons of rank. The parliamentary interest confessedly so powerful in making dignitaries and rich incumbents, our author decides to be partly beneficial and partly injurious to the church and to national morality. *' That which is exerted by rich commoners or noble families, to obtain livings for men of Irarning and virtue, who have been tutors to their children, is highly advantageous ; it insures good education to our young nobility, and it encourages men of learning and talents, in the middle or lower orders of life, to instruct themselves, and become fit for such em- ployments, and worthy of such rewards. Parliamentary interest, in- fluencing the distribution of clerical honours and emoluments, is also beneficial, as it tempts parents of good families and fortunes to educate younger sons for the church : they give, as it were, a family pledge for the good conduct of their children, who at the same time may. by their manners and rank, raise the whole profession in the esteem and respect of the public. Church benefices may thus be considered as a fund for the provision of the younger sons of our gentry and nobles ; and in this point of view it cannot surely be a matter of complaint to any of the higher and middle classes of the community, that the clergy enjoy a large portion of the riches of the state." — P. 69 No reader, it is presumed, can permit himself for one mo- ment to doubt, whether all these arrangements can fail to keep in view, as their grand object, the promotion of primitive Christianity among the people, or to prove the best possible means of teaching and exemplifying it; whether the men from the inferior classes, thus seeking and attaining the pre- ferments of the church through the medium of tutorships in noble families, be secure against all possibility of becoming sycophants in the course of their progress, and political tools at its conclusion ; or whether zealous piety, and a dereliction of the spirit and fashions of the world, be the necessary in- heritance of the younger sons of the nobility and gentry. On edgeworth's professional education. 153 these points there can be no doubt; and therefore it is clear that thus far the parliamentary interest in question is highly beneficial to the Christian cause. But the subject has a dark side as well as a bright one ; and every reader will be at once grieved and astonished on reading the next paragraph, in which our author says, in so many words, " But parlia- mentary interest is not always employed in this manner ; it is sometimes exerted to obtain livings for the mean hanger- on of one lord, or the drinking or the profligate companion of another." These are literatim the words, as they stand in the book before us ; but how is it possible they can be true 1 How is it possible that any bishop will suffer such a man to declare before him that he is moved by the Holy Ghost to enter the sacred function ? Or, if it is after his entrance into the church that he becomes such a character, how is it pos- sible an institution framed purely in aid of Christianity should fail to have the most peremptory regulations, not only for in- terdicting such a man from preferment to larger emoluments and more extensive cure of souls, but for expelling him from the ministry altogether ? If parents have resolved to devote a son to the church, a judicious education will, according to the essayist, infallibly make him a person to do honour to the sacred vocation. In order to determine the right method of education for this specific purpose, our author delineates at length the required character, in the successive official stages of curate, rector, and prelate. He informs us that " a good curate is not the man who boasts of being the boon companion of the jolly squire, who is seen following him and his hounds at full cry, leaping five-barred gates, the admiration of the hallooing heroes of the chase, or, floundering in the mud, their sport and derision : he is not the man set oflScially, at the foot of his patron's table, "to smack his wine, and rule his roast ;" he neither drinks nor swears : he scorns to become the buf- foon, and never can become the butt, of the company. In- deed, he does not feel it absolutely necessary to be continually in company." The character which our author proposes to create, is extremely amiable in all the situations and offices in which it is represented. The reader will be prepared not to expect any very strong emphasis to be laid on religion, in the strict sense of the word ; he may supply that desideratum, from his own mind, to a sketch of exemplary prudence, dig- 154 edgeworth's professional education. nity, kindness to the poor and sick, diligence, propriety intho performance of the public offices of the church, and modera- tion on advancement to superior station. There seems a material omission in the description of a good rector. After the melancholy picture given of the misery and degradation suffered by many curates from extreme poverty, we confidently expected to find it made an essential point, in the good cha- racter of the rector, never to suffer his curate to be in this situation from the parsimony of the stipend. As the legisla- ture has declined to interfere in this concern, it lies with the holders of livings to give their curates that complacency in their office which accompanies a respectable competence, or to gall them with the mortification, impatience, and disgust, inflicted by a long, toilsome, and hunger-bitten apprenticeship* to some better station, towards which they will be continually looking with a loathing and abhorrence of the present con- dition, and which they will be tempted to practise the grossest servility in order to obtain. What must be the natural effect, on the state of the church, of perhaps several thousands of its ministers having their characters and exertions subjected for many years, if not for life, to the operation of such feel- ings as these ? And what are all the gentlemanly qualities of a rector worth, if he can be content to see a fellow-clergy- man and his family half starving on the five per cent, which the said rector affords him from his ecclesiastical income, for taking the work of the parish oft' his hands 1 Having exhibited the model of excellence in the different clerical ranks, in all of which he says it is the very same character that is required, and the highest of which none should attain without having commenced with the lowest, the writer proceeds to the proper training for making the good curate, rector, and bishop. And the plan includes something extremely specific and peculiar, for it proceeds on the princi- ple that " the virtues of a clergyman should be founded on religion ;" a foundation, which we cannot, from this work, ascertain to be necessary to the virtue of other professional characters, or necessary to man in general as a moral agent. We are not distinctly informed whether religion, that is, of course, Christianity, is to be considered as any thing more than a convenient basis for a profession, with its appropriate set of peculiar decorums ; or whether it is really a system of truth communicated by divine revelation. Nor are we taught to t' ibtJcATi EDGE worth's PROFESSIONAt' EfitJCATlON. 155 comprehend how, if Christianity be to be regarded as such a system, education in general, and education tor the other par- ticular professions, can be safely and innocently conducted un- der the exclusion of this divine system of doctrine and moral principles ; and nt)t only an exclusion, but in some of the de- partments of education, a most pointed and acknowledged oppo- tion. Possibly the light in which the subject is regarded is this — that it is a very trifling question whether Christianity be true or false ; but that it teaches some principles and modes of ac- tion, the prevalence of which to a certain extent would be use- ful in society, and therefore it is desirable they should be incul- cated ; while, on the other hand, the condition of society re- quires the prevalence also, to a certain extent, of directly op- posite principles, and therefore the same regard to utility re- quires that other professions should support, and be supported by, those opposite principles. — With entire gravity our author takes quite the Christian ground, in settling the moral princi- ples of the youth destined to the church. It is while deciding whether his education should be in a great measure private or at a public school. The private education recommended is not to be a recluse education : the youth is to see the friends and acquaintance of the family, and mix in general conversation. He is to be led gradually, and not with too much haste, into a comprehension of the principal truths, — perhaps we should rather say pro- positions or notions, — of religion, and into a firm faith in them, founded on the " broad basis of evidence." A devo- tional taste is to be created by " letting a child have oppor- tunities of observing the sublime and beautiful appearances of nature, the rising and the setting sun, the storm of winter and the opening flowers of spring," to all which, however, compared with the " top and apple-pie," most children will probably manifest the utmost indiflerence. The impressions are to be reinforced by Mrs. Barbauld's beautiful hymns, by good descriptions of the striking objects in nature, and by good church music. The most simple and affecting narrative parts of the Bible are to be added as soon as they can be clearly understood ; but the author strongly disapproves of children at an early age being set to read the Bible at large, w^hen a great portion of it must be unintelligible to them, when the irksomeness of having it for a sort of task-book, and the carelessness resulting from constant familiarity with 156 it, may predispose the pupil to regard it with dislike, and dis- qualify him fur feeling the full impression of its sanctity and grandeur in subsequent life. Instructors are admonished to be cautious of giving the child erroneous and mean ideas of the Divine Being by minute illustrations or trivial and de- ceptive analogies ; of habitually threatening his vengeance on their faults, in the form either of immediate judgments or future retribution ; and of describing the future state with the particularity which must divest the idea of all its sublimity. Considering it as impossible, by the nature of the youthful mind, that very young children can be effectually governed by ideas of a remote futurity, our author advises not to make use of these ideas in governing them, " till reiterated experience shall have given them the habit of believing that what was future has become present." With regard to attempting to connect, in the minds of the children, ideas of the divine anger, and the punishments of a future state, with their faults and vices, we think there are pious parents and teachers that need some admonition. To resort, with a promptitude which has at least the effect of profaneness, to these awful ideas, on every recurrence of carelessness or perversity, is the way both to bring those ideas into contempt, and to make all faults appear equal. It is also obvious, that, by trying this expedient on all occasions, parents will bring their authority into con- tempt. If they would not have that authority set at de- fiance, they must be able to point to immediate consequences, within their power to inflict on delinquency. Perhaps one of the most prudential rules respecting the enforcement on the minds of children of the conviction that they are accountable to an all-seeing though unseen Governor, and liable to the punishment of obstinate guilt in a future state, is, to take op- portunities of impressing this idea the most cogently, at sea- sons when the children are not lying under any blame or dis- pleasure, at moments of serious kindness on the part of the parents, and serious inquisitiveness on the part of the chil- dren, leaving in some degree the conviction to have its own effect, greater or less, in each particular instance of guilt, according to the greater or less degree of aggravation which the child's own conscience can be made secretly to acknow- ledge in that guilt. And another obvious rule will be, that when he is to be solemnly reminded of these religious sanc- tions and dangers in immediate connexion with an actual EDGE worth's PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION. 157 instance of criminality in his conduct, the instance should be one of the most serious of his faults, that will bear the utmost seriousness of such an admonition. As to how early in life this doctrine may be communicated, there needs no more pre- cise rule than this ; that it may be as early as well-instructed children are found to show any signs of prolonged or return- ing inquisitiveness concerning the supreme Cause of all that they behold, and concerning what becomes of persons known to them in their neighbourhood, whom they find passing, one after another, through the change called death, about which their curiosity will not be at all satisfied by merely learning its name. These inquiries will often begin to interest theiii, and therefore these doctrines and sanctions of religion may be beneficially introduced into their minds, sooner a great deal than our author seems willing they should hear any thing about God as a Judge, or a future state of retribution. Be- sides, we do not know what the economy may be at Edge- worth's Town, but in a family where there is any avowed at- tention to religion, where the children are made acquainted with even only select portions of the Scriptures, where there are any visible acts of devotion, and where it is a practice to attend public worship, it is quite impossible to prevent them from acquiring the ideas in question in some form ; and there- fore, unless parents will adopt systematically, and maintain with the most vigilant care, the practical habits of atheists, in order to keep the children's minds clear of these ideas, there is an absolute necessity of presenting these ideas in a correct though inadequate form as early as possible to the mind, to prevent their being fixed there in a form that shall be absurd and injurious. The Essay proceeds to indicate the practical discipline for cultivating, or rather creating, the virtues of economy, charity, tolerance, and firmness of mind. Here we meet with one of the many instances of compromise between absolute principle and convenience. ** In marking the difference between education for different professions, we may observe that a clergyman's should essentially differ from a law- yer's in one respect. A boy intended for the bar may be, in some degree, indulged in that pertinacious temper, which glories in supporting an opin- ion by all the arguments that can be adduced in its favour; but a boy designed for the church should never be encouraged to argue for victory ; be diould never be applauded for pleading his cause well, for supporting 158 EDGE worth's PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION. his own opinion, or for decrying or exposing to ridicule that of his oppo- nent." P. 88. It seems quite a settled principle of our author's morality, thus to make the character of the man not only secondary to the professional character, but a sacrifice to it. Nor can we know where the operation of this principle is to be limited, nor whether it has any limits. If, as in the case before us, the love of truth, and, by infallible consequence, the practical love of justice, may thus be exploded, by a formal sanction to the love of victory, and to a pertinacity regardless of right and wrong, for the sake of producing professional expertness — what other virtue should we hesitate to sacrifice to the same object ? Thus explicitly tolerate and encourage in the pupil the contempt of one essential part of moral rectitude, and he may very justly laugh at his parents and tutors, when they are gravely enjoining him not to violate any of the rest. He may tell them, he apprehends it may be of service, in prose- cuting some of his designs, to throw aside one or two more of the articles commonly put by moralists among the essentials of virtue ; and that therefore, if they please, he had rather be excused listening to any canting lectures about integrity. And if the pure laws of moral excellence are to be deposed from their authority at all, we presume the benefit of the exemption ought not to be confined to the persons intended to figure at the bar. Some other employments, to which the bar profes- ses to be in deadly hostility, have also their pupils and their adepts, to whom the abrogation of the rigid standard of moral- ity will be exceedingly welcome and convenient ; and more professions than these essays extend to, might have been treated of in the book, much to the edification of many acute and active young persons who are at all times training to them. — Let it be also considered in what a ludicrous predica- ment the theory of morals would be placed, in a family in which there were several sons, educating for different profes- sions, under the immediate care of their parents ; a case which our author regards as very desirable. One son, let it be supposed, is to be a lawyer, another a clergyman. The young clergyman receives, in the sight and hearing of his brother, daily lessons on the indispensable duty of maintaining an ardent love of truth, and an honest candid simplicity, that admits every argument in its proper force, and would feel it a violation of principle — ^not of reason or decorum only, but of EDGE worth's PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION. 159 conscientious principle — to defend error through obstinacy or the desire of victory. But the very spirit and conduct which the young clergyman is taught to regard as immoral, is by the same instructors, on the same day, in the same room, encour- aged in the young lawyer by a tolerance, which, if he acquits himself cleverly, will approach to applause. What are these virtuous instructors to do, or say, when the young lawyer laughs aloud at his brother while undergoing their moral lec- ture, and at them for making it ; or when their clerical pupil asks them, with ingenuous distress, what they really mean by the terms duty, morality, virtuous principle, and the like, seeing the pretended moral principle and its direct reverse are thus to be regarded as equally right ? We can conceive no expe- dient for these worthy parents to adopt in such a case, but to dismiss at once the hypocrisy of an illusory diction, and frankly avow, that, as to the point of virtue and matter of conscience involved in the honesty enjoined on the clergyman, that is all a joke ; but that the plain thing is, there is a prof essional pro- priety in the clergyman's cultivating the quality in question, and a professional convenience in the lawyer's despising it. The remainder of the essay briefly traces, without affecting any novelty of system, the proper course of a young clergy- man's studies, previously to his going to college, at college, and in his subsequent years. The French and English modes of eloquence are contrasted, and the latter, for very good rea- sons, preferred. There are some plain and useful suggestions of methods of discipline, by w^hich the preacher should ac- complish himself as a good speaker. He is advised to study the pulpit manners of living preachers, not for so poor and ab- surd an object as the imitation of even the best of them, but to perfect his abstract idea of excellence by means of a consider- ation of various examples, better and worse, — ^for he recom- mends the student to hear some of the worst specimens as well as the best. Among the vilest sort, he says, " should be class- ed all those clerical coxcombs, who show that they are more intent on the nice management of a cambric handkerchief, or the display of a brilliant ring on their white hands, than upon the truths of the gospel, or the salvation of their auditors." He concludes by recommending the clergyman to acquaint himself accurately with the various modes of faith, worship, and religious establishment, in our own and other countries, in order to keep himself clear of bigotry and party violence, and 160 edgeworth's professional education. to become qualified to act the part of a wise and benevolent moderator among others. On taking leave of the clerical profession, the author ap- pears to take a final and willing leave of religion. The word is admitted, indeed, two or three times, in enumerating the re- quisite instructions for the other professions ; it is introduced just as a notice that the subject has been duly disposed of al- ready ; and the writer appears glad to be thus left at full liber- ty to sketch the whole scheme of the education of the soldier, physician, lawyer, and statesman, without formally including this ungracious article. Such a thing as a solemn regard to the Governor of the world, and a rigorous adherence to his re- vealed laws, was deemed too trifling or too fanatical to be brought forward in each of the delineations of professional ex- cellence, as a purifier of motives, as a prescriber of ends, and a regulator in the choice of means, in every department of human action. It was not that the author was anxious to avoid repe- tition ; for most of the other requisite branches of instruction, and qualities of character, which have been illustrated and en- forced as indispensable or highly useful for one profession, are again fully insisted on with reference to another, and still another. Nor do we complain of this repetition. The value of what may be called a philosophical memory, of a most care- fully cultivated reasoning faculty, of intellectual and moral self- command, of a certain portion of learning and science, and of extensive knowledge of mankind, is obviously so great to all persons employed in important concerns, that the reader is willing and pleased to have them brought again in view, in or- der to its being shown in what manner they are indispensable in the education of the physician, or the lawyer, or the states- man. But, while such ample liberty is taken of enlarging again, in the successive divisions of the work, on several quali- fications which are not merely professional, but are indispen- sable to professional men, just because they are indispensable to all enlightened and useful men, we own we cannot help re- ceiving an unfavourable impression of the moral quality of a work, from seeing so careful an omission, (except in the part where it was unavoidably to be noticed as professionally ne- cessary,) of that one qualification of human character, which is the only secure basis of any virtue, and gives the purest lustre to every talent. The third essay is on Military and Naval Education. In edgeworth's professional education. 161 undertaking to sketch the proper education for the several professions, Mr. Edgeworth has omitted, apparently by design, to premise any observations tending to fix the moral estimate of each, for the assistance of those persons who are compelled to consult a delicate conscience in choosing the professions of their children. A few observations of this kind might not have been out of place, at the beginning of an essay on the method of making a soldier ; for such a conscience may per- versely raise a very strong question, whether it be right to destine a child to the occupation of slaying men ; and, happily, for our country, (or unhappily, as we believe it will be more according to the current moral principles of the times to say,) there are a certain proportion of people who cannot dismiss in practice their convictions of right, even though flattered by a presumption that their names, in their sons, might attain the splendour of military fame. We cannot be unaware how much offence there are persons capable of taking, at a plain description of war in the terms expressive of its chief opera- tion. And it is, to be sure, very hard that what has been be- dizened with the most magnificent epithets of every language, what has procured for so many men the idolatry of the world, what has crowned them with royal, imperial, and, according to the usual slang on the subject, " immortal " honours, what has obtained their apotheosis in history and poetry, — it is hard and vexatious that this same adored maker of emperors and demi-gods, should be reducible in literal truth of description to " the occupation of slaying men," and should therefore hold its honours at the mercy of the first gleam of sober sense that shall break upon mankind. But, however whimsical it may appear to recollect that the great business of war is slaughter, however deplorably low-minded it may appear to regard all the splen- dour of fame with which war has been blazoned, much in the same light as the gilding of that hideous idol to which the Mexicans sacrificed their human hecatombs, however foolish it may be thought to make a difficulty of consenting to merge the eternal laws of morality in the policy of states, and however presumptuous it may seem to condemn so many privileged, and eloquent, and learned, and reverend personages, as any and every war is sure to find its advocates, — it remains an obsti- nate fact, that there are some men of such perverted percep- tions as to apprehend that revenge, rage and cruelty, blood and fire, wounds, shrieks, groans, and death, with an infinite ac» 162 edgeworth's professional education* companiment of collateral crimes and miseries, are the ele- ments of what so many besotted mortals have worshipped in every age under the title of " glorious war." To be told that this is just the common-place with which dull and envious moralists have always railed against martial glory, will not in the slightest degree modify their apprehension of a plain mat- ter of fact. What signifies it whether moralists are dull, en- vious, and dealers in common-place, or not ? No matter who says it, nor from what motive ; the fact is, that war consists of the components here enumerated, and is therefore an infernal abomination, when maintained for any object, and according to any measures, not honestly within the absolute necessities of defence. In these justifying necessities, we include the peril to which another nation with perfect innocence on its part may be exposed, from the injustice of a third power ; as in the instance of the Dutch people, saved by Elizabeth from being destroyed by Spain. Now it needs not be said that wars, justifiable, on either side, on the pure principles of lawful defence, are the rarest things in history. Whole centuries all over darkened with the horrors of war may be explored from beginning to end, without perhaps finding two instances in which any one belligerent power can be pronounced to have adopted every precaution, and made every effort, concession, and sacrifice, required by Christian morality, in order to avoid war ; to have entered into it with extreme reluctance, to have entertained while prosecuting it, an ardent desire for peace, promptly seizing every occasion and expedient of conciliation ; to have sincerely forsworn all ambitious objects, to have spurned the foolish pride of not being the first to offer peace, and to have ended the war the very first hour that it was found that candid negociation and moderate terms would be acceded to by the enemy. It is certain, at least, that the military histo- ry of this country is not the record where such examples are to be sought. But it may be presumed, we suppose, that those parents whose moral principles are to be of any use to their children, will abhor the idea to their sons being employed in any war that has not the grounds of justification here enumer- ated. But then, in order to their feeling themselves warranted to educate those sons for the business of war, they must have a firm assurance that the moral principles of their nation, or its government, are about to become so transformed, that there shall be, during the lives of their children, no war which shall edgeworth's professional education. 163 not, on the part of their country, stand within the justifying conditions that we have specified. And let a conscientious parent seriously reflect, whether there be any good cause for entertaining such an assurance. But, unless he has such an assurance, he gives his son to be shaped and finished, like a sword or a bayonet in a Birmingham manufactory, to be em- ployed in deeds of slaughter, righteous or iniquitous, just as may be determined by the persons in power, to whom he must sell his services unconditionally, and whose determinations may probably enough be guided by the most depraved princi- pies ; while there is this unfortunate diflference between the youth and the sword, that the youth who is thus becoming an instrument of slaughter, cannot still be divested of the ac- countableness of a moral agent. A melancholy case ! that the father should have cause to deplore the impossibility of his son's being at once an accomplished soldier and an idiot. — If a time shall come when the nation and its government shall manifest, with any thing like a sufficient security for perma- nently manifesting, half as much moderation as they have shown pride and ambition, and half as decided an attachment to peace as they have shown violent passion for war, during the last half century, then the parent's conscientious scruples m^^y be turned from the general question of the morality of the military employment, to the particular considerations of its probable influence on his son's character, and its dangers to his life ; that is to say, if all such considerations, and the pro- fession itself, are not by that time set aside by the final cessa- tion of war. In the mean time, conscientious parents may do well to resign the ambition of training sons to martial glory, to those fathers — a plentiful complement — ^who will laugh at the sickly conscience which scruples to devote a youth to the pro- fession of war, on the ground that the wars in which he shall be employed may be iniquitous. We are not sure that Mr. Edgeworth would not join in this laugh, as he makes very light of whatever morality has to do in the concern. He contemplates with the utmost coolness, not only the possibility that his young hero may be employed in an unjust cause, (in which case he is here recommended to take no responsibility on his conscience, but mind his pro- per business of killing and slaying,) but the certainty that the prescribed education for a military life will powerfully tend to promote and perpetuate a state of war. He says, 164 edgewokth's professional education. ** After quitting his academy, it is scarcely possible that a yoxmg man, ■who has acquired all the knowledge, and caught all the enthusiasm ne- cessary for his profession, should not ardently wish for war, that he may have opportiHiities of distinguishing himself. Martial enthusiasm and a humane philosophical lore of peace are incompatible, therefore military pupils should not be made philosophers, or they cease to be soldiers, and how then can we expect to be defended ?" — P. 1&4. Thus it is plainly asserted, that a rightly conducted milita- ry education will inspire its subjects with an ardent passion against the nation's being at peace. Now let it be considered, that of the numerous youths to be thus educated, and there- fore inspired with this passion, a considerable proportion will be sons of the nobility, who form a branch of the legislature, a kind of permanent council to the king ; that another large proportion are from the families of the prodigious number of executive functionaries of the state, through all their grada- tions ; and that a very numerous supply is from the families of wealth and influence throughout the country, whose direct or collateral relations have seats in the House of Commons : let all this be reflected on but five minutes ; let it be consid- ered that the younger sons of the nobility, when thus educa- ted, must be provided for at all events, even if they were not burning for martial enterprize ; that in the descending ranks of family and wealth, who send their representatives to the House of Commons, the modern habits of living have created certain necessities very powerfully tending to influence the fathers of these young heroes to promote in that House, in person, or by their friends, such national schemes as will fur^ nish employment for their sons ; and that the generous ambi- tion, as it will be called,* of these high-spirited young men, always therefore the favourites and idols of their families and connexions, will probably have no little direct influence on the volitions of their parliamentary relatives. Let any man think of all this influence, acting in reinforcement of that horror of peace which may prevail as much in the government and a great part of the nation another half century, as it has prevail- ed during the last, and say whether there can be any better security for a constant national disposition to a state of wan The nation is to stand, therefore, in this desirable predica- ment ; that the grand expedient for defending it against ene- mies, is to be most exactly calculated to set it continually on finding and making enemies* edgeworth's professional education. 165 Such are the natural effects of our author's scheme of mili- tary education, according to his own statement of its tendency, on which statement he appears not to have the slightest idea that any one can be so wrong-headed as to found an objection to such an education. It is no business of ours, in this place, to enter into a dull and useless discussion whether it be prac- ticable to devise a scheme of education which should qualify young men to be efficient soldiers, whenever duty should appear to summon them to act in that capacity, and should equally, at the same time, cultivate all the moral principles that would inspire a detestation of war. But it is our business, as Chris- tian censors and monitors, to say, that, if this is not practica- ble, no parent can educate his son for war, without a complete virtual abjuration of Christianity ; as it is obviously impossi- ble for him at once to be faithful to the laws of an institution which commands every thing gentle, pacific, preventive of strife and suffering, and repressive of ambition, and deliberate- ly to excite in his son an ardent passion for that employment, of which the grand elements are fury, anguish, and destruc- tion. The laws of this institution are fundamental and abso- lute, forming the primary obligation on all its believers, and reducing all other rules of action to find their place as they can, in due subordination, — or to find no place at all. No arguments in favour of this military passion are to be allowed from such topics as national glory, unless it is to be maintain- ed, that Christianity has provided for a suspension of its own principles, in favour of that pride and ambition generally im- plied in this phrase. And if it has made an exception in fa- vour of these, why should it not be equally indulgent to any other depraved feelings connected with other kinds of corrupt interest ? that is, why has it an existence, as a moral author- ity ? It had better not exist at all, if it were an institution which enforced gentleness and quietness on mankind, just as if to give the more destructive effect to an exception sanction- ing martial madness to harass and consume them. Truly it would deserve all the contempt which such persons jts our author feel for it, if it were a system maintaining itself rigidly obligatory on those whose refined moral sensibility yields to admit the obligation, but not obligatory on those whose fierc© passions disdain its control ; that is, a thing of which the obligation depends on whether men are willing to acknow- ledge it or not. 8* 166 edgeworth's professional education. We have mentioned what is called national glory, as this is one of the chief idols which men of war are always required to worship, and to which there is hardly any thing in the whole moral system which they will not be justified, by the general- ity of politicians and moralists in these times, for sacrificing. But national defence is Mr. Edgeworth's immediate plea, in justification of a mode of training which must deprave the moral sentiments of a considerable portion of our youth ; " How can we" otherwise, he asks, " expect to be defended ?" "We have already said, in reply to this. How can we, at this rate, be ever free from perils, created by our own foolish dis- position to seize or make occasions for war ? But we add another question of still graver import : — On the supposition that there is a righteous Governor of the world, how can we expect to be defended, if we industriously promote, in the minds of a large and the most active proportion of our youth, a spirit which he abominates, and the national conduct naturally re- sulting from which he has threatened to visit with punishment? This question, indeed, it must be acknowledged, can perti- nently be addressed only to the " fanatics ;" as we have had extensive opportunity of observing, that the persons so reput- ed alone show any real practical recognition of a divine go- vernment in speculating on the policy of states. It is to be hoped that all these fanatics, in consistency with their faith in such a government, beware of soliciting the demon of mar- tial ambition into the minds of their sons ; convinced that no possible combination of circumstances under heaven can sanc- tify a spirit the reverse of their religion, and that, as a gene- ral law, a state in danger has just so much the greater cause to despair of being defended, as it prepares its defence in a spirit careless of divine injunctions, and scornful of a reliance on Providence. Till the right spirit shall find its way into nations and governments, it remains to be seen what that Pro- vidence will suffer to be effected among them by that valorous Ambition which Mr. Edge worth wishes to inflame, and all the glory of which — except its success, and its eflicacy to annihi- late national danger — has richly crowned this country during the last half century. If the question were still urged. But how can a nation be defended ? it may be answered at once, that a nation whose piety and justice are approved by heaven, (and how is a nation of an opposite character to have any security of being defend* edgeworth's professional education. 167 ed, whatever be its ostensible means ?) such a nation may be defended by the divine agency giving efficacy to the operation of such numbers, such military apparatus, and such resources of science, as the purely defensive spirit would always keep partly prepared, and would soon make ready for action, in an enlightened nation, conscious of having the most valuable pos- sessions to lose. Our author's morality appears on the same level, in the doctrine that it is not for military men, except those of the very highest rank, to form any judgment of their own on the right or wrong of the cause in which they are to be employed. That is, in the one employment which is the most awful on earth, that of inflicting death on human beings in the mass, men are not to consider their actions as of consequence enough for the cognizance of conscience ; they may divest themselves of the inconvenience of moral accountableness, till they return to the solemn functions of buying and selling, and the ordinary proprieties of life. In the civil economy of society, the life of an individual is regarded as of such importance, that it must not be touched without a most grave and punctilious process ; witnesses are attested and rigorously examined, juries are sworn and charged, laws are explained, learned judges pre- side, and are even allowed by their office to assume in a cer. tain degree the character of advocates for the accused ; and should any one of all these persons concerned, be proved to have acted in the process as a man divested of moral respon- sibility, his character is blasted for ever. But let an ambi- tious despot, or a profligate ministry, only give out the word that we must be at war with this or the other nation, — and then a man who has no personal complaint against any living thing of that nation, who may not be certain it has committed any real injury against his own nation or government, nay, who possibly may be convinced by facts against which he cannot shut his eyes, that his own nation or government is substantially in the wrong, then this man, under the sanction of the word war^ niay, with a conscience entirely unconcern- ed, immediately go and cut down human beings as he would cut down a copse. It is nothing to him if the people he is to co-operate in attacking are peaceful, free, and happy, and that this very freedom and happiness may have been the cause of the w^ar, by exciting the malignity of the aggressor. The peaceful valleys and hills of Switzerland can be no more sacred 168 EDGEWORTH's professional EDUCATIOINT. in his view, than the borders of the most arrogant and mali- cious rival. The officers who invaded and subdued that coun- try were, all but the commander-in-chief, as virtuously employ- ed as those who fell in attempting to defend it. And, admit- ting that the popular resistance in Spain is really an effort of a long-degraded people to obtain liberty, the invaders, except- ing perhaps the marshal dukes, are as honourably occupied as their opponents ; for they are destroying men and desolating the country, under the modest forbearance, enjoined by our moralist, to arrogate to themselves a right of judging of the merits of the cause. And should they receive orders from their superiors to perpetrate the barbarities of Herod, they have only to obey, and exult in their exemption from moral respon- sibility. The exemption goes this length, and every length, or it cannot be proved to exist at all ; for if an accountable - ness is to take place at some point, and the man's own judg- ment is to decide where, he will be compelled to begin his examination, and therefore to acknowledge his accountable- ness, at the very first moral question that can be put concern- ing his employment. The young soldier from Mr. Edgeworth's school is not to be eagerly set on duelling, but neither is he in all cases to decline that honourable practice. " The best character," he says, " a young man can establish on going into the army, is that of being determined to fight in a proper cause, but averse to quarrel for trifles." He strongly recommends fencing as a part of an officer's education. ** It might again revive the custom among gentlemen, of fighting duels with swords instead of pistols : a custom, which would at least diminish the number of duellists, by confining them to a certam class in society. Gentlemen would then be m some measure protected from the insolence of uneducated temerity, and every ill-bred upstart would not find himself upon a footing with his superior because he can fire a pistol, or dares to Btand a shot. If any distmction of ranks is to be supported, if any idea of subordination is to be maintained in a country, and what nation can exist without these, education must mark the boundaries, and maintain the privileges of the different orders. The honour and the life of an officer and a senator, and that of a mere idle man of the town, ought not to be put on the same level, nor should their differences be adjusted by one and the same appeal to the trigger.'* P. 152. This expedient for preserving so valuable a privilege to the better sort, for keeping duels a strictly genteel amusement, PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION. 169 would prove ineffectual ; for these " idle men of the town" would, in spite of their description, be soon stimulated to qua- lify themselves in the art, on which they found their equality with the " officers and senators" was to depend ; and some of them, of the true bravo species, would soon acquire the power to overawe their pretended superiors. Mr. Edgeworth might know that some of these men of the town practise shooting at a mark, expressly in preparation for "affairs of honour," with as much assiduity as would finish them in the use of the sword. Under the appearance of idle men of the town, there will always, in the metropolis, be a class of keen desperate adventurers by profession, who regard what Mr. Edgeworth may call " their superiors," as their game ; and so long as gentlemen of the senatorian, or whatever other dignified sort, choose, in defiance of morality and law, to maintain the prac- tice of " appeal " to either the " trigger " or the sword, they will deservedly be at the mercy of the more unerring pistols or swords of these formidable men. As to the supposed higher value of the " honour and the life of the officer or senator," surely the man is the best judge himself what the one or the other is worth ; he is not obliged to appraise them in a pistol- ling match with " every ill-bred upstart, or idle man of the town," and, if he chooses to do it, it is of course because he judges they are things fit for such a traffic. And, truly, what- ever price they might have borne before, he cannot well esti- mate them too meanly by the time that he has measured his ground with his worthless antagonist, since community in crime is the grand equalizer in degradation. By the time he has consented to place himself in that situation, his " honour," at any rate, is hardly worth the trouble of a preference of one weapon to another, and his " life " is worth — ^mentioning in to-morrow's newspaper as a thing that went out in a gentle- manly style. In the name, then, of that liberty, so much fa- voured by the government and tribunals of this Christian country, of violating in this point morality and law, let not the man be forced to take the pains of learning an additional art in order to dispose of his couple of trifles, " honour and life," which can be disposed of with less trouble in the mode now in fashion. The reader will be somewhat surprised to find that this de- termination to fight duels on all proper occasions, is to coa- lesce, in the young soldier's mind, with a religion which it 170 shall be worth his while to maintain with an equal constancy of determination. We are not certain, even, whether the same weapons are not, in the last resort, to be employed ; since "all interference with his religious sentiments, whether by ridicule or remonstrance," is represented as such "an in- fringement of his rights and his independence," as we should suppose he will be bound to resent with lead or steel. ** As a young officer will early mix with varieties of dissipated company, his religious principles should not trust for their defence to any of those outworks which wit can demolish ; he should not be early taught to be scrupulous or strict in the observance of trifling forms ; his important du- ties, and his belief in the essential tenets of his religion, should not rest up- on these slight foundations, lest, if they be overthrown, the whole super- structure should fall. When his young companions perceive that he is not precise or punctilious, but sincere and firm in his belief; when they see that he avoids all controversy with others, and considers all interference with his own religious sentiments, whether by ridicule or remonstrance, as an infringement of his rights and his independence ; he will not only be left unmolested in his tenets, but he will command general respect. It is of the utmost importance that the early religious impressions made on the mind of a soldier should not be o^ a gloomy or dispiriting sort ; they should be connected with hope, not with fear, or they will tend to make him cowardly instead of brave. Those who believe that they are secure of happiness hereafter, if to the best of their power they live and die doing their duty, will ceitainly meet danger, and if necessary, death, with more courage than they can ever do who are oppressed and intimidated by su- perstitious doubts and horrors, terrors which degrade man, and which are inconsistent with all ideas of the goodness and beneficence of God." — P. 143. It should seem to be conveyed, in this piece of instruction, that it is in some certain degree at the option of religious teach- ers what they shall inculcate as religion ; and that therefore, in their religious instructions to their military pupils, they can considerably accommodate to the purpose of producing bra- very. We may also learn that a religion which involves " ter- rors " needs not be believed by any of us, soldiers, authors, or critics, any testimony to the contrary in the Bible notwith- standing. As to the phrase " if they live and die doing their duty," nothing can be more indefinite, or even equivocal ; for, according to our author, a military man may die doing his duty though he dies in a duel, or, as far as we see, if he dies in the act of sacking a harmless town, which some atrocious tyrant, or tyrant's tool, has sworn to annihilate. After so much more than enough on the moral complexion of this long essay on military education, there needs but very EDGEWOHTH's professional EDtlCATlOlSr. 171 few words on its other qualities. In common with the others, it has a certain defect, very sensibly felt by a reader of indif- ferent memory ; that of not prominently marking the several stages and topics in the scheme. But this perhaps could not have been remedied by any other means than a formal divis- ion into a number of sections with distinct titles and argu- ments. The multifarious assemblage of precepts and illustra- tions includes, we should suppose, almost all the expedients most conducive to excite the spirit and finish the accomplish, ments of a soldier. Many directions are given for preparing the young hero, from his infancy, for the toils and privations of his future service. The discipline of stripes must never be applied to him, of whatever perversity or mischief he may be guilty. Every thing must be done by an appeal to his pride, which passion is to be promoted and stimulated in every possible way, as the sovereign virtue of the military character ; nor is any pre- scription given for transmuting it into the opposite Christian virtue just at the extreme moment when he is finally laying down his arms, if he should then be apprehensive that this mil- itary character may be an uncouth garb in which to appear in the other world. The proper discipline for creating courage is pointed out ; amusements bearing some relation to the ope- ration of war are suggested ; it is advised that the boy be in- duced to employ himself sometimes in familiar practical me- chanics ; be early made master of the terms and elements of mathematics ; be carefully trained to an accurate use of his eyes, in order to judge of distances and relative magnitudes ; be taught drawing ; learn some of the modern languages, but not expend much of his time on Latin and Greek. He is to be made conversant with the lives of warriors, and even the sto- ries of chivalry. But the book of mightiest inspiration is the Iliad, of which it was indispensably necessary to mention yet once more, that it sent " Macedonia's madman and the Swede," to draw glorious lines of blood and devastation across certain portions of the surface of the earth, beckoned on by the Homeric ghost of Achilles. The character of this amiable hero has been "fated," it seems, like those of the Christian apostles and martyrs, to meet with detractors among the base- minded moderns. ** Some modem writers have been pleased to call Achilles a mad butch- er, wading in carnage ; but all our love for the arts of peace, and all our 172 edgeworth's professional education. respect for that humane philosophy which proscribes war, cannot induce us to join in such brutal abuse, such unseemly degradation of the greatest military hero upon poetic record ;" and there follows a portion of useful composition on the " he- roic beauties in his character ;" in answer to all which it is sufficient to ask, But was he not, after all, " a mad butcher wading in carnage ?" There are many excellent observations on an officer's conduct in war, on the proper combination, while he is a subaltern, of subordination with independence of character, on presence of mind, on the mode of attaching sol- diers, and inspiring them with confidence, and on that vigour of good sense which, disdaining to be confined to the princi- ples of any school of war, can adapt every operation pointedly to the immediate state of the circumstances. The whole es- say is enlivened by numerous historical examples, selected in general with great judgment and felicity. The remaining Essays are on the education for the Medical Profession, for the duties of Country Gentlemen, for the pro- fession of the Law, and for Public Life, with a short conclud- ing chapter on the education of a Prince. They involve such a multiplicity of particulars, as to be beyond the power of analy- sis, had we any room left to attempt it. Nor is there any bold novelty of general principles that can be stated as per- vading the whole mass ; unless, indeed, we may cite, as a novelty, the author's detestation of the political profligacy and low intrigues of what are called public men. This appears in many parts of the book, and is conspicuously displayed in the Essay on the education of men intended for Public Life. And it is quite time it should be displayed by every honest man, since the public mind habitually leans to a forgetfulness or a tolerance of those vices of public men, to which the public in- terests are made a sacrifice. Thus far is well ; but when our author proceeds confidently to remedy all these evils by means of the inculcation of pride, honour, and magnanimity, (which is only another name for pride, when it is found in such company,) we cannot help wondering through what pre- ternatural splitting of his faculties into a very intelligent part and a very whimsical one, it has happened that the same in- dividual has been in many directions an excellent observer and thinker, but in others a deplorable visionary. BRITISH STATESMEN. 173 VI. BRITISH STATESMEN. Lives of British Statesmen. By John Macdiarmid, Esq., Author of man Inquiry into the System of National Defence in Great Britain, and of an Inquiry into the Principles of Sub' ordination. If we have not learnt to feel for statesmen, as such, a suffi- cient share of that reverential respect which pronounces their names with awe, which stands amazed at the immensity of their wisdom, which looks up to them as the concentrated rea- son of the human species, which trembles to insinuate or to hear insinuated against them the slightest suspicion of obliqui- ty of understanding or corruption of moral principle, and which regards it as quite a point of religion to defend their re- putation, it has not been that we have not received many grave instructions and rebukes on this head from much better men. A hundred times it has been repeated to us, that a pe- culiar and extraordinary genius is requisite to constitute a statesman ; that men, who by situation and office are conver- sant with great concerns, acquire a dignity and expansion of mind ; that those who can manage the affairs of nations prove themselves by the fact itself to be great men ; that their ele- vated position gives them an incomparably clearer and more comprehensive view of national subjects than is to be attained by us on the low level of private life ; that we ought, in defer- ence to them, to repress the presumption of our understand- ings ; that, in short, it is our duty to applaud or be silent. With a laudable obsequiousness we have often tried to con- form ourselves to our duty, at least as prescribed in the latter part of this alternative ; and we have listened respectfully to long panegyrics on the sagacity, fortitude, and disinterested- ness of the chief actors and advisers in state affairs, and to in- culcations of the gratitude due to men who will thus conde- 174 BRITISH STATESMEN. scend, in their lofty stations, (which at the same time it is pre- sumed they can claim to hold for no other purpose,) to toil and care for us the vulgar mass of mankind. Presently these lau- datory and hortatory strains would soften into an elegiac plaintiveness, bewailing the distresses of men in high situa- tions in the state. The pathetic song has deplored the op- pressive labours of thought required in forming their schemes, their cruel exposure to the persecutions of an adverse party, the difficulty of preserving harmony of operation in a wide and complex system involving many men and many dispositions, their anxiety in providing for the wants of the state, the fre- quent failure of their best concerted measures, tl^ir sleepless nights, their aching heads, and their sufferings from the un- grateful reproaches of the people. Here our impatience has overcome our good resolutions, and we have been moved to re- ply. We have said. Is not the remedy for all these sorrows at all times in their reach ? They can quit their stations and all the attendant distresses whenever they please, in behalf of other men who are waiting, eager almost to madness, to ob- tain their share of all the vexations you are commiserating. But while you are so generously deploring the hardships of their situation, they are anxiously devising every possible con- trivance to secure themselves in possession of it, and nothing less than the power that put them in can wrench them out. It is vastly reasonable to be requiring lenient judgments on the conduct, and respectful sympathy for the feelings, of public men, while we see with what a violent passion power and sta- tion are sought, with what desperate grappling claws of iron they are retained, and with what grief and mortification they are lost. It might be quite time enough, we should think, to commence this strain of tenderness, when in order to fill the places of power and emolument it has become necessary to drag by force retiring virtue and modest talent from private life, and to retain them in those situations by the same com- pulsion, in spite of the most earnest wishes to retreat, excited by delicacy of conscience, and a disgust at the pomp of state. So long as men are pressing as urgently into the avenues of place and power as ever the genteel rabble of the metropolis have pushed and crowded into the play-house to see the new actor, and so long as a most violent conflict is maintained be- tween those who are in power and those who want to supplant them, we think statesmen form by eminence the class of per- BRITISH STATESMEN. 175 sons, to whose characters both the contemporary examiner and the historian are not only authorized, but in duty bound, to ad- minister justice in its utmost rigour, without one particle of extenuation. While forcing their way toward offices in the state, and while maintaining the possession once acquired, they are apprised, or might and should be apprised, of the nature of the responsibility, and it is certain they are extremely well ap- prised of the privileges. They know that the public welfare depends, in too great a degree, on their conduct, and that the people have a natural instinctive prejudice in favour of their leaders, and are disposed to confide to the utmost extent. They know that a measure of impunity unfortunate for the public is enjoyed by statesmen, their very station affording the means both of concealment and defence for their delinquencies. They know that in point of emolument they are more than paid from the labours of the people for any services they render; and that they are not bestowing any particular favour on the coun- try by holding their offices, as there are plenty of men, about as able and as good as themselves, ready to take their places if they would abdicate them. When to all this is added the acknowledged fact that the majority of this class of men have trifled with their high responsibility, and taken criminal advan- tage of their privileges, we can have no patience to hear of any claims for special indulgence of charity, in reading and judging the actions of statesmen. On the ground of morality in the abstract, separately from any consideration of the effect of his representations, the biographer of statesmen is bound to a very strict application of the rules of justice, since these men constitute, or at least be- long to, the uppermost class of the inhabitants of the earth. They have stronger inducements arising from situation, than other men, to be solicitous for the rectitude of their conduct ; their station has the utmost advantage for commanding the as- sistance of whatever illumination a country contains ; they see on the large scale the effect of all the grand principles of action ; they make laws for the rest of mankind, and they direct the execution of justice. If the eternal laws of morality are to be applied with a soft and lenient hand in the trial and judgment of such an order of men, it will not be worth while to apply them at all to the subordinate classes of mankind ; as a morality that exacts but little where the means and the responsibility are the greatest, would betray itself to contempt 176 BRITISH STATESMEN. by pretending to sit in solemn judgment on the humbler sub- jects of its authority. The laws of morality should operate, like those of nature, in the most palpable manner on the largest substances. Another reason for the rigid administration of justice to the characters of men that have been high in the state, is to secure the utility of history, or rather to preserve it from be- coming to the last degree immoral and noxious. For since history is almost entirely occupied with the actions of this class of men, and for the much greater part with their vices and their crimes, and the calamitous consequences, it is easy to see that a softened mode of awarding justice to these characters will turn the whole force of history to the effect of depraving our moral principles, by partially conciliating both our feelings and judgments to those hateful courses of action, of which we are already very much too tolerant in consequence of being from our childhood familiarized to the view of them, in every account of the past and present state of the world. And in this way we are inclined to think that history has actually been, on the whole, the enemy of morality. Its readers will have too light an impression of the atrocity of great crimes and great criminals. Great crimes constitute so large a pro- portion of the historian's materials for constructing splendid exhibitions, that if he does not insensibly become almost par- tial to them, as a general does to a band of the most cruel savages whose ferocity he has repeatedly employed to obtain his victories, his hatred admits at least a certain softening of literary interest ; and in many a glowing description of enor- mous wickedness, we fancy we see the hand of the painter or poet rather than the moral censor. Artful combinations of odious circumstances, epithets to aggravate each indignant line, eloquence of execration, are possibly not spared ; but we still find ourselves rather invited as spectators of a splendid tragedy, than summoned as jurors in a solemn court of justice. The diminution or modification, in the historian's mind, of the abhorrence of crimes, in consequence of the benefit which he derives from them as striking materials for his work, aids the operation of any other cause which may tend to render him indulgent to the actor of them. And often the great criminal has had some one virtue, or at least some very showy faults, adapted, in the historian's view, to relieve and even extenuate the account of his wickedness ; he might have munificence, a BEITISH STATESMEN. 177 love of letters, a very lofty kind of ambition, or what a lax morality would term a liberal love of pleasure ; at any rate, he probably had talents, and this is perhaps after all the most seductive of the distinctions by which a bad man can dazzle our judgments. The historian, besides, acquires a kind of partiality for an eminent actor in the times and transactions which he describes, from even the circumstance of being, in imagination, so long in his company. In prosecuting his work, he returns to this person each morning, for weeks, months, or even years ; the interest of the literary labour consists in following this person through the whole train of his proceedings ; the disposition for quarrelling with him gradually subsides ; the odious moral features are familiarized to the view ; while perhaps the conviction of his great attain- ments, and the wonder at his achievements, are progressively augmented ; extenuations suggest themselves, and - occasion- ally even partial claims on applause ; the writer becomes a kind of participator in the activity and importance of the trans- actions, while he is clear of all the guilt : and thus by degrees the rigour of justice is forgotten, and flagrant iniquity is ex- hibited with so little prominence of turpitude, that it depends very much on the moral state of the reader's own mind, whether he shall regard it with indulgence or detestation. We shall not wonder at the bad morality of history, if we com- bine this view of the injurious effect of the historian's studies on his mind, with the consideration that the eminent historians of antiquity were pagans, and the most distinguished ones of modern times very near the moral level of paganism, by means of their irreligion. It is, again, very desirable that a rigid justice should be maintained in delineating and recording the characters and actions of statesmen, because it is in the nature of the people, in all countries, to feel a kind of superstitious veneration for those who are so much above them as to have the command of their public affairs. Place men, of whatever sort, in power, and there will need no burning fiery furnace to intimidate their fellow-citizens into reverential prostration. On the mere strength of their situation they shall gain credit to almost all they pretend, and acknowledgment of right to all they arrogate ; fine talents and fine qualities in abundance shall be ascribed to them ; and the crowd shall look up with awe to the beings that can make speeches and enactments, 178 BRITISH STATESMEN. appointments and imposts, treaties and wars. Or even if the deficiency of integrity and abilities is so notorious as to force a reluctant conviction on the people, the high station secures a certain tolerance which a man in humbler life must not too confidently expect for vices and incapacity. It is matter of great difficulty and effort for these men to sin away the whole stock of credit and partiality, which sounding titles and elevat- ed stations have raised for them in the popular mind. Even our pride is in their favour ; our pride as respecting ourselves is unwilling to believe, that we are all passing our lives in sub- missive homage to persons not at all our betters in wisdom or morals ; and our pride of national comparison feels it abso- lutely necessary to maintain, that we are wise enough to put as much wisdom at our head as any people in the world can boast. — We mean this as a description not of the English nation in particular ; it is the case of every nation. Now this superstitious respect for persons possessing con- sequence in the state is injurious to the people in two ways ; it deteriorates their moral principles, and it endangers their political condition. If statesmen, as a class, had been proved by experience to be the purest of all saints, then this excess of reverence for them might be a most salutary sentiment, as re- inforcing the attractions and authority of virtue by all the in- fluence held over our minds by these its noblest examples. But it has been found till now, or at least till very lately, that statesmen in general deem it necessary to keep in their posses- sion about the same quantity of vice as their neighbours ; and the respect which the people feel for the men, on account of their station, prevents the just degree of contempt or abhor- rence for the vice. All the palliation which vice acquires, as beheld in connexion with respected personages, it is sure aflerwards to retain as viewed in itself; the principles there- fore by which its noxiousness should be esteemed are de- praved ; and all who are disposed to like it w411 gladly take the privilege of committing it at the same reduced expense of con- science and character, as their superiors. In every commu- nity the estimate of the evil of immorality, in the abstract, will infallibly be reduced nearly to the level of that opinion of its evil which is entertained respecting it, as committed by the most privileged class of that community. As to the danger which threatens the political condition of the people, no illustration can well make it plainer. If states- BRITISH STATESMEN. 179 men were an importation of celestials, partaking in no degree of the selfishness and perversity of mortal men, it would be a delightful thing for us to throw into their hands an unlimited power over all the great concerns of a nation, and prosecute our individual purposes, and indulge our tastes and domestic affections, in perfect security that all would go right in the general affairs of the nation. Or if the constitution of things were such, that the interest of the leaders were necessarily coincident entirely with the interest of the people, it might be safe to dismiss the anxiety of vigilance under the presiding direction of even a party of mere human creatures ; as the passengers in a ship give themselves very tranquilly to their amusements or their sleep, because they are certain the offi- cial conductors of the vessel have necessarily just the same interest in its safety as themselves. But it is obvious, that in- numerable occasions will present themselves to men in power, of serving their own interests quite distinctly from those of the people, and decidedly to their detriment. Indeed, the personal interests of these men are necessarily opposed to the grand popular interest of freedom itself, insomuch that no people ever long maintained their internal liberty, who did not main- tain it by precaution against the very statesmen they were obliged to employ. Every thing that ascertains the freedom of the people necessarily fixes the bounds to the power of those who are placed over them ; and it would be requiring too much of human nature, to expect that men, whom ambi- tion, for the most part, has raised to the stations of power, should not regard with an evil eye these limitations to the scope of their predominant passion, and consider them as ob- stacles which they are to remove or surmount if they can. And their high station, as we have observed, affords them many facilities for concealing and protecting themselves, in the prosecution of measures for the gradual subversion of liberty ; in which course and for which purpose very many statesmen, according to the testimony of history, have employed the pow- ers and resources vested, and the confidence reposed in them, by the nation, as the persons officially engaged to guard its interests. Now the thing which beyond all other things would be desired by men with such designs, is, the prevalence in the public mind of a blind veneration for statesmen, that attributes to them rectitude and talents of too high an order to be inspected and scrutinized and controlled by any profane 180 BEITISH STATESMEN. arrogance of the people. Under favour of this state of the popular mind, they have but to make pompous professions of patriotism, and act in tolerable concert, and they may obtain unlimited confidence while they are both wasting the imme- diate resources of the country, and assiduously sapping away all that which can enable each individual inhabitant to say, I am no man's property or slave. It is the duty therefore of all who wish well to mankind, to remonstrate against this perni- cious infatuation ; and it is our official duty to represent that the biographical flatterers of statesmen are among the most wicked perverters of the public mind. Mr. Macdiarmid is not of this class. His language is per- haps a little too indulgent, occasionally, to meet our ideas of the severe duties of the office he has chosen ; but we regard him on the whole as a faithful and impartial biographer. He never gets into such a current of panegyric that he cannot for his life stop to notice a fault. He appears in a considerable degree the friend of several of the eminent men whose actions he records ; but he is such a friend as, if he could have been contemporary and acquainted with any of them, would not have withheld those candid animadversions, which might have contributed to make them greater benefactors of the times, and greater ornaments to history. He does not profess to present their characters in any new light, nor to have drawn facts and anecdotes from rare and unpublished records ; but he thought it might not be an unacceptable service to the public to give a somewhat more ample, and a more minute and per- sonal sketch, of these distinguished men, than can be found, or could with propriety be contained, in any one history of their times. Accordingly he has employed much industry and judg- ment in deducing, from the information supplied by a number of historical and biographical works, very clear narrations of the lives of Sir Thomas More, and Lords Burleigh, Strafford, and Clarendon. The narration is very successful in the point of keeping the individual always fully in view, while it is often necessarily extended, by the public nature of his actions, to the whole breadth of the national history of his times. The writer in general confines himself very strictly to his narra- tion, and is very sparing of reflections ; a forbearance prac- tised, no doubt, from the conviction, that a narrative written with fidelity, force, and discrimination, might in general be very safely left, from the obvious simplicity of its moral, to the SIR THOMAS MORB. 181 reader's own understanding. It is also a commendable modesty to keep at a great distance from the fault of those his- torians, who might seem to be persuaded, that the transactions they record took place positively for no other purpose on earth but to draw forth certain wise notions from their minds. Yet many readers, and we do not disclaim to be of the number, are indolent enough to wish the historian would just give the direction to their thoughts ; and if he can manage to time his reflections well, and to avoid being very trite or prolix, we are very willing to divide with him the merit of being very phi- losophical on every circumstance of the narration. We are not, perhaps, of opinion, that Mr. Macdiarmid's reflections would have been more than usually profound ; but they would have still further manifested that sound, liberal sense which is already so apparent. The style has quite the measured and equable form of set historical composition ; it is however per- spicuous, unaffected, and in a very respectable degree vigor- ous. The book offers a more speedy and elegant introduc- tion, than was before attainable, to an acquaintance with four of the most distinguished characters in our political history. With regard to the first of them. Sir Thomas More, we will acknowledge it must be nearly impossible for the historian of- his life to avoid becoming very decidedly, and even enthu- siastically, attached to him. No great harm would result from a relaxation, in this instance, of that law of severity under which we have represented that the lives of statesmen ought to be written ; for no second instance of the same kind will be found in the subsequent political annals of England. Indeed, he is a person so unique in the records of statesmen, that we can see no chance that any utility in the way of ex- ample, would arise from a display of his life and character. Some email degree of similarity is pre-requisite as the basis of any reasonable hope of seeing an example imitated ; and therefore it would seem very much in vain, as to this purpose, to display a statesman and courtier who was perfectly free from all ambition, from the beginning of his career to the end ; who was brought into office and power by little less than compulsion ; who met general flattery and admiration with a calm indifference, and an invariable perception of their vanity ; who amidst the caresses of a monarch, longed to be with his children ; who was the most brilliant and vivacious man in every society he entered into, and yet was more fond 9 182 BKITISH STATESMEN. of retirement even than other statesmen were anxious for public glare ; who displayed a real and cordial hilarity on descending from official eminence to privacy and comparative poverty ; who made all other concerns secondary to devotion ; and who, with the softest temper and mildest manners, had an inflexibility of principle, which never at any moment knew how to hesitate between a sacrifice of conscience and of life. The mind rests on this character with a fascination which most rarely seizes it in passing over the whole surface of his- tory. In this progress we often meet with individuals that we greatly admire ; but the bare sentiment of admiration may fail to make us delighted with the ideal society of the object, or interested in its fate. In the company of Sir T. More, the admiration scarcely ever stands separate from the more kindly feelings ; it seems but to give the last emphasis to the inexpressible complacency with which we listen to him, converse with him, observe his movements, and follow him wherever he goes. If personally acquainted with such a man, we should, in absence from him, be incessantly haunted with a necessity and a passion to get near him again ; and should not only feel the most animated pleasure, but also, in spite of the contrast between our intellectual powers and his, should feel as if we had five times more sense than usual, when stimulafted and supported by the vigour of a genius which seemed entirely to forget any comparison between itself and those around, which kindly lent itself to assist every one to think, and gladly aided any one to shine, while it had never once any other ambition than to diffuse happiness or impart instruction. The absence of every kind of selfishness, the matchless gayety and good humour which accompanied his great talents, and his wonderful facility of using them, divested of the least timidity every one that approached him, except pretenders and villains. His manner of displaying his talents delighted his friends, into such a total forgetfulness of fear, that only his exalted virtue could preserve to him that veneration, which again his face- tiousness prevented from oppressing those who felt it. Per- haps there never was a person that possessed many various qualities in such perfect combination, as, in an equal degree with More, to make the effect of them all be felt in the opera- tion of any one of them. His playful wit never put his se- vere virtue and ,his wisdom out of recollection ; and at the SIR THOMAS MORE. 183 same time it was acknowledged, that so imperial a virtue had never before been seen so much at its ease in the company of pleasantry and humorous fancy. The habitual influence, therefore, of his character, was a happy and most singular complexity of operation ; as he could exert, and did almost involuntarily exert, not in succession and alternation, but at one and the same time, the wit, the philosopher, and the Christian. Distinguished statesmen generally become what may be called technical characters ; the whole human being becomes shaped into an official thing, and nature's own man, with free faculties, and warm sentiments, and unconstrained manners, has disappeared. An established process regulates the crea- ture into a mechanical agency ; the order of its manners is squared to the proper model, formed between the smooth com- plaisance of the courtier, and the assuming self-importance of the minister ; the whole train of thinking turns on mea- sures of state, on councils, acts, debates, and intrigues ; and the character of the court, the cabinet, and senate, sticks to the being most inseparably, even in the domestic circle, in visits to friends, and in country rambles. In More, on the contrary, the general natural man was always predominant above any artificial character of office. The variety of his interest, the animation of his sentiments, and the strength of his powers, would not suffer affairs of state to repress the living impulses of his mind, or reduce to a formality of action that elasticity which played in all directions with infinite free- dom. Even in the transactions of office, it appears that his wit sometimes threw its sparkles through the gravity of the judge. In reading the lives of most other statesmen, we seem to be making a very unmeaning and unentertaining visit, to see them among their secretaries, or going to their councils, or at their levees, or seated in their robes ; in read- ing of More, it seems to be the statesman that makes a visit to us, in the dress of an ordinary person, with manners formed by no rule but kindness and good taste, talking on all subjects, casually suggested, with an easy vigour of sense, and no fur- ther reminding us of his station and its habits, than by the surprise now and then recurring on our own minds to recol- lect that so wonderfully free and pleasant a man is really a great officer of state. More's character derives some adventitious lustre, from comparison with the persons most conspicuous in the public 184 BRITISH STATESMEN. affairs of England at that time. His being contemporary and intimately connected with Henry the Eighth, might seem as if intended to show in one view the two extremes of human nature. His modesty and disinterestedness contrast admirably with the proud insatiable ambition of Wolsey ; his indepen- dence and magnanimity with the courtly servility which it is im- possible not to impute to the otherwise excellent Cranmer. Amidst the early display and fame of talents and learning, his favourite wish was to become a monk, but was overruled by his father, who was earnest for his adopting the profession of the law. This at length he did, and with the greatest suc- cess, notwithstanding he continued to direct a large proportion of his studies to classical literature and to theology. At the age of twenty-three he entered the House of Commons, in the latter part of the reign of Henry the Seventh, in which situation his first exertion was little less than the hazard of his life, by an eloquent resistance to an iniquitous demand of money, made by this tyrant, and which the fears of the house would have silently yielded but for the courageous virtue of More, which roused them to refuse the grant. He was, how- ever, compelled, in consequence, to exchange the bar for com- plete retirement ; but this only served to complete his know- ledge, and mature his virtues, while the tenderest domestic re- lations occupied his affections, and all the time that could be spared from his studies. He returned to his practice at the accession of Henry the Eighth, whose favourite, after a little while, he very reluctantly became, and so continued for many years, notwithstanding that lofty integrity which never once made the smallest sacrifice of principle to the will of the monarch. After holding several important situations, he was constrained to accept that of high-chancellor, in which he administered justice with a promptitude and a disinterested- ness beyond all former example, till the period of Henry's quarrel with the pope, respecting his divorce of the queen, and his marriage with Anne Boleyn. More foresaw that in his office of chancellor he should be compelled to an explicit op- position to the king, very dangerous to himself; and by ear- nest request obtained the acceptance of his resignation. In prosecuting his determination relative to the marriage, throw- ing off in consequence the authority of Rome altogether, and ultimately assuming himself the supremacy of the English church, the tyrant required the approbation, by oath, of the SIR THOMAS MORE. 185 chief persons in the state. Especially the approbation of More, though now but a private person, was of far greater importance to him than that of any other individual. He was aware that More was conscientiously unable to give this ap- probation, and knew well that nothing on earth could induce him to violate his conscience ; yet, after repeated attempts at persuasion, he angrily insisted on his taking the several oaths, summoned him before a council, and gave him time to deli- berate in prison. After enduring with unalterable patience and cheerfulness the severities of a year's imprisonment in the tower, he was brought to trial, condemned with the un- hesitating haste which always distinguishes the creatures em- ployed by a tyrant to effect his revenge by some mockery of law, and with the same haste consigned to execution. Im- agination cannot represent a scene more affecting than the interview of More with his favourite daughter, nor a character of more elevation, or even more novelty, than that most sin- gular vivacity with which, in the hour of death, he crowned the calm fortitude which he had maintained through the whole of the last melancholy year of his life. Thus one of the noblest beings in the whole world was made a victim to the malice of a remorseless crowned savage, whom it is the in- famy of the age and nation to have suffered to reign or to live.* * In a subsequent paper on Cayley^s Memoirs of Sir Thomas More, Mr. Foster recurs to this subject, and dwells upon it with a beauty and force which strikingly exhibit the nice discrimination and sound moral sense by which his intellect was distinguished. The passage should be read in connexion with his remarks on the hilarity of Hume. " Some grave and pious persons have been inclined to censure this gayety as incongruous with the feelings appropriate to the solemn situa- tion. We would observe, that though we were to admit, as a general rule, that expressions of wit and pleasantry are unbecoming the last hour, yet Sir Thomas More may be justly considered as the exception. The constitution of his mind was so singular and so happy, that throughout his life his humour and wit were evidently, as a matter of fact, com- patible, in almost all cases, with a general direction of his mind to serious and momentous subjects. His gayety did not imply a dereliction, even for the moment, of the habitude of mind proper to a wise and consci- entious man. It was an unquestionable matter of fact, that he could emit pleasantries and be seriously weighing in his mind an important point of equity or law, and could pass directly from the play of wit to the acts and the genuine spirit of devotion. And if he could at all other times maintain a vigorous exercise of serious thought and devout sentiment, unhurt by the gleaming of these lambent fires, there was no good reason 186 BRITISH STATESMEJr. Sir Thomas More's constant adherence to the church of Rome was evinced by his writing against the reformers in a strain of violence most uncongenial with his general charac- ter, by his superstitious discipline of a hair shirt and a knot- ted whip, by certain severities exercised on persons declaring against popery, by his expressing in the inscription which he wrote for his tomb his hostility to heretics, and by his de- liberate preference of death to yielding any sanction to a mea- sure by which the English monarch arrogated the ecclesiasti- cal supremacy which had previously been acknowledged in the popes. In the earlier part of his life, however, he manifested a freedom of opinion which by no means threatened to grow into that bigotry, which in the latter part formed the only, but certainly very serious foil, to so much excellence. In his Utopia he made no scruple to censure the corruptions and ridicule the follies prevalent in the Roman church, and there can be no doubt that to a certain limited extent he would have zealously concurred in a plan of reform. Till the tumults attending the reformation excited him to wish that Christen- why they might not gleam on the scaffold also. He had thousands of times before approaclied the Almighty, without finding, as he retired, that one of the faculties of his mind, one of the attributes of extraordinary and universal talent imparted to him by that Being, was become extmct in consequence of pious emotions : and his last addresses to that Being could not be of a specifically different nature from the former ; they could only be one degree mure solemn. He had before ahnost habitually thought of death, and most impressively realized it ; and still he had wit, and its soft lustre was to his friends but the more delightful for gilding so grave a contemplation : well, he could only realize the awful event one degree more impressively, when he saw the apparatus, and was warned that this was the hour. As protestants, we undoubtedly feel some defect of com- placency, in viewing such an admirable display of heroic self-possession mingled with so much error ; but we are convinced that he was devoutly obedient to what he believed the will of God, that the contemplation of the death of Christ was the cause of his intrepidity, and that the errors of his faith were not incompatible with his interest in that sacrifice. *' There is so little danger of any excessive indulgence of sallies of wit in the hour of death, that there is no need to discuss the question, how far as a rule applicable to good men in general, such vivacity, as that of More, would in that season comport with the Christian character ; but we are of opinion that it would fully comport, in any case substantially resembling his ; in any case where the innocent and refined play of wit had been through life one of the most natural and unaffected operations of the mind, where it had never been felt to prevent or injure serious thinking and pious feeling, and where it mingled with the clear indica- tions of a real Christian magnanimity in death." SIR THOMAS MORE. 167 dom might be tranquillized by a paramount authority in reK- gion, his veneration for the pope had by no means gone the length of ascribing an absolute unlimited authority in reli- gious matters. At all times he held the decrees of general councils in higher respect than those of the papal court ; and when Henry the Eighth was about to publish the famous book which procured him and all his successors the title of De- fender of the Faith, More vainly remonstrated with him against the extravagant terms in which that book set forth the pope's authority. He probably was not himself aware how firmly the popish superstitions had taken hold of his mind, till they were at- tacked by Luther ; and then he found them become so sacred in his opinion, that he deliberately avowed, and with unques- tionable sincerity, in his Apology, that he deemed heretics worse than robbers and murderers. And since his philosophy had fallen far short of admitting the principle that human au- thority has no right to punish modes of faith, he considered heretics as amenable to the tribunals of the state, and the magistrate bound to prosecute the enemies of God. The pro- gress of his mind to bigotry and persecution is explained by Mr. Macdiarmid with much intelligence, and with the utmost candour toward the admirable person whom he is painfully forced to accuse. It is impossible now to ascertain how far More was prac- tically a persecutor. If it were possible, we should go into the inquiry with a strong apprehension of finding, that he did in some measure contribute to the rigorous execution o£ the laws enacted, or brought into more decisive operation, against the protestants, during part of the detestable reign in which it was his fe,te to live. It is unquestionable however that some of the protestant writers have greatly exceeded the truth, in charging him with numerous acts of direct personal cruelty in the exercise of his power. They have used expressions from which it might almost be inferred, that one of his ordi- nary methods against protestants was the infliction of corporal suffering. But we have his own express affirmation, which we consider as of higher authority than all other testimony, that he had recourse to personal violence on account of the declared renunciation of popery only in two instances, that of a boy of his household, and that of a man who was guilty of indecent outrages on persons, particularly on women, attend- I8i BRITISH STATESMEN* ing the mass. These two he caused to be " stripped," he says, but not so much, he affirms, as to cause them any lasting pain or injury. Without however proceeding the odious length that has been most unjustly imputed to him, he might, in his high official capacity of chancellor and president of the star- chamber, exercise much legal intolerance ; and from such a view we can only join with all good and wise men in lamenting the deplorable darkness and perversity of human reason, which both in that and later times so obstinately refused to perceive or acknowledge, that religious opinions are entirely beyond the jurisdiction of human authority. What is most humiliating of all, — -many of the reformers themselves, though asserting liberty of opinion in their dissent from the church of Rome, could not comprehend that other men had the very same right to dissent from them. The larger portion of the history of the reformed churches has been the history of popish intolerance, variously modified indeed, in its action, by national and local character, and by the particular temper of leading individuals, but well furnished with its conclaves, its holy offices, its political intrigues, its bulls, its dungeons, and even its executioners, and operating rather on a reduced scale of power, than with any mitigation of malignity. All this, say the protestants, is very arrogant and impious in the papal church ; but the papal church is erroneous, and the papal church is not ours : — of what inestimable utility, in the true church, would be a modified exercise of that high authority, which is indeed so wrong and pernicious in the corrupt one ; it were very unfortunate to lose entirely so grand an advantage gained over the human mind by ecclesiastical authority ; cer- tainly it has been very improperly acquired and used by the church that gained it, but being gained, might it not become a holy thing in the hands of holy men ? The conqueror was no doubt guilty of ambition and injustice, but his successors, who are of course wise and beneficent, may do much more good by retaining the subjugated provinces and the spoils, than by restoring liberty and property. Can the power be too great, when the only object to which it is possible for it ever to be applied in our hands is the support of the genuine cause of God ? When strong measures have been employed to pro- mote and establish error, are we not in duty called upon to use means equally strong to maintain the truth ? Sentiments of this kind are unhappily felt and expressed by bigots, not LORD BURLEIGH. 189 only in all establishments, but in all sects, however mani- festly incompatible with their primary and fundamental prin- ciples. As long as the popish establishment stands, it will have the effect, not only of setting an example, venerable by age, of ecclesiastical dominion, but of continually suggesting how far it might be carried ; and it will tend to prevent any set of men from ever suspecting themselves of intolerance, so long as they stop short of the downright tyranny which that church has always practised, and prevent them from cordially allow- ing an absolute freedom of thought and profession, satisfied with just so much authority over men's religious opinions as argument, eloquence, and virtue can maintain. On account of this influence, as well as of the immediate noxiousness of the papal dominion wherever it exists, we have fervently to wish for the downfall of all its establishments, and humbly to pray, that the movements of the present awful crisis may happily be made so far beneficial as to result in their final demolition. We come back to the book before us by observ- ing, that the detestable quality of religious, and especially popish bigotry, is hardly more conspicuous in the exhibitions of Smithfield and St. Bartholomew, than in the fact of its having sometimes filled with virulence such an otherwise almost angelic being as Sir Thomas More. We must be more brief in our notice of the remaining lives. That of Cecil, Lord Burleigh, presents to our view beyond all doubt the most useful minister that ever managed the afiairs of our country. He held the important station during very nearly the whole reign of Elizabeth ; and we shall not allow it to constitute any impeachment of either our loyalty or gal- lantry, that we have wished, while reading the account of his life, that he had been the monarch instead of our famous queen. It is impossible to say what share of the better part of her fame was owing to him, but we are inclined to think, that if we could make out an estimate of that reign, wanting all the good which resulted from just so much wisdom and moderation as Cecil possessed beyond any other statesman that could have been employed, and including all the evil which no other minister would have prevented, we should rifle that splendid period of more than half its honours. A very considerable proportion of his political labour was a contest with his sovereign, a contest with caprice, with superstition, 9* 190 BRITISH STATESMEN. with bigotry, and with the prodigality of favouritism. This would no doubt reflect great honour on the sovereign who could, notwithstanding, retain in her favour and service so upright a minister, if the fact had not been, that his services were just as indispensable to her government as those of a cook or postillion were to her personal accommodation. She had the sense to be convinced, and the prudence to act on her conviction, that no other man in her dominions could so happily direct her affairs through the extreme dangers of that memorable period. Though, therefore, she would sometimes treat him with the meanest injustice, contriving to throw on him the odium of any dishonourable or unpopular action of her own, and would occasionally make him the object, like the rest of her ministers, of her abusive petulance, addressing him with the titles of " old fool," " miscreant," and " coward," yet she made him always her most confidential counsellor, zealously defended him against his enemies, refused his ur- gent solicitation, when advanced far in life, to be allowed to retire from his office, and anxiously visited his sick room in the concluding period of his life, and not remote from the close of her own. Excepting one or two sublime examples in the Jewish his- tory. Sir Thomas More was probably the only great states- man that ever rose to eminence and power without ambition. Though Cecil's virtue could descend to no base expedients for advancement, he was from his early youth of a very aspir- ing disposition ; and certainly, if the most extraordinary in- dustry and attainments could merit distinction and honourable employment, no young man ever had superior claims. He very soon drew the attention of the court, obtained the utmost that his ambition could desire, and held a ministerial office probably a greater number of years than any other man in our history. With the exception of a very few objectionable or doubtful circumstances, it seems impossible to use language too strong in praise of this admirable minister. No states- man since his time has given the nation, after long experience of his conduct, such a profound complacent feeling of being safe. The idea which gradually came to be entertained of him was almost that of a being not needing sleep or recrea- tion, always active by an invincible necessity, not subject to any caprices of temper nor obscurations of understanding, created and endowed to live for the state and for no other pur- LORD BURLEIGH. 191 pose, and so far above all meanness of self-intersst as to make it not at all worth while to examine his conduct ; and after being minister several times ten years, he seemed, in the apprehension of the people, to have outlived any danger of being removed from his office by death. If any unexpected public event happened, in England or the surrounding coun- tries, it was felt to be certain that the faithful old sentinel would be the first to see it, and would descry and avert any danger it might involve. If parties threatened to run high, it was recollected that Cecil's discernment and impartiality would calmly judge and balance their respective principles and merits, and that his incomparable powers of conciliation had already quieted or moderated many a political war. If a new man was raised to some important station, it was well- known that Cecil, in his appointments and recommendations, trampled on all pretensions but those of personal qualification. If the queen's favourites were given to wild courses, and seemed to endanger the sobriety of her government, it was not doubted that Cecil would keep a vigilant eye on their pro- ceedings, and would dare, if it should become necessary, even to admonish her Majesty on the subject. If a tax was im- posed, it was relied on that the careful and frugal minister would not have sanctioned it without an indispensable ne- cessity. If a negotiation was carried on with foreign states, it was quite a certain thing that Cecil would neither provoke them nor cringe to them, would sacrifice no national advan- tage either through pride or meanness. And if a military expedition was to be equipped, it was not a matter to be doubted that some just and important object was to be gained, at the smallest possible hazard and expense. Such a man was of necessity violently hated by every party and every in- dividual, in constant succession, that had any mean projects of self-interest to prosecute at the expense of the public wel- fare ; but the bulk of the nation must have wished centuries of life, if it had been possible, to the incomparable minister. The character of his understanding was that of vast compre- hension, which could view the most complicated system of concerns in all its parts, and in due proportion, at once ; and therefore saw how to promote the advantage of the whole by the expedients devised for any particular part. The charac- ter of his political temper, if we may so express it, was a vigorous moderation, prompt and resolute in its measures, 192 BRITISH STATESMEN. and yet seeking to accomplish the end by the most temperate means and in the quietest manner. Moderation was conspi- cuous in the general scope and direction of his designs, as well as in the manner of effecting each particular object. He was the invariable opponent of war, which he, unaccounta- bly, judged an expedient very rarely necessary even in the most turbulent times, and of which he most perfectly beheld the vile and hideous features through the romantic dazzling kind of heroism so much in vogue in those enterprising times. But the greatest and most continued efforts of his moderate policy were made in the endeavour to preserve to the peo- ple some slight shadow of religious liberty, in opposition to the half-popish queen, and a most bigoted and perse- cuting hierarchy, that incessantly counteracted his liberal schemes. The boasted reign of Elizabeth was a period of great barba- rism, as far as related to the royal and episcopal notions of the rights of conscience, and of great cruelty in the practical ad- ministration of the religious department. Cecil remonstrated in a spirited manner against the proceedings of the prelates, which he charged with being nearly the same as those of the Inquisition ; but when he attempted to interpose his official authority in defence of the victims of their intolerance, he found they had so entirely the approbation of the queen, that they would set his remonstrances and interposition at defiance. She was a bigoted devotee to various popish superstitions, was passionately fond of gaudy and childish ceremonials in the ecclesiastical institutions, was the bitter enemy of every thing like real liberty of religious opinion, and, in short, was altogether unworthy of being, where circumstances had placed her, at the head of the protestant cause. The accident of her being placed in this distinguished situation, and being conse- quently hated and conspired against by all the catholic go- vernments, was the grand security for the animated loyalty of her protestant subjects ; and even the puritans, towards whom the measures of her reign symbolized a good deal with the plagues of Egypt, were so desperate of any other defence against the horrors of a real popish dominion and persecution, that they entered into associations for the protection of her person and government. Their loyalty, therefore, was ob- viously in a great degree self-interested ; but the following passage, among very many others of a similar kind that might LORD BURLEIGH. 193 be extracted, will tend to show that it was also in no small degree generous and gratuitous. Away then with the charge of faction and turbulence which has been made against this venerable class of sufferers, unless the charge of fac- tion is also to be applied to the principle of returning good for evil. " Elizabeth holding: very different sentiments from these, not only pre- scribed peculiar forms for the worship of her people, but was deter- mined that they should use no other. The puritans, on the other hand, without calling her right in question, objected to the forms which she had appointed, because they had been previously employed in the popish wor- ship, as mystical symbols, and were associated in the minds of the people with the grossest superstitions. They resolved therefore that no worldly considerations should induce them to assume what ihey accounted appen- dages of idolatry : while the queen, on her part, prepared to employ all her authority in support of this exertion of her supremacy. " Finding that her coimcil, the ablest and wisest council that England ever saw, were decidedly averse to measures which threatened to involve the nation in the most dangerous dissensions, she resolved to effect her pur- pose by means of the bishops, particularly Archbishop Parker, who readily and zealously entered into her views. The severities to which these now proceeded, were only surpassed by the frivolity of the pretences under which they were exercised. While the fervent attachment to the use of surplices, corner-caps, tippets, the cross in baptism, and the ring in mar- riage, were considered as the distinguishing characteristics of a Christian, any dislike to these forms, which were allowed to be in themselves indif- ferent, was accounted a sufficient crime to subject the most learned and pious clergyman to imprisonment and exile ; or, as a mitigated punish- ment, to be turned out of his living, and with his family consigned to indi- gence. The most pernicious effects necessarily flowed from these excesses. While the church was weakened by the loss of a large portion of her most able divines, and degraded by the introduction of a great number of men who could barely read the prayer-book, and write their own names, without even pretending to preach, the people began every where to collect round their expelled teachers, and to form conventicles apart from the establish- ment. Yet these bad consequences only set the queen and her bishops upon obtaining new statutes to reach the refractory ; and at length, even the laity were brought within their grasp, by an act which provided that non. attendance at public worship, in the parish churches, should be punished with imprisonment, banishment, and if the exile returned, with death. An arbitrary commission was appointed with full powers to bring all religious offenders to punishment ; and as any resistance to the injunctions of the queen, as supreme head of the church, was at length construed into sedi- tion and treason, many subjects, of unquestioned loyalty, were imprisoned, banished, and even executed." — P. 156. There could be no hazard in affirming, that a man combin- ing greater industry with greater powers of execution, never 194 BRITISH STATESMEN. lived since the beginning of time. And when it is considered through what a very long period these exertions were main- tained, and that for the most part they were most judiciously directed to the public good, we may be allowed to dwell with high complacency on this great character, notwithstanding the censure which we think justly due to the magnificence of his private establishment, and the reprobation deserved by one or two iniquitous modes of taxation which he suggested to Eliza- beth. And though it was certainly very unnecessary, except to his ambition, for him to occupy so vastly wide a sphere of official employment, and it might have been more truly pat- riotic to have endeavoured to introduce other men of merit into some of the departments, both in order to give them a share of the deserved distinction, and to qualify them to serve the na- tion after death should have closed his own labours, yet we would earnestly press this wonderful example of industry, as a pattern and a monition, on the consciences of many worthy people, who may applaud themselves for having passed a busy week, in virtue of about so much real application as would have been compressed into less than half a day of our indefati- gable statesman. Notwithstanding the rigorous occupation of his time and faculties by the business of the government, we are informed that he could lay aside all the formality of the statesman, in the company of his select friends, and in amusing himself with his children and grandchildren. — We are gratified by all the indications that religion had a habitual influence on his mind ; and his maxim, given in the first sentence of the following quotation, will furnish the most dignified explanation of the principle which secured the general rectitude of his own use- ful and admirable life. ** It was usual with him to say that he would never trust any man but of sound religion, for he that was false to God would never be true to man. From his spaeches and discourses we are led to conclude, that his religious 83ntim3nts had a powerful effect in confirming his fortitude, amidst the perilous circumstances with which he was often surrounded. At the aw- ful period when Philip was preparmg his Armada, and when the utter de- struction of the Eiglish governm3nt was confidently expected abroad, and greatly dreaded at home, Burleigh appeared uniformly collected and reso- lute ; and when the mighty preparations of the Spaniards were spoken of in his presence with apprehension, he only replied with firmness, ' They shall do no m^re than G^d will sufFjr them.' Tae strictness of his morals corresponded with his religious professions ; nor could his enemies, who EARL OF STRAFFORD. 195 Beverely scrutinized his most indifferent actions, impute to him even the vices peculiarly incident to his rank." — P. 245. Devout references to the Deity might not be of ordina- ry occurrence among ministers of state of that day ; the more extensive prevalence of sincere piety among the great, in the present times, must be the cause that we now so very frequently hear our statesmen, in adverting to dan- gers of similar kind, utter with true devotional solemnity such reflections as that expressed by Cecil on occasion of the Ar- mada. The next life is that of Wentworth, Earl of Strafford, and it is the longest and most important of the series. It is evi- dently the result of severe thought, and very diligent research ; and to us it appears to be written with the utmost impartiality that is possible to any man who really holds certain decided principles relative to the right and wrong of governments. We can perceive in the writer no trace of the demagogue or partisan ; the amplest justice is done to the talents of the dis- tinguished person, and in several points his conduct is liberal- ly applauded for integrity ; while the very fair advantage is given him throughout of being his own evidence and advocate, as his letters and dispatches are taken as the principal author- ity. This life is a most interesting piece of composition, in which the account of an extraordinary individual is very dex- terously managed to combine and animate various general sketches of the affairs of the most memorable period of our his- tory. The narration of Strafford's active political career, which commenced early in his life, is preceded by a rapid but very able and luminous statement of the contest which had been zealously maintained, through several ages, between the respective claims of the monarch and the people ; which great contest, as he clearly shows, was precipitated very fast to- ward a decision, at the period when Strafford entered on the public stage. The preceding sovereigns, and by no means less than the rest, James's immediate predecessor, had held a very magnificent language on the subject of the royal power and prerogatives ; but Elizabeth took care to avoid the necessity of bringing the obnoxious question to issue in the most dan- gerous form of large demands of money. Her extreme econo- my in the public expenditure, her admired talents, the une- qualled policy of her great minister, her being the chief of 196 BRITISH STATESMEN. the protestant cause, and the influence which her sex main- tained on the chivalrous part of the nation, had all concurred to secure for her a tolerance of the arrogant pretensions which she so prudently forbore to follow up into a complete practical assertion. It was not within the capacity of James to understand, that the nation must be greatly transformed if it could endure the same language, even though combined with the same practical forbearance, from a stranger, of the slen- derest endowments, of prodigal and low habits, suspected of popery, and governed by such a favourite as the infamous Buckingham. But he was resolved that they should not only hear the loftiest strains of the jus divinum, but should be made to acquiesce in all the modes of verifying it on their purses, their creeds, and their persons. He was indeed compelled to observe the popular formality of calling parliaments ; but he revenged himself by stout though laconic lectures to them on passive obedience, by insults, by declarations of their futility, by peremptory demands of money, and by petulant orders of dissolution. This Avas the state of things at the time that Strafford, a young gentleman of large fortune, of very high spirit, of powerful talents, and by no means devoid of all good qualities, entered into parliament ; and it required but a short time to make him very prominent among the leaders of the popular cause, to the support of which none of his contempo- raries brought more courage, or more eloquence. He entered so fully into the arguments of this cause, as to deprive himself, if he should desert it, of all apology on the ground of juvenile rashness and inconsideration. It was of course not long before so formidable an opponent received overtures from Bucking- ham, in behalf of himself and the court which he ruled. What surprise would be felt by any reader who should not have lived long enough to know how these matters regularly go, to find that these overtures were received and replied to with the greatest possible politeness by Strafford, though he had a thou- sand times, within a few preceding months, pronounced the man by whom they were made to be the greatest miscreant in Europe, and to be intent on such designs as every man of vir- tue ought to oppose, even to the hazard of his life ! He in- stantly placed himself in the attitude of patient waiting, and in part payment of the price of the good things he was going to receive, began, in parliament, to endeavour to moderate the tone of the popular party ; though most zealous for their great EAHL OF STRAFFORD. 197 cause, he was anxious they should not prosecute it in the spi- rit and language olfaction. Our benevolent sympathy was ex- tremely hurt to find, that this virtuous patriot was deceived and insulted by Buckingham, who, on second thoughts, had deter- mined to do without him. It then became proper to discov- er again, that no energy of opposition in parliament could be too vehement against the designs of the favourite and the king. That king was Charles the First, who having made a long and very strenuous effort to subdue the people and the parlia- ment to his arbitrary government by authority and intimidation, was induced again to try the expedient of converting some of the boldest of the refractory into friends by means of honours and emoluments. He w^as instantly successful with Strafford, who accepted a peerage, and the presidency of the Council of York ; and became and continued to the end of his life, the most faithful and devoted servant of the king, and of his de- spotic system of government. He might seem to have felt an almost enthusiastic passion for despotism in the abstract, inde- pendently of any partiality for the particular person who was to exercise it. After a few years of his administration as viceroy of Ireland, he exulted to declare, that in that country the king was as absolute as any monarch in the whole world. And when, after the very long series of struggles between Charles and the people, the question was coming rapidly to the last fatal arbitrement, he urged the king to the prompt adoption of the most vigorous and decisive measures ; and he was mor- tified almost to distraction when he saw him, notwithstanding this energetic advice, falling into a wavering and timid policy. His own character and measures, indeed, had always been distinguished by an extraordinary and almost preternatural vig- our. His energy and fortitude did not desert him, even when at length he found himself falling under the power and ven- geance of that irresistible popular spirit which embodied its de- termined force and hostility in the long parliament, aided, with respect to Strafford, by the hatred and court influence of the queen. He maintained the most graceful and dignified firmness on the scaffold, to which he was consigned in the result of the most memorable trial, except that of his royal master, in the records of our history ; a trial in which a perversion of law was made the expedient for accomplishing what was deemed a point of moral justice not formally provided for by the law. 198 BRITISH STATESMEN. As in all such cases, the bad effects became conspicuous, as Mr. Macdiarmid observes, in the admiration which the heroic suf- ferer excited in his death ; whereas, if he had only been doom- ed, as he did well deserve, and would have been felt to deserve, to perpetual imprisonment or exile, his name and character would have sunk down quietly to their proper level, and he would simply have been recollected as one of the many able unprincipled men, who have chosen to identify their fame with that of the despots of whom they have consented to be the tools. LOBD KAMES. 199 VIL LORD KAMES. Memoirs of the Life and Writings of the Hon. Henry Home, of Kame ; containing Sketches of the Progress of Litera^ ture and general Improvement in Scotland, during the great- er part of the Eighteenth Century, The principal facts relative to the individual who forms the leading subject of this work, may be given in a few words. Henry Home was the son of a country gentleman of small for- tune, and was born in the year 1696. About the age of six- teen, he was bound by indenture to attend the office of a writer to the signet in Edinburgh, with a view to prepare himself for the profession of a solicitor. Being sent one evening by his master with some papers to the President of the Court of Ses- sion, he was so handsomely treated by the venerable judge and his daughter, and so enchanted with the character of dignity and elegance in their manners and situation, that he was in- stantly fired with the ambition of attaining eminence in the public profession of the law, and resolved to qualify himself for an advocate. He commenced a most laborious course of study, as well in the departments of literature and science, as in the knowledge more peculiarly appropriate to his intended profes- sion, and made a rapid progress in them all. He was called to the bar at the age of twenty- seven, published various writings on legal subjects, obtained at length the first eminence as a pleader, and was appointed at the age of fifty-six one of the judges of the Court of Session, by the title of Lord Kames. His moral and metaphysical studies were prosecuted with as much ardour as those of the law ; he was personally acquaint- ed with most of the philosophers of the time ; and by means of his writings became celebrated as a philosopher himself. When he was near the age of seventy, his fortune received the addition of a very large estate, left to his wife, to whom he had 200 LORD KAMES. been married at the age of forty-five : this estate he was almost enthusiastically fond of cultivating and adorning. About the same period that he obtained this w^ealth, his legal rank was raised to that of a Lord of Justiciary, a judge of the supreme criminal tribunal in Scotland, of which office he continued to discharge the duties till his death, in 1782, in the eighty- seventh year of his age. Lord Kames was a very conspicuous man in his time, and deserved to pass down to posterity in a record of considerable length. He has rendered a material service to literature by his " Elements of Criticism ;" and from the work before us it is evident, that his professional studies contributed the most im- portant advantages to both the theory and the administration of law in Scotland. The improvement in agriculture also, in that country, seems to have taken its rise, in a great measure, from his zeal and his example. He received from nature an extra- ordinary activity of mind, to which his multiplied occupations. allowed no remission, even in his advanced age ; we find him as indefatigable in his eightieth year, as in the most vigorous and ambitious season of his life. The versatility of his talents was accompanied by a strength and acuteness, which penetrated to the essence of the subjects to which they were applied. The intentions with which he prosecuted such a wide diversity of studies, appear often excellent ; very few men so ingenious, so speculative, so systematic, and occasionally so fanciful, have kept practical utility so generally in view. The great influence which he exerted over some of the younger philoso- phers of the time, several of the most distinguished of whom were proud to acknowledge themselves his pupils,was employed to determine their speculations to useful purposes. His conduct in the office of judge appears to have impressed every impartial man that witnessed it, with an invariable opinion of his talents and integrity. As a domestic and social man, his character was that of frankness, good humour, and extreme vivacity. His prompt intelligence continually played around him, and threw its rays on every subject that even casualty could intro- duce into conversation. His defects as a speculatist were, that he had not, like the very first order of minds, that simplicity of intellect that operates rather in the form of power than of inge- nuity, and is too strong to be either captivated or amused by the specious fallacies of a fantastic theory ; and that, as far as we have the means of judging, he had a higher respect for LORD KAMES. 201 the conjectures of mere reason, than for the authority of reve- lation. The name of Lord Kames is sufficiently eminent to render an account of his life interesting, though it appear more than twenty years after his death. But we greatly admire the modesty with which Lord Woodhouselee, better known to the literary world under the name of Mr. Fraser Tytler, has been waiting, during this extended interval, for some abler hand to execute a work, to which he, very unaccountably, pro- fesses himself inadequate. This long delay, however, has been of immense service to the magnitude of the performance, which has perhaps been growing many years, and has risen and expanded at length, into a most ample shade of cypress over the tomb of Lord Kames. In order to give the book this prodigious size, the author has chosen to take advantage of Lord Kames's diversified studies, to enlarge on the several subjects of those studies ; of his profession of law, to deduce the history of Scottish law, and of the lives of its most distinguished professors and practitioners, accompanied by dissertations on law in general ; and of his happening to be a Scotchman, to go back as far as the tenth century in order to prove that there were scholars then in Scotland, and return all the way downward, proving that there have been scholars there ever since. In his youth Lord Kames was acquainted with a particular species of beaux, peculiar to those times, which animals had, if our author is to be believed, a singular faculty of uniting the two functions of fluttering and thinking ; and therefore several in- dividuals are to be separately described, (vol. i. p. 57, &:c.) It was extremely proper to give us a short account of the species, as forming a curious branch of entomology ; but it does not seem to have been so indispensable to describe, in- dividually, beau Forrester and beau Hamilton. Because one of Lord Kames's early friends, a Mr. Oswald, was a mem- ber of parliament, a sheet and a half must be occupied by uninteresting letters, which this Mr. Oswald wrote to him about temporary and party politics. A larger space is filled with letters from Dean Tucker, which, excepting one, and perhaps two or three paragraphs of another, are not of the smallest consequence, further than their being written to Lord Kames ; but therefore they are inserted. Lord Kames was acquainted with David Hume, and, therefore, in his life, there must be a very long account of the publication and reception 202 LORD KAMES. of " Hume's Treatise of Human Nature," with a very long extract from its conclusion. Lord Kames wrote a well known book called the " Elements of Criticism," and therefore ac- tually fifteen pages at once are filled with an extract from that book. We have taken all due pains, but ineffectually, to reconcile ourselves to this mode of enlarging the size of a book by uninteresting letters, and indolent extracts. But even if a large work were constructed without this lazy ex- pedient, and consisted almost wholly of the honest workman- ship of the author, we have still an invincible dislike to the practice of pouring forth the miscellaneous stores of a com- mon-place book, of relating the literary, the legal, the philo- sophical, and the political transactions of half a century, and of expending narrative and panegyric to a vast amount on a crowd of all sorts of people, under the form and pretence of recording the life of an individual. It is an obvious charge against this species of writing, that it can have no assignable limits, for as the object is undefinable, we can never be cer- tain that it is gained ; and therefore the writer may go on adding volume to volume, still pretending that all this is neces- sary to his plan, till his whole stock of miscellaneous ma- terials is exhausted ; and then he may tell us with a critical air of knowing what he is about, that he has executed, how- ever imperfectly, the plan which he had considered as best adapted for doing justice to the interesting subject. But if instead of this he were to tell us, (perhaps on having found another drawer-full of materials) that another volume was ne- cessary for giving right proportions and a right conclusion to his work, we could not contradict him, because we should not know where to seek for the rules or principles by which to decide what would be a proper form or termination ; unless we were to refer the case to be settled by our patience, or our purse, according to which authorities in criticism, we may possibly have passed, a good way back, the chapter or paragraph, which appeared very proper for a conclusion. Every work ought to have so far a specific object, that we can form some notion what materials are properly or improperly introduced, and within what com- pass the whole should be contained. Those works that dis- dain to recognise any standard of prescription according to which books are appointed to be made, may fairly be regarded as outlaws of literature, which every prowling reviewer has a right to fall upon wherever he finds them. Another serious objection against this practice of making a XORD KAMES. 203 great book of a mass of materials so diverse that they have no natural connexion, and in such quantity that the slender nar- rative of an individual's life is insufficient to form an artificial connexion, is, that it is extremely injurious to the good order of our intellectual arrangements ; as it accustoms the reader to that broken, immethodical, and discursive manner of thought which is preventive or destructive of the power both of pro- longed attention and continuous reasoning. Just when a man has resolved, and possibly begun, to put his mind under severe discipline, in order to cure its rambling propensities, when he has perhaps vowed to do penance in mathematics for his mental dissipation, he is met by one meretricious pair of vol- umes after another, presenting all the seducing attractions of novelty, variety, facility of perusal, amusement somewhat dignified by an admixture of grave sense, and all this in an attire of the utmost elegance, from the type to the outside covering. The unfortunate sinner renounces his vow s, throws away his mathematics, and becomes as abandoned a literary libertine as ever. If it be said, that a book thus composed merits, at the most, no more serious accusation than merely that of its being a miscellany, and that we have many mis- cellanies and collectanea which are well received by the pub- lic as a legitimate class of books ; we answer, yes, we have miscellanies and collectanea without number, and they are a pest of literature ; they reduce our reading to a useless amusement, and promote a vicious taste that nauseates the kind of reading, which alone can stipply well-ordered know- ledge, and assist the attainment of a severe and compre- hensive judgment. These heterogeneous productions drive away the regular treatises, the best auxiliaries of mental dis- cipline, from the tables of both our male and female readers ; and the volumes of our Lockes, and Hartleys, and Reids, are reduced to become a kind of fortifying wall to the territory of spiders, on the remotest and dustiest shelf in all the room. Against an assemblage of multifarious biography of dis- tinguished men, under the ostensible form of a record of the life of an individual, we have to observe that it has the falla- cious effect of making that individual appear as always the king of the whole tribe. This would not be the effect, if merely so much were mentioned, concerning other eminent persons, as should be indispensable to the history of the one immediately in question. These short references might just give us an impression of the high rank of those other persons, 204 LORD KAMES. and induce us to seek in the proper quarter for more ample information concerning them ; they would be brought into no comparison with the person whose life is exclusively to be re- lated. But when so much is said of them, that we seem to have a competent memoir of each, so that we do not want to inquire any further, and when yet all these memoirs together do not occupy so large a space as that filled by the chief per- sonage, this individual comes to hold in our thoughts a magni- tude superior to that of the rest, nearly in proportion to the ampler space he fills in the book. There is enough to bring them into comparison with him, and too little to illustrate and support their claims in that comparison ; and they seem but assem- bled as bashaws round their Grand Turk. In the work be- fore us, Lord Kames appears, (for we have been at pains, with the help of Erasmus, De copia verhorum et rerum, to find a nobler simile than the last) like Jupiter on the top of the Scottish Olympus, looking kindly, though majestically, down, on the inferior personages of the worshipful assembly, such as Hume, Reid, Adam Smith, Millar, and many others. Lord Woodhouselee does not expressly proclaim the superiority, and perhaps no more did Mercury or Ganymede s ; it is enough that Jupiter did, and that Lord Kames does. Sit on the most spacious throne. But then let us turn to the historian and eulogist of some other member of that great philosophic hierarchy, and the vere^'^^le order is strangely confounded and revolutionized; Li. Adam Smith, for instance, places David Hume on the proudest eminence, and Kames, and all the rest of them, are made to know their places. This game of shifting dignities, this transferring of regal honours, must continue, till each panegyrist shall have the discretion to con- fine his work so much to an individual, as to avoid the in- vidiousness of constantly, in effect, running a parallel between him and his contemporaries. We also object to the telling, in the life of one man, of so much about the life, and works, and actions of another, be- cause if the life of that other is likewise to be written, the biographer of the former actually forestalls or pilfers the ma- terials which are wanted by the biographer of the latter. And thus the same thing is told twice, or, if but once, it is told in the wrong place. But it is certain to be told twice, for the trade of mutual borrowing, and mutual stealing, never throve better than among the biographers of the present day. In reading this, and some late voluminous works, purport- LORD KAMES. 205 ing to he the lives of particular persons, and in observing the multitude of memoirs of other persons appended or inter- woven, we have earnestly wished, that each country, and especially North Britain, had been a good while since pro- vided with a standard approved dictionary of all its names of any consequence ; with a sufficient quantity of information under each, and with a concise supplement regularly added every few years. In that case, the writer of a particular and eminently distinguished life, would not have needed, and could have had no pretext, to swell the bulk o^ his work with an account of every person, of the smallest note, whom he liad occasion to mention, as contemporary, or in any manner connected, with the principal person, or even as having pre- ceded him by years or centuries. We might then be re- ferred, in one line, to the article in the dictionary, to be con- sulted at leisure, and go on, without circuit or interruption, with the main subject. We still wish this were done, with the utmost haste ; since we do not know how many more pon- derous and costly works, like the present, may else come out, loaded with secondary subjects, and even with the substance of some of the very same articles which have encumbered this and recent publications. For making such a dictionary, it will be of service to consult these works of which we have complained, and extract from them several articles relating to persons of whom, though deserving of some notice, no in- formation, as it should seem, may be found anywhere else. There is, for instance, in the book before us, a particular ac- count of an obscure, but apparently an able man, of the name of Colin Maclaurin. It was a disappointment to us not to see this followed by some account of Maclaurin's master, an- other obscure man of the name of Newton. Having thus honestly protested against this mode of raising a large and costly book by collecting a heap of heterogeneous materials, and having informed our readers that the life of Lord Kames, though very long and busy, forms but a rather slight and arbitrary combination of the contents of these vol- umes, we must now express our opinion of the merit of those contents separately considered ; and produce some extracts illustrative of their quality. And we are prompt to testify, that in many instances their quality is high. Lord Wood- houselee is an able and practised thinker, possessed of ample stores of learning and general knowledge, well acquainted 10 206 LOHD KAMBS. with the history, the schools, and the queGtions of philosophy ; a discriminative judge of character ; and writing in a style, which we deem a finished example of what may be called transparent diction. It is so siiigularly lucid, so free from all affected rhetoric and artificial turns of phrase, so perfectly abstracted, with the exception of a law term or two, from every dialect appropriated to a particular subject, that we have never viewed thoughts through a purer medium. It is so pure and perfect, that we can read on, a considerable way, without our attention being arrested by the medium ; it is as if there were nothing, if we may so express ourselves, between us and the thoiight. And w^e are made to think of the medium after some time, only by the reflection how very clearly we have apprehended the sense, even when relating to the uncouth subjects of law, or the abstruse subjects of metaphysics. By this pure and gi-aceful diction, we are beguiled along with the author, through several prolix and unnecessary details, without being indignant, till we are past them, that he should have occupied himself and us with things too inconsiderable to deserve a fifth part of the space they fill. We have been greatly pleased and instructed by many of the reasonings on topics of philosophy, law, and criticism, the result of mature and comprehensive thought, and but very little tinctured by the peculiarities of any sect or school, though somewhat partial, of course, to the opinions of Lord Kames, who, in spite of the immense disparity of age, was the intimate friend of the author's younger years. Many of his observations and statements, elucidate the history and pro- gress of law, science, and literature in Scotland. We have only to regret, that he had not elaborated his thoughts on these various subjects into a digested series of finished essays, in- stead of throwing them together in a mass, to swell beyond all reasonable bounds the importance of an individual. A great part of this matter might just as well have been ap- pended to the life of any one of half a dozen other of the Scottish philosophers of the last century ; a proof of the im- propriety of its being all incorporated with the history of one. As to the letters to Lord Kames, which constitute a ma- terial portion of the work, we have already said, that many of them ought to have been omitted. But a considerable number are highly distinguished by sense or ingenuity ; we refer to LORD KAMES. 207 several from Dr. Franklin, many from Mrs. Montague, one from Lord Chancellor Hardwicke, on courts of equity, one or two from David Hume, and a few long ones, of great value, from Professor Walker and Dr. Reid. The very long and intimate friendship with this last eminent philosopher, con- tinued to the death of Lord Kames. Their characters are thus amusingly contrasted by Mr. Dugald Stewart : " With one very distinguished character, the late Lord Kames, he (Dr. Reid) lived in the most cordial and affectionate friendship, notwithstand- ing the avowed opposition of their sentiments on some moral questions to which he attached the greatest importstnce. Both of them, however, were the friends of virtue and of mankind ; and both were able to temper the warmth of free discussion with the forbearance and good humour founded on mutual esteem. No two men, certainly, ever exhibited a more striking contrast in their conversation, or in their constitutional tempers : the one slow and cautious in his decisions, even on those topics which he had most diligently studied; reserved and silent in promiscuous society ; and retaining, after all his literary eminence, the same simple and unassuming manners which he brought from his country residence : the other lively, rapid, and communicative ; accustomed by his pro- fessional pursuits, to wield with address the weapons of controversy, and not averse to a trial of his powers on questions the most foreign to his ordinary habits of inquiry. But these characteristical differences, while to their common friends, they lent an additional charm to the distinguish- ing merits of each, served only to enliven their social intercourse, and to cement their mutual attachment." — Vol. IL p. 230. Their correspondence, and no doubt their conversations, were directed very much to the most abstruse questions of physical and metaphysical science. Indeed, we deem it honourable to Lord Kames, that most of his friendships ap- pear to have been as laborious as they were sincere. The whole quantity of intellectual faculty existing among his friends was put in permanent requisition. And when he at any time heard of strong minds among his contemporaries, beyond the circle of his acquaintance, it was not long before he was devising how to trepan them, as elephants are caught in the east, in order to make them work. He had all kinds of burdens ready for them, and no burden so light, that any of them could frisk and gambol under it, in the wantonness of superfluous strength. It was at their peril, that any of them showed signs of thinking little of the difficulty of a discussion in law or criticism ; they were sure to have a whole system of metaphysics laid on their backs at the next turn. Very early in life he commenced this plan, and thought himself on the point of catching one of the stoutest of the elephantine 208 LORD KAMES. race. Dr. Clarke had some years before published his cele- brated Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God. Mr. Home, at the age of twenty-seven, wrote him a long letter, proposing objections, and demanding new arguments and solutions. Its unceremonious and almost presumptuous style, however, evinced a want of skill as yet in his inveigling art ; the device was too coarsely adjusted to trepan one of the most discerning of the giant species ; who just stopped a few minutes in passing, tossed about with his trunk, as if in scorn of the design, some of the piles of materials with which it had been intended to load him, and then moved quietly off into the forest. — In simple language. Dr. Clarke wrote him a short, civil, aud argumentative letter, and the correspondence went no further. Lord Kames had always a very strong partiality to meta- physical studies ; and he evinced even in that letter to Dr. Samuel Clarke, which we have already noticed with disappro- bation of its spirit, an acuteness adapted to excel in abstract speculations. In first introducing him in the character of a philosopher. Lord Woodhouselee takes occasion to make some observations on the tendency and value of metaphysical re- searches. " Allowing them to be conversant about the noblest part of our frame, the nature and powers of the human soul ; and granting that they give the most vigorous exercise to the understanding, by training the mmd to an earnest and patient attention to its own operations ; still I fear it must be admitted, that as those abstract studies are beyond the limits of the faculties of the bulk of mankind, no conclusion thence derived can have much influence on human conduct. Even the anxiety shown by metaphy- sical writers to apologize for their favourite pursuits, by endeavouring, with great ingenuity, to deduce from them a few practical consequences with respect to life and manners, is strong proof of the native infertility of the soil, on which so much labour is bestowed to produce so small a return. It is not much to the praise of this science, that the most subtle and inge- nious spirits have, for above two thousand years, assiduously exercised themselves in its various subjects of discussion, and have not yet arrived at a set of fundamental principles on which the thinking world is agreed. Neither have the uses, to which this sort of reasoning has sometimes been applied, tended to enhance its estimation. The attempts that have been made to found morality on metaphysical principles, have for certain been prejudicial, on the whole, to the cause of virtue. The acutest of the sceptical writers, availing themselves of Mr. Locke's doctrine of the origin . of ideas, and the consequences he has thence drawn respecting morals, have done much more harm by weakening our belief in the reality of moral distinctions, than the ablest of their opponents, combating them on the same ground, and with the same weapons, have found it possible to LORD KAMES. 200 repair. The baneful industry of the former has, it is true, made the labours of the latter in some degree necessary, and therefore useful ; and it is in this point of view that the writings of those metaphysicians, who are antagonists of the sceptical philosophy, are entitled to attention and to praise."— Vol. I. p. 21. Such observations are of much weight as coming from a person so well versed in metaphysics. But it will be impos- sible for the reader of these volumes to believe the author can mean to be very rigid in proscribing metaphysical study, to which we can perceive that his clear understanding is in no small degree indebted.* Nor will any enlightened man, we think, condemn, without great qualification, what is evidently the sublimest class of speculations, what demands the strong- est mental powers, and their severest exertion, and makes a bold effort to reach, in some small degree, that kind of know- ledge, or, if we may so speak, that mode of knowing, which perhaps forms the chief or peculiar intellectual distinction be- tween us and superior spirits. Metaphysical speculation tries to resolve all constituted things into their general elements, and those elements into the ultimate mysterious element of substance, thus leaving behind the various orders and modes of being, to contemplate being itself in its essence. It retires awhile from the consideration of truth, as predicated of parti- cular subjects, to explore those unalterable and universal re- lations of ideas, which must be the primary principles of all truth. It is not content to acknowledge or to seek the respec- tive causes of the effects which crowd every part of the crea- tion, but would ascertain the very nature of the relation be- tween cause and effect. Not satisfied to infer a Deity from the wise and beautiful order of the universe, it would descry the proof of this sublime fact in the bare existence of an atom. To ascertain the laws according to which we think, is a grati- fying kind of knowledge, but metaphysical speculation asks what is it to think, and what is that power which performs so strange an operation ; it also attempts to discover the nature of the connexion of this mysterious agent with a corporeal machine ; and of the relation in which it really stands to that external world, concerning which it receives so many millions of ideas. In short, metaphysical inquiry attempts to trace things to the very first stage in which they can, even to the most penetrating intelligences, be the subjects of a thought, a doubt, or a proposition ; that profoundest abstraction, where 210 LORD KAMES» they stand on the first step of distinction and remove from ^ nonentity, and where that one question might be put concern- ing them, the answer to which would leave no further ques- tion possible. And having thus abstracted and penetrated to the state of pure entity, the speculation would come back, tracing it into all its modes and relations ; till at last metaphy- sical truth, approaching nearer and nearer to the sphere of our immediate knowledge, terminates on the confines of distinct sciences and obvious realities. Now it would seem evident that this inquiry into primary truth must surpass, in point of dignity, all other speculations. If any man could carry his discoveries as far, and make his proofs as strong, in the metaphysical world, as IN ewton did in the physical, he would be an incomparably greater man than even Newton. The charge, therefore, of being frivolous, alleged sometimes angrily, and sometimes scornfully, against this department of study, is, so far as the subjects are concern- ed, but a proof of the complete ignorance of those who make it. Ignorance may be allowed to say any thing ; but we are very much surprised, when we sometimes hear men of consid- erable thought and knowledge, declaring, almost uncondition- ally, against researches into pure metaphysical subjects ; and also insisting, that our reasonings on moral subjects must never, for a moment, accept the pernicious aid of metaphysi- cal distinctions. We cannot comprehend how it is possible for them to frequent the intellectual world, without often com- ing in view of some of the great questions peculiarly belong- ing to this department of thought ; such as those concerning the nature of the mind, the liberty or necessity of human action, the radical distinction between good and evil, space, duration, eternity, the creation of inferior beings, and the attributes of the Supreme. And we wonder that, if it were only to enjoy the sensation of being overwhelmed in sublime mystery, and of finding how much there is reserved to be learnt in a higher state of existence and intelligence, an in- quisitive mind should not, when these subjects are forced on the view, make a strong, though it were a transient, effort of investigation. Nor can we conceive how a man of the least sagacity can deeply examine any moral subject, without often finding himself brought to the borders of metaphysical ground ; and there perceiving very clearly that he must either enter on that ground, or leave his subject most partially and unsatis- LOSD KAMES. 211; fectorily discussed. All subjects have first principles, toward which an acute mind feels its investigation inevitably tending, and all first principles are, if investigated to their extreme re- finement, metaphysical. The tendency of thought toward the ascertaining of these first principles in every inquiry, as con- trasted with a disposition to pass (though perhaps very ele- gantly or rhetorically) over the surface of a subject, is one of the strongest points of distinction between a vigorous intellect and a feeble one. It is true enough, to the grief of philosophers, and the humiliation of human ability, that but a very small degree of direct success has ever crowned these profound researches, or perhaps will ever crown them in the present state of our existence. It is also true, that an acute man who will abso- lutely prosecute the metaphysic of every subject to the last pos- sible extreme, with a kind of rebellion against the very laws and limits of nature, in contempt of his senses, of experience, of the universal perceptions of mankind, and of divine revela- tion, may reason himself into a vacuity where he will feel as if he were sinking out of the creation. Hume was such an example ; but we might cite Locke and Reid, and some other illustrious men, who have terminated their long sweep of ab- stract thinking, as much in the spirit of sound sense and rational belief as they began. Yet while we must attribute to weakness or ignorance the contempt or the terror of these inquiries, it is so evident from the nature of things, and the whole history of philosophy, that they must in a great measure fail, when extended beyond cer- tain contracted limits, that it is less for the portion of direct metaphysical science which they can ascertain, than for their general effect on the thinking powers, that we deem them a valuable part of intellectual discipline. Studies of this nature tend very much to augment the power of discriminating clearly between different subjects, and ascertaining their analogies, dependencies, relative importance, and best method of inves- tigation. They enable the mind to dissipate the delusion of first appearances, and detect fallacious subtleties of argument. Between the most superficial view of a subject and its most abstracted principles, there is a gradation of principles still more and more abstracted, cond^icting progressively, if any mind were strong enough to follow, to that profoundest princi- ple where inquiiy mu^t terminate for ever ; now, though it be 212 iORD KAMES, impossible to approach within the most distant glimmering sight of that principle, yet a mind sharpened by metaphysical investigation, will be able sometimes to penetrate to the second, third, or fourth place in this retiring gradation, and will therefore have a far more competent understanding of the subject, from being able to investigate it to this depth, than another mind which has been accustomed to content itself with an attention merely to the superficies. A man habitua- ted to this deeper examination of every subject of which he seriously thinks, will often be able, and entitled, to advance his propositions with a confidence to which the man that only thinks on the surface of a subject must be a stranger, unless indeed he can totally forget that there is any thing deeper than the surface ; but then he may very fairly be excused from making any propositions at all. On the whole, we are of opinion, that though it is most un- wise to dedicate the chief part of a studious life to metaphysi- cal speculation, except in the case of those few extraordinary minds which can carry this speculation so far as to render to mankind the service of practically ascertaining the limits which human ability cannot pass, a moderate portion of this study would be of the greatest use to all intellectual men, as a mode of acquiring, in the general exercise of their under- standings, at once the double advantage of comprehensive- ness and precision. While therefore we are doing honour to abstract science, for the superior talents which it requires in the investigator, for the augmented powers which it confers in the progress of study, and for the elevating dignity which it bestows in the suc- cessful result, we are willing to remember, that after all it is but of subordinate importance. And we cannot help admir- ing the wisdom of that arrangement, by which nothing that is truly essential to the well-being of man is denied to the exer- tion of such powers as man generally possesses. The truths connected with piety and the social duties, with the means of personal happiness, and the method of securing an ulterior condition of progressive perfection and felicity, lie at the very surface of moral inquiries ; like the fruits and precious stores of the vegetable kingdom, they are necessary to supply inev- itable wants, and are placed, by Divine Benevolence, within the reach of the meanest individual. The secret treasures, however, of the moral, as of the physical world, lie deep and LORD KAMES. 213 remote from casual observation, and are only yielded up to a series of skilful and laborious efforts : they are indeed wonder- ful and splendid ; they may gratify the ambition of the curious and ostentatious, and they may denote the gradations of men- tal nobility ; they may even be applied to more useful pur- poses ; but they afford no substantial enjoyments, they consti- tute no part of the necessaries or comforts of existence ; a man who wants them, may yet be happy, contented, and secure ; and he who possesses them in provision, may glitter in the array of intellectual opulence, yet pine, and perish. About the middle of his life Lord Kames became acquaint- ed with David Hume, who was considerably younger than himself, and who was just then making a manfiil attempt for fame, and against religion, in the publication of his " Treatise of Human Nature." His letters describing the views and feelings which possessed his mind at that time, and which he seems to have retained with little alteration through life, ex- hibit but a very mean moral picture of the man. The printing of his "Philosophical Essays," which Lord Kames dissuaded, gave occasion for his lordship's full appearance before the public as a philosopher, in his " Essays on the Principles of Morality and Natural Religion," in which he set himself to oppose the opinions of Hume. The intelligent reader will be anxious to meet with this book ; for he is given to expect, that the author makes out a fine account of human nature, as a well-poised, well-regulat- ed, and most harmonious moral system. He must be curious to see in what manner he disposes of the stupendous depravity, which through all ages has covered the earth with crimes and miseries : and how he has illustrated the grand and happy effects resulting from the general and permanent predominance of the selfish over the benevolent affections, from the imbeci- lity of reason and conscience as opposed to appetite, from the infinitely greater facility of forming and retaining bad habits than good ones, from the incalculable number of false opinions embraced instead of the true, and from the deprivation which is always found to steal very soon into the best institutions. He must, surely, be no less solicitous to see the dignity and certainty of the moral sense verified in the face of the well- known fact, that there is no crime which has not, in the ab- sence of revelation, been committed, in one part of the world or another, without the smallest consciousness of guilt. 10* 214 LORD KAMES. It is too evident that our philosopher felt it a light matter, that his speculations were sometimes in opposition to the book which Christians deem of paramount authority. He would pretend, in a general way, a kind of deference for that book, and yet go on with his theories and reasonings all the same. In this we consider his conduct, and the conduct of many other philosophic men, as most absurd, setting aside its irreligion. The book which avows itself, by a thousand solemn and ex- plicit declarations, to be a communication from heaven, is either what it thus declares itself to be, or a most monstrous impos- ture. If these philosophers hold it to be an imposture, and therefore an execrable deception put on the sense of mankind, how contemptible it is to see them practising their civil cringe, and uttering phrases of deference ! If they admit it to be what it avows itself, how detestable is their conduct in advancing positions and theories, with a cool disregard of the highest authority, confronting and contradicting them all the while ! And if the question is deemed to be yet in suspense, how ridi- culous it is to be thus building up speculations and systems, pending a cause which may require their demolition the instant it is decided ! Who would not despise, or pity, a man eagerly raising a fine house on a piece of ground at the very time in doubtful litigation 1 Who would not have laughed at a man, who should have published a book of geography, with minute descriptions and costly maps, of distant regions and islands, at the very time that Magellan or Cook was absent on purpose to determine their position, or even verify their existence ? If Lord Kames was doubtful on the question of the truth or im- posture of the most celebrated book in the world, a question of which the decision, the one way or the other, is the indis- pensable preliminary to so many speculations, why did he not bend his utmost strength to decide it ? This had been a work of far more importance than any of those to which he applied himself: of far more importance than his reasonings on the existence of a Deity; since the very object of these reasonings was to prove, that we have a natural, intuitive, and invincible assurance, that there is a God, and therefore, in fact, that we need no reasoning or writing on the subject. Or if he would not make an effort toward the decision of this great question himself, why should he not lie quiet till the other examiners should decide it ; cautious, even to anxiety, not to hazard, in the mean while, a siugle position of such a nature as must LORD KAMES. 215 assume that the question was already decided, and decided against the pretensions of the book professing to be of Divine authority ? But such positions he made no difficulty of advanc- ing, especially in what was called, at that time, his magnum opus, the " Sketches of the History of Man." The leading doctrine of this work appears to be, that man was originally in the state of a most ignorant savage, and that all his knowledge and improvements, subsequently attained, as well in morals and theology, as in arts and sciences, have resulted from the progressive development of his natural pow- ers by natural means : in this same work, notwithstanding, the author affected to pay some deference to the Mosaic his- tory. This idle and irreligious notion was retained and cher- ished, in spite of the able reasoning of Dr. Doig, of which Lord Woodhouselee gives a lucid abstract, followed by a curious account of the commencement of the acquaintance between Dr. Doig and Lord Kames. The other distinguished literary performance of Lord Kames, was the " Elements of Criticism." The biographer intro- duces his remarks on this work, by a very curious inquiry into the history of philosophical criticism, the invention of which he attributes to the Scottish philosopher, after an acute exam- ination of the claims of both the ancients and moderns. We are very much entertained by this ingenious investigation ; though Lord Woodhouselee 's own acknowledgment of the near approaches to this species of criticism in one or two of the ancients, and the actual, though very imperfect, development of it in several modern writers, especially Akenside, warrants our hesitation to assign to Lord Kames the title of inventor which is wrested, by a rather nice distinction, from Aristotle. In the " Treatise of Rhetoric," Aristotle gave an elaborate analysis of the passions, and of the sources of pain and pleasure, expressly with a view to instruct writers and speakers how to interest those passions. If this was not actually deducing, it was making it easy for the persons so instructed to deduce, from the very constitution of the human mind, the essential laws of good writing and eloquent speaking. It was showing that excellence in these arts must consist, in the adaptation of all their performances to the principles of human nature. By thus illustrating the manner in which the human mind can be subjected to the powers of eloquence, Aristotle laid at least the foundation of philosophical criticism. It is true that this could 216 XORD KAMES. not so strictly be called criticism till it should be carried a little further, till a number of precise inferences from this ex- plication of the passions should be propounded, as laws of cri- ticism, and these laws be formally applied to the productions of genius. But this was nearly a matter of course when the first great work of elucidating the passions was accomplished ; when the nature of the materials was ascertained, it dictated at once the mode of operating on them. By a very slight change of form, each proposition, relative to the passions, might have been made a critical rule, applicable to its respec- tive part of the works to be addressed to them. This had been a very slender effort for the great philosopher, if he had chosen to pursue his subject so far ; and therefore it does not claim any very high degree of fame, if a modern has done what he omitted. We allow, however, to Lord Karnes, the " merit of having given to philosophical criticism the form of a science, by reducing it to general principles, methodizing its doctrines, and supporting them everywhere by the most copious and beautiful illustrations*" V DEFENCE OF THE STAGE. 217 VIIL DEFENCE OF THE STAGE. Four Discourses on Subjects relating to the Amusement of the Stage, Preached at Great St. Mary's Church, Cambridge, on Sunday, September 25, and Sunday, October 2, 1808 ; with copious Supplementary Notes. By James Plumpteb, B.D., Fellow of Clare-HaU. It is not expressed in the title-page, that these discourses were preached, and are published, with an intention hostile to the stage ; but the reader can have no doubt as to this point, we presume, when informed that they are dedicated to the Vice- .Chancellor of the University of Cambridge after having re- ceived his approbation, that the author is an admirer of some of our most serious and orthodox divines, that he appears to be actuated by a sincere wish to do good, and that the discourses are founded on no other than the following texts : — " Whether therefore ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." — " Be not deceived, evil communications cor- rupt good manners." — " Let not foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient, be once named among you, as be- cometh saints." — " To him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin." A selection of texts so pointedly ap- plicable, will appear to indicate the preacher's correct view of his subject ; and shall we not incur the suspicion of wantonly offending against the third injunction, when we state, that, notwithstanding all these reasons for a contrary presumption, Mr. Plumptre's discourses are meant as a formal defence of the stage ? Merely that a minister of the Christian religion should have considered it as within the scope and duty of his sacred func- tion to undertake such a defence, will not be a fact of sufficient novelty, in our times, to excite surprise ; for it would be un- grateful to charge it on defect of reverend instruction, if we 218 DEFENCE OF THE STAGE. do not know that the play-house is one of our best Christian institutions. But there is something strikingly new in hear- ing a vindication of the stage from a clergyman, who connects it with a serious admonition that life should be employed in a preparation for eternity, with a zealous inculcation of the apostolic rule of doing all things to the glory of God, with an admission that the general quality of polite literature is decid- edly adverse to Christian principles, and with an extended and very instructive illustration of the prevalence of this adverse spirit in even the least exceptionable part of the English drama. If the reader's impression of the incompatibility of what we have here reported to him as combined, should lead him to suspect affectation in the religious parts of the compound, we must assure him there are the strongest marks of sincerity. This being believed, his surmises towards an explanation of such a phenomenon will probably terminate in a conjecture, that, in the preacher's youth, the drama must have inspired a passion so deep as to become like one of the original princi- ples of his mind, which therefore the judgment could never eradicate, nor ever inspect without an involuntary bias operat- ing like a spell. And this is the explanation furnished by the preacher's long dedication, in which he adverts to the leading circumstances of his life, by way of accounting for his writing a book on such a subject, and with such a design. In course of time he entered, at college, on the studies pre- paratory to the clerical profession, and obtained a parochial charge, in which his professional duties and studies began entirely to engross his thoughts, " and yielding," he says, " to the prejudices of the world, I determined to relinquish in a great measure the amusement of the stage." He sold a large dramatic library in order to purchase better books, among which were Mrs. More's works, including her dialogue on amusements, and her most excellent preface to her tragedies ; these tracts had a great influence on his mind, and for some years he wholly abstained from the amusement of the theatre. " The circumstances of his parish" suggested to him the pos- sible utility of modifying to a moral purpose the most popular convivial songs, of which he has subsequently printed several volumes, with the required expurgations and additions, under the title Vocal Repository. This occupation revived his at- tention to the drama, which he had never been persuaded en- tirely to condemn, though his opinion of it was somewhat al- DEFENCE OF THE STAGE. 219 tered. In an interval of professional employment, he medita- ted a set of lectures to be delivered at the University, partly with a view to the reformation of the stage. This design was not executed ; but an opportune occasion was offered for putting some of the collected materials into the form of sermons, to which, when printed, another portion could be appended as notes. The inducement to adopt the form of sermons was, [j./>., F,R,S.E., one of the Ministers of the High Church, and Professor of Rhetoric and Belles Letires in the University of Edinburgh. By John Hill, LL.D., F.R.S.E., Profes- sor of Humanity in the University. There appears to be some cause for apprehension, lest the extravagant admiration once lavished on Dr. Blair should de- cline, by degrees, into a neglect that will withhold even com- mon justice. No productions so celebrated at first, as his ser- mons, have perhaps ever come in so short a time to be so nearly forgotten. Even before the conclusion of the series, the public enthusiasm and avidity had begun to languish, and the last volume seemed only announced in order to attend the funeral of its predecessors. The once delighted readers ex- cused the change of their taste by pretending, and perhaps believing, that a great disparity was observable between the two prior volumes and those which followed them. The alleged inferiority might possibly exist in a certain degree ; but the altered feeling was in a much greater degree owing to the recovery of sober sense, from the temporary inebria- tion of novelty and fashion ; and the recovery was accompa- nied by a measure of that mortification, which seeks to be con- soled by prompting a man to revenge himself on what has be- trayed him into the folly. As a critical writer, however. Dr. Blair has suffered much less from the lapse of years. His lectures have found their place and established their character among a highly respect- able rank of books, and will always be esteemed valuable as an exercise of correct taste, and an accumulation of good sense, on the various branches of the art of speaking and writing. It was not absolutely necessary they should bear the 276 LIFE OF BLAIR, marks of genius, it was not indispensable that they should be richly ornamented ; but yet we can by no means agree with this biographer, that ornament would have been out of place, and that the dry style which prevails throughout the lectures is the perfection of excellence in writings on criticism. It has been often enough repeated, that such a bare thin style is the proper one for scientitic disquisitions, of which the object is pure truth, and the instrument pure intellect : but, in general criticism, so much is to be done through the interven- tion of taste and imagination,, that these faculties have a very great right to receive some tribute, of their own proper kind, from a writer who wishes to establish himself in their peculiar province. And the writings of Dryden, Addison, and John- son, will amply show what graces may be imparted to critical subjects by a fine imagination, without in the least preventing or perplexing the due exercise of the reader's understanding. We are not so absurd as to reproach Dr. Blair for not having a fine imagination ; but we must censure his panegyrist for attempting to turn this want into a merit. Philosophical crit- icism, indeed, like that of Lord Kames and Dr. Campbell, which attempts to discover the abstract principles, rather than to illustrate the specific rules, of excellence in the fine arts, — and between the object of which, and of Dr. Blair's criticism, there is nearly the same difference as between the office of an anatomist who dissects, or a chemist who decomposes beautiful forms, and an artist who looks at and delineates them, — may do well to adhere to a plainer language ; but the biographer has judiciously withdrawn all claims, in behalf of Dr. Blair, to the character of a philosophical critic. He has acknowledged and even exposed the slightness of the Profes- sor's observations on the formation of language. He has not, however, said one word of the irreligious inconsistency and folly of professing a zealous adherence to revelation, and at the same time, labouring to deduce the very existence of lan- guage, in a very slow progress, from inarticulate noises, the grand original element of speech, as it seems, among the primeval gentlefolk, at the time when they went on all-four, and grubbed up roots, and picked up acorns. Our readers will remember the happy ridicule of a part of this theory, in one of Cowper's letters, in which he humorously teaches one of these clever savages to make the sentence, " Oh, give me apple." They may find the system ably and argumentatively CHARACTERISTICS OF HIS SERMONS. 277 exploded in Rousseau's " Discourse on the Inequality of Man- kind." While this part of the lectures is given up to deserved neglect, we think the work will, on the whole, always main- tain its character, as a comprehensive body of sensible criti- cism, and of very valuable directions in the art of writing. We agree with this biographer, in admiring especially the lec- tures on the subject of style. But it is rather on the unrivalled excellence of the Sermons that Dr. Hill seems inclined to found the assurance of Dr. Blair's celebrity in future times. In order to persuade our- selves into the same opinion, we have been reading some of the most noted of those performances. And they possess some obvious merits, of which no reader can be insensible. The first is, perhaps, that they^re not too long. It is not im- pertinent to specify the first, because we can put it to the con- sciences of our readers, whether, in opening a volume of ser- mons, their first point of inspection relative to any one which they are inclined to choose for its text or title, is not to ascer- tain the length. The next recommendation of the Doctor's sermons, is a very suitable, though scarcely ever striking, in- troduction, which leads directly to the business, and opens into a very plain and lucid distribution of the subject. Another is a correct and perspicuous language ; and it is to be added, that the ideas are almost always strictly pertinent to the sub- ject. This, however, forms but a very small part of the ap- plause which was bestowed on these sermons during the transient day of their fame. They were then considered by many as examples of true eloquence ; a distinction never per- haps attributed, in any other instance, to performances marked hj such palpable deficiencies and faults. In the first place, with respect to the language, though the selection of words is proper enough, the arrangement of them in the sentence is often in the utmost degree stiff and artifi- cial. It is hardly possible to depart further from any resem- blance to what is called a living, or spoken style, which is the proper diction at all events for popular addresses. If not for all the departments of prose composition. Instead of the thought throwing itself into words, by a free, instantaneous, and almost unconscious action, and passing off in that easy form, it is pretty apparent there was a good deal of handicraft em- ployed in getting ready proper cases and trusses, of various but carefully measured lengths and figures, to put the thoughts 13 278 XIFE OF BLAIK. into, as they came out, in very slow succession, each of them cooled and stiffened to numbness in waiting so long to be dressed. Take, for example, such sentences as these : " Great has been the corruption of the world in every age* Sufficient ground there is for the complaints made by serious observers, at all times, of abounding iniquity and folly." " For rarely, or never, is old age contemned, unless when, by vice or folly, it renders itself contemptible." "Vain, nay often dangerous, were youthful enterprises, if not conducted by aged prudence." " If, dead to these calls, you already languish in slothful inaction," &c. " Smiling very often is the aspect, and smooth are the words of those who inwardly are the most ready to think evil of others." " Exempt, on the one hand, from the dark jealousy of a suspicious mind, it is no less removed, on the other, from that easy credulity which," &c. "Formidable, I admit, this may justly render it to them who have no inward fund," &;c. " Though such em- ployments of fancy come not under the same description with those which are plainly criminal, yet wholly unblameable they seldom are," " With less external majesty it was attended, but is, on that account, the more wonderful, that under an ap- pearance so simple, such great events were covered." There is also a perpetual recurrence of a form of the sen- tence, which might be occasionally gi^aceful, or tolerable, when very sparingly adopted, but is extremely unpleasing when it comes often ; we mean that construction in which the quality or condition of the agent or subject is expressed first, and the agent or subject itself is put to bring up the latter clause. For instance, " Pampered by continual indulgence, all our pas- sions will become mutinous and headstrong." " Practised in the ways of men, they are apt to be suspicious of design and fraud," &c. " Injured or oppressed by the world, he looks up to a judge who will vindicate his cause." In the second place, there is no texture in the composition. The sentences appear often like a series of little independent propositions, each satisfied with its own distinct meaning, and capable of being placed in a different part of the train, without injury to any mutual connexion, or ultimate purpose, of the thoughts. The ideas relate to the subject generally, without specifically relating to one another. They all, if we may so speak, gravitate to one centre, but have no mutual attraction among themselves. The mind must often dismiss CHARACTERISTICS OF HIS SER3I0NS. 279 entirely the idea in one sentence, in order to proceed to that in the next ; instead of feeling that the second, though dis- tinct, yet necessarily retains the first still in mind, and partly derives its force from it ; and that they both contribute, in connexion with several more sentences, to form a grand com- plex scheme of thought, each of them producing a far greater effect, as a part of the combination, than it would have done as a little thought standing alone. The consequence of this defect is, that the emphasis of the sentiment and the crisis or conclusion of the argument comes nowhere ; since it cannot be in any single insulated thought, and there is not mutual dependence and co-operation enough to produce any com- bined result. Nothing is proved, nothing is enforced, nothing is taught, by a mere accumulation of self-evident propositions, most of which are necessarily trite, and some of which, when they are so many, must be trivial. With a few exceptions, this appears to us to be the character of these sermons. The sermon, perhaps, most deserving to be excepted, is that " On the Importance of Religious Knowledge to Mankind," which exhibits a respectable degree of concatenation of thought, and deduction of argument. It would seem as if Dr. Blair had been a little aw^are of this defect, as there is an occa- sional appearance of remedial contrivance ; he has some- times inserted the logical signs ybr and since, when the con- nexion or dependence is really so very slight or unimportant that they might nearly as well be left out. If, in the next place, we were to remark on the figures in- troduced in the course of these sermons, we presume we should have every reader's concurrence that they are, for the most part, singularly trite ; so much so, that the volumes might be taken, more properly than any other modern book that we know, as comprising the whole common-places of imagery. A considerable portion of the produce of imagina- tion was deemed an indispensable ingredient of eloquence, and the quota was therefore to be had in any way and of any kind. But the guilt of plagiarism was effectually avoided, by taking a portion of what society had long agreed to consider as made common and free to all. When occasionally there occurs a simile or metaphor of the writer's own production, it is adjusted with an artificial nicety, bearing a little resem- blance to the labour and finish we sometimes see bestowed on the tricking out of an only child. It should, at the same 280 LIFE OP BLAIR* time, be allowed, that the consistency of the figures, whether common or unusual, is in general accurately preserved. The reader will be taught, however, not to reckon on this as a certainty. We have just opened on the following sentence : " Death is the gate which, at the same time that it closes on this world, opens into eternity." (Sermon on Death.) We cannot comprehend the construction and movement of such a gate, unless it is like that which we sometimes see in place of a stile, playing loose in a space between two posts ; and we can hardly think so humble an object could be in the author's mind, while thinking of the passage to another world. With respect to the general power of thinking displayed in these sermons, we apprehend that discerning readers are coming fast toward a uniformity of opinion. They will all cheerfully agree that the author carries good sense along with him, wherever he goes ; that he keeps his subjects distinct ; that he never wanders from the one in hand ; that he presents concisely very many important lessons of sound morality ; and that in doing this he displays an uncommon knowledge of the more obvious qualities of human nature. He is never trifling nor fantastic ; every page is sober, and pertinent to the subject ; and resolute labour has prevented him from ever falling in a mortifying degree below the level of his best style of performance. He is seldom below a respectable medi- ocrity, but, we are forced to admit, that he very rarely rises above it. After reading five or six sermons, we become as- sured that we most perfectly see the whole compass and reach of his powers, and that, if there were twenty volumes, we might read on through the whole, without ever coming to a bold conception, or a profound investigation, or a burst of genuine enthusiasm. There is not in the train of thought a succession of eminences and depressions, rising towards sub- limity, and descending into familiarity. There are no pecu- liarly striking short passages where the mind wishes to stop awhile, to indulge its delight, if it were not irresistibly car- ried forward by the rapidity of the thought. There are none of those happy reflections back on a thought just departing which seem to give it a second and a stronger significance, in addition to that which it had most obviously presented. Though the mind does not proceed with any eagerness to what is to come, it is seldom inclined to revert to what is gone CHAEACTERISTICS OF HIS SERMONS. 281 by ; and any contrivance in the composition to tempt it to look back with lingering partiality to the receding ideas, is forborne by the writer ; quite judiciously, for the temptation would fail. A reflective reader will perceive his mind fixed in a won- derful sameness of feeling throughout a whole volume : it is hardly relieved a moment, by surprise, delight, or labour, and at length becomes very tiresome ; perhaps a little analogous to the sensations of a Hindoo while fulfiUinJJP|| vow, to re- main in one certain posture for a month. A sedate formality of manner is invariably kept up through a thousand pages, without the smallest danger of ever luxuriating into a beauti- ful irregularity. We never find ourselves in the midst of any thing that reminds us of nature, except by that orderly stiff- ness which she forswears ; or of freedom, except by being compelled to go in the measured paces of a dull procession. If we manfully persist in reading on, we at length feel a tor- por invading our faculties, we become apprehensive that some wizard is about turning us into stones, and we can break the spell only by shutting the book. Having shut the book, we feel that we have acquired no definable addition to our ideas ; we have little more than the consciousness of having passed along through a very regular series of sentences and unex- ceptionable propositions ; much in the same manner as, per- haps, at another hour of the same day, we have the con- sciousness or remembrance of having just passed along by a very regular painted palisade, no one bar of which particu- larly fixed our attention, and the whole of which we shall soon forget that we have ever seen. The last fault that we shall allege, is some defect on the ground of religion ; not a deficiency of general seriousness, nor an infrequency of reference to the most solemn subjects, nor an omission of stating sometimes, in explicit terms, the leading principles of the theory of the Christian redemption. But we repeatedly find cause to complain that, in other parts of the sermon, he appears to forget these statements, and ad- vances propositions which, unless the reader shall combine with them modifications which the author has not suggested, must contradict the principles. On occasions, he clearly de- duces from the death and atonement of Christ the hopes of futurity, and consolations against the fear of death ; and then, at other times, he seems most cautious to avoid this grand 282 LIFE OF BLAIR. topic, when adverting to the approach of death, and the feel- ings of that season ; and seems to rest all the consolations on the review of a virtuous life. We have sometimes to charge him also with a certain adulteration of the Christian moral principles, by the admixture of a portion of the worldly spirit. As a friend to Christianity, he wished her to be a little less harsh and peculiar than in her earlier days, and to show that she had not lived so long in the genteelest world in the crea- tion, without learning politeness. Especially it was neces- sary for her to exercise due complaisance when she attended him, if she felt any concern about his reputation, as a com- panion of the fashionable, the sceptical, the learned, and the affluent, and a preacher to the most splendid congregation in the whole country. It would seem that she meekly took these delicate hints, and adopted a language which no gentleman could be ashamed to repeat, or offended to hear. The ser- mons abound with specimens of this improved dialect, but we cannot be supposed to have room here for quotations ; we will only transcribe a single short sentence from the Sermon on Death : " Wherever religion, virtue, or true honour call him forth to danger, life ought to be hazarded without fear." Now what is the meaning of the word " honour," evidently here employed to denote something distinct from virtue, and there- fore not cognizable by the laws of morality ? Does the reverend orator mean, that to gain fame or glory, as it is called, or to avert the imputation or suspicion of cowardice, or to maintain some trivial punctilio of precedence or arrogant demand of pride, commonly called a point of honour, between individuals or nations, or to abet, as a matter of course, any cause rendered honourable by being adopted hj the higher classes of mankind, — a Christian ought to hazard his life ? — Taken as the ground of the most awful duty to which a human being can be called, and yet thus distinguished from religion and morality, what the term means can be nothing good. The preacher did not, perhaps, exactly know what he intended it to mean ; but it was a term in high vogue, and therefore well adapted to be put along with religion and virtue to qualify their uncouthness. It was no mean proof of ad- dress to have made these two surly puritans accept their sparkish companion. If this passage were one among only a few specimens of a dubious language, it would be scandal- ous in us to quote it in this particular manner ; but as there CHARACTERISTICS OF HIS SERMONS. 283 are very many phrases cast after a similar model, we have a a right to cite it, as an instance of that tincture of the un- sound maxims of the world, which we have asserted to be often perceptible in these sermons. This might be all in its place in the sermons of the despicable Yorick ; but it is dis- gusting to hear a very grave divine blending, with Christian exhortations, the loathsome slang of duelling lieutenants, of gamblers, of scoffers at religion, of consequential fools who believe their own reputation the most important thing on earth, and indeed that the earth has nothing else to attend to, and of men whosQ rant about perhaps the glory of dying for their country, is mixed with insults to the Almighty, and im- precations of perdition on their souls. This doubtful and accommodating quality was one of the chief causes, we apprehend, of the first extraordinary popu- larity of these sermons. A great many people of gayety, rank, and fashion, have occasionally a feeling that a little easy quantity of religion would be a good thing ; because it is too true, afler all, that we cannot be staying in this world always, and when one goes out of it, why, there may be some hardish matters to settle in the other place. The prayer- book of a Sunday is a good deal to be sure toward making all safe, but then it is really so tiresome ; for penance it is very well, but to say one likes it, one cannot for the life of one. If there were some tolerable religious thing that one could read now and then without trouble, and think it about half as pleasant as a game of cards, it would be comfortable. One should not be so frightened about what we must all come to some time. — Now nothing could have been more to the purpose than these sermons ; they were welcomed as the very thing. They were unquestionably about religion, and grave enough in all conscience ; yet they were elegant ; they were so easy to comprehend throughout, that the mind was never detained a moment to think ; they were undefiled hy methodism ; they but little obtruded peculiar doctrinal no- tions ; they applied very much to high life, and the author was evidently a gentleman ; the book could be discussed as a matter of taste, and its being seen in the parlour excited no surmise that any one in the house had been lately converted. Above all, it was most perfectly free from that disagreeable and mischievous property attributed to the eloquence of Peri- cles, that it " lefi; stings behind." 284 I/IFE OF BLAIK# With these recommendations, aided by the author's repu* tation as an elegant critic, and by his acquaintance with per- sons of the highest note, the book became fashionable ; it was circulated that Lord Mansfield had read some of the sermons to their Majesties ; peers and peeresses without number were cited, as having read and admired ; till at last it was almost a mark of vulgarity not to have read them, and many a lie was told to escape this imputation, by persons who had not yet en- joyed the advantage. Grave elderly ministers of much severer religious views than Dr. Blair, were, in sincere benevolence, glad that a work had appeared, which gave a chance for re- ligion to make itself heard among the dissipated and the great, to whom ordinary sermons, and less polished treatises of piety, could never find access. Dainty young sprigs of the- ology, together with divers hopeful young men and maidens, were rejoiced to find that Christian truth could be attired in a much nicer garb than that in which it was exhibited in Bever- idge, or in the Morning Exercises at Cripplegate. If the huzzas attending the triumphal entry of these sermons had not been quite so loud, the present silence concerning them might not have appeared quite so profound. And if there had been a little more vigour in the thought, and any thing like nature and ease in the language, they might have emerged again into a respectable and permanent share of pub- lic esteem. But, as the case stands, we think they are gone or going irrevocably to the vault of the Capulets. Such a deficiency of ratiocination, combined with such a total want of original conception, is in any book incompatible with its staying long in the land of the living. And, as to the style, also, of these performances, there were not wanting, even in the hey-day and riot of their popularity, some doctors, cunning in such matters, who thought the dead monotony of the ex- pression symptomatic of a disease that must end fatally. We should apologize to our readers for having gone on thus far with our remarks, without coming to the work which has given the occasion for introducing them. This volume has disappointed our expectation of finding a particular account of the life of Dr. Blair, enlivened with anecdotes illustrative of his character. Nearly half of it is occupied not in criticizing, but actually in epitomizing, the Doctor's writings, a labour of which it is impossible to com- prehend the necessity or use, except to make up a handsome- CHARACTERISTICS OF HIS SERMONS. 285 looking volume. Several of the most noted of the sermons are individually dissected, in a tedious manner, and compared with several of the sermons on the same subjects, in the vol- umes of some of the celebrated French preachers, but with- out any critical remarks of consequence. The other half of the book does relate mainly to the man himself, but is writ- ten much more in the manner of a formal academical eulogy, than of any thing like a lively and simple memoir. It is not florid, but it is as set and artificial as the composition of Dr. Blair himself; and indeed seems a very good imitation, or, at least, resemblance. Except in the acknowledgment of one or two slight weaknesses, as we are taught to deem them, in the Doctor's character, it is a piece of laboured and unvaried pane- gyric, carried on from page to page, with a gravity which be- comes at length perfectly ludicrous. Hardly one circum- stance is told in the language of simple narrative ; every sentence is set to the task of applause. Even Dr. Blair him- self, whose vanity was extreme, would have been almost satisfied, if such an exhibition of his qualities and talents had been written in time to have been placed in his view. To avoid several pages of extracts, we must remark, that Dr. Blair was something of a beau, and very fond of novel reading. Every reader will be surprised and provoked to find so very small a share of personal history. It is well known that we are not in general to look for many incidents and ad- ventures in the life of a scholar and clergyman : but we should have supposed that a period of eighty-three years might have furnished more matters of fact, than what could be comprised in a quarter of that number of pages. Those which are here afforded, consist of little beside the notice and dates of the two or three more obscure preferments of Dr. Blair, on his road to what is described the summit of ecclesiastical success and honour, the High Church of Edinburgh ; his appointment as Professor of Belles Lettres ; his failure of being placed in the situation of Principal of the University of Edinburgh, which he expected to receive from the pure gratitude and ad- miration of his country, without any solicitation ; and, the important circumstance of preaching his last sermon. This circumstance, will be henceforward inserted, we trust, with its precise date, in all chronicles of the memorable things of past times ; for it is enlarged on here, as if it had been one of the most momentous events of the century. He died De- 13* 286 LIFE OF BLAIR. cember 27th, 1800, in the eighty-third year of his age, and the iifty-ninth of his ministry. The Doctor's successful progress through life was on the whole adapted to gratify, one should think almost to satiety, that love of fame which his biographer declares, in so many words, to have been his ruling passion ; nor had the passion which. Dr. Hill does not say, was second in command, the love of money, any great cause to complain. We sincerely wish to persuade ourselves that, with all his labour of encomium, this Dr. Hill has done less than justice to his subject. For if we are to take his representation as ac- curate and complete, we have the melancholy spectacle of a preacher of religion, whose grand and uniform object in all his labours was advancement in the world. This is clearly the only view in which his admiring friend contemplates those labours. The preacher's success is constantly dwelt on with delight ; but this success always refers to himself, and his own worldly interests, not to any religious influence exerted on the minds of his inferior, and afterwards, his splendid, auditories. His evangelical office is regarded as merely a professional thing, in which it was his happiness to surpass his competi- tors, to attain the highest reputation, to be placed in a con- spicuous station, to obtain a comparative affluence, to be most sumptuously flattered by the great, and to be the intimate friend of Hume, Smith, Home, Ferguson, and Robertson. There is hardly a word that attributes to the admired preacher any concern about promoting the Christian cause, the king- dom of Christ, or the conversio;i of wicked men, — in short, any one of those sublime objects for which alone the first magnanimous promulgators of Christianity preached, and laboured, and suflfered. It is easy to see that, though Dr. Blair's reputed eloquence had been made the means of im- parting the light, and sanctity, and felicity, of religion, to ten thousand poor wicked peasants, yet if he had not sought and acquired high distinction in polished society, his learned biographer would have been utterly disinclined to celebrate him, as deeming him either a grovelling spirit, incapable of aiming at a high object, or the victim of malignant stars that forbade him to attain it. We could make plenty of citations to acquit ourselves of injustice in this representation : there are many passages of a quality similar to the following : — **Hi8 Lordship,'* (Chief Baron Orde,). " in his official capacity, was a CHARACTERISTICS OF HIS SERMONS. 287 regular hearer of the Doctor's sermons, while his court sat, and there was no one better qualified to judge of the preacher's merit. This merit, too, was never more conspicuous than when it was honoured with the appro- bation of the venerable Judge. Dr. Blair's literary reputation was there thoroughly established. And the unwearied labour he underwent in his closet, while composing his sermons, was repaid by the admiration of a discerning audience." — P. 187. The Doctor is commonly reputed to have had a tolerably sufficient attachment to pelf. He might have higher motives for clinging so fast to the patronage of Lord Melville, but it is irksome to hear of his being " so much indebted to that pa- tron's munificence," with the addition of the fulsome cant that, " every favour which he received (from this patron) was multa dantis cum laude, and did honour to the hand that be- stowed it. This patron is presumed to have been at the bot- tom of the pension of £200 granted from the public treasury. In reading so many things about patronage, and munifi- cence, and protection, and advancement, and success, it can- not fail to occur to any reader of sense to ask, with a senti- ment very indignant in one reference, or very compassionate in the other — If all this was necessary to Dr. Blair, with a very small family, and with all the internal means attributed to him of advancing his interests, what is to become of ever so many hundred hapless clergjmien, in Scotland and else* where, who have large families, slender livings, and n6 General Frazers, Chief Barons, and Lord Melvilles to " pro- tect" them, no means of getting into the High Church of Ed- inburgh, no chance of attracting the notice of Royalty, and a pension of £200, and no hope of collecting tribute by means of a literary reputation " extending beyond the bounds of the British empire ?" 288 RITCHIE S LIFE OF HUME XIII. DAVID HUME Account of the Life and Writings of David Hume, Esq^ By Thomas Edwakd Ritchie. This is by no means so ample a memoir as the number of pages would seem to indicate. The last eighty pages are occupied with Hume's publication in French, relative to the affair with Rousseau ; a translation of this pamphlet is in- serted in the narrative, accompanied by several additional let- ters on the same business, and engrossing more than a hun- dred pages ; and about one hundred and thirty pages are filled with criticism on Hume's writings, eight pages that were printed in the first edition of his " Essays," but in the later ones omitted by the author, and a critique on Wilkie's " Epi- goniad," sent by Hume to the " Critical Review." Much less than half the book, therefore, is occupied with what is strictly biographical, even if we include a considerable num- ber of his letters to some of his distinguished friends, espe- cially Dr. Robertson. In so much of the volume as we owe to the pen of Mr. Ritchie, we do not find occasion for any great measure of either praise or blame. It is written with per- spicuity, in a style not clumsy, but not remarkable for ele- gance. The detail of the few events of Hume's life would be sufficiently orderly, if there appeared less eagerness to seize and dilate every circumstance that can be introduced as an episode. A character of sense and independence is visible throughout ; and the present is one of the very few biogra- phers who are free from the weakness of enthusiastically ad- miring, or the hypocrisy of affecting so to admire, the mixed and imperfect subject of their pages. If he could have brought himself to the obsequiousness of promising to laud his subject up to the pitch of eulogy which would have gratified the deli- cate ears of Hume's living relations, he might have been ena- Ritchie's life of hume. 289 bled to supply a great deficiency of information respecting the early years and habits of the philosopher ; but we are com- pelled to approve the independent conduct described in the note at page 4. *' In the hope of being enabled to fill up any chasm in this narrative, I applied to a near relation of Mr. Hume, and was told, that if the work was to advance his fame, and a copy of the manuscript furnished to the family, the information wanted would, perhaps, be supplied. With such condi- tions I refused compliance, choosing rather to remain satisfied with the little I had otherwise obtained, than to fetter my sentiments, and subject myself to so laborious a task, in return for what was probably of little im- portance." In the narrative part, great use is necessarily made of Hume's own memoir, called " My Own Life," with the addi- tion of Dr. Smith's details of the circumstances which preced- ed the exit. This is followed by a general estimate of Hume, as a metaphysician, a moralist, a writer on general policy, and a historian. It is a brief review of all his writings, and evinces a good share of acuteness and knowledge. The last eighteen pages of this review are filled with a curious collec- tion of sentences from the " History of England," as they stand corrected in the later editions, compared with the same sentences of the first edition, which are placed in an opposite column, with here and there a suggestion from Mr. Ritchie of still further corrections, wanted in some of these sentences. It would not seem that Mr. Hume's composition can pretend to high merit on the ground of correctness. It is not the biographer's fault that Hume's life furnishes but a singularly meagre and uninteresting detail. It is cu- rious to think how many thousands of his contemporaries whose names are forgotten, would have supplied each a far more animated and entertaining narrative. The story of ma- ny a common soldier or sailor, many a highwayman, many a gipsy, many a deserted child, and many a beggar, would have kept awake the attention which is much inclined to slumber over an account of this celebrated philosopher. — He was born at Edinburgh in 1711. There was some undefined quantity of nobility in the blood of his ancestors on both sides, and therefore we suppose in his own, of which he is said to have been always extremely vain. We are told, "the juvenile years of Hume were not marked b}^ any thing which can at- tract our notice. His father died while our historian was an 2 90 Ritchie's life of hume. infant, and left the care of him, his elder brother Joseph, and sister Catharine, to their mother, who, although in the bloom of life, devoted herself to the education of her children with laudable assiduity." He went to school and to college, was designed by his friends for the law, but was often guilty of sli- ly stealing from the lectures of his venerable tutors, Voet and Vinnius, into the much more dashing company of Cicero and Virgil. These gentlemen had certainly taken care to make their own fortunes, in their day ; but their harangues and hexameters were of so little service to that of their admirer, which had no broader basis than the patrimony of a Scottish younger brother, that he determined to enter on some com- mercial pursuit. He therefore left the citizens of Rome, and went to try his skill among those of Bristol ; but finding him- self after a few months, totally unequal to the bustle incident to a mercantile situation, he abandoned the attempt, and went to France. Thence he returned to London in 1737, and, in the following year, published his " Treatise of Human Na- ture." Under the profession of showing what qualifications are re- quisite for the satisfactory performance of such a work as this pretends to be, Mr. Ritchie has given a sketch of the history of philosophy, or rather a catalogue of philosophers, from Pla- to to Hume. But we do not exactly comprehend the design of this, unless he means to be understood, that to be able to in- dite a philosophical treatise on human nature, the writer must have studied all that has ever been written, by all the philo- sophers of ancient and modern times. We could certainly wish that Hume had deemed this an indispensable prerequi- site to the privilege of writing and vending his own sceptical cogitations ; but it is too evident that none of the infidel phi- losophers have ever had the conscience to acknowledge the obligation of this preliminary duty. This enumeration of dis- tinguished names ends with a real curiosity, a list of about a sixth part, as the author believes, of " the commentators and scholiasts on Aristotle's philosophical works," which accumu- lates the titles of books containing, in all, a quanity of writing which would have amounted to several hundred quarto vo- lumes. It is well known, from Hume's own acknowledgment, that this his first performance was utterly neglected by the public. In making the acknowledgment, he praises the equanimity Ritchie's life of hume. 291 which he maintained on the occasion, and the facility with which his cheerful and sanguine temper returned to the habit of animation and hope. Mr. Ritchie has in his text consented to say the same thing, but has subjoined a note which gives an- other representation of the philosopher's patience and tranquil- lity. *' In the « London Review,* Vol. V. p. 200, (anno 1777,) edited by Dr. Kcnrick, there is a note on this passage in our author's biographical nar- rative, rather inimical to the amenity of disposition claimed by him. The reviewer says, — ' so sanguine, that it does not appear our author had ac- quired, at this period of his life, that command over his passions of which he afterwards makes his boast. His disappointment at the public recep- tion of his • Essay on Human Nature,' had indeed a violent eifect on his passions in a particular instance ; it not having dropped so dead-born from the press, but that it was severely handled by the reviewers of those times, in a publication entitled. The Works of the Learned ; a » what lie could without much difficulty bring, considering th^ immense number of his veterans at every moment in the pos- ture of war, the authority and promptitude of his decrees of conscription, and the vast extent of populous territory over which those conscriptions operate. And as to the nature of this popular levy, it was to be considered what an uncouth element of armies it would continue to be for months, what a want there was of men of commanding military talents, to throw the rude though brave masses into system, and at the same time how soon their quality, and the capacity of their leaders, were likely to be brought to the test by the unremit- ting assault of their rapid and pertinacious enemy. It was also to be inquired, where were arsenals and magazines 1 whence were half the requisite number of fire-arms to be obtained ? for as to other arms, there can be no greater folly than to talk of them. Possibly there are, in every country, a very small number of men so firm and so fierce that, with- out any other weapons than pikes, they would resolutely ad- vance to the encounter with musketry and artillery ; but as to the generality of the men that armies must be composed o^ we think their defeat is infallible, whatever their numbers may be, if under no other protection than their pikes they ^re confronted with lines of fire-arms. For, setting aside the real difference of power between the two kinds of wea- pons, setting aside too the effect of manoeuvres, the influence of imagination will be great and fatal. To unpractised troops, ^t least, guns seem something more than mere weapons ; both by those that hold them, and those that meet them, it is almost felt as if they had a kind of formidable efficacy in themselves, their operation is so totally different from any other instrument that can be wielded by human hands. The explosion, the flash, and the infliction of death, at a great distance, by a missile that cannot be seen or avoided, inspire in the possessor of the weapon a certain consciousness of being a much more powerful agent, than he could have been by an implement, which had no other force than just that which he could give it by the gi'asp and movement of his hand, and no effect at a distance. And this influence of imagination operates with double force on the man who is advancing against these fire-arms, while himself has only an inert piece of wood or iron ; he will look with despondency and contempt on his pointed stick, while the lines in his front southey's chronicle of the cid. 381 seem to be arrayed in thunder and lighting, while he is start- ling at the frequent hiss of bullets, and seeing his companions begin to fall. But there would be no end of enumerating the disadvan- tages, under which the Spanish insurrection was to encounter such a tremendous invasion ; and, even admitting that insur- rection to be as general and as enthusiastic as it was repre- sented, a sanguine expectation of its success was probably entertained by very few of our countrymen, after it was as- certained to the conviction of all that Bonaparte had nothing to fear on the side of Germany, though the earnest desire did sometimes assume the language of confident hope. Still, however, it was not the less certain, that a great and resolute nation might accomplish wonders, against the largest regular armies, and the most experienced commanders ; as history was at hand to show, by various examples, and eminently above all others, that of the war of the French revolution. Certainly indeed, there was an ominous difference, in point of genius and system, between the leaders of the war against Spain and the commanders who had invaded France ; the highest genius, however, cannot work literally by magic ; and if the French legions could have been commanded by even still greater talents than those actually at their head, it was evident they must receive a dreadful shock if they were to be fallen upon by several hundred thousand men, impelled by the same enthusiasm of valour and obstinacy of perseverance which first confounded and finally routed the grand armies of Brunswick, Clairfait, and Saxe Coburg ; in the varieties of the conflict, besides, all the latent genius in the patriotic army would flame out, and declare whom nature had appointed, in contempt of all laws of rank, to the command. But then, there must be an adequate cause to inspire the popular levies with this heroic fury, which should persist to burn and to fight, in spite of all checks, and disasters, in fortress and in field, whether the battalions were in order or confusion, whe- ther they found themselves separated into small bodies, or thrown together in a ponderous mass. And it might fairly be assumed, at the commencement of the Spanish revolution, that no less cause, no other cause, than that which had pro- duced this grand effect in the French levy en masse, would now produce it in that of Spain. All know that the cause which operated thus on the revolutionary axniies of France, 17* 882 southey's chronicle of the cid. was the passion for liberty, continually inflamed to a state of enthusiasm, by having the object most simply and conspicu- ously placed in view. The object was placed before them, if we may so express it, "full orbed;" it was liberty, not in the partial sense merely of being freed from the power and interference of the foreign monarchs who had sent the armies they were combating, and whose design, they had little doubt, it was to divide France among them as a conquest, and its people as slaves ; but in the animating sense, also, of being no longer the subjects of a despot at home. A general could circulate through his camp an address like the following : — " Brave citizens, soldiers of liberty ! prepare for battle ; to drive these legions of Austria and Prussia from your country, which is henceforth to be the land of freedom. Your an- cestors, in such times as those of Louis the Fourteenth, were sent to war on these very plains, at the mandate of a cruel tyrant, and his detestable minions ; while they fought, with a forlorn and melancholy valour, their countrymen were all in chains, and a grand object for which they were to fight and bleed was, that their master might lose none of his power to keep them so. You, soldiers of liberty, are called to cele- brate in arms the commencement of a new era. By the heroic charge that shall dash these armies of insolent in- vaders in wrecks and fragments back on the countries from which they came, you will confirm the doom that has crushed the internal despotism of our country in the dust. The Bas- tile is down, there is an end of a profligate court and arbitrary power, of the exclusive rights and the arrogance of nobles, of the rapacity of farmers-general, and the domination of papal priests. The impositions that so long fixed our slavery, by fettering our minds, are broken away ; we have exploded the notion, as well as defied the power, of despotism ; we have proclaimed that all political power essentially resides in the people, and that those to whom its exercise is to be en- trusted, shall be cjjosen by the people, and most strictly ac- countable to them. We are a part of this emancipated and elevated people, and are boldly come forth to maintain their cause and our own. Is it not worthy of us to be brave in such a cause 1 Does not this land of new-born liberty de- serve that we should fight for it like lions ? There, in our sight, are the armies that are come to make us all slaves again. Let us fall upon them directly, and drive them into the Rhine." southey's chronicle of the cid. 383 Every mind responded to such an appeal ; though imper- fectly organized at first, though in various instances unskil- fully or unfaithfully commanded, and though many times in a state of confusion and defeat, these half-disciplined battal- ions were " fraught with fire unquenchable ;" they astonished, and after a while intimidated, their veteran antagonists, by returning incessantly to the charge ; they were continually re- inforced by more of their countrymen, animated with the same powerful sentiment, till at length the most famous legions and generals of Europe were overpowered, and driven away by an irresistible torrent. We can remember to have read, in the accounts of those times, that one morning, after several days of severe conflict, and very partial success, in Alsace^ General Pichegru signified to the army that he felt it needful to give them repose that day ; on which he was informed that they testified their disappointment, and expressed a strong and general wish to be led again to battle ; they were led accord- ingly. — It would be as much beside the purpose to discuss here the correctness of that idea of liberty, which created such an almost preternatural energy in the people and the armies of France, as to notice what a wi'etched disappoint- ment, and what a hateful despotism, were in reserve to ter- minate all their prospects. It is sufficient for our object, that a bold, grand idea of liberty, involving the annihilation of every thing that had oppressed and galled the people, and sent their advocates to the Bastile, under the old despotism, and quite clear of all counteractive considerations of this and the other aristocratical distinction or monopoly to be held sacred, and this or the other individual or family to be maintained in power, — it is enough that this idea inspired the energy, which flung the relics of the invading armies at the palace gates of those who had sent them. It is enough that every one can imagine in an instant, what would have been the effect in the camp of Jourdan or Pichegru, if information had come from Paris, of the provisional government, anxious to secure the rights and happiness of the people, having settled that, though neither a prince of Austria or of Prussia, nor exactly Louis the Sixteenth, must be king, yet the allegiance of the nation was inviolably due to some individual of the family, the Duke of Chartres for instance, on whose accession the government would go on in the same wise and popular manner that it had done a hundred years past. 884 southey's chronicle of the cid. The reader has anticipated all we could say in the applica- tion of these hints to the recent movement of the Spanish people. We shall content ourselves with very few words, as there is now probably no great difference of opinion among thinking men, relative to the original and progressive proba- bilities attendant on this memorable event. One single short question disposes of the whole speculation : Has liberty, in the sense in which alone it is of importance to a people, ever \>een fairly set before the Spanish nation? It is of the essence of this question, to reflect a moment on the condition of the Spanish nation previously to this event ; we mean their condition as justly imputable to their own sovereigns, and their own system of government, exclusively of what evils may have accrued to them of late years from the French intrigues and ascendency in their court. And according to all accounts, that condition was deplorable. Taken in a collec- tive view, the people were ignorant, indolent, poor, dirty, and extravagantly superstitious, fond of tawdry shows and cruel §ports, strangers, in a great measure, to ingenious and mechanic arts, stationary in almost all the points of civiliza- tion in which the other countries of Europe are advancing, hampered by a clumsy and perverse judicature, in short, bear- ing the most flagrant marks of an incorrigibly bad govern- ment. Thus matters had gone on during the reigns of suc- cessive monarchs, and during the reign of probably the last of the Bourbons in Spain, Charles the Fourth. At length, in consequence of we know not what intrigues and private arrangements, the sovereignty passed suddenly from him into the hands of his son, not, of course, without expostulation and repugnance on the part of the father, whose rights, according to all orthodox notions on the subject, were grossly violated by the transfer. All this while, however, a powerful neighbour, whose tenets concerning kingly rights, saving and excepting those of himself and his royal brothers, are deemed highly heretical, had his schemes of transfer prepared, and his ma- chines in operation ; and lo ! in a moment both the kings vanish from Spain, and " our brother Joseph " succeeds to the throne. It was found that the two monarchs had been fascia nated, as we read of unfortunate birds sometimes being, to throw themselves directly into the mouth of the great serpent. At this juncture began the commotion which has so deeply and justly interested all Europe. A just indignation at the southey's chronicle of the cid. 385 base and treacherous proceedings of Napoleon, rose so high, in some parts of the country, as to issue in an energetic call of the whole nation to arms. This was a tremendous crisis, and a most awful summons ; for it might be held certain, that the enemy, defied and challenged in this unexpected quarter, and this new manner, would discharge the whole collected thunders of his martial empire, and, even if unsuccessful, would desperately prosecute the contest with the last battalion that would adhere to his standard. And if such would be his determination, what a scene the patriots had before them ! If the emergency should prove to require it, he would be able, at a moderate computation, to bring three hundred thousand soldiers, in successive armies, into Spain. It would be idle to calculate that such a force, a large proportion of it veterans accustomed to victory, and commanded by such a set of generals as never were combined in any other service, could be everywhere encountered, and finally repelled, by less than four or five hundred thousand of the patriots. And if the war should continue even no more than six or eight months, how many great battles would there be, beside the incessant course of partial actions and bloody smirmishes ? Would it have been at all an extravagant prediction that, during so many months of such a war, two hundred thousand devoted Spaniards might perish ? And then what miseries would be suffered by the defenceless inhabitants, what num- bers of aged and sick persons, and women and children, would be exposed to terror, to w^ant, and in many cases even to death ; what desolation of the country, what destruction of habitations, what ruin of agriculture, and what famine, as the probable consummation of all ! This picture is inexpressibly too faint for the prospect, which was, or ought to have been, distinctly presented to the minds of those who first summoned, and all who seconded them in summoning, their countr}Tnen to combat with the whole power of France. Now then, we may ask, solemnly, what was that object, for the attainment of which the country was to be laid open to this most gigantic and enormous train of horrors ? What was that ultimate transcendent felicity, the thought of which was to inspire such multitudes of men with the perfectly new sentiment, a con- tempt of wounds and death ; which was to animate the mothers, wives, sisters, and daughters of these men to urge them on to battle, and which was to reconcile the whole 386 soitthey's chronicle of the cid. population to have their country placed, for months, in a situa- tion about parallel to that of a forest infested by tigers ? At the very least, that object could be no less than the noblest system of national liberty that ever blessed any people. Let our readers recall to mind the manifestoes, and ad- dresses to the people, issued by the provincial Juntas that took the lead, and judge whether this was the object. Some of those publications were strongly conceived, and eloquently expressed. They powerfully expatiated on the treacherous arts by which the nation and the royal family had been in- veigled, on the excesses committed in some places by the French troops, and on the glory of revenge ; on which last topic we regretted to see the patriots adopting a language, and endeavouring to rouse a spirit, of savage ferocity, fit only for the most barbarous age. But the accomplishment of revenge could be only a very subordinate object with the pati'iotic Juntas ; nor could it be expected to prove an object adequate, in those parts of the country which had not immediately suffered or witnessed the outrages committed by the French, to stimulate the population to turn their meadows into fields of battle, and expose their persons to the sword ; especially as it would be obvious that as soon as Joseph should be enthroned, the excesses of the French must, even for his sake, cease. What, then, it must still be asked, was the grand ultimate ob- ject to be attained by so dreadful a war, even presuming it must be successful ? And, as far as we have at any time been able to discover, the grand, the sublime object, which was to animate the people to such a warfare, to compensate its infinity of miseries, and to crown the final victory, was no other than a return to the old state of things^ with the mere exception of French influence, and the mischievous power of the Prince of the Peace, at the Spanish court. None of the indispensable innovations, none of the grand reforms, for the want of which that people had been so long pitied or despised by all the civilized world, were specifically held out, as any part of the incitement or the prize ; no limitations of the royal power, or the royal expenses, no reduction of the privileges of the aristocracy, no restraints on ecclesiastical arrogance, no political existence to be given to the people, no method of en- abling them to participate or influence their government, no abrogation of the barbarous municipal regulations against the freedom of trade, no improvements of political economy that southey's chronicle of the cid. 387 should contribute to supply clothes to those in rags, and food to those almost starving. No, there was nothing of all this held out to the people ; they were to draw on them, to fight, and to expel, the whole power of France, at the dreadful cost that we have described, and then Ferdinand and the old government were to be triumphantly restored, and all would be well ! Hundreds of thousands of them were summoned to rush out gallantly to perish, in order that the remainder might continue to be the poor, ragged, forlorn nation, that they were, and are. If a project for exciting the people to plunge into an un- fathomable gulf of miseries and death for such an object, may be forgiven fo the statesmen and prelates of Spain, whose catholic imaginations are so stored with prodigies and miracles, what, however, will sober judges hereafter say of the politicians of England, at the memorable juncture ? By what reach of conjecture will it be possible to explain, how they, the enlightened inhabitants of a free country, in which they have so often eloquently 'declaimed on the glory of hav- ing permitted no despotism here, on the energy with which noble ideas of liberty will inspire a people to resist the armies of a tyrant, and on the wretchedness of living under a government like that of Spain ; in what way can it be made intelligible, how these enlightened politicians should conceive it possible to rouse a whole people to arms, at the peril of such awful consequences, by any objects held out to them by the Juntas ? or should deem it a desirable thing if they could, — excepting, indeed, with the mere view of diverting the danger a while longer from our own country, and giving, in our stead, Spanish victims to the French sabres. What was Ferdinand, or any other individual, to the un- happy people of Spain, who were to leave their families, to have their cottages burnt, to famish, or to bleed for his sake ? What had he ever done for them, or attempted to do ? If he had been a thousand times more their friend than they had ever found him to be, by what law of justice or common sense could it be, that countless multitudes should go to be slaugh- tered on his account ? — ^not to notice the absurdity of sum- moning a nation to fight for a person who was, as to any possible connexion with them, to all intents, a nonentity. For a while, we still hoped, that the name of Ferdinand would be suffered to sink, by degrees, out of the concern ; and 388 soutiiey's chronicle of the cid. that the project would assume, at length, the bold aspect of a really popular cause. In this hope, we anxiously waited the assembling of the Supreme Junta. At last they assembled, ve- ritied their powers, and took the oath which they had solemnly framed. We read that oath, and have never since, for one instant, entertained the smallest hope of the Spanish cause. There were some most vague and insignificant expressions in that oath, about taking care of the interest of the nation ; but its absolute sum and substance was, popery and Ferdinand* The first of these, avowed in its utmost extent and grossness, we considered, as we have already attempted to explain, as enough to ensure the fate of the whole design, on account of its aspect relatively to the divine government ; and the latter, as furnishing far too insignificant a motive to animate a nation to battle. The Junta began by declaring they had no power to assemble the Cortez, in other words, that they could do nothing for the people ; they went on to restrict the freedom of the press, and now,^ — the world is ceasing to inquire what they are doing. No room remains for remarks on the measures of our government, relating to the vast preparations and armies pro- fessedly intended for the assistance of Spain ; what is worse, we have no room for adding many remarks on the book which has given occasion to this article. The Cid (i. e. Lord) Rodrigo Diaz was a most renowned hero, of the eleventh century, who was sometimes in the service of the Christian monarch of Spain, and sometimes maintained himself independent in his conquests from the Moorish part of the country. There are several ancient re- cords, and an epic poem, concerning him, in the Spanish language ; Mr. Southey has formed the present work, by combining and harmonizing the several relations together, faithfully translating, as he assures us, what he has selected from each, and noting, in the margin of each paragraph, the work, and the part of the work from which it is taken. The translation is in the antiquated English dialect, which appears to us to be, in general, pretty successfully supported. The story is something between a history and a romance ; and Mr. Southey has not attempted to distinguish what is true from what is fabulous ; the Spanish literature evidently sup- plied no means for doing this, nor would it have been worth while, had it been practicable, as the fabulous parts are pro^ southey's chronicle of the cid. bably quite as amusing as the true, and give as striking a picture of the times. In this view the worlc is very interest- ing. We are transported into an age and country, where the gentlemen go out to work in the morning, with their steeds and lances, as regularly as the farmers with their team and plough, and indeed, a good deal more so. The Cid surpasses all his contemporaries for diligence and success in such laudable occupation. His course of enterprise is so rapid, so uniformly successful, and so much of a piece in other re- spects, that in some parts of the book the mind is quite tired of following him. In many other parts, however, the narra- tive is eminently striking, especially in describing some of the single combats, and most of all, in the long account of an extraordinary court of justice, held on two young princes or noblemen, who had abused their wives, the daughters of the Cid. Nothing in the whole library of romantic history can exceed this narrative. The Cid appears a humane warrior, according to the standard of those times, and yet he could calmly be guilty of the most infernal cruelties ; for instance, burning alive many Moors, in the siege of Valencia. The destruction of " inhdels," indeed, in any and every manner, seems to have been regarded as one of the noblest exercises of Christian virtue. Three or four of his constant companions in arms display such magnanimous bravery, and such an affectionate fidelity to him, as to excite the reader's interest and partiality in no small degree. A prominent feature of the story throughout, is the frequent recurrence of religious and superstitious ideas, in the discourse of the warriors, in all situations. 390 MODERN EGYPTIANS. XX. MODERN EGYPTIANS An Account of the Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyp- tians ; written in Egypt during the Years 1833, 4, and 5 ; partly from Notes made during a former Visit to that Country in the Years 1825, 6, 7, and 8. By Edward William Lane. A CURIOUS and reflective mind will not fall on many subjects more attractive than the relation of ancient regions, such as history and monuments have recorded them, to the same re- gions viewed in their modern and present state. It is striking to consider how widely they are, as it were, estranged from their primitive selves ; insomuch that the mere local and nominal identity has less power to retain them before us under the original idea fixed on the place and name, than their actual condition has to present them as domains of a foreign and alien character. They are seen divested to so great a degree, of that which had created a deep interest in contemplating them, that we consign them to a distant pro- vince of our imagination, where they are the objects of a reversed order of feelings. We regard them as having dis- owned themselves, while retaining their ancient names, and their position on the earth. We say, " divested to so great a degree ;" for if the regions be eminently remarkable for natural features — mountains, rivers, defiles, and peculiar productions — these do, indeed, continue to tell something of ancient times. In keeping under our view a groundwork of the scenes we had meditated on, they recall to us by association what once was there, and is there no longer. But they do so to excite a disturbance by incongruity. What is there now^ rises in the imagination to confound or overpower the images of what was there then. So that, till we can clear away this .intrusion, we have an un- MODERN EGYPTIANS. 391 couth blending of the venerable ancient and the vulgar modern. Again ; there are seen in those territories striking relics of the human labours of the remote ages ; which are thus brought back more impressively to the imagination than by the most prominent features of nature. But these disclaim more decid- edly still, in the name of that departed world to which they entirely belong, all relationship with the existing economy of man and his concerns. They are emphatically solitary and estranged amidst that economy. Their aspect, in their gloom and ruin, is wholly to the past, as if signifying a disdain of all that later times have brought around them. And if, in some instances, man is trying to avail himself of some parts or ap- pendages of them for his ordinary uses of resort or dwelling, we may, by a poetical license of thought, imagine them loath- ing the desecration. Still, as the vulgarities do obtrude them- selves in contiguity, the contemplatist cannot wholly abstract himself from the annoyance. Some of those scenes of ruin, indeed, and especially and pre-eminently the tract and vast remaining masses of Babylon, are placed apart by their awful doom, as suffering no en- croachment and incongruous association of human occupancy or vicinity. There is no modern Babylon. It is secluded and alone in its desolation ; clear of all interference with its one character as monumental of ancient time and existence. If the contemplative spectator could sojourn there alone and with a sense of safety, his mind would be taken out of the ac- tual world, and carried away to the period of Babylon's mag- nificence, its multitudes, its triumphs, and the divine denuncia- tions of its catastrophe. Egypt has monuments of antiquity surpassing all others on the globe. History cannot tell when the most stupendous of them were constructed ; and it would be no improbable prophe- cy that they are destined to remain to the end of time. Those enormous constructions, assuming to rank with nature's an- cient works on the planet, and raised, as if to defy the powers of man and the elements and time to demolish them, by a ge- neration that retired into the impenetrable darkness of anti- quity when their work was done, stand on the surface in so- lemn relation to the subterraneous mansions of death. All the vestiges tear an aspect intensely and unalterably grave. There is inscribed on them a language which tells the inquirer 392 MODERN EGYPTIANS. that its import is not for him or the men of his times. Persons that lived thousands of years since remain in substance and form, death everlastingly embodied, as if to emblem to us the vast chasm, and the non-existence of relation, between their race and ours. A shade of mystery rests on the whole econo- my to which all these objects belonged. Add to this our as- sociations with the region from those memorable transactions and phenomena recorded in the sacred history, by which the imagination has been, so to speak, permanently located in it, as a field crowded with primeval interests and wonders. It may then be asserted, perhaps, that Egypt surpasses every tract of the world (we know not that Palestine is an exception) in the power of fascinating a contemplative spirit, as long as the contemplation shall dwell exclusively on the ancient scene. But there is a modern Egypt. And truly it is an immense transition from the supernatural phenomena, the stupendous constructions, the frowning grandeur, the veiled intelligence, the homage, almost to adoration, rendered to death, and the absorption of a nation's living powers in the passion for leav- ing impregnable monuments, in which after their brief mortal existence they should remain memorable forever, — to the pre- sent Egypt as described by Mr. Lane. But this Egypt, as it is spread around the wonderful spectacles which remain to give us partially an image of what once it was, disturbs the contem- plation by an interference of the coarse vulgar modern with the solemn superb ancient. At least to a reader who has not enjoyed the enviable privileges of beholding those spectacles, and so practically experiencing how much they may absorb and withdraw the mind from all that is around them, it would seem that the presence of a grovelling population, with their miserable abodes, and daily employments, combined with the knavish insolent annoyance of the wearers of a petty authori- ty, must press on the reflective spectator of pyramids, temples, and catacombs, with an effect extremely adverse to the musing abstraction in which he endeavours to carry his mind back to the ancient economy. As to any advantage to arise from con- trast^ there is no need of it. And besides, the two things are too far in disproportion for contrast. Who would let hovels and paltry mosques come into comparison at all with the pyra- mids and the temple of Carnac ? Mr. Lane has surrendered to the antiquarian and imagina- tive tribe the vestiges of the ancient country, and strictly ad- MODERN EGYPTIANS. 393 hered to his purpose of describing its present state and people. This he has done in such a manner that his work may be con- sidered as nearly superseding all the slighter sketches convey- ed to us in the narratives of the numerous recent travellers. He has possessed the advantage over them of a protracted re- sidence, of having one special design to prosecute, of a com- petent mastery of the language ; and of possessing a certain flexibility of adaptation to the notions and habits of the people, by which he has insinuated himself into a familiarity and confi* dence with them quite out of reach of any passing visitant. The result is a work surprisingly comprehensive and particu- lar. His vigilant inquisitiveness has gone into all the detail of dress, domestic manners, conventional observances, super- stitious notions and ceremonies, ordinary occupations, traffic, political economy, official administration, and characteristic di- versities of the several sections of the heterogeneous popula- tion ; which are exhibited with a minuteness and precision, to make us marvel at his untiring patience of investigation. All is set forth in the plain language of an honest intention and la- bour to give a matter-of-fact account of things, Avithout any flourishing ofl* into sentiment or ambitious speculation. It could not be so amusing a book as those which have been made up of picturesque touches and incidents of adventure ; it necessarily partakes of what we are apt to call dry ; but it will be the repository to be consulted by every person who wants to know any thing about any part or circumstance of the character, habits, and condition, of the modern inhabitants of the old realms of the Pharaohs. The author's observations were chiefly made in Cairo, the capital, and its precincts ; but that portion of the country may, he says, be taken as very competently representing the ge- neral character and state of the nation, and of the Mahomedan world to a much wider extent than the Egyptian section ; for, says he, ** In every point of view, Musr (or Cairo) must be regarded as the first Arab city of our age ; and the manners and customs of its inhabitants are particularly interesting, as they are a combination of those which prevail most generally in the towns of Arabia, Syria, and the whole of Northern Africa, and in a great degree in Turkey. There is no other place in which we can obtain so complete a knowledge of the more civilized classes of the Arabs." It is out of the question to attempt any thing like an analy- 394 MODERN EGYPTIANS, sis of such a multitude and aggregate of particulars. All we can do is to make a few brief notices, here and there, in pass- ing over the eight hundred closely printed pages — a journey through which, though thus commodiously guided and put at our ease, it is really not a light adventure to follow the au- thor, who had himself, at every step, to make it with the slow- ness of the most marked and deliberate attention.' Had he lived in the early times of the country, he would have been an excellent superintending officer to take note of each added stone, in one of the huge piles which consumed a whole life of a generation of labourers. His first observations respect the climate ; which, he says, is remarkably salubrious through the greater part of the year ; more so in the southern part of the Upper, though the heat is 10*^ higher there than in the Lower Egypt; where the ther- mometer, "in the depth of winter," (an expression of strange sound for Egypt,) in the afternoon, in the shade, is at from 50^ to 60'^; in the hottest season from 90'^ to lOO'^; the heat still not very oppressive, being attempered by a northerly breeze. In default of the more pompous relations between the ancient and the modern, there is still in noble superabundance the plague of ffies, lice, and other insect nuisances. Precautions more than formerly are adopted against the invasion of the plague, so named by eminence. But in 1835 it was intro- duced from Turkey, extended over the whole country, and car- ried off in Cairo alone 80,000, one third of the inhabitants. There is a very lengthened description, illustrated by nu- merous wood-cuts, of the houses, in all their diversities, pro- portions, and adjustments. The best of them seem such as may well content the " true believers," during their proba- tion for the more luxurious abodes promised them by the pro- phet ; " but the dwellings of the lower orders, particularly those of the peasants, are very mean ; mostly built of unbaked bricks ; some of them mere hovels," The villages are raised on the progressively accumulating and rising heaps, made by the ruin and rubbish of former ones ; thus maintaining a proper height above the inundation, by rising in proportion to the con- tinual rise of the alluvial plains and the bed of the river. The population, of which there is no authentic statement, can hardly, Mr. Lane thinks, be estimated at so many as 2,000,000, since its prodigious diminution by the pasha's sweeping conscriptions for his wars, of at least 200,000, that MODERN EGYPTIANS. 895 is, a full half of all the men fit for military service. This goes beyond the rate of our once terrible neighbour of France ; and surely threatens a similar eventual prostration to the minor po- tentate. The calculation for the several classes is, Mahome- dan Egyptians (peasants and townspeople,) 1,750,000 ; Chris- tian Egyptians (Copts,) 150,000; Osmanlees, or Turks,UO,- 000 ; Syrians, 5000 ; Greeks, 5000 ; Armenians, 2000 ; Jews, 5000. As dress is a main thing by which mankind all over the world wish to be taken account of, our author pays the Egyptians the compliment of dissecting and delineating theirs, through every article, and fold, and colour, and change, and through each grade of society, with a detail and critical precision which we are confident no tailor or mantua-maker in all Cairo could equal, even if as handy at the pen and pencil as at the needle. To us it appears, as shown in the engravings,* very ungainly and cumbrous in many of its modes. Draperies so unshaped, — and so hung, and loaded, and swathed on the figure, — as some of them appear, must impose a total unfitness for action, even for walking, more than a short measured amble ; and by the very quantity, garment heaped on garment, must greatly add to the grievance of heat. They needed not to outvie the customary Turkish costumes, in the ambition of casting a broad shadow on the ground. But of course this excess is the exclusive privilege and grace of the better sort, who can af- ford to parade a w^ardrobe, and are exempt from the humbler calls to action. The old and approved operation of walking is for them nearly out of the question. A handsome race of asses has the honour of saving them that trouble. Mr. Lane is pleased with the personal appearance of both sexes, about the period of maturity. But unfortunately the females " generally attain their highest degree of perfection at the age of fifteen or sixteen ;" when, and for a few years longer, many of them are very beautiful in figure and counte- nance ; but are under the doom of thenceforward declining ; till they have lost, at the age of forty, all the graces but those sometimes retained in the eyes ; which, " with few exceptions, * We may as well! notice the wood-engravings here, once for all. They are after drawings by the author, in number exceeding a hundred : not of high pretensions in elegance of art ; but bearing, in their plain simplicity, strong marks of faithful representation. They were not meant, he says, " to embellish the pages, but to explain the text." 396 MODERN EGYPTIANS. are black, large, and of a long almond form, with long and beautiful lashes, and an exquisitively soft bewitching ex- pression : eyes more beautiful can hardly be conceived : their charming effect is much heightened by the concealment of the other features." We must take the describer's authority for what we have some difficulty to conceive, that this effect is also greatly heightened by a practice of blackening the edge of the eye -lids, both above and below the eye, with a powder called kohhl. For the antiquity of the practice, reference is made to the example of Jezebel, and to Ezekiel xxiii. 40. Another cosmetic device is the well-known use of henna leaves, to dye of a yellowish red or a deep orange colour the nails, tips of the fingers, palm of the hand, toes, and other parts of the feet. Children are regarded as a great blessing ; and with a reason subject to less exception than in many other parts of the world, if, as we are here told, their behaviour to their parents as they grew up is always exemplary. As a consequence that looks odd at first sight, their childhood is kept in a state disgustingly squalid ; even a lady finished off in dress, and scenting with her perfumes the street through which she is walking, shall be seen leading her little favourite " with a face besmeared with dust, and clothes appearing as if they had been worn for months without ever being washed." This is from dread of the evil eye, which, vainly coveting the sweet creature, would blast it to spite the owner. But the mind is worse off than the person can be ; the state of education being as wretched as political slavery and religious superstition can require. The females are not educated at all. Very few of even the women of the higher order can read, or have learnt to say their prayers. They must not pray in the mosque, and need not pray at home. For boys there are numerous schools, in which, with the letters, they are taught to recite chapters of the koran. Writing is an accomplishment nearly confined to those intended for offices, or the services of the mosque. One of the very first elements of their instruction is "religious pride, with hatred of the Christians, and all sects but their own." A long chapter on Religion and Laws, after distinguishing the religious parties, respectively denominated after the doctors whose tenets they have adopted, recites in substance the doc- trines and prescriptions of the koran; and goes through a. MODERN EGYPTIANS. S97 minute detail of the formularies of devotion, an odious com- post of the ideas of the divine unity, power, and goodness, with the principles of a vile and virulent superstition ; the noxiousness of the latter destroying the practical good of the former, and vitiating even the good moral rules and senti- ments which are blended in the institute. The grave frivoli- ties and grimaces of the ritual are a worthy decoration of the depravity of the principles. The Moslems of Egypt have their proportion of formalists and fanatics ; but collectively considered, they cannot make very high claims for that con- scientious faithfulness of observance, which some of our travelling describers of Turkey have taken pleasure in cele- brating and exaggerating. In the habits of many there is great laxity, and in not a few an almost total neglect. The rigours of their grand solemnity of the Ramadan, regarded as of more importance than any other religious appointment, are unscrupulously melted down in secret by many of the wealthy classes. The majority, however, strictly keep the fast ; which, says Mr. Lane, " is fatal to numerous persons in a weak state of health." The pilgrimage to Mecca and Mount Ararat, once in every true believer's life, though nom- inally of comprehensive obligation, admits of some com- promise and exception in favour of poverty and ill health ; " but many neglect the duty who cannot plead a lawful ex- cuse ; nor are they reproached for so doing." The inter- dicted wine and spirituous liquors are no strangers in the con- cealed recesses of many a Mahomedan dwelling. As to the one article of swine's flesh, it seems they are veritably and universally conscientious. The laws, conformably to the koran, concerning marriage, concubinage, and divorce, and the property adjustments in each case, are as multifarious as any Mahomedan or even Christian jurisconsult, and as lax in morality as any libertine, could well desire. The worthy husband, when he conceives any dislike, or perhaps has too many on his hands, has only to say, " I divorce thee," or, "Thou art divorced," and to pay her some trifle as a return of a part of her dowry, which he had kept back from the first against such an occasion. He may take her again if the whim should take Mm^ should she have no objection ; and in certain cases whether she con- sent or not. But a woman cannot separate herself from her husband against his will, unless for some very considerable 18 398 MODERN EGYPTIANS. fault on his part, such as cruel treatment or neglect ; nor then without a process in the cadi's court. There are, however^ fully as many provisions in the legal system in favour of women, as could be expected where they are held mentally and morally of such small account. Under the article Religion, it should be noticed that the imams are by no means so exclusively sacerdotal, consecrat- ed, privileged, and endowed a class as our Christian clergy are constituted. One point of distinction is, (rather hard on the imams, in the comparative adjustment,) that they " enjoy no respect but what their reputed piety or learning may obtain them." Besides this, they are liable, for misconduct, to be displaced, with loss of salary. And while in the service of the mosque, of which the emolument is very small, they gain their livelihood chiefly by other employments, as tradesmen, schoolmasters, &c. In looking at the chapter on Government, we must congrat- ulate Mr. Lane on Mahomed All's inability to read English. Otherwise we should think that if, in case of his being intro- duced into the presence, he were to catch sight of his own book, lying on the table or divan, it would be rather an alarm- ing spectacle. His rapid glance would alternate between the book and the visage of despotic power — the vultus instaiitis tyranni. For this part of the work is the pictm^e of a nation tormented, plundered, exhausted, crushed down to extreme misery, under the hoofs of the whole troop of centaurs in au- thority. The pasha himself performs in grand fashion, and each subordinate official does his part. The people have never read of the locusts,, and what became of them, in Pha- raoh's time ; or they would look with some passionate wishes toward the Red Sea. It is needless to say, that the term Government in this in- stance means nothing of theory. Nor is it a well-organized tyranny. Its chief possesses, in the exertion of an iron force of will, sufficient ascendency to make the disordered consist- ence of the state work to his own purposes ; but not enough to reduce it to a system, in which the parts should work to- gether as commodiously, with as little secondary mischief, as possible, in maintaining and perfecting the one imperial mis- chief of a relentless despotism. Indeed it would seem that he does not care, as long as that can be maintained, what it may cost to the human mass over which it is exercised. As MODERN EGYPTIANS* 899 a matter of feeling merely, that is nothing wonderful ; but it is somewhat strange that, in simple policy and foresight, he should not be more economical of the harassment and con- sumption of the living and all other materials which are to con- stitute his state ; and the ruin of which must render his do- mination worthless to him. By a rapacious monopoly, and a taxation which watches every thing that grows just in order to crop it, he extinguishes all the incentives to industry and im- provement, in the agricultural interest especially, but those ap- plied by brute force. One of the most iniquitous, and at the same time reckless, of the measures in unsparing prosecution is, that of making himself lord paramount, plainly the absolute owner, of the land, by taking it away from the proprietors, with the semblance of giving them an equivalent or compensation in pensions for life ; which he pays as long as he pleases or finds com^enient ; and which at all events leave the families of the once rightful possessors consigned at last to the condi- tion of serfs or of total destitution. He has laid his talons also on the endowments of religious and charitable institutions. His revenue is understood to amount to three millions sterling. But the section is occupied chiefly with an account of the several courts of law, and other offices of administration. And it just tells how every thing is managed as rogues would have it ; by bribery, falsification, perjury, oppression of the weak, and collusion, as far as the respective corrupt interests of the parties will admit of it, among the strong. There is a curious detailed relation of a concerted plan to defraud a merchant's orphan daughter of her father's property. It had been brought, through all due legal formalities, to a prosperous consumma- tion — the villains in actual possession — when it was blown up by so rare a thing as the resolute intervention of a high pub- lic officer of inflexible integrity. Another story describes an act of summary retribution, not surpassed in fantastic barbar- ism by any judicial transaction in the whole annals of rude tribes and times. We are sorry not to have room to insert it at full length, because the admirably graphic and dramatic ef- fect is lost in a bare statement of the facts ; which are these : The nazir (collecting officer of a village) demanded of a poor peasant sixty riyals, equal to about thirty shillings, which he was wholly unable to pay, his sole property being a cow, w^hich at once supported his family by her milk and ploughed his 400 MODERN EGYPTIANS. small piece of ground. The officer seized the cow, had it cut up in sixty pieces, and summoned sixty peasants, with a com- mand to take each a piece and pay down a riyal, the butcher receiving the head in payment for his work. Thus the requir- ed sum was realized. The ruined peasant went with his la- mentable tale to the superior officer, Defterdar, of the district, who instantly ordered before him all the parties, the collector, the sixty purchasers, and the butcher. After due, but short inquisition, he ordered the butcher to serve out the collector as he had the cow, cutting the body in sixty pieces. As the cow had been sold at but half its value, he commanded each of the former purchasers to take his piece of the collector and pay two riyals ; the butcher receiving, as before, the head for his trouble. Not a man, during the proceeding, had presumed to utter a syllable in remonstrance. The hundred and twenty riyals were then given to the poor peasant. The mode of living, that is to say, the system (for so it may claim to be named) of eating and drinking, with the adjunct and supplementary luxuries, is set forth in all its apparatus, varieties, and ceremonial, as in practice in the higher classes of the city people ; an affair of careful interest and study ; though failing far enough short of the sumptuousness and waste of certain Christian capitals. This must always be the chief resource of combined ignorance, indolence, and wealth. The Egyptian gentry, all who can afford to have nothing to do but indulge and amuse themselves, are a lazy tribe. Nor is it said that they suffer, in any great degree, the plague and pun- ishment of laziness in the shape of ennui. It does not appear but they get life along with tolerable complacency, between their reflections, their gossiping visits and lounges, their reli- gious formalities, and their pipes. This last article is a fa- vourite and inseparable companion, seen in close fellowship with the Moslem all the day long, in his hand, or placed beside him, or carried by his attendant when he walks or rides. Even the women, the ladies, are in great familiarity with it, but have a refined sort of tobacco, of which the smoke serves as a kind of perfume. Like other favourites, the pipe is made an object of vanity and a subject of decoration, the mouth-piece often costing, between material and ornamental device, from two to three pounds sterling. The tranquillity of indolence and luxury is not so entire but that the stimulus of some bustling occasion is highly welcome. MODERN EGYPTIANS. 401 As if for the purpose of contributing this benefit on the widest scale, the marriages of persons of any account are celebrated in a succession of public shows, processions, and racket, in most barbarian contempt of all that good taste would dictate in such an affair — if we may be allowed to apply that epithet af- ter being reminded that, in society pretending to the most fin- ished civilization, that transaction is sometimes profaned with proclamation, parade, and noisy hilarity. In odd contrast with this flaring and vociferous publicity, described through all its shows and changes by our author, is the circumstance that the bridegroom is not permitted to see the face of the bride, absolutely cannot know whether he shall like her or not, till the contract is affirmed, and the whole ceremonial, after sev- eral days of it, coming to an end. He is then introduced to see her without her veil ; and there is a party waiting outside for an appointed sign that he is pleased or content with this first glance of what he is to be — we were unwittingly going to say — looking at for life. But no ; he may rid himself of her when- ever he has a mind. The facility of cutting the tie has been mentioned already ; but Mr. Lane goes into ampler detail in the chapters on marriage and the harem. The slenderness of the conjugal bond yields to the men the substantial advantage of variety and change, without the trouble and expense of polygamy, for which the Mahomedan law gives so large a privilege. The pluralists in this line are chiefly among the lower order, where, instead of incurring an expense, the man may turn the venture to a profit, by taking wives who will consent to work for him. But, taking all to- gether, Mr. Lane thinks "that not more than one husband in twenty has two wives." Sometimes in addition to the one, a slave is held in the combined capacity of servant and paramour. In exposing the arrangements of the harem, the author repre- sents the condition of the inmates as not so consciously unhap- py as is commonly imagined ; the wretchedness incidental to mental vacuity being averted by employment in ornamental works, by much real gayety, and by the liberty, under precau- tionary attendance of course, of going on visits and little rides about the city. As to the husband's vigilance, we are told that any obvious deficiency of it would be deemed by an Egyptian lady an affront, as betraying a want of due regard for her. It is needless to mention that all females, but those of the lower order, are veiled up to the eyes when they appear in public : 402 MODERN EGYPTIANS. and in the house also, whenever there would be a chance of their being seen bj any of the other sex, except the very few who are privileged by relationship. What a degraded esti- mate of half the race of rational creatures is implied in this whole system of precaution, preclusion, and concealment ! The description of the indolent and voluptuous life of the higher classes, inhabiting the metropolis and great towns, stands in flagrant contrast with the condition of those at the bottom of the scale ; especially the peasantry, who are sus- tained in their ill-rewarded toils by a diet on which we may wonder how they can preserve strength to labour at all, or even to live. But how earnestly this poor lot of existence is clung to in preference to the military service, may be seen in the expedients employed by parents to save their sons from that destination. It is fortunate for these Moslems not to have a great variety of subjects to study ; for the tax on their time and faculties for the complete mastery, in knowledge and practice, of the code alone of salutations, compliments, and other verbal civilities, would leave little chance for their proficiency in other learn- ing. There are settled classical forms of speech for all manner of social occasions and incidents, even down to that of yawning ; on which occurrence the true believer is to ap- ply the back of his left hand to his mouth, and say, "I seek refuge with God from Satan the accursed." The ungraceful act, however, is rather to be avoided as much as may be ; and for a much better reason than any thing against it on the score of grace or politeness ; " for it is believed that tl e devil is in the habit of leaping into a gaping mouth." It is not stated whether that incursion be in any degree attracted by the circumstance that the Egyptian mouth is always filled with smoke. " The ordinary set compliments in use in Egyptian society," says Mr. Lane, "are so numerous, that a dozen pages of this work would not suffice for the mention of those which may be heard almost every day." Very inconvenient and onerous as this appears in one view, it is commodious in another, as saving the trouble of any strain on the inventive faculty. The void of knowledge is occupied by an ample order and disorder of superstitions, to the greater portion of mankind a more acceptable mental possession ; inasmuch as it is a thing far more easy and of more lively excitement to indulge the imagination than to exercise the understanding. Superstition, MODERN EGYPTIANS. 403 besides, has the advantage over sober truth of bringing its false creations into more intimate contact with the passions of hope and fear, especially the latter — except in the case of persons of the most extraordinary piety. Nay, it presses closer on the mind than all the objects of the senses, and in many instances constitutes the impressive force of those very objects. For example, our author represents the belief of these Islamites in Ginn (Genii) as subjecting them to a per- petual haunting of their effective good or evil (but especially evil) intervention, in all times and places, and in every thing they do. These invisible agents, some of them " true be- lievers," some of them malignant infidels, denominated Effreets, and being the more powerful order, are deemed to pervade the earth and the sky, and to be ready to take offence at the most common actions of life ; so that it is prudent to ex- claim or mutter, " Destoor," that is, "Permission," by way of deprecation, on letting a bucket down into a well, lighting a fire, or throwing water on the ground. They are the actuating spirits of some of the dangerous commotions of the elements, such as the whirlwinds of sand. Against the ginee approach- ing in that fashion, the most approved charm is to bawl out, *' Iron, thou unlucky ! " as the genii are supposed to have a great dread of that metal. Some of them are believed to assume, occasionally or constantly, the form of dogs, cats, or other brutes ; and among a number of characteristic anec- dotes is the story of what one of the most illuminated sages of the country, recently deceased, who had written several worlis on various sciences, used to relate (if seriously, which is im- plied) of his attendant ginee in the person of a cat ; evincing a debility or perversion of intellect almost incredible. The veneration among the Mahomedans for idiots is better accounted for than we had imagined ; the case being that " the mind of the idiot is (literally) in heaven, while his grosser part mingles among ordinary mortals ; consequently he is considered an especial favourite of heaven." The order of persons holding the repute of saints forfeit none of their respect by taking a practical dispensation from the rules of morality, decency, and religion. At the head of them is a personage of peculiar and pre-eminent sanctity, denominated Ckooth; who is believed to be here, or to be there, but nobody can certainly tell where ; for he is never seen so as to be recognised at any of the stations supposed to be favoured with 404 MODERN EGYPTIANS. his presence. There is so strong a presumption of his being: ensconsed behind the constantly turned-back half of one of the city gates, that " Numbers of persons afflicted with the headache drive a nail into the door to charm away the pain ; and many sufferers from the toothache extract a tooth, and insert it in a crevice of the door, or fix it in some other way, to insure their not being attacked again by the same mrlady. Some curious individuals often try to peep behind the door, in the vain hope of catching a ghmpse of the Ckootb, should he happen to be there, and not at the moment m visible. He is believed to transport himself from Mecca to Cairo in an instant, and also from any one place to another. He wan- ders throughout the whole world, among persons of every religion, wliose appearance, dress, and language he assumes : and distributes to mankind, chiefly through the subordinate welees (saints) evils and blessings, the awards of destiny." There is a notion among many that the ckootbs are ap- pointed in succession by Elijah, whom they consider as the Ckootb of his time, and acknowledge that he never died. Some amusingly ridiculous stories relating to the powers, vocations, and habits of the welees are recited by Mr. Lane, who says they are believed by persons who, in many respects, evince good sense ; and that to laugh, or express discredit, would give great offence. The coveted honour of being reckoned among the welees, or saints, is conceded, in repute, to a few only of a numerous and less sacred order, the Durweeshes (dervises) ; who still are made of some better material than ordinary mortals ; have riles of initiation; some not very defined connexion with re- ligious offices ; and are classed under four distinctive denomi- nations. Some of them figure in the exercise of repeating the name of Allah, with a few other words interjected, as long as the vocal organs can sustain the task ; " accompanying their ejaculations or chants with a motion of the head, or of the whole body, or of the arms. From long habit they are able to continue these exercises for a surprising length of time without intermission." Some of them excel in mountebank feats, of thrusting iron spikes into their bodies, eating glass or burning coals, and live serpents. But the majority seem to employ themselves chiefly in the more ordinary, honest, and useful occupations. On some public occasions the author witnessed the most ambitious exploits of the fine performers* The dancing and whirling exhibition does not appear to have equalled what is described as seen in Constantinople. But MODERN EGYPTIANS. 405 that of fire-eating with impunity was a more wonder-making spectacle than any feats of agility could have been. But something much more strange than this is done in Egypt, and probably no where else. Mr. Lane had heard from English residents in Cairo such accounts of a modern Jannes or Jambres that it would have evinced an inexcusable w ant of curiosity not to seek an interview. There was intro- duced to him a fine -looking man, affable and unaffected in his conversation, who had no reluctance or fear to put his powers to the test before the most shrewd or suspicious inspector. The preparatory ceremony was to write on a paper in ^^rabic (which he readily showed to Mr. Lane, who has given a translation) an invocation to two ^emi, his "familiar spirits," named Turshoon and Turyooshoon.'^ This w^as cut in slips, w^iich were successively thrown together with some incense, on the fire in a chafing-dish, while the process of incantation was going on, in an indistinct muttering by the magician — not, to be sure, a very imposing kind of spell, and more adapted to excite suspicion than create credulity. It w^as necessary there should be an intermediate person between him -and the inquisitive observer. And this might be " a boy, not arrived at puberty, a virgin, a black female slave, or a pregnant woman ;" a rule of fitness seemingly odd and arbi- trary enough. A boy was brought in from the street, by a chance selection, made by Mr. Lane himself, from a number who were returning from a manufactory. He is very particu- lar and positive in asserting that there was not, and could not be, any manner of collusion. A reed-pen and ink were sup- plied by Mr. Lane himself (as the paper for the charm and the scissors for cutting it had also been) at the request of the magician ; who then drew " a magic square " in the palm of the boy's hand, with Arabic numerals marked on its margin, and a blot of ink, less than a sixpence, in the middle. So far in sight of Mr. Lane, who has given the diagram on his page ; what might come next w^as not to be seen by him, but de- scribed by the boy. The spot of ink was to become the ground, or scene, or mirror, of the objects required to appear. The room being filled with smoke of the incense, the magician interrupted his muttering to ask the boy whether he saw any * In a note Mr. Lane says, ** He professed tame that his wonders were effected by the agency of good spirits ; but to otherg he has said the re- verse ; that his magic is Batanic." 18* 406 MODERN EGYPTIANS. thing, and was answered, " no ; " but soon after, with signs of fear, the boy said, " I see a man sweeping the ground." He was then directed to call, in succession, for a long series of spectacles, some of them consisting of a variety of objects and movements ; and he described them distinctly, in form, colour, number, and change of action, in such prompt, plain manner, as to leave no doubt that they were actually before his eyes. One example may suffice : " The boy was directed to say, * Bring the sultan's tent, and pitch it.' This he did ; and in about a minute after, he said, * Some mon have brought the tent ; a large green tent ; they are pitching it;' and presently he added, ' They have set it up ' ' Now,' said the magician, * order the soldiers to come and pitch their camp around the tent of the sultan ' The boy did so; and immediately said, * I see a great many soldiers with the tents; they have pitched the tents ' He was then told to order that the soldiers should be drawn up in ranks ; and he presently said that he saw them thus arranged." — lb. p. 353. But if it might be suspected that all this, however inexpli- cable, was merely a predetermined show of phantasmagoria, an adjusted course of spectral illusion, the magician presently went beyond any conceivable reach of such an artifice. "He now addressed himself to me; and asked me if I wished the boy to see any person absent or dead. I named Lord Nelson ; of whom the boy had evidently never heard ; for it was with much difficulty that he pronounced the name, after several trials. The magician desired the boy to say to the sultan, *' My master salutes thee, and desires thee to bring Lord Nelson ; bring him before my eyes that I may see him, speedily." The boy then said so, and almost immediately added, " A messenger is gone, and has returned, and brought a man dressed in a black suit of European clothes. The man has lost his left arm." He then paused for a moment or two ; and, looking more intently, and more closely, into the ink, he said, *' No ; he has not lost his left arm, but it is placed to his breast " This correction made his description more striking than it had been without it; since Lord Nelson generally had his empty sleeve at- tached to the breast of his coat ; but it was the right arm that he had lost. Without saying that I suspected the boy had made a mistake, I asked the magician whether the objects appeared in the ink as if actually before the eyes, or as if in a glass which make s the right appear as the left. He answered that they appeared as if in a mirror. This rendered the boy's description faultless." The author mentions in a note that the term here translated black is equally applied by the Egyptians to dark blue, Mr. Lane next called for a native Egyptian of his acquaint- ance, then and during many years before residing in England^ MODERN EGYPTIANS. 407 wearing the European dress, and who had, at the time of Mr. Lane's going to Egypt, been long confined to his bed by illness. •* I thouj[Tht that his name, one not very uncommon in Egypt, might make the boy describe him incorrectly; though another boy, on the former visit of the magician, had described this same person as wearing a Eu- ropean dress, like that in which I last saw him. In the present case the boy said, *' Here is a man brought on a kind of bier, wrapped up in a sheet." This description would suit, supposing the person to be still con- fined to his bed, or if dead. The boy described his face as covered; and was told to order that it should be uncovered. This he did ; and then said, * His face is pale ; and he has mustaches, but no beard ;' which wa« correct." Several other persons were named, but the boy's descrip- tions became " imperfect, though not altogether incorrect ; as if his sight were becoming gradually dim." Another boy was tried, out could see nothing ; the magician said he was too old. Mr. Lane confesses that he was somewhat disappointed, be- cause the performances fell short of what had been witnessed, in many instances, by some of his friends and countrymen, of unquestionable authority as deponents. We wish that, to accumulate the largest amount of evidence and illustration, he had recorded the detail of a number of those instances, with the same particularity as the following : ** On one of these occasions, an Englishman present ridiculed the per- formance, and said that nothing would satisfy him but a correct descrip- tion of the appearance of his own father, of whom he was sure that no one of the company had any knowledge. The boy, accordmgly, having called by name the person alluded to, described a man in a Frank dress of warse, with his hand placed to his head, wearing spectacles, and with one foot on the ground, and the other raised behmd him, as if he were stepping down from a seat. The description was exactly true in every re- spect ; the peculiar position of the hand was occasioned by an almost con- stant headache ; and that of the foot or leg by a stiff knee, caused hy a fall from a horse, in hunting. I am assured that on this occasion the boy accurately described each person and thing called for. On another oc- casion Shakspeare was described with the most minute correctness, both as to person and dress ; and I might add several other cases in which the magician has excited astonishment in the sober minds of Englishmen of my acquaintance." — P. 356. Now these statements being assumed as accurately true to matter of fact — and the testimony appears to be such as to pre- 403 MODERN EGYPTIANS, elude all doubt — what are we to think of the art or power which so prodigiously surpasses all known resources of me- chanical ingenuity and physical science ? Mr. Lane declines to adventure an opinion, resigning the affair to impenetrable mystery. But there will be no lack of confidence to pro- nounce, and the authority so pronouncing will assume the name and tone of philosophy, that there was nothing more in the whole matter than artful contrivance ? that there was no intervention of an intelligent agency extraneous to that of the immediate ostensible agent. But can this assumption be made on any other ground than a prior general assumption that there is no such preternatural intervention in the system of the world ? But how to know that there is not ? The negative decision, pronounced in confident ignorance, is a conceited im- pertinence, which ought to be rebuked by that philosophy whose oracles it is affecting to utter. For what any man knows, or can know, there may be such intervention. That it is not incompatible with the constitution of the world, is an unquestionable fact with the unsophisticated believers in the sacred records. And not a few occurrences in later history have totally defied every attempt at explanation in any other way. And now take the facts before us, as described by Mr, Lane, First, those that may be called the inferior class ; — in the day-time, without concert, without machinery, unless the burning and smoke of incense may be named so, and on a ground in all appearance unfit, to the last degree, for the spec- tacles, there were brought, not a vague dazzlement of some- thing like imagery (which, however, it is an extreme suppo- sition that the excited state of the young seer under the influ- ence of perfumes and strange rites might seem to create,) but a series of distinct scenes of persons and transactions, each remaining long enough to be plainly described, but succeeded, at the interval of a few moments by another, different and also of precise delineation. It is easy to fling off the diffi- culty by saying, it was all done by some juggling device. — This cheap philosophy may be quietly put aside. But let the greatest adept in all that real philosophers know of science and art point out an ascertained principle in nature, by the action of which he deliberately believes that he, or any philo- sopher, can — nay, rather, by which the philosopher shall practically prove that he can — ^at his mere will, as unaided by MODERN EGYPTIANS. 409 optical apparatus as the Egyptian, command the elements into the sudden formation of such a series of images, rapidly but definitely presented to the eyes, or can impart to the eyes themselves the power of instantaneously shaping them. But the philosopher ! — the thing was done by a person whose phi- losophical qualifications our adept would despise. But next the stronger cases : the statement is, that, imme- diately on being called for, there were presented the images of persons, unknown to the Magus, far absent, or dead, in conspicuous portraiture, with various and very particular marks of correspondence to what was known of those per- sons by the challengers of his mysterious faculty. Now put it to any rational man, who has not attained the wisdom of an a priori rejection of the supernatural, whether he can be- lieve that such an effect was within the competence of some curious art, or some resource of science, in the possession of the unschooled Mahomedan ; or within the competence of any art or science .in the possession of any man in the world. If the pr language of - - 277 " merits of - - 277 *♦ popularity of - 275—283 Sheridan, Richard B. - - 79 Solar System, - - - 19 ♦* Soul Doctor," a - - 2G3 Southey's Chronicle of the Cid, 370 Spain, affairs of - 371— 389 Stage, the defence of - - 217 Stars, fixed - - - - 24 " inhabited - - - 26 *' magnitude of - - 23 ♦* number of - - 23 State Trials, effects of - - 83 Stephen's memoirs of John Home Tooke, . - . 54 Stewart Dugald, character by 207 St. Pierre, Eustace - - 117 Strafford, Earl of - - 195 Stranger in Ireland, - - 317 Styles on the Theatre, - - 230 Superstitions of the Higii- landers, - - . - 339 Suppression of erroneous opin- ions, - - _ - 293 Sydney, Algernon - - 137 INDEX. 419 T. Page Talcs of fashionable life, - 265 Taxation, errors concerning - 104 Telescopes, - - - - 23 Herschel's - - 23 Temple's correspondence of Franklin, - - - 231 Theatre, character of the 228 ** depravity of the 220 " impiety of the - 229 " never can become good - - 226 " picture of an imag- inary one - - 223 " supporters of the 222 Theories of philosophers, - 104 TooKE, John Home - - 64 " abandons the priesthood, 70 " advertisement by, on battle of Lexhigton, 72 ** a great talker, - - 86 ** appearance of, before the H. of Commons 72 ** attack by, on the Speak- er of the H. of Commons 71 »* becomes a priest of the establishment, - 68 ** conduct of, at the Mid- dlesex election, - 63 " contests the election for Westminster, - 77 ** correspondence of, with Junius, - - 69 " correspondence of, with Wilkes, - - 64 " death of - - - 87 ** defeats Lord Mansfield, 64 " defends Mr. Tooke, 71 " diseases of - - 84 •* education of - - 57 »» eiforts of, for freedom, 69, 70 " elevation of, to Parlia- ment, - - - 84 " habits of - - - 59 " imprisonment of - 73 ** in the Tower, - _ 81 " inconsistency of - 60 " letter of ... 60 Page. " letters of, from Italy, 62 " letters of, to Junius, - 65 *' moral constitution of 8f> " morals of - - 62 " objects of - - B7 " opinion of, concerning Warren Hastings, - 76 " preaching of - - 62 ** refused admission to the counsellor's practice 74 " Sultanic look of - 85 " Studied medicine, - 59 " Tract against the American war by - 75 " travels in France and Italy, - - 58,62 " "Two Pair of Por- traits" by - - 75 Trial of Warren Hastings, 77 Truth, laws of - - - 104 U. Universe, immensity of - 36 ♦» material, the - 22, 24 Vindicators of Justice, - - 67 Vitality religious, semblance of 53 W. Walker, Professor - - 207 War, horrors of - - - 161 Wartburg, castle of - - 106 Washington, George - - 138 Wentworth Thomas, life of - 195 Westminister election, - 77 Whitfield, George, - - 247 Whitgift, life of - - - 3ti3 Wilkes, John - - 60, 62 " W.se Club," the - - 253 Word of the Almighty, 13, 27 Wordsworth the Poet, - - 95 Wordsworth's Ecclesiastical Biography, - - - 356 Works of God, - - 13,27 Worlds of intelligent beings, 47 Writings of Hugh Blair, - 275 ^'. -s A CATALOGUE OF BOOKS, INVABIOUS DEPAETMENTS OF LITERATURE, PUBLISHED BT ' D. APPLETON & Co., New-York^ AND GEO. S. APPLETON, Philadelphia. For sale hy the several Booksellers throughout the United States, Classifieir Hxi^tx. AaRIOULTUBE. Falkner on Manures. Smith's Productive Farming. Farmer's Treasure, by Falkner and Smith. ARTS, MANUFACTURES, &c. Ewbank's Mechanics and Hydraulics. Hod«e on the Steam-Engino. Lafever's Modern Architecture. *' Stair-case Construction. Vre's Dictionary of Arts, Manuf., and Mines. BIOGRAPHY. Hamilton (Alex.), Life of. Philip's Life of Milne. CHEMISTRY, Freseniusfs Chemical Analysis. Liebig's Chemical Letters. Parnell'a Applied Chemistry. EDUCATION. Hazen's Symbolical Speller. Keightley's Mythology of Greece and Italy. Taylor's Home Education HISTORY. Frost's History of United Slates Navy. *• ** Army. Guizot's Histoiy of CivilizaUon. L'Ardeche's Histonr of Napoleon. Taylor's Natural History of Society. JUVENILE. Boone, Daniel, Adventures oC Boy's Manual. Cameron's Farmer's Daughter. Child's Delight. Copley's Early Friendships Copley's Poplar Grove. Cortes, Adventures of. De Foe's Robinson Crusoe. Evans's Joan of Arc. " Evenings with the Chronic lenk Guizot's Young Student. Girl's Manual. Holyday Tales. Hewitt's Love and Money. " Work and Wages. " Little Coin, much Care. " Which is the Wiser? « Who shall be Greatest " Hope on, Hope ever. " Strive and Thrive. *' Sowing and Reaping. ** No Sense like Common Sense. ** Alice Franklin. Jerram'a Child's Story-Book. Appleton's Catalogue of Valuable Publications. Looking-Glass for the Mind. Lucy and Arthur. Log Cabin, or World before You. Martineau's Crofton Boys. ^ " Peasant and Prince. Marryat's Masterman Ready. Old Oak Tree. Prize Story. Book. Pratt's Dawnings of Genius. Sandham'e Twin Sisters. Smith,. Capt?, Adventures oC Sherwood's Duty is Safety. " Jack the Sailor. " Think before you Act. Taylor's Young Islandeis. ery Little Tales. ' Youth's Book of Nature. MEDICAL. Chavasse's Advicfi to Mothers. Hall's Principles of Diagnosis. Smith on Nervous System. MI$OELLANEOUS. Arthur's Tired of Housekeeping. Austin's German Writers. Carlyle's Heroes, Hero Worship. Cotton's Exiles of Siberia. D'Israeli's Curiosities of Literature. Deleuze on Animal Magnetism. Ellis's Mothers of England. " Wives of England. " Daughters of England., «* Women of England. " First Impressions. " Danger of.Dining Out. «' SomerviUe Hall. Embury's Nature's Gems. Foster's Miscellanies. ** Christian Mora^r. Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefiet^. . " , ^Essays. Johnson's Kasselas. Lover's Handy Andy. " £. s. d.— Treasure Trove. Maxwell's Hector O'Halloran. More's Domestic Tales. « Rural Tales. Pure Gold. Sinclair'! Scotland ind Scbtch. «' Shetland and Shetlandeis. St. Pierre's Paul and Virginia. Taylor's Physical Theory of Another Life. Useful Letter-Writer. Woman's Worth. i^OETfeY. Bums's Poetical Works. Cowper*8 " Gems from American Poets. Hemans's Poetical Works. " Songs of the Affections. Lewis's Records of the Heart. Milton's Poetical Works. " Paradise Lost. " ♦* Regained Moore's Lallah Rookh. Pollok's Course of Tinie. Scott's Poetical Works. " Lady of the Lake. " " Marmion. « Lay of the Last Minstrel. Southey's Poetical Works. Thomson^s S^tasons. Token of Affection, by various writers •* Friendship.. Token of Love. « the Heart. " Remembrance. Young's Night Thoughts. RELIGIOUS. A Kempis's Imitation of Christ. Anthon's Catechism on Homilies. Beaven's Help to Catechising. Bible Expositor. Book of Common Prayer. Burnet's Hist, of Reformation. " Exposition of XXXIX. Articles. Bradley's Practical Sermons. " Sermons at Clapham and Glasbury. Churton's Early English Church. Christmas Bells. Cruden's Concordance, N. T. Clarke's Scripture Promises. Evans's Rectory of Valehead. Faber on Election. Gresley on Preaching. " English Churchman. Harems Sermons. Hooker's Works. Jahles's True Christian. " Widow Directed. " Young Man from Home. • " Christian Professor. " Anxious Inquirer after Salvation. " Happiness, its Nature and Sourcee^ Kip's Double Witness. Kingsley's Sacred Choir. Lyra Apostolica. Magee on Atonement. Manning on Unity of the Church. Marshall's Notes on Episcopacy. More's Private Devotion. " Practical Piety, Maurice's Kingdom of Christ. Newman's Parochial Seimons. " Sermons on Subjects of .the D«f. Ogilby on Lay-Baptism, " Lectures on the Church. Palmer on the Church. Paget's Tales of the Village. • Pearson on the Creed. Philip's Devotional GuideV. " The Hannahs. « The Marys. «* The Marthas. " The Lydiak. *' Love of the Spirit. Sherlock's Practical Christian. Smith on Scripture and Geology. Spencer's Christian Instructed. Spincke's Manual of Devotion. Sprague's Lectures to Young People " True and False Religion. Sutton's Learn to Live. " Learn to Die. . . ** On Sacrament. Stuart's Letters to Godchild. Taylor, on Episcopacy. " Golden Grove. " Spiritual Christianity Wayland's Human Responsibility Wilson's Sacra Privata. Wilberforce's Communicant's ManuaL VOYAGES AND TRAVELS. Cooley's American in Egypt. Olmsted's Whaling Voyage. Silliman's Ameiican Scenery Soutligate's Turkey aiid Persia. Appleton^s Catalogue of Valuable Puhlications. — ■ A KEMPIS.-OF THE IMITATION OF CHRIST: ' Four books by Tkomas k Kempis. One elegant volume, 16mo. $1 00. " The author of this invaluable work was born about the year 1380, and has always be«n honoured by the Church for his eminent sanctitip^. Of the many pious works composed by him, his 'Imitation of Christ' (being collections of his devotional thoughts and meditations on impor- tant practical subjects, together with a separate treatise on the Holy Communion) is the moat celebrated, and has ever been admired and valued by devout Christians of every name. It hai Eassed through numerous editions and translations, the first of which into English is said to have een made by the illustrious Lady Margaret, mother of King Henry VII. Messrs. Appleton's Tery beautiful edition is a reprinC from the last English, the translation of which was chiefly copied from one printed at London in 1677. It deserves to be a companion of the good Bishop Wilson's Sacra Privata. — Banner of the Cross. AMERICAN POETS.— GEMS FROM AMERICAN POETS. One volume, 32mo., frontispiiece, gilt leaves, 37 1-2 cents. Forming one of the series of " Miniature Classical Library.'* Contains selections from nearly one hundred writers, among which are- Bryant, Halleck, Longfellow, Percival, Whittier, Sprague, Brainend, Dana, Willis, Pinkney, Allston, Hillhouse, Mrs. Sigourn^y, L. M. David- son, Lucy Hooper, Mrs. Embury, Mrs. Hale, etc. etc ANTHON,-CATECHISMS ON THE HOMILIES OF THE CHURCH, 18mo. paper cover, 6 1-4 cents, $4 per hundred. CONTENTS. m. Of the Passion of Christ. IV. Of the Resurrection of Christ. I. . Of the Miserjrof Mankind. II. Of the Nativity of Christ. By HENRY ANTHON, D. D., Rector of St. Mark's Church, New York. This little volume forms No. 3, of a series of " Tracts on Christian Doctrine and Practice^" »ow in course of publication under the supervision of Rev. Dr. Anthon. AUSTIN.—FRAGMENTS FROM GERMAN PROSE WRITERS. Translated by Sarah Austin, with Biographical Sketches of the Authon. One handsomely printed volume, 12mo. $1 25. ARTHUR.— TIRED OF HOUSE-KEEPING By T. S. Arthur, author of " Insubordination," etc. etc. One volume, 18mo« froijtispiece, 37 1-2 cents. Forming one of the series of" Tales for the People and their Children.'*^ Contents. — I. Going tQ House-keeping. — II. First Experiments. — tit. Morning Calls. — IV. First Demonstrations. — V. Trouble with Servants. — Vt. A New One.^VII. More Trouble— VIII. A True Friend.— IX. Another Powerful/Demonstration, — X. Breaking .up. — XI. Experiments in Boarding and Taking Boarder. — XII. More Sacrifices. — XIII. Extracting Good front Evil.^XIV. Failure of the First Experiments.— XV. The New Boardingr . house.— XVI. Trouble in Earnest— XVII. Sickness.— XVIII. Another Change. — XIX. Conclusion. ■ . 'j» . BEAVEN.— A HELP TO CATECHISING. For the use of Clergyirien, Schools, and Private Families. By James Bea . ven, D. D., Professor of Theology at King's College, Toronto. Revised and adapted to the use of the Protestant Episcopar Church in the United. States. By Henry Anthon, D. D., Recior of St. Mark's Church, N. Y. 18mo.,. paper cover, 6 1-4 cents, $4 per hundred. Forming No. I of a series of Tracts on Christian Doctrme and Praetioe,*' now in eounavf pablication under the luperintendence of Rer. Dr. Anthon. a . Ajjpletori's Catalogue of Valuable Piiblications, BIBLE EXPOSITOR, Confirmation of the Truth of the Holy Scriptures, from the Observations ot recent Travellers, illustrating the Manners, Customs, and Places referred to in the Bible. Published under the direction of the Society for the Promo tion of Christian Knowledge, London. Illustrated with 90 cuts. On* volume, 12mo., 75 cents. EXTRACT FROM PREFACE. ** The Holy Scriptures contain many passages full of importance and beauty, but not generally understood, because they contain allusions to manners and customs, familiar indeed to those to whom they were originally addressed, but imperfectly known to us. In order to obviate this difficulty, this' volume is now presented to the public, consisting of extracts from the narratives of travel lers who have recorded the customs of the oriental nations, from whom we learn that some usages were retained among them to this day, such as existed at the times when the Scriptures were written, and that their manners are in many instances little changed since the patriarchal times. The compiler of this volume trusts that it may be the means, under God's providence, of leading vnlearned readers to a more general acquaintance with Eastern customs, and assist them to a clearer perception of tke propriety and beauty of the illustrations so often drawn from them in the Bible." BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER; And Administration of the Sacraments and other Rites and Ceremonies ol the Church, according to the use of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, together with the Psalter or Psalms of David. Illustrated with six steel engravings, rubricated, 13mo. size, in varioua bindings. Morocco, extra gilt leaves, $2 25. With clasp, do., $3 00. Imitation of Morocco, gilt leaves, $1 50. Plain do., $1 00. Without rubrics, in Morocco, extra, $2 00. Imitation do., $1 25. 'Sheep, plain, 37 1-2 cents. It may also be had in rich silk velvet binding, mounted with gold, gilt borders, clasp, &c., price $8 00. A very superior edition, printed in large type, from the new authorized edition, is nearly ready. It will be embellished with choice steel engravings from designs by Overbeck. BOONE.— ADVENTURES OF DANIEL BOONE, The Kentucky Rifleman. By the author of " Uncle Philip's Conversations." One volume, 18mo. 37 1-2 cents. . Forming one of the seri.es of " A Library for my Young Countrymen.*' ** It is an excellent narrative, written in a plain, familiar style, and sets forth the character and wild adventures of the hero of the Kentucky wilderness in a very attractive light. The boys will all be in an agony to read it." — Com. Adv. BOYS' MANUAL- Comprising a Summary View of the Studies, Accomplishments, and Princi- ples of Conduct, best suited for promoting Respectability and Success in Life. 1 vol. 18mo. 50 cents. BRADLEY.-FAMILY AND PARISH SERMONS, Preached at Clapham and Glasbury. By the Rev. Charles Bradley. From the seventh London edition, two volumes in one,8vo. $1 25. PRACTICAL SERMONS For every Sunday throughout the year and principal holydays. Two volumei ij of English edition in one 8vo, $150. f ^FCT" The above two volumes may be bound together in one. Price $2 50. The Sermons of this Divine are much admired for their plain, yet chaste and elegant style; thoy will be found admirably adapted for family reading and preaching, where no pastor is located. Recommendations might be given, if space would admit, from several of our Bishops and Clergy— also from Ministers of various denominations. . The following are a few of the Enjlish and American critical opinions of their merit: — ** Bradley's ityle is sententious, pithy, and colloquial. He is simple without being quaint, mtA he almost holds conversation with his hearers, without descending from the dignity of the Iftcred chair."— JEcZectic Review. ** We earnestly desire that every pulpit may ever be the vehicle of discourses as judicious ana practical, as scriptural and devout, as these." — Christian Observer. ** The style is so simple that the most unlearned can understand them ; the matter so instrao> tiv« that the best informed can learn something ; the spirit so fervent that the most engaged Christian can be animated and warmqd by tioir perusal." — Christian Witnesa* Appleton^s Catalogue of Valuable Publications BURNET.-THE HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION or the Church of England, by Gilbert Burnet, D. D., late Lord Bishop ol Salisbury — with tlte Collection of Records and a copious Index, revise* and corrected, with additional Notes and a Preface, by the Rev. E Nares, D. D.,late Professor of Modern History in the University of Oxford, Illustrated with a Frontispiece and twenty-three engraved Portraits, form ing four elegant 8vo. volumes. $8 00. A cheap edition is printed, containing the History in three vols, without th© Records — which form the fourth vol. of the above. Price, in boards, $2 50. To the student either of civil or religious history, no epoch can be of more importance than that of the Reformation in England. The History of Bishop Burnet is one of the most celebrated end bv far the most frequently quoted of any that has been written of this great event. Upon th« original publication of the first volume, it was received in Great Britain with the loudest and most extravagant encomiums. The author received the thanks of both Houses of Parliament, and was requested by them to continue the work. In continuing it, he had the assistance of the most learned and eminent divines of his time; and he confesses his indebtedness for important aid to Lloyd, Tillotson,and Stillingfleet, three of the greatest of England's Bishops. The present edition of this great work has been edited with laborious care by Dr. Nares, who professes to have corrected important errors into which the author fell, and to have made such improvements in the order of the work as will render it far more useful to the reader or historical student. Preliminary explanations, full and sufficient to the clear understanding of the author, are given, and marginal references are made throughout the book, so as greatly to facilitate apd lender accurate its consultation. It will of course find a place in every theologian's libraiy — and will, by no means, we trust, be confined to that comparatively limited sphere — ^JV*. Y, Tribune. BURNET— AN EXPOSITION OF THE XXXIX ARTICLES Of the Church of England. By Gilbert Burnet, D. D., late Bishop of Salisbury. With an Appendix, containing the Augsburg Confession, Creed of Pope Pius IV., &c. Revised and corrected, with copious Notes and Additional References, by the Rev. James R. Page, A. M. One handsome 8vo. vol-i ume. $2 00. The editor has given to our clergy and our students in theology an edition of this work, which must necessarily supersede every other, and we feel he deserves well at the hands of the Church, which he has so materially served. — Church of England QuarUrly Review. BURNS.— THE COMPLETE POETICAL WORKS Of Robert Burns, with Explanatory and Glossarial Notes, and a Life of the Author, by James Currie, M. D., illustrated with six steel engravings, one volume^ 16mo. $1 25. Forming one of the series of " Cabinet Edition of Standard British Poets." This is the most complete American edition of Bums. It contains the whole of the poetry com- prised in the edition lately edited by Cunningham, as well as some additional pieces ; and snch notes have been added as are calculated to illustrate the manners and customs of Scotland, so as to render the whole more intelligible to the English reader. He owes nothing to the poetry of ovher lands — he is the offspring of the soil : he is as natural to Scotland as the heath is to her hills— his variety is equal to his originality j his humour, hia gayety, his tenderness and his pathos, come all in a breath ; they come freely, for they come of their own accord ; the contrast is never offensive ; the comic slides easily into the serious, the serious into the tender, and the tender into the pathetic— ^ZZan Cunningliam. CAMERON— THE FARMER'S DAUGHTER: A Tale ofHumble Life, by Mrs. Cameron, author of" Emma and Her Nurse,'* ** the Two Mothers," etc., etc., one volume, 18mo., frontispiece. 37 1-2 eta. We welcome, in this little volume, a valuable addition to the excellent series of " Tales for the People and their Children." The story conveys high moral truths, in a most attractive fomj — Huvfs Merchants Mag. CARLYLE — ON HEROES, HERO WORSHIP, And the Heroic in History. Six Lectures, reported with Emendations and Ad» ditions, by Thomas Carlyle, author of the " French Revolution," "Sartor Resartus," &c. Elegantly printed in one vol. 12mo. Second edition. $1. CHlLa'S DELIGHT; A Gift for the Young. Edited by a lady. One volume small 4to. EmbeL lished with six steel Engravings coloured in the most attractive style. This is the gem of the season. In style of en^bellishment and originality of matter, it itandi %lg|ie. We cordially recommend the volume to our juvenile friends. — Ut S. Oaiette, Appleton's Catalogue, of Valuable Publications CHURTON-— THE EARLY ENGLISH CHURCH; 4^|i|iVi Ojt, Christian History of England in early British, Saxon, and Norman Timet. By the Rev. Edward Churton, M. A With a Preface by the Right Rev. Bishop Ives. One vol. l6mo. $1 00. The following delightful pages place before us some of the choicest examples— both clerical and lay— of the true Christian spirit in the EARLY ENQLISH CHURCH. In truth, those page* are crowded with weighty lessons. * ♦ * Extract from Editor^ $ Prefqce. CLARKE.— SCRIPTURE PROMISES '^Jnder their proper heads, representing the Blessings Promised, the Duties to which Promises are made. By Samuel Clarke, D. D. Miniature size, , 37 1-2 cents. In this edition«^very passage of Scripture has been compared and verified. The volume i« like an arranged museum of gems, and precious stones, and pearls of inestimable value. The divine promises comprehend a rich and endless vaiiety. — jDr Wardlaw. COOLEY— THE AMERICAN IN EGYPT. With Rambles through Arabia-Petraea and the Holy Land, during the years 1839-40. By James Ewing Cooley. Illustrated with numerous steel En gravings, also Etchings and Designs by Johnston. One handsome volume, octavo, of 610 pages. $2 00. No other volume extant gives the reader so true a picture of what he would be likely to see «nd meet in Egypt. No other book is more practical and plain in its picture of precisely what the traveller himself will meet. Other writers have one account to 'give of their journey on paper, and another to relate in conversation. Mr. Cooley has but one story for the fireside •circle and the printed page. — Brother Jonatlian. CHAVASSE.-ADVICE TO MOTHERS On the Management of their Offspring, during the periods of Infancy, Child- hood, and Youth, by Dr. Pye Henry Chavasse, Member of the Royal Col- lege of Surgeons, London, from the third English edition, one volume,' 18mo. of 180 pages. Paper 25 cents, cloth 37 1-2. All that I have attempted is, to have written useful advice, in a clear style, stripped of all technicalities, which mothers of every station may understand. * * * I have adopted a con- versational form, as being more familiar, and as an easier method of making myself nnderstood. — Extract from Author^ s Preface. COPLEY— EARLY FRIENDSHIPS, By Mrs. Copley. With a frontispiece. One volume, IBmo. 37-12 cents. A continuation of the little library of popular works for " the People and their Children." It* design is, by giving the boarding-school history of a young girl, whose early education had been conducted on Christian principles, to show the pre-eminent value of those principles in moulding and adorning the character, and enabling their possessor successfully to meet the temptations and trials of life. It is attractively written, and full of interest. — Com. Adv. COPLEY— THE POPLAR GROVE: Or, little Harry and his Uncle Benjamin. By Mrs. Copley, author of" Early Friendships," &c., &c. One vol. ISmo. frontispiece, 37 1-2 cents. An excellent little story this, showing how sound sense, honest jft-inciples, and intelligent industry, not only advance their possessor, but, as in the case of Uncle Benjamin the gardener, enable him to become the benefactor, guide, and friend of relations cast down from a loftier spher* in life, and, but for him, without lesource. It is a tale for youth of all classes, that cannot be read without profit, — JV*. Y. Amarican. CORTES.— THE ADVENTURES OF Hernan Cortes, the Conqueror of Mexico, by the author of "Uncle Philip*! Conversations," with a Portrait. One volume, 18mo. 37 1-2 cents, f'orming one of the series of " A Library for my Young Countrymen.' The fitory is full of interest, and is told in a captivating style. Such books add all the charms of romance to the value of history. — Prov. Journal. COTTON.-ELIZABETH; OR, THE EXILES OF SIBERIA. By Madame 'Cotton. Miniature size, 31 1-4 cents. Forming one of the series of " Miniature Classical Library." Tba extensire popularity (^this little tale is vr«ll knoivo. 6 • • Appleton^s Catalogue of Valuable Publications, COWPER— THE COMPLETE POETICAL WORKS Of William Cowper, Esq., including the Hymns and Translations from Mad. Guion, Milton, &c., and Adam, a Sacred Drama, from the Italian of Bat- tista Andreini, with a Memoir of the Author, by the Rev. Henry Stebbing, A. M. One volume, 16mo., 800 pages, $1 50, or in 2 vols. $1 75. Forming one of the Series of " Cabinet Edition of Standard British Poets." Morality never found in genius a more devoted advocate than Cowper, nor has moral wisdom, in its plain and severe precepts, been eves more successfully combined jvith the delicate spirit or poetry than in his works. He was endowed with all the powers which a poet could want who waf to be the moralist of the. world— the reprover, but not the satirist, of men— the teacher of •imple truths, which were to be rendered gracious without endangering their simplicity. CRUDEN.— CONCORDANCE OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. By Alexander Cruden, M. A., with a Memoir of the Author by W. Youngman. Abridged from the last London Edition, by Wm. Patton, D. D. Portrait. One volume, 32mo., sheep, 50 cents. *** Contains all the words to be found in the large work relating to the New Testament. DE FOE.— PICTORIAL ROBINSON CRUSOE- The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. By Daniel De Foe. With a Memoir of the Author, and an Essay on his Writings, with upwards of 300 spirited Engravings, by the celebrated French artist, Grandville. One elegant volume, octavo, of 500 pages. $1 75. Crusoe has obtained a ready passport to the mansions of the rieJL, and the cottages of the poor^ and communicated equal delight to all ranks and classes of the community. Few works haTO been more generally read, or more justly admired ; few that have yielded such incessant amuse- ment, and, at the same time, have developed so many lessons of practical instruction. — Sir IValter Scott, T Life bot De Foe's ge ^ , . the reader, and never can lose its popularity while the English language endxiTea.—Pennsylvanian, D'ISRAELI.—CURIOSITIES OF LITERATURE, And the Literary Character illustrated, by I. Disraeli, Esq., D. C. L., F. S. A. First and Second Series. The Literary Character, illustrated by the Histo- ry of Men of Genius, drawn from their own feelings and confessions, by I. D'Israeli, Esq. Curiosities of American Literature, compiled, edited, and arranged by Rev. Rufus W. Griswold. The three works in one volume, large 8vo. Price $3 50. This is the double title of a large and beautifully printed octavo volume, which has just made its appearance in the World of Letters. With the first part every body is already familiar. The deep research, the evident enthusiasm in his subject, and the light and pungent humor displayed by D'lsraeli in it, are the delight of all elapses of readers, and ivill undoubtedly send him down a eheerful journey to posterity, if only on account of the pleasant company in which he has managed •o agreeably to introduce himself. The other portion of this work— that relatipg to the Curiosi- ties of American Literature— is entirely new to the public; yet we shall be disappointed if it is not directly as popular as the other. Mr. Griswold has performed his task in a manner highly creditable to his taste, while displaying most favorably his industry, tact, and perseverance.— JVeif York Tribune. DE LEUZE -PRACTICAL INSTRUCTION IN ANIMAL Magnetism, by J. P. F. De Leuze, translated by Thomas C. Hartshorn. Re- vised edition, with an Appendix of Notes by the Translator, and Lettem from i;minent Physicians and others, descriptive of cases in the U. States. One volume, 12mo. $1 00. The translator of this -work has certainly presented the profession with an uncommonly well dUfeited treatise, enhanced in value by bis own notei and the corroboratiye teitimooyof enuiiMft mkjniGi9Ln».'~Boston Med^ Surg, Journal, , VV ' Appleton^s (Catalogue of Valuable PuhHcations. ELLIS.— THE DAUGHTERS OF ENGLAND; Their position in Society, Character, and Responsibilities. By Mrs. Ellif. In one handsome volume, ISmo., cloth §ilt. 50 cents. ELLIS— THE WOMEN OF ENGLAND; Their Social Duties and Domestic Habits. By Mrs. Ellis. One handsome volume, 12mo., cloth gilt. 50 cents. ELLIS.-THE WIVES OF ENGLAND ; Their Relative Duties, Domestic Influences, and Social Obligations. By Mr«. Ellis. One handsome volume, 12mo., cloth gilt. 50 cents. ELLIS— THE MOTHERS OF ENGLAND; Their Influence and Responsibility. By Mrs. Ellis. One handsome volume, 12mo., cloth gilt. 5U cents. This is an appropriate mid very valuable conclusion to the series of works on the subject of female duties, by wiiich Mrs. Ellis has pleased, and we doubt not profited, thousands of readers. Her counsels demand attention, not only by their practical, sagacious usefulness, but also by the rueek and modest spirit in which they are conmiunicated. — Watchman, ELLIS.— THE MINISTER'S FAMILY; Or Hints to those who would make Home happy. By Mrs. Ellis. One vol- ume, 18mo. 37 1-2 cents. ELLIS— FIRST IMPRESSIONS; Or Hints to those who would make Home happy. By M/s. Ellis. One vol ume, ]8mo. 37 1-2 cents. ELLIS— DANGERS OF DINING OUT; Or Hints to those who would make Home happy. By Mrs. Ellis. One vol ume, 18mo. 37 1-2 cents. ELLIS— SOMERVILLE HALL; Or Hints to those who would make Home happy. By Mrs. Ellis. One vol- ume, ISmo. 37 1-2 cents. The above four volumes form a portion of series of" Tales for the People and their Children.'* " To wish prosperity to such books as these, is to desire the moral and physical welfare of the human species." — Bath Chronicle. EVANS— EVENINGS WITH THE CHRONICLERS; Or Uncle Rupert's Tales of Chivalry. By R. M. Evans. With seventeen^ illustrations. One volume, 16mo., elegantly bound, 75 cents. This would ha^ve been a volume after our own hearts, while we were younger, and it is •carcely less so now when we are somewhat older. It discourses of those things which charmed all of us in early youth — the daring deeds of the Knights and Squires of feudal warfare — the true version of the " Chevy Chase," — the exploits of the stout and stalwart Warriors of England, Scotland, and Germany. In a word, it is an attractive book, and rendered more so to young reai •rs by a series of wood engravings, beautifully executed. — Courier ^ Enquirer. EVANS— THE HISTORY OF JOAN OF ARC. By R. M. Evans, author of " Evenings with the Chroniclers," witfi twenty- four elegant illustrations. One volume, 16mo. Extra gilt. 75 cents. In the work before us, we have not only a most interesting biography of this female prodigy, including what she was and what she accomplished, but also a faithful account of the relations that exirted between England and France, and of the singular state of things that marked the Seriod when this wonderful personage appeared upon the stage. The leading incidents of her fe are related with exquisite simplicity and touching pathos ; and you eannot repress your admi- ration for her heroic qualities, or scarcely repress your tears in view of her ignominious end. To Uio youthful reader we heartily recommend this volume. — Albany Advertiser, Appleton^s Catalogue of Valuable Publications, EVANS— THE RECTORY OF VALEHEAD; Or, the Records of a Holy Home. By the Rev. R. W. Evans. From the twelfth English edition. One volume, 16mo. 75 cents. Universally and cordially do we recommend this delightful volume We believe no person eould read this work, and not be the better for its pious and touching lessons. It is a page taken from the book of life, and eloquent with all the instruction of an excellent pattern ; it is a com- mentary on the affectionate warning, " Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth." We have not for some time seen a work we could so deservedly praise, or so conscientiously recom- KMi.zA'— Literary Oazette. EMBURY— NATURE'S GEMS; OR, AMERICAN FLOWERS [n their Native Haunts. By Emma C. Embury. With twenty plutes of Plants carefully colored after Nature, and landscape views of their localities, from drawingsi^aken on the spot, by E. W. Whitefield. One imperial oc- tavo volume, printed on the finest paper, and elegantly bound. This beautiful work will undoubtedly form a "Gift-Book" for all seasons of the year. It is illustrated with twenty colored engravings of indigenous flowers, taken from drawings made on the spot where they were found ; while each flower is accompanied by a view of some striking feature of American scenery. The literary plan of the book dilfers entirely from that of any other work on a similar subject which has yet appeared. Each pLite has its botanical and local de- scription, though the chief part of the volume is composed of original tales and poetry, illustrative of the sentiments of the flowers, or associated with liie landscape. No pains or expense has been spared in the mtclianical execution of tho volume, and the fict that it is purely American both in its graphic and literary departments, should recommend it to general notice. EWBANK— HYDRAULICS AND MECHANICS- A Descriptive and Historical Account of Hydraulic and other Machines for raising Water, including the Steam and Fire Engines, ancient and modern ; with Observations on various subjects connected with the Mechanic Arts ; including the Progressive Development of the Steam Engine. In five books. Illustrated by nearly three hundred Engravings. By Thomas Ewbank. One handsome volume of six hundred pages. ^3 50. This is a highly valuable production, replete with novelty and interest, and adapted to gratify equally the historian, the philosopher, and the mechanician, being the result of a protracted and extensive research among the arcana of historical and scientific literature. — JVat. Intelligencer, FABER— THE PRIMITIVE DOCTRINE OF ELECTION; Or, an . Historical Inquiry into the Ideality and Causation of Scriptural Elec- tion, as received and maintained in the primitive Church of Christ. By George Stanley Faber, B. D., author of "Difficulties of Romanism, "Difficulties of Infidelity," &c. Complete in one volume, octavo. $1 75. Mr. Faber verifies his opinion by demonstration. We cannot pay a higher respect to his work than by recommending it to all. — Church of England Quarterly Review. FALKNER— THE FARMER'S MANUAL, A Practical Treatise on the Nature and Value of Manures, founded from Experiments on various Crops, with a brief Account of the most Recent Discoveries in Agricultural Chemistry. By F. Falkner and the Author of '* British Husbandry." 12mo., paper cover 31 cents, cloth 50 cents. It is the object of the present treatisu to explain the nature and con.'5titution of manures gene- rally — to point out the means of augmenting the quantity and preserving the fertilizing power of farm-yard manure, the various sources of mineral and other artificial manures, and the cause of their frequent failuies. — Author^s Preface. FARMER'S TREASURE, THE ; Containing '' Falkner's Farmer's Manual," and *' Smith's Productive Farm- ing," bound together, l^mo., 75 cents. FOSTER— ESSAYS ON CHRISTIAN MORALS, Experimental and Practical. Originally delivered as Lectures at Broadmead Chapel, Bristol. By John Foster, author of " Essays on Decision of Char* acter," etc. One volume, IHmo., 50 cents. This volume contains twenty-six Essays, some of which are of tho highest-order of sublimity aod excellence. Appleton^s Catalogue of Valuable Publications, FOSTER.-BIOG., LIT., AND PHIL. ESSAYS, Xyontributed to the Eclectic Review, by John Foster, author of *' Esaaya on Dd- cision of Human Character," etc. One volume, 12mo., ^1 25.' These contributions well deserve to class with those of Macauley, Jeffrey, and Sidney Smith, in the Edinburgh Review. They contain the productions of a more original and profound thinker than either, whose master-mind has exerted a stronger influence upon his readers, ami has left a deeper impression upon our literature; and whose peculiar merit it was to present the doctrinea and moralities of the Christian faith, under a form and aspect which redeemed the familiar from triteness, and threw a charm and freshness about the severest truths.—- Z/owrfon Patriot. FROST.— THE BOOK OF THE NAVY: Comprising a General History of the American Marine, and particular accounts of all the most celebrated Nava* Battles, from the Declaration of Independ- ence to the present time, compiled from tJie best authorities. By John Frost, LL. D. With an Appendix, containing Naval Songs, Anecdotes, &,c. Embellished With numerous original Engravings, and Portraits of distinguished Naval Commanders. One volume, 12mo., ^1 00. This is the only popular and yet authentic single view which we have of the naval exploits of our country, arranged with good taste and set forth in good language — U. S. Gazette. This volume is dedicated to the Secretary of the Navy, and is altogether a very faithful and . attractive historical record. It deserves, and will doubtless have, a very extended cirouiution —^JVat. Intelligencer. FROST-— THE BOOK OF THE ARMY: Comprising a General Military History of the United States, from the period of the Revolution to the present time, with particular accounts of all the most celebrated Battles, compiled from the best authorities. By John Frost, LL. D. Illustrated with numerous Engravings, and portraits oi distinguished Commanders. One volume, 12mo., $1 00. This work gives a complete history of military operations, and their causes and eflfefcts, from th(B opening of the Revolution to the close of the last war, with graphic descriptions of the cele- brated battles and characters of the leading generals. It is illustrated with numerous portraits on Bteel, and views of battles, from original drawings by Darley and others. The importance of pop-, ular works of the class to which this and the " Book of the Navy " belong, must be obvious to ali who recognize the value of national recollections in preserving a true national spirit. FRESENIUS.-CHEMICAL ANALYSIS. Elementary Instruction in Chemical Analysis. By Dr. C. Rhemigius Frese- nius. With a Preface by Prof Liebig. Edited by I. Lloyd Bullock. One neat volume, 12mo. Paper, 75. cents > cloth, $1 00. This Introduction to Practical Chemistry is admitted to bo the most valuable Elementary In- structor in Chemical Analysis fo scientific operatives, and for pharmaceutical chemists, wliich has erer been presented to the public. GUIZOT— THE YOUNG STUDENT ; Or, Ralph and Victor. By .Madame Guizot. From the French, by Samuel Jackson. One volume of 500 pages, with illustrations. Price 75 cents, or in three volumes, $1 12. This volume of biographical incidents is a striking picture of juvenile life To all that num- ' berless class of youth who arc passing through their literary education, whether in boarding- schools or academies, in the collegiate course, or the preparatory studies connected with them, we know nothing more piecisely fitted to meliorate their character, and direct their course, subordi- nate to the higher authority of Christian ethics, than this excellent delineation of " The Young Student," by Madame Guizot. * * * The Trench Academy were correct in their judgment, when they pronounced Madame Guizot'a Student the best book of the year.— Courier ^ Enquirer. GUIZOT-GENERAL HISTORY OF CIVILIZATION In Europe, from the fall of the Roman Empire to the French Revolution. Translated from, the French of M. Guizot, Professor of History to la Facul- ty des Lettres of Paris, and Minister of Public Instruction. Third Ameri- can edition, w^ith Notes, by C. S. Henry, D. D. One handsome volume, 12mo., $1 00. M. Guizot in his instructive Lectures has given us aii. epitome of modern history, distinguished by all the merit which, in another department, renders BJJackstone a subject of such peculiar and unbounded praise — a work closely condenaed, including nothing useless, omitting nothing cseen tial j written with grace, and conceived and arranged with consummate ability. — BosL Traveller . AppletoiVs Catalogue of Valuable Publications, GRISWOLD.-CURIOSITrES OF AMER. LITERATURE: Compiled, edited, and arranged by Rev. Rufus W.. Griswold. See D'Israeli GIRL'S MANUAL: Comprising a summary View of Female Studies, Accomplishments, and Prin ciples of Conduct. Frontispiece. One volume, 18mo., 50 cents. GOLDSMITH-PICTORIAL VICAR OF WAKEFIELD. The Vicar of Wakefield. By Oliver Goldsmith. Illustrated with upwards of 100 engravings on wood, making a beautiful volume, octavo, of 300 pages. $1 25. The same, miniature size, 37 1-2 cents. We love to turn back over these rich old classics of our own .language, and re-juvenate our- •clves by the never-failing associations which a re-perusal always calls up. Let any one who has not read this immortal talc for fifteen or twenty years, try the experiment, and we will warrant that he rises up from the task — the pleasure, we should have said — a happier and a better man. In the good old Vicar of Wakefield, all is pure gold, without dross or alloy 6f any kind. This much we have said to our last generation readers. This edition of the work, however, we take it, was got up" for the benefit of tRe rising generation, and we really envy our young friends the plea- sure which is before such of them as will read it for the first time. — Savannah Republican, GOLDSMITH— ESSAYS ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS, By Oliver Goldsmith. Miniature size, 37 1-2 cents. Forming one of the seiies of" Miniature Classical Library.'* GRESLEY— PORTRAIT OF A CHURCHMAN, By the Rev. W. Gresley, A. M. From the Seventh English edition. One elegant volume, 16mo., 75 cents. " The main part of this admirable volume is occupied upon the illustration of the practical toorkina- of Church principlts when sincerely received^ setting forth their value in the commerce of daily life, and how surely they conduct those who embrace them in the safe and quiet path of holy life." GRESLEY,— A TREATISE ON PREACHING, In a Series of Letters by the Rev. W. Gresley, M. A. Revised, with Supple- mentary Notes, by the Rev. Benjamin I. Haight, M. A., Rector of All Saints' Church, New York. One volume, 12mo. $1 25. Advertisement. — Tn preparing the American edition of Mr. Greslev's valuable Treatise, a few foot-notes have been added by the Editor, which are distinguished by brackets. The more extend- ed notes at the end have been selected from the best works on the subject — and which, with one or two exceptions, are not easily accessible to the American student. HAMILTON.-THE LIFE OF ALEXANDER HAMILTON, Edited by his son, John C. Hamilton. Two volumes, 8vo., $5 00. .. We cordially recommend the perusal and diligent study of these volumes, exhibiting, ail they do, much valuable matter relative to the Revolution, the establishment of the Federal Constitu- tion, and other important events in the annals of our country. — A*. Y. Review. HEMANS— THE COMPLETE POETICAL WORKS Of Felicia Hemans, printed from the last English edition, edited by her Sister. Illustrated with 6 steel. Engravings. One beautifully printed and portable volume, 16mo., $ , or in two volumes, $ Of this highly accomplished poetess it has been truly said, that of all her sex " few have writ- ten so much and so well." Although her writings possess an energy equal to their high-toned beauty, yet are they so pure and so refined, that not a line of them could feeling spare or delicacy blot fiom her pages. Her imaginatiorv v/as rich, chaste, and glowing. Her chosen themes are the cradle, the hearth-stone, and the death-bed. Tn her poems of Cceur de Lion, Ferdinand of Ara- fon, and Bernard del Carpio, we see beneath the glowing colors with which she clothes her ideaii, the feelings of a woman's heart. Her earlier poems, Records, of Woman and Forest Sanctuary, rtand unrivalled. In short, her works will ever be read by a pious and enlightened community. HEMANS -SONGS OF THE AFFECTIONS, By Felicia Hemans. One volume, 32mo., gilt. 31 cents. Forming one of the series of" Miniature Classical Library." HARE.-SERMONS TO A COUNTRY CONGREGATION, Bj Augustus William Hare, A. M., late Fellow of New College, and Rector of Alton Barnes. One volume, royal 8v6., $2 25. XI Appleton^s Catalogue of Valuable Publications. HALL.— THE PRINCIPLES OF DIAGNOSIS, liy Marshall Hall, M. D., F, R. S., &c. Second edition, with many improve- ments. By Dr. John A. Sweet. One volume, 8vo., $2 00. This work 'A'as published in accordance with tlie desire of some of the most celebrated physi- cians of this country, who were anxious that it should be brought within the reach of all classei Oi' medical men, to whose attention it offers strong claims as the best work on the subject. HAZEN— SYMBOLICAL SPELLING-BOOK. The Symbolical Spelling-Book, in two parts. By Edward Hazen. Contain- ing 288 engravings. 18 3-4 cents. This work is used in upwards of one thousand different schools, and pronounced to be on« rf the best works published. HODGE— THE STEAM-ENGINE: Its Origin and gradual Improvement, from the time of Hero to the present day, as adapted to Manufactures, Locomotion, and Navigation. Illustrated with 48 Plates in full detail, numerous wood cuts, &c. By Paul R. Hodge, C. E. One volume folio of plates, and letter-press in Bvo. $10 00. This work should be placed in the " Captain's Office " of every steamer in our country, and also with every engineer to whom is confided the control of the engine. From it they would de- rive all the information which would enable them to comprehend the cause and effects of every ordinary accident, and also the method promptly and successfuUy to repair any injury, and to rem- edy any defect. HOLYDAY TALES: Consisting of pleasing Moral Stories for the Young. One volume, square 16mo., with numerous illustrations. 37 1-2 cents. This is a most capital little book. The stories are evidently written by an able hand, and that too in an exceedingly attractive style. — Spectator. HOOKER-THE COMPLETE WORKS Of that learned and judicious divine, Mr. Richard Hooker, with an account of his Life and Death. By Isaac Walton. Arranged by the Rev. John Keble, M. A. First American from the last Oxford edition. With a complete general Index, and Index of the texts of Scripture, prepared expressly for this edition. Two elegant volumes, 8vo., $4 00. Contents. — The Editor's Preface comprises ageneralsurvey of the former edition of Hooker's Works, with Historical Illustrations of the period. After which follows the Life of Hooker, by Isaac Walton. His chief work succeeds, on the " Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity." It commences with a lengthened Preface designed as an address " to them who seek the refor- mation of the Laws and Orders Ecclesiastical of the Church of England." The discussion is divi- ded into eight books, which include an investigation of the topics. After those eight books of the "Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity," follow two Sermons, "The certainty and perpetuity of Faith in the elect ; especially of the Prophet Habakkuk's faith ;" and " Justification, Works, and how the foundation of faith is overthrown." Next are introduced " A supplication made to the Council by Master Walter 'J'ravers," and " Mr. Hooker's answer to the supplication that Mr Travers made to the Council." Then follow two Sermons — *•' On the nature of Pride," and a " Remedy against Sorrow and Fear." Two Sermons on part of the epistle of the Apostle Jude are next in- serted, with a prefatory deJication by Henry Jackson. The last article in the works of Mr. Hooker is a Sermon on Prayer. The English edition in three volumes sells at $10 00. The American is an exact reprint, at less than half the price. HUDSON— THE ADVENTURES OF HENRY HUDSON, By the author of " Uncle Philips Conversations." Frontispiece. 18mo., cloth. 37 cents. Forming one of the series of" A Library for my Young Countrymen." This little volume furnishes us, from authentic sources, the most important facts in this cc'e- oi-atcd adventurer's life, and in a style that possesses more than ordinary interest.— Evening' Post. HOWITT.-THE CHILD'S PICTURE AND VERSE-BOOK; Commonly called " Otto Speckter's Fable-Book." Translated from the Ger- man by Mary Howitt. Illustrated with 300 engravings on wood. Square 12rao., in ornamental binding, $ A celebrated German review says, " Of this production, which makes itself an epoch in the world of children, it is superfluous to speak. The Fable-Book is throughout all Germany in the hands of parents and children, and will always be new, because evevy year fresh children are born " Appleton's Catalogue of Valuable Publications. HOWITT— LOVE AND MONEY; An Every-Day Tale, by Mary Howitt. 18mo., two Plates, cloth gilt, 38 cents LITTLE COIN, MUCH CARE; Or, How Poor People Live. By Mary Howitt. 18mo., two Plates, 38 cent*. SOWING AND REAPING; Or, What will Come of It. By Mary Howitt. 18mo., two Plates, 38 cents. ALICE FRANKLIN; A Sequel to Sowing and Reaping — a Tale. By Mary Howitt. 18mo. two Plates, cloth gilt, 33 cents. WORK AND WAGES; Or, Life in Service — a Tale. By Mary Howitt. 18mo., two Plates, cloth gilt, 38 cents. STRIVE AND THRIVE; A Tale. By Mary Howitt. 18mo., two Plates, cloth gilt, 38 cents. WHO SHALL BE GREATEST; A Tale. By Mary Howitt. 18mo., two Plates, cloth gilt, 38 cents. WHICH IS THE WISER; Or, People Abroad — a Tale. By Mary Howitt. 18mo., two Plates, 38 cents* HOPE ON, HOPE EVER; Or, The Boyhood of Felix Law — a Tale. By Mary Howitt. 18mo., two Plates, cloth gilt, 38 cents. NO SENSE LIKE COMMON SENSE; A Tale. By Mary Howitt. 18mo., two Plates, cloth gilt, 38 cents. *4:* Tho above ten volumes form a portion of the series published under the general title of "Tales for tho People and their Children." Of late years many writers have exerted their talents in juvenile literature, with great success. Miss Martineau has made political economy as familiar to boys as it formerly was to statesmen. Our own Miss Sedgwick has produced some of the most beautiful moral stories, for the edification and delight of children, which have ever been written. The Hon. Horace Mann, in addresses to adults, has presented the claims of children for good education, with a power and eloquence of style, and an elevation of thought, which shows his heart is in his work. The stories of Mary Howitt, Harriet Martineau, Mrs. Copley, and Mrs. Ellis, which form apart of" Tales for the Peo- ple and their Children," will be found valuable additions to juvenile literature ; at the same time they may be read with profit by parents for the good lessons they inculcate, and by all other read- ers for the literary excellence they display. We wish they could be placed in the hands and engraven on the minds of all the younnected with the days of the " Revolution." — Courier if Enquirer. 16 k Appletoii^s Catalogue of Valuable Publications. MAURICE —THE KINGDOM OF CHRIST; Or, Hints respecting the Principles, Constitution, and Ordinances of the Cath- olic Chnrc:!!. By llev. Frederick Denison Maurice, M. A. London. One volume, 8vo., 600 pages, $2 50. On the theory of the Church of Christ, all should consult the work of Mr. Maurice, the most philosophical writer of the »lay. — Prof. QarhetVs Bamptan Lectures, 1842 MILTON— THE COMPLETE POETICAL WORKS Of Jolin Milton, with Explanatory Notes and a Life of the Author, by the Rev. Henry Stebbing, A. M. Illustrated with six steel Engravings. One vol- ume, 16mo., $1 25. Forming one of the series of *'Cahinct Edition of Standard Poets." *^* The Latin and Italian i'oeins are included in this edition. Mr. Stebbing's Notes will be found very useful in elucidating the learned allusions with which the text abounds, and they are also valuable for the correct appreciation with which the writer di- rects attention to the beauties of the author. PARADISE LOST, By John Milton. With Notes, by Rev. H. Stebbing. One volume, 18mo., cloth 38 cents, gilt leaves 50 cents. PARADISE REGAINED, Br John JNIilton. With Notes, by Rev. H. Stebbing. One volume, ISmo., cloth 25 cents, gilt leaves 38 cents. MAXWELL.— FORTUNES OF HECTOR O'HALLORAN And his man Mark Antony O'Toole, by W. H. Maxwell. One volume, 8vo., two plates, paper, 50 cents, twenty-four plates, boards, $1 00, cloth, $1 25 It is one of the bertof all the Irish stories, full of sairit, fun, drollery, and wit. — Cour. ^ Enq MOORE -LALLAH ROOKH ; An Oriental Romance, by Thomas Moore. One volume, 32mo., frontispiece, cloth gilt, 38 cents. Forming a portion of the series of" Miniature Classical Library." This exquisite Poem has long been the admiration of readers uf all classes. MORE— PRACTICAL PIETY, By Hannah More. One volume, 32mo., frontispiece, 3S cents. Forsning one of the series of" Miniature Classical Library." "Practical Piety " has always bee deemed the most attractive and eloquent of all Hannah More's works. PRIVATE devotion': A Series of Prayers and Meditations, with an Introductory Essay on Prayer, chiefly from the writings of Hannah More. From the twenty-fifth London edition. One volume, 32mo., Frontispiece, cloth gilt, 31 cents. Forming one of the series of" Miniature Classical Library.*' Upwards of fifty thousand copies of this ardmirable manual have been sold in the U. States. DOMESTIC TALES And Allegories, illustrating Human Life. By Hannah More. One voJuroe, 18mo., 38 cents. CoirrENTS. — I. Shepherd of Salisbury Plain. II. Mr. Fantom the Philosopher. III. Tw» Shoemakers. IV Giles the Poacher. V. Servant turned Soldier. VI. GenoralJ ail Delivery. • RURAL TALES, By Hannah More. One volume, 18mo., 38 cents. CoNTENT».~I. Parley the Porter. II. All for the Best. III. Two Wealth7 Farmers. IV Tom White. V. Pilgrims. VL Valley of Teais. Forming a portion of the series of " Tales for the People and their Children " These two volumes comprise that portion of Hannah More's Repository T&1«« which nn adapted to general use^fulness in this country. 17 Apj.leton' s Catalogue of Valuable Publications. NAPOLEON— PICTORIAL HISTORY Of Napoleon Bonaparte, translated from the French of M. Laurent de I/Ar- deche, with Five Hundred spirited Illustrations, after designs by Horace Vernet, and twenty Original Portraits engraved in the best style. Corn- 'plete in two handsome volumes, 8vo., about 500 pages each, $3 50 ; cheap edition, paper cover, four parts, ,f 2 00. The work is superior to the long, verbose productions, of Scott and Bourienne — not in style alone, but in truth — l)eing written to please neitlier Charles X. nor the English aristocracy, but foe Ihe cause of freedom. It has advaniagts over every other memoir extant. — American Traveller. NEWMAN— PAROCHIAL SERMONS, By John Henry Newman, B. D. Six volumes of the English edition in two volumes, 8vo., $5 00. SERMONS BEARING ON SUBJECTS Of the Day, by John Henry Newman, B. D. One volume, 12mo., f 1 25. As a comi»endium of Christian duty, these Sermons will be rend by people of all denomina* lions; as models of style, they will be valued by writers in every department of literature. — United States Oazette. OGILBY.— ON LAY-BAPTISM : An Outline of the Argument against the Validity of Lay-Baptism. By John D. Ogilby, D. D., Professor of Eccles. History. One vol., 12mo., 75 cents. From a cursory inspection of it, we take it to be a thorough, fearless, and able discussion of the subject which it proposes — aiming less to excite inquiry, than to satisfy by learned an'l ingenious argument inquiries already excited. — Churchman. CATHOLIC CHURCH IN ENGLAND And America. Three Lectures — L The Church in England and America Apostolic and Catholic. IL The Causes of the English Reformation. Ill Its Character and Results. By John D. Ogilby, D. D. One vol., l€mo., 75 cents. " I believe in one Catholic and Apostolic Church." JSTicene Creed Prof. Ogilby has furnished the Church, in this little volume, with a most valuable aid. We 'Jiinkitis designed to become a text-book on the subject of wliich it treats. — Trui Catholic. OLD OAK TREE: Illustrated with numerous wood-cuts.- One volume, 18mo., 38 cents. The precepts conveyed are .altogethe'r unexceptionable, and the volume is well calculated to prove attractive with children. — Saturday Chronicle. OLMSTED— INCIDENTS OF A WHALING VOYAGE: To which is added. Observations on the Scenery, Manners, and Customs, and Missionary Stations of the Sandvvich and Society Islands, accompanied by numerous Plates. By Francis Allyn Olmsted. One vol*., 12ma., ^1 50. The work embodies a mass of intelligence interesting to the ordinary reader as well as to tho philosophical inquirer. — Courier ^'Enquirer PAGET— TALES OF THE VILLAGE, By the Rev. Francis E. Paget, M. A. Three elegant volumes, IBmc, $1 7; The first series, or volume, presents a popular view of the contrast in opinions and modea of thought.betwecn Churchmen alid Romanists ; the second sets forth Church principles, as opposed to what, in England, is termed Dissent ; and the third, places in contrast the chaiacter of th« Churchman and the Infidel.. At any time these volumes would be valuable, especially to the young. At present, when men's minds are much turned to such subjects, they cannot fail of being eagerly sought for. — J^ew- York American PALMER— A TREATISE ON THE CHUROH Df Christ. Designed chiefly for the use of Students in Theology. By the Rev. William Palmer, M. A., of Worcester College, Oxford. Edited, with Notes, by the Right Rev. W. R. Whittingham, D. D., Bishop of the Prot. Epis. Church in the Diocese of Maryland. Two volumes, 8vo;, $5 00. Ths chief design of this work is to supply some answer to the assertion so frequently made. that individuals are not. bound to* submit to any ecclesiastical authority whatever : or that, if they tre, th»y must, }n consistency, accept Romanism with all its claims and errors.— Pr^a««. 18 ^ppleton*s Catalogue of Valuable Publications. PARNELL— APPLIED CHEMISTRY, In Manufactures, Arts, and Domestic Economy. Edited by E. A. Parnell. Illustrated with numerous Wood Engravings, and specimens of Dyed and Printed Cottons. Paper cover 75 cents, cloth ^1 00. • The Editor's aim is to divest the work, as far as practicable, of all technical terms, to as ta adapt it to the requirements of the general reader. The above forms the first division of the work. It is the author's intention to continue it from, time to time, so. as to form a complete Practical Encyclopaedia of Chemistry applied to the Arts. The subjects to immediately follow will be, Manufacture of Glass, Indigo, Sulphuric Acid Zine, Potash, Coflfee, Tea, Chocolate, &c. ^ PEARSON— AN EXPOSITION OF THE OREED, By John Pearson, D. D., late "Bishop of Chester. With an Appendix, contain- ing the principal Greek and Latin Creeds. Revised und corrected by the Rev. W. S. Dobson, M. A., Peterhouse, Cambridge. One vol., 8vo., $2 00. The following may be stated as the advaritages of this edition over all others T First— Great care has been taken lo correct the numerous errors in the references to the texts of Scripture, which had crept in by reason of the repeated editions through which this admirable work has passed , and many references, as will be seen on turning to the Index of Texts, have been added. ' Secondly — The Quotations in the Notes have been almost universally identified and the refer- ence to them adjoined. Lastly — The principal Symbola or Creeds, of which the particular ArticleB have been cited by the Author, have been annexed ; and wherevei the original writers have given the Symbola in a scattered and disjointed manner, the detached parts have been brought into a successive and con- nected point of view. These have been added in Chronological order, iii the form of an Appen- dix.— Fide £daor PHILIP— THE LIFE AND OPINIONS Of Dr. Milne, Missionary to China. Illustrated by Biographical Annals of Asiatic Missions, from Primitive Protestant Times : intended as a Guido to Missionary Spirit. By Rev. Robert Philip. One vol., 12mo., 50 cents. The work is executed with great skill, and embodies a vast amount of valuable missionary inte!ligerice,besidesa rich variety of personal incidents, adapted to gratify not only the missionary or the Christian, but the more general reader. — Observer. — YOUNG MAN'S CLOSET LIBRARY, By Robert Philip. With an Introductory Essay, by Rev. Albert Barnes. One volame, 12mo., $1 00. LOVE OF THE SPIRIT, Traced in His Work : a Companion to the Experimental Guides. By Robert Philip. One volume, 18mo., 50 cents. DEVOTIONAL AND EXPERIMENTAL Guides. By Robert Philip. With. an Introductory Essay by Rev. Albert Barnes. Two volumes, 12mo., $1 75. Containing Guide to the Per- plexed, Guide to the Devotional, Guide to the Thoughtful, Guide to the Doubting, Guide to the Conscientious, Guide to Redemption. LADY'S CLOSET LIBRARY: The Marys, i r Beauty of Female Holiness ; The Marthas, or Varieties of Fe- male Piety ; The Lydias, or Develojiment of Female Character. By Rob- ert Philip. Each volume, 18mo., 50 cents • The MATERNAL scries of the above popular Library is now ready, entitled The Hannahs ; or, Maternal Influence of Sons. By Robert Philip. One volume, 18mo., 50 cents. : . . 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