The Southern Literary Messenger, Vol. II., No. 10, September, 1836

By Various

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Title: The Southern Literary Messenger, Vol. II., No. 10, September, 1836

Author: Various

Editor: Edgar Allan Poe

Release date: August 13, 2024 [eBook #74247]

Language: English

Original publication: United States: T. W. White, Publisher and Proprietor, 1836

Credits: Ron Swanson


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SOUTHERN LITERARY MESSENGER, VOL. II., NO. 10, SEPTEMBER, 1836 ***


THE SOUTHERN LITERARY MESSENGER:

DEVOTED TO EVERY DEPARTMENT OF LITERATURE AND THE FINE ARTS.


Au gré de nos desirs bien plus qu'au gré des vents.
                                      _Crebillon's Electre_.

As _we_ will, and not as the winds will.


RICHMOND:
T. W. WHITE, PUBLISHER AND PROPRIETOR.
1835-6.


{605}


SOUTHERN LITERARY MESSENGER.

VOL. II.  RICHMOND, SEPTEMBER, 1836.  NO. X.

T. W. WHITE, PROPRIETOR.  FIVE DOLLARS PER ANNUM.




CROMWELL.

BY EDWARD LYTTON BULWER.[1]

[Footnote 1: This Tragedy is now in the press of Messieurs Saunders 
and Otley, (with whom Mr. Bulwer has made an exclusive arrangement for 
the issuing of his works here simultaneously with their appearance in 
England,) and will be published forthwith. We are indebted to the 
attention of these gentlemen for Act I, in anticipation, copied from 
the original MS.]


ACT I.

SCENE I.—A Room in Whitehall. At the back, folding doors hung with 
black crape. Henry Martin—Harrison—Ireton.

IRETON. Does the crowd gather still?

HARRISON.            Ay! Round the door
  The godless idle cluster; nor with ease
  Can our good guards—the tried men of the Lord—
  Ward off the gapers, that, with thirsty mouths,
  Would drink, as something sacred, the mute air
  Circling the dust of him that _was_ a king.

MARTIN. Ev'n as I passed the porch, a goodly cit,
  Round and tun-bellied, plucked me by the robe:
  ‘Sir, can I see the king?’ quoth he. I frowned:—
  ‘There is no king!’ said I. ‘The man called Charles
  Is the same clay as yours and mine. Lo! yonder
  Lies, yet unburied, a brave draper's corpse;
  Go ye and gaze on that!’ And so I passed.
  Still the crowd murmured—‘We would see the king!’

IRETON. Ay, round the vulgar forms of royalty,
  Or dead or quick, the unthinking millions press;
  They love the very mummery of their chains,
  And graceless walks unsceptred Liberty
  To their coarse gaze. 'Twas a bold deed, that death!

HARRISON. A deed we ne'er had had the souls to do,
  But for the audible mandates of the Lord.
  I did not sleep seven nights before my hand
  Signed that red warrant; and e'en now, methinks
  Midnight seems darker and more sternly still
  Than it was wont to do!

IRETON.                   A truce with this.
  When saw ye last the General?

MARTIN.                 Scarce an hour
  Hath joined the Past, since I did leave him praying.

IRETON. The pious Cromwell!—'Tis a blessed thing
  To have a lodge above, and, when the air
  Grows dim and rank on earth, to change the scene,
  And brace the soul in thoughts that breathe of Heaven.
  He bears him bravely then, that virtuous man?

MARTIN. Bravely; but with a graver, soberer mien
  Than when we councilled on the deed now done.

IRETON. Yea, when he signed the warrant, dost thou mind
  How, with the pen yet wet, he crossed thy face,
  My honest Harry! ('twas a scurvy trick!)
  And laughed till merry tears coursed down his cheek,
  To see thy ruddy hues so streaked with black?
  Ha! Ha!—and yet it was a scurvy trick!
  And thou didst give him back the boon again,
  And both laughed loud, like mad-caps at a school,
  When the grim master is not by. I was
  The man who, next to Cromwell, planned the act
  Which sealed old England's freedom; yet that laugh
  Made me look back—and start—and shudder!

MARTIN.                                     Tush!
  Thou know'st thy kinsman's merry vein what time
  The humor's on him. I'll be sworn, nor he
  Nor I thought lightlier of the solemn deed
  For that unseemly moment;—'twas the vent
  Of an excited pulse; and if our own,
  The scaffold we were dooming to the Stuart,
  We should have toyed the same.

HARRISON.             Why prate ye thus—
  Lukewarm and chill of heart? When Barak broke
  The hosts of Sisera, after twice ten years
  Of bondage, did the sons of Israel weep?
  Or did they seek excuses for just mirth?
  No; they sang out in honest joy—“Awake!
  Captivity is captive! and the stars
  Fought from their courses against Sisera.”
  Our Sisera is no more—we will rejoice!

IRETON. (_aside to Martin_) Humor him Harry, or we 'scape not so
  This saintly porcupine of homilies
  Bristling with all the missiles of quotation:
  Provoke him,—and he pricks you with a text.
  (_aloud_) Right, holy comrade, thou hast well rebuked us.
  But to return to earth. The General feels,
  My Harry, how the eyes of the dumb world
  Are fixed on us—how all of England's weal
  Weighs on our shoulders, and with serious thought
  Inclines him to the study of the HOUR:
  For every moment now should womb designs,
  And in the air we breathe the thundercloud
  Hangs mute:—may Heaven disperse it on our foes!

MARTIN. Ireton, his soul foresees, and is prepared.
  He will not patch new fortune with old fears,
  Nor halt 'twixt doubt and daring. We have done
  That which continued boldness can but bless;
  And on the awful head we have discrowned
  Must found our Capitol of Liberty!

HARRISON. (_who has been walking to and fro, muttering to himself,
                                       suddenly turns round_)
  Who comes? thou hast ill omen on thy brow.
  Art thou—nay, pardon!—soldier of the Lord!


SCENE II.—To them Sir Hubert Cecil.

CECIL. Where is the General? Where the lofty Cromwell?

IRETON. Young Cecil! Welcome, comrade! Just from Spain?
  What news I pray? The dust upon thy garb
  Betokens weary speed.

CECIL.                   False heart, away!
  Where is thy master, bloodhound?

IRETON.                    Art thou mad?
  Is it to me these words?—Or that my sword
  Were vowed to holier fields, this hand——  {606}

CECIL. (_fiercely_)              That hand!
  Look on it well. What stain hath marred its white
  Since last we met? And you, most learned Martin,
  And you, text-mouthing Harrison—what saws
  Plucked from the rotten tombs of buried codes,
  What devilish garblings from the holy writ,
  Gave ye one shade of sanction for that deed
  Which murdered England's honor in her king?

HARRISON. (_interrupting Martin and Ireton, as they are about to
                                                       reply_)
  Peace! peace, my brethren! Leave to me the word:
  Lo, my soul longs to wrestle with the youth.
  I will expound to him. Thus saith the Lord——

CECIL. Blaspheme not! keep thy dark hypocrisies
  To shroud thee from thyself! But peace, my heart!
  I will not waste my wrath on such as these.
  Most honest Ireton, did they tell me false,
  Or is thy leader here? thy kinsman, Ireton?—
  Oh God! hath stout-armed Cromwell come to this!—
  The master deathsman of your gory crew?

IRETON. I would he were, young madman, to requite
  Thy courteous quoting of his reverent name.
  Go seek our England's David at his hearth,
  And chide the arm that struck Goliah down.

HARRISON. I will wend with thee, rash idolator!
  So newly turned to the false gods of Horeb;
  My soul shall wrestle with thee by the way.

CECIL. (_to Harrison, who is about to follow him_)
  Butcher, fall back!—there is a ghost behind thee,
  That, with a hueless cheek and lifeless eye,
  Forbids thee henceforth and for aye to herd
  With men who murder not. And so farewell!
                                      (_exit Cecil_)

HARRISON. (_looking fearfully around_)
  A ghost! said he, a ghost?

MARTIN.                  Ay, General, ay;
  And he who stands upon the deadly brink
  Of Cromwell's ire, may well behold the ghosts
  He goes so soon to join.
               (_Enter a Puritan Soldier_)

SOLDIER.                   Worshipful Sirs,
  The council of the faithful is assembled,
  And the Lord President entreats your presence.

IRETON. Come, Martin; come, bold-hearted Harrison,
  Bradshaw awaits.

HARRISON.           Get thee behind me, Satan!
  I fear thee not! thou canst not harm the righteous.
  Ghost, quoth he! ghost! Seest thou a ghost, good Ireton?

IRETON. What, in broad day? Fie, General!

HARRISON.                Satan walks
  Daily and nightly tempting; but no more!
  We'll to the council. Verily, my soul
  Darkens at times the noon! The fiend is strong.
                                            (_exeunt_)


SCENE III.—A Room in Cromwell's House. The Lady Claypole. Edith.

LADY CLAYPOLE. So leave we, then, the Past! The angry sky
  Is cleared by that same thunderstroke which cleaves
  The roof of kings; the dark time's crowning evil
  Is o'er; the solemn deed, that stern men call
  Necessity, is done;—now let us hope
  A brighter day for England!

EDITH.                  Who knows Cromwell,
  Knows him as one inflexibly austere
  In what his head deems justice; but his heart
  Is mild, and shrinks from the uncalled-for shedding
  Ev'n of the meanest blood: yet would to Heaven,
  For his own peace, that he had been less great,
  Nor sate as judge in that most fearful court,
  Where either voice was peril. What the world
  Will deem his choice, lies doubtful in the clouds
  That shade the time. Thank God that we are women!

LADY CLAYPOLE. Yea! in these hours of civil strife, when men
  Know not which way lies conscience, and the night
  Scares the soft slumbers from their haggard eyes
  By schemes of what the morrow shall bring forth,
  'Tis sweet to feel our weakness, and to glide
  Adown the stream of our inactive thought!—
  While, on the bank, towers crash and temples fall,
  We sail unscath'd; and watch the unvex'd life
  Mirror that peaceful heaven, earth cannot mar!
                           (_after a pause, with a smile_)
  Yet scarce indeed unvex'd, while one wild power
  Can rouse the tide at will, and wake the heart
  To tempest with a sigh;—nay, blush not, Edith.

EDITH. I have no cause for blushes; and my cheek
  Did wrong my thought, if it did speak of shame.
  To love!—ah! 'tis a proud, a boastful joy,
  If he we love is worthy of our love!

LADY CLAYPOLE. And that, in truth, is Cecil: with his name
  Honor walks spotless, and this stormy world
  Grows fair before his presence; in his tongue
  Lurks no deceit; his smile conceals no frown:
  Ev'n in his very faults, his lofty pride
  And the hot frankness of his hasty mood,
  There seems a heavenly virtue, by the side
  Of men who stalk around, and, if they win
  Truth to the soul, wear falsehood on the brow.

EDITH. Speak thus forever, dearest! for his praise
  Makes thy voice music. Yes, he is all this;
  And I, whose soul is but one thought of him,
  Feel thought itself can compass not the girth
  Of his wide merit. Was I not right to say
  I could not blush to love him? Yet, methinks,
  Well might I blush to feel that one like Cecil
  Has love for Edith!

LADY CLAYPOLE. If, sweet coz, I cease
  To praise him, it shall be for sweeter words
  Ev'n than his praise!

EDITH. Impossible!

LADY CLAYPOLE.                     And yet,
  Were I a maid that loved as Edith loves,
  Tidings of him I loved were sweeter words
  Ev'n than his praise.

EDITH.                Tidings!—Oh, pardon, coz!—
  Tidings from Spain?

LADY CLAYPOLE. No, Edith, not from Spain;
  Tidings from London. Cecil is returned.
  Just ere we met, his courier's jaded steed
  Halted below. Sir Hubert had arrived,
  And, on the instant, sought my father.

EDITH.                          Come!
  And I to hear it from another's lips!

LADY CLAYPOLE. Nay, coz, be just: with matters of great weight—
  Matters that crave at once my father's ear—  {607}
  Be sure that he is laden.
                       (_Enter a Servant_)

SERVANT.                     Pardon, Madam!
  Methought the General here!

LADY CLAYPOLE. Who asks my father?

SERVANT. Sir Hubert Cecil, just arrived from Spain,
  Craves audience with his honor.

LADY CLAYPOLE. Pray his entrance.
  Myself will seek the General.    (_exit servant_)
                               Thank me, Edith!
  If now I quit thee, wilt thou thank me less?

EDITH. I prithee stay!

LADY CLAYPOLE. Nay, Friendship is a star
  Fading before the presence of Love's sun.
  Farewell! Again, those blushes!—Edith, fie!
                                 (_exit Lady Claypole_)


SCENE IV.—Cecil and Edith.

CECIL. Where is the General?—Where—Oh, Heaven! my Edith?

EDITH. Is there no welcome in that word? Am I
  Unlooked for at thy coming?

CECIL.                    Pardon, Madam!
  I—I—(_aside_) Oh, God! how bitter is this trial!
  Why do I love her less? Why fall I not
  At her dear feet? Why stand I thus amazed?
  Is this not Edith? No! 'tis Cromwell's niece;
  And Cromwell is the murtherer of my king!

EDITH. ‘Pardon’ and ‘madam!’—do I hear aright?
  Art thou so cold? Do I offend thine eyes?
  Thou turn'st away thy face! Well, Sir, 'tis well!
  Hubert! still silent! (_In a softer voice_) Hubert!

CECIL.                         Oh, for grace!
  For heaven's dear grace! speak not in that sweet tone!
  Be not so like that shape that _was_ my Edith!

EDITH. (_Gazing upon him with surprise and anger, turns as if to quit
                                      the stage, and then aside_)
  Sure he is ill! Keen travail and the cares
  Of these unhappy times have touched the string
  Of the o'erlabored brain. And shall I chide him?
  _I_ who should soothe? (_Approaches and aloud_) Art thou not well,
      dear Hubert?

CECIL. Well! well! the leaping and exultant health
  Which makes wild youth unconscious of its clay,
  Deeming itself all soul; the golden chain
  Which link'd that earth, our passions—with that heaven,
  Our hopes—why _this_ was to be _well!_ But now
  One black thought from the fountain of the heart
  Gushes eternally, till all the streams
  Of all the world are poisoned,—and the Past
  Hath grown one death, whose grim and giant shadow
  Makes that chill darkness which we call ‘_the Future!_’
  Where are my dreams of glory? Where the fame
  Unsullied by one stain of factious crime?
  And where—oh where!—the ever dulcet voice
  That murmured, in the star-lit nights of war,
  When the loud camp lay hushed, _thy_ holy name?
  Edith is mine no more! (_taking her hand_) Yet let me gaze
  Again upon thee! No! thou art not changed
  Ah! would thou wert! In that translucent cheek
  The roses tremble, stirr'd as by an air,
  With the pure impulse of thy summer soul—
  On thy white brow chaste conscience sits serene—
  There is no mark of blood on this fair hand—
  Yet Cromwell is thy kinsman!

EDITH.                       By the vows
  That we have plighted, look not on me thus!
  Speak not so wildly! Hubert, I am Edith!
  Edith!—thine own! oh! am I not thine own?

CECIL. My own!—my Edith! Yes, the evil deeds
  Of that bold man cast forth no shade on thee,
  Albeit they gloom the world as an eclipse
  Whose darkness is the prophecy of doom!

EDITH. Hush! hush! What! know'st thou not these walls have ears?
  Speak'st thou of Cromwell thus, upon whose nod
  Hang life and death?

CECIL.                But not the _fear_ of death!

EDITH. What change hath chanc'd, since last we met, to blot
  Thy champion and thy captain from thy grace?
  Why, when we parted, was not thy last word
  In praise of Cromwell? Was he not the star
  By which thy course was lighted? Nay, so glowed
  His name upon thy lips, that I—ev'n I—
  Was vexed to think thou'dst so much love to spare!

CECIL. Ah, there's the thought—the bitter, biting thought!
  Boy that I was, I pinned my faith to Cromwell;
  For him forsook my kin; renounced my home,
  My father's blessing, and my mother's love;
  Gave up my heart to him, my thoughts, my deeds,—
  Reduced the fire and freedom of my youth
  Into a mere machine—a thing to act
  Or to be passive as its master wills;
  On his broad banner I affixed my name—
  My heritage of honor; blindly bound
  My mark and station in the world's sharp eye
  To the unequal chances of his sword!
  But then methought it was a freeman's blade,
  Drawn, but with sorrow, for a nation's weal!

EDITH. And was it not so, Hubert?

CECIL.                Was it? What!
  When (with no precedent, from all the Past—
  That solemn armory for decorous Murther!)
  Some two score men assumed a people's voice,
  And sullied all the labors of long years,
  The laurels of a war for equal laws,
  By one most tragic outrage of all law!
  Oh, in that stroke 'twas not the foe that fell!
  'Twas we who fought!—the pillar of our cause;
  The white unsullied honor of our arms;
  The temperate justice that disdains revenge;
  The rock of law, from which war's standard waved;—
  The certainty of RIGHT;—'twas these that fell!

EDITH. Alas! I half foreboded this, and yet
  Would listen not to fear. But, Hubert, I—
  If there be sin in that most doubtful deed—
  _I_ have not shared the sin.

CECIL.                      No, Edith, no!
  But the sin severs us! Will Cromwell give
  The hand of Edith to his foe?

EDITH.                             His foe!
  What madness, Hubert! In the gloomy past
  Bury the wrong thy wrath cannot undo;
  Think but in what the future can repair it.

CECIL. I do so, Edith; and, upon that thought,
  I built the wall 'twixt Cromwell and my soul.  {608}
  The king is dead—but not the race of kings;
  There is a second Charles! Oh, Edith, yet—
  Yet may our fates be joined! Beyond the seas
  Lives my lost honor—lie my only means
  To prove me guiltless of this last bad deed!
  Beyond the seas, oh, let our vows be plighted!
  Fly with thy Cecil!—quit these gloomy walls,
  These whited sepulchres, these hangman saints!
  Beyond the seas, oh! let me find my bride,
  Regain my honor, and record my love!

EDITH. Alas! thou know'st not what thou say'st. The land
  Is lined with Cromwell's favorers. Not a step
  But his eye reads the whereabout. From hence
  Thou couldst not 'scape with life, nor I with honor!

CECIL. Ah, Edith, rob not Heaven of every star!
  From home, and England, and ambition banished—
  Banish me not from _thee_!

EDITH.                     What shall I say?
  How act—where turn? Thy lightest word hath been
  My law—my code of right; and now thou askest
  That which can never be.

CECIL.                     Recall the word!
  There's but one ‘never’ for the tongue of Love,
  And that should be for parting—_never part_.
  Oh, learn no other ‘never.’

EDITH.             Must thou leave me?
  Must thou leave England—thy old friends in arms—
  The cause of Freedom—thy brave spirit's hope?
  Must thou leave these? Is there no softer choice?

CECIL. None other—none!

EDITH.               So honor bids thee act;
  So honor conquers love! And is there, then,
  No honor but for man? Bethink thee, Hubert,
  Could I, unblushing, leave my kinsman's home,
  The guardian of my childhood—the kind roof
  Where no harsh thought e'er entered? For whate'er
  Cromwell to others, he to me hath been
  A more than parent. In his rudest hour
  For me he wore no frown; no chilling word
  Bade me remember that I had no father!
  Shall I repay him thus:—desert his hearth
  In his most imminent hour; betroth my faith
  To one henceforth his foe; make my false home
  With those who call him traitor; plight my hand
  To him who wields a sword against his heart?—
  That heart which sheltered me!—oh, never, Hubert!
  If thou lov'st honor, love it then in Edith,
  And plead no more.
                    (_enter Servant_)

SERVANT. The General hath sent word
  That, just released from council, he awaits
  Sir Hubert Cecil at Whitehall.

CECIL.                        I come!
                                      (_exit Servant_)
  So fare thee well!

EDITH. (_passionately_) Farewell!—and is that all?
  And part we thus forever? Not unkindly?
  Thou dost not love me less? Oh, say so, Hubert!
  Turn not away; give me once more thine hand.
  We loved each other from our childhood, Hubert;
  We grew together; thou wert as my brother,
  Till that name grew a dearer. I should seem
  More cold—more distant; but I cannot. All
  Pride, strength, reserve, desert me at this hour!
  My heart will break! Tell me thou lov'st me still!

CECIL.                   Still, Edith, still!

EDITH. I'm answered—bless thee, Hubert!
  One word! one parting word! For my sake, dearest,
  Rein thy swift temper when thou speakest to Cromwell.
  A word may chafe him from his steady mood
  In these wild moments; and behind his wrath
  There gleams the headsman's axe. Vex him not, Hubert!

CECIL. Fear not! This meeting hath unmanned my soul,
  Swallowed up all the fierceness of my nature
  As in a gulf! and he—this man of blood—
  He hath been kind to thee! Nay fear not, Edith!
                                            (_exit Cecil_)

EDITH. He's gone! O God support me! I have done
  That which became thy creature. Give me strength!
  A mountain crushes down this feeble heart;
  Oh, give me strength to bear it, gentle Heaven!
                                            (_exit_)


SCENE V—A Room at Whitehall; (the same as in Scene I) Enter Cromwell,
           Ireton, and Martin.

CROMWELL. So be it, then! At Windsor, in the vaults
  Of his long line, let Charles's ashes sleep.
  To Hubert and to Mildmay we consign
  The funeral cares; be they with reverence paid.
  Whoever of the mourners of the dead,
  The friends and whilom followers would assist
  In the grave rite, to them be licence given
  To grace the funeral with their faithful wo.
  We spurn not the dead lion.

MARTIN.                     Nobly said.
  Wouldst thou I have these orders straight conveyed
  To the king's friends?

CROMWELL. Forthwith good Martin.
                                (_exit Martin_)
                                 So
  With those sad ashes rest our country's griefs.
  Henry, no phœnix from them must spring forth;
  No second Charles! Within the self-same vault
  That shrouds that harmless dust we must inter
  Kingly ambition; and upon that day
  Proclaim it treason to declare a king
  In the King's son! The crown hath passed away
  From Saul, and from the godless house of Saul.

IRETON. The Parliament is fearful, and contains
  In its scant remnant many who would halt
  Betwixt the deed and that for which 'twas done.

CROMWELL. They must be seen to, Henry! Seek me out
  This eve at eight; we must confer alone.
  Strong meat is not for babes! But of this youth,
  This haughty Cecil! Thou hast seen him then?
  Is he, in truth, so hot?

IRETON.                   By my sword, yea!
  That which I told thee of his speech fell short
  Of its rash madness.

CROMWELL.                 'Tis a goodly youth;
  Brave and sound hearted, but of little faith,
  Nor suited to the hunger of these times,
  Which feeds on no half acts! And for that cause,
  And in that knowledge, when we had designed
  To bring the King to London, I dismissed him  {609}
  With letters into Spain. We must not lose him!
  He is of noble birth; his house hath wealth;
  His name is spotless:—he must not be lost!

IRETON. And will not be retained!

CROMWELL.              Methinks not so.
  He hath the folly of the eyes of flesh,
  And loves my niece; by that lure shall we cage him.

IRETON. Yet he is of a race that, in these times,
  Have fallen from the righteous.

CROMWELL.                       Ay, and so
  The more his honest courage. In the day
  When the king's power o'erflowed, and all true men
  Joined in a dyke against the lawless flood,
  His sire and I were co-mates—sate with Pym;
  On the same benches—gave the self-same votes;
  But when we drew God's sword against the king,
  And threw away the sheath, his fearful heart
  Recoiled before the act it had provoked;
  And, halting neuter in the wide extremes,
  Forbade his son to join us.

IRETON.                    But the youth—

CROMWELL. More bravely bent, forsook the inglorious sire,
  And made a sire of Cromwell. In my host
  There was not one that loved me more than Cecil!
  Better in field than prayer, and more at home
  Upon his charger than his knee, 'tis true;
  But to all men their way to please the Lord!
  To heaven are many paths!

IRETON.                 So near to thee,
  And knew not of the end for which we fought?
  Dreamt he it was against the man called king,
  And not against the thing called kingly?

CROMWELL.                              So
  The young man dreamed; and oft-times he hath said
  When after battle he hath wiped his sword,
  Oft hath he sighing said, ‘These sinful wars—
  Brother with brother, father against son,
  Strife with her country, victory o'er her children—
  How shall they end? If to the hollow word
  Of this unhappy king no truth is bound,
  Shall the day come when he, worn out with blood,
  Will yield his crown to his yet guiltless son,
  And we made sure of freedom by firm laws,
  Chain the calm'd lion to a peaceful throne?’	

IRETON. The father's leaven still! most foolish hope
  To plaster with cool prudence jarring atoms,
  And reconcile the irreconcileable—
  The rushing present with the mouldering past!

CROMWELL. Thou say'st it, Ireton! But the boy was young
  And fond of heart; the times that harden us,
  Make soft less thoughtful natures.
                    (_enter a Puritan Soldier_)

SOLDIER.       Lo! your worship,
  The youth hight Hubert Cecil waits thy pleasure!

CROMWELL. Friend, let him enter. Henry, leave us now!
  At eight, remember!
                                       (_exit Ireton_)
                     It hath lamely chanced
  That Cecil should return upon the heat
  And newness of these fierce events; a month
  Had robbed him of their horror! While we breathe
  Passion glides on to Memory:—and dread things,
  That scared our thoughts but yesterday, take hues,
  That smooth their sternness, from the silent morrow.
(_Enter Cecil—Cromwell leaning on his sword at the farther end of the
    stage, regards him with a steadfast look and majestic mien_)
  Well, sir, good day! What messages from Spain?
(_Cecil presents him despatches—Cromwell glances over them, looking,
    from time to time, at Cecil_)

CECIL. (_aside_) What is there in this man that I should fear him?
  Hath he some spell to witch us from ourselves,
  And make our natures minion to his own?

CROMWELL. Plead they so warm for Stuart? 'tis too late!

CECIL. It is too late!

CROMWELL. Since last we parted, Hubert,
  He, the high author of our civil wars,
  Hath been their victim. 'Twas an evil, Hubert;
  But so is justice ever when it falls
  Upon a human life!

CECIL.             God's mercy!—justice!
  Why justice is a consequence of law—
  Founded on law—begotten but by law!
  By what law, Cromwell, fell the King?

CROMWELL.                             By all
  The laws he left us! Prithee silence, Cecil!
  Sir, I might threaten, but I will not:—hold!
  And let us, with a calm and sober eye,
  Look on the spectre of this ghastly deed.
  Who spills man's blood, his blood by man be shed!
  'Tis Heaven's first law—to that law we had come—
  None other left us. Who, then, caused the strife,
  That crimsoned Naseby's field, and Marston's moor?
  It was the Stuart:—so the Stuart fell!
  A victim, in the pit himself had digged!
  He died not, Sir, as hated kings have died,
  In secret and in shade—no eye to trace
  The one step from their prison to their pall;
  He died i' the eyes of Europe—in the face
  Of the broad Heaven—amidst the sons of England,
  Whom he had outraged—by a solemn sentence,
  Passed by a solemn court. Does this seem guilt?
  (It might be error—mortal men will err!)
  But _Guilt_ not thus unrobes it to the day;
  Its deeds are secret, as _our_ act was public.
  You pity Charles! 'tis well; but pity more
  The tens of thousand honest humble men,
  Who, by the tyranny of Charles compelled
  To draw the sword, fell butchered in the field!
  Good Lord—when one man dies who wears a crown,
  How the earth trembles—how the nations gape,
  Amazed and awed!—but when that one man's victims,
  Poor worms uncloth'd in purple, daily die,
  In the grim cell, or on the groaning gibbet,
  Or on the civil field, ye pitying souls
  Drop not one tear from your indifferent eyes:
  Ye weep the ravening vulture when he bleeds,
  And coldly gaze upon the countless prey
  He gorged at one fell meal. Be still young man;
  Your time for speech will come. So much for justice;
  Now for yet larger duties: to our hands
  The peace and weal of England were consigned;
  These our first thought and duty. Should we loose
  Charles on the world again, 'twere to unleash
  Once more the Fiend of Carnage: should we guard  {610}
  His person in our prison, still his name
  Would float, a wizard's standard, in the air,
  Rallying fresh war on Freedom; a fit theme
  To wake bad pity in the breasts of men;
  A focus for all faction here at home,
  And in the lewd courts of his brother kings.
  So but one choice remained: it was that choice
  Which (you are skilled methinks in classic lore,
  And prize such precedent,) the elder Brutus
  Made when he judged his children: such the choice
  Of his descendant—when, within the senate
  He sought to crush, the crafty Cæsar fell.

CECIL. Cæsar may find his type amidst the living;
  And by that name our sons may christen Cromwell.

CROMWELL. Men's deeds are fair enigmas—let man solve them!
  But men's dark motives are i' the Books of God.
                   (_In a milder tone_)
  Cecil! thou wert as my adopted son.
  Hast thou not still fought by my proper person—
  Eat'n at my board—slept in my tent—conceived
  From me thy rudiments and lore of war—
  Hath not my soul yearned to thee—have I not
  Brought thee, yet beardless, into mark and fame—
  Given thee trust and honor—nay, to bind
  Still closer to my sheltering heart thine own—
  Have I not smiled upon thy love for Edith,
  (For I, too, once was young,) and bid thee find
  Thy plighted bride in my familiar kin—
  And wilt thou, in this crisis of my fate,
  When my good name stands trembling in the balance,
  And one friend wanting may abase the scale,
  Wilt thou thus judge me harshly—take no count
  Of the swift eddies of the whirlpool time,
  Which urge us on to any port for peace,
  And set the brand of thy austere rebuke
  Upon the heart that loved thee so? Fie! fie!

CECIL. Arouse thine anger, Cromwell! rate me, vent
  Thy threats on this bare front—thy kindness kills me!

CROMWELL. Bear with me, son, as I would bear with thee!
  Add not to these grim cares that press upon me.
  Eke thou not out the evils of the time;
  They are enow to grind my weary soul.
  Restrain the harsher thoughts, that would reprove,
  Until a calmer season, when 'tis given
  To talk of what hath been with tempered minds;
  And part we now in charity.

CECIL.                         O Cromwell,
  If now we part, it is forever. Here
  I do resign my office in thy hands;
  Lay down my trust and charge,—

CROMWELL. [_hastily_] I'll not receive them;
  Another time for this.

CECIL.        There is no other.
  I came to chide thee, Cromwell; ay, to chide,
  Girt as thou art with power: but thou hast ta'en
  The sternness from my soul, and made the voice
  Of duty sound so grating to my ear,
  That, for mine honor, I, who fear thee not,
  Do fear my frailty, and will trust no more
  My conscience to our meeting.

CROMWELL.          Wouldst thou say
  That thou wilt leave me?

CECIL. Yes.

CROMWELL. And whither bound?

CECIL. The king's no more; and in his ashes sleep
  His faults. His son as yet hath wronged us not:
  That son is now our king!

CROMWELL.           Do I hear right?
  Know'st thou, rash boy, those words are deadly? Know'st thou,
  It is proclaimed “whoever names a king
  In any man, by Parliament unsanctioned,
  Is criminal of treason?”

CECIL.               So 'tis said;
  And those who said it, were themselves the traitors.

CROMWELL. This, and to me!—beware; on that way lies
  My limit of forbearance.

CECIL.               Call thy guards;
  Ordain the prison; bring me to the bar;
  Prepare the scaffold. This, great Cromwell, were
  A milder doom than that which I adjudge
  Unto myself. 'Tis worse than death to leave
  The flag which waved above our dreams of freedom—
  The Chief our reverence honored as a god—
  The bride whose love rose-colored all the world—
  But worse than many deaths—than hell itself,
  To sin against what we believe the right.

CROMWELL. [_moved and aside_] And this bold soul I am about to lose!
  [_Aloud_] If me thou canst forget, and all my love,
  Remember Edith! Is she thy betrothed,
  And wilt thou leave her too? Thou hid'st thy face.
  Stay, Hubert, stay; I, who could order, stoop
  And pray thee stay.

CECIL. No—no!

CROMWELL. [_with coldness and dignity_] Then have thy will.
  Desert the cause of freedom at her need,—
  False to thy chief, and perjured to thy love.
  I do repent me that I have abased
  Myself thus humbly. Go, Sir, you have leave;
  I would not have one man in honest Israel
  Whose soul hath hunger for the flesh of Egypt.

CECIL. [_approaching Cromwell slowly_] Canst thou yet make the
      doubtful past appear
  Done but in sorrowing justice?—canst thou yet
  Cement these jarring factions—join in peace
  The friends alike of royalty and freedom,
  And give the state, secured by such good laws
  As now we may demand, once more a king?

CROMWELL. A king! Why name that word? A head—a chief,
  Perchance, the Commonwealth may yet decree!
  Speak on!

CECIL. I care not, Cromwell, for the name;
  But he who bears the orb and sway of power
  Must, if for peace we seek, be chosen from
  The Stuarts' lineage. Charles the First is dead:
  Wilt thou proclaim his son?

CROMWELL. [_laughing bitterly_] An Exile, yes! A Monarch, never!

CECIL. Cromwell, fare thee well!
  As friends we meet no more. May God so judge
  As I now judge, believing thee as one
  Whom a bold heart, and the dim hope of power,
  And the blind wrath of faction, and the spur
  Of an o'ermastering Fate, impel to what  {611}
  The Past foretells already to the Future.
  Dread man, farewell.
                                    [_exit Cecil_]

CROMWELL. [_after a pause_] So from my side hath gone
  An upright heart; and in that single loss,
  Methinks more honesty hath said farewell,
  Than if a thousand had abjured my banners.
  Charles sleeps, and feels no more the grinding cares,
  The perils and the doubts that wait on POWER.
  For him, no more the uneasy day,—the night
  At war with sleep,—for him are hushed, at last,
  Loud Hate and hollow Love. Reverse thy Law,
  O blind compassion of the human heart!
  And let not death which feels not, sins not—weeps not—
  Rob Life of all that Suffering asks from Pity.
  [_He paces to and fro the scene, and pauses at last opposite the
      doors at the back of the stage_]
  Lo! what a slender barrier parts in twain
  The presence of the breathing and the dead—
  The vanquisher and victim—the firm foot
  Of lusty strength, and the unmoving mass
  Of what all strength must come to. Yet once more,
  Ere the grave closes on that solemn dust,
  Will I survey what men have feared to look on.
  [_He opens the doors—the coffin of the king on the back ground
      lighted by tapers—Cromwell approaches it slowly, lifts the
      pall, and gazes, as if on the corpse within_]
  'Tis a firm frame; the sinews strongly knit;
  The chest deep set and broad; save some grey hairs
  Saddening those locks of love, no sign of age.
  Had nature been his executioner
  _He would have outlived me!_ and to this end—
  This narrow empire—this unpeopled kingdom—
  This six feet realm—the overlust of sway
  Hath been the guide! He would have stretched his will
  O'er that unlimited world which men's souls are!
  Fettered the earth's pure air—for freedom is
  That air to honest lips;—and here he lies,
  In dust most eloquent—to after time
  A never silent oracle for kings!
  Was this the hand that strained within its grasp
  So haught a sceptre? this the shape that wore
  Majesty like a garment? Spurn that clay—
  It can resent not; speak of royal crimes,
  And it can frown not: schemeless lies the brain
  Whose thoughts were sources of such fearful deeds.
  What things are we, O Lord, when at thy will
  A worm like this could shake the mighty world!
  A few years since, and in the port was moored
  A bark to far Columbia's forests bound;
  And I was one of those indignant hearts
  Panting for exile in the thirst for freedom;
  Then, that pale clay (poor clay that was a king!)
  Forbade my parting, in the wanton pride
  Of vain command, and with a fated sceptre
  Waved back the shadow of the death to come.
  Here stands that baffled and forbidden wanderer,
  Loftiest amid the wrecks of ruined empire,
  Beside the coffin of a headless king!
  He thrall'd my fate—I have prepared his doom:
  He made me captive—lo! his narrow cell!
          [_Advancing to the front of the stage_]
  So hands unseen do fashion forth the earth
  Of our frail schemes into our funeral urns;
  So, walking dream-led in life's sleep, our steps
  Move blindfold to the scaffold or the throne!—
  Ay, to the _Throne!_ From that dark thought I strike
  The light which cheers me onward to my goal.
  Wild though the night, and angry though the winds,
  High o'er the billows of the battling sea
  My Spirit, like a bark, sweeps on to Fortune!




MEMOIRS OF MRS. HEMANS.[1]

[Footnote 1: From the Memoirs of Mrs. Hemans, by Chorley—now in the 
press of Messieurs Saunders and Otley, to whom we are indebted for 
some of the sheets.]


It will be yet more clearly seen, from further portions of Mrs. 
Hemans' correspondence, with what devotion and gratitude she regarded 
German literature; she spoke of its language as “rich and 
_affectionate_, in which I take much delight:”—how she gratefully 
referred to its study as having expanded her mind and opened to her 
new sources of intellectual delight and exercise. For a while, too, 
she may have been said to have written under the shadow of its 
mysticism; but this secondary influence had passed away some time 
before her death. It is not the lot of high minds, though they may 
pass through and linger in regions where thought loses itself in 
obscurity, to terminate their career there. The “Lays of many Lands,” 
most of which appeared in the New Monthly Magazine, then edited by Mr. 
Campbell, were, we are told by herself, suggested by Herder's 
“_Stimmen der Volker in Liedern_.” Her next volume was formed of a 
collection of these, preceded by “The Forest Sanctuary.”

Mrs. Hemans considered this poem as almost, if not altogether, the 
best of her works. She would sometimes say, that in proportion to the 
praise which had been bestowed upon others of her less carefully 
meditated and shorter compositions, she thought it had hardly met with 
its fair share of success: for it was the first continuous effort in 
which she dared to write from the fulness of her own heart—to listen 
to the promptings of her genius freely and fearlessly. The subject was 
suggested by a passage in one of the letters of Don Leucadio Doblado, 
and was wrought upon by her with that eagerness and fervor which 
almost _command_ corresponding results. I have heard Mrs. Hemans say, 
that the greater part of this poem was written in no more picturesque 
a retreat than a laundry, to which, as being detached from the house, 
she resorted for undisturbed quiet and leisure. When she read it, 
while in progress, to her mother and sister, they were surprised to 
tears at the increased power displayed in it. She was not prone to 
speak with self-contentment of her own works; but, perhaps, _the one_ 
favorite descriptive passage was that picture of a sea burial in the 
second canto.

    ... She lay a thing for earth's embrace,
  To cover with spring-wreaths. For earth's?—the wave
  That gives the bier no flowers, makes moan above her grave!

  On the mid-seas a knell!—for man was there,—
  Anguish and love, the mourner with his dead!
  A long, low, tolling knell—a voice of prayer—
  Dark glassy waters, like a desert spread,—
  And the pale shining Southern Cross on high,  {612}
  Its faint stars fading from a solemn sky,
  Where mighty clouds before the dawn grew red:—
  Were these things round me? Such o'er memory sweep
  Wildly when aught brings back that burial of the deep.

  Then the broad lonely sunrise, and the plash
  Into the sounding waves!—around her head
  They parted, with a glancing moment's flash,
  Then shut—and all was still....

The whole poem, whether in its scenes of superstition—the Auto da 
Fe—the dungeon—the flight, or in its delineation of the mental 
conflicts of its hero—or in its forest pictures of the free west, 
which offer such a delicious repose to the mind, is full of happy 
thoughts and turns of expression. Four lines of peculiar delicacy and 
beauty recur to me as I write, too strongly to be passed by. They are 
from a character of one of the martyr sisters.

  And if she mingled with the festive train,
  It was but as some melancholy star
  Beholds the dance of shepherds on the plain,
  In its bright stillness present, though afar.

But the entire episode of “Queen-like Teresa—radiant Inez”—is wrought 
up with a nerve and an impulse, which men of renown have failed to 
reach. The death of the latter, if, perhaps, it be a little too 
_romantic_ for the stern realities of the scene, is so beautifully 
told, that it cannot be read without strong feeling, nor carelessly 
remembered. And most beautiful, too, are the sudden out-bursts of 
thankfulness—of the quick, happy consciousness of liberty with which 
the narrator of this ghastly sacrifice, interrupts the tale, to 
reassure himself—

  Sport on, my happy child! for thou art free!

The character of the convert's wife, Leonor,—devotedly clinging to his 
fortunes, without a reproach or a murmur, while her heart trembles 
before him, as though she were in the presence of a lost spirit,—is 
one of those, in which Mrs. Hemans' individual mode of thought and 
manner of expression are most happily impersonated. As a whole, she 
was hardly wrong in her own estimate of this poem: and on recently 
returning to it, I have been surprised to find, how well it bears the 
tests and trials with which it is only either fit or rational to 
examine works of the highest order of mind. But here, also, would 
criticism be impertinent.

The next work of Mrs. Hemans, and the one by which she is most 
universally known, was the “Records of Woman,” published in 1828. In 
this, to use her own words, “there is more of herself to be found” 
than in any preceding composition. But even the slightest analysis of 
these beautiful legends would be superfluous; suffice it to say, that 
they were not things of meditation, but imagined and uttered in the 
same breath; like every line that she wrote, as far as possible from 
being a studied exercise. It is true, that in some lyrics more than 
others, her individual feelings are eagerly put forth—in those, for 
instance, wherein aspirations after another world are expressed, or 
which breathe the weary pining language of home sickness, or in which 
she utters her abiding sense of the insufficiency of fame to satisfy a 
woman's heart, however its possession may gratify her vanity—or 
wherein she speaks with a passionate self-distrust of her own art, of 
the impossibility of performance to keep pace with desire. The fervor 
with which these were poured forth seriously endangered a frame 
already undermined by too ardent a spirit, whose consuming work had 
been aided by a personal self-neglect, childish to wilfulness. So 
perilously, indeed, was she excited by the composition of Mozart's 
Requiem, that she was prohibited by her physician from any further 
exercise of her art, for some weeks after it was written. Few more 
genuine out-bursts of feeling have been ever poured forth than the 
three following verses of that poem.

         “Yet I have known it long:
          Too restless and too strong
  Within this clay hath been the o'ermastering flame;
          Swift thought that came and went,
          Like torrents o'er me sent
  Have shaken as a reed, my thrilling frame.

          Like perfumes on the wind,
          Which none may stay or bind,
  The beautiful comes floating through my soul;
          I strive with yearning vain,
          The spirit to detain
  Of the deep harmonies that past me roll!

          Therefore disturbing dreams
          Trouble the secret streams,
  And founts of music that o'erflow my breast;
          Something far more divine
          Than may on earth be mine,
  Haunts my worn heart, and will not let it rest.”

Most of the poems above referred to, were written at Rhyllon; the last 
and most favorite of Mrs. Hemans' residence at Wales. Some of them 
will be found colored by a shadow which had recently passed over her 
lot—the death of her mother. To this, which she always felt as an 
irreparable loss, will be found not a few touching allusions in many 
following letters.

A small woodland dingle, near Rhyllon, was her favorite retreat: here 
she would spend long summer mornings to read, and project, and 
compose, while her children played about her. “Whenever one of us 
brought her a new flower,” writes one of them, “she was sure to 
introduce it into her next poem.” She has unconsciously described this 
haunt over and over again with affectionate distinctness; it is the 
scene referred to in the “Hour of Romance,” and in the sonnet which is 
printed among her “Poetical Remains.”

  “Still are the cowslips from thy bosom springing,
   O far off grassy dell?—And dost thou see,
   When southern winds first wake the vernal singing,
   The star-gleam of the wood anemone?
   Doth the shy ring-dove haunt thee yet—the bee
   Hang on thy flowers, as when I breathed farewell
   To their wild blooms? and round the beechen tree
   Still in green softness, doth the moss bank swell?”

Many of the imaginations which floated through her brain in this 
retirement, were lost in the more interrupted and responsible life, 
which followed Mrs. Hemans' departure from Wales; when the breaking up 
of her household, on the marriage of one of her family, and the 
removal of another into Ireland, threw her exclusively upon her own 
resources, and compelled her to make acquaintance with an “eating, 
drinking, buying, bargaining” world with which, from her disposition 
and habits, she was ill-fitted to cope. One of these unfinished works 
was the “Portrait Gallery,” of which one episode, “The lady of the 
Castle,” is introduced in the “Records.”


{613}


CONCLUDING LECTURE

Of the Course on the Obstacles and Hindrances to Education, arising 
from the peculiar faults of Parents, Teachers and Scholars, and that 
portion of the Public immediately concerned in directing and 
controlling our Literary Institutions.

BY JAMES M. GARNETT.


Since the first lecture of the course on the obstacles to all correct 
education was delivered, so much time has elapsed, and so many of you, 
probably, have not heard the whole, that some farther recapitulation 
than was given when I last addressed you, seems necessary fully to 
understand what I still wish to say in conclusion.

It will be recollected, I hope, that I have endeavored to fix upon 
parents themselves much the greater portion of the guilt, as well as 
the folly of creating these obstacles; since _they_, and the _nurses_ 
whom they choose, are unquestionably the first moral and intellectual 
instructers of their children. I tried to prove that the deadly 
mischief was accomplished by a process commencing almost with their 
birth—a process which consists in checking or misdirecting the first 
dawnings of intellect and feeling in these helpless little beings; in 
teaching their heads, and neglecting their hearts; in cultivating 
sensual rather than intellectual appetites; in the irregularity of 
their moral discipline, which encourages or silently permits, at one 
time, the outbreaking of certain juvenile propensities, which, at 
another, they will severely punish; in performing this painful duty 
much oftener from caprice and wrath than sound judgment; in 
transferring their authority and their duties to others with far too 
little consideration; in their frequent changes of schools and 
teachers; in their reckless attacks upon the characters of both; in 
suffering their children often to choose for themselves—not only 
_where_, but _what_ and _how_ they shall be taught; in confounding the 
mere going to school and confinement in a school-room, with profitable 
study; in frequently disgusting their children with books in general, 
and all scholastic learning in particular, by making application to 
their lessons a punishment, rather than a pleasurable occupation; in 
preparing them for insubordination, by treating and speaking of the 
class of teachers as much inferior to themselves, and by taking part 
against the former, upon almost every occasion where complaints are 
made by either party; in making holidays seasons for feasting, 
idleness, and dissipation, rather than of rational recreation and 
agreeable diversity in the mode of intellectual and moral improvement; 
in educating their offspring for situations which they will probably 
never fill, and giving them tastes and desires never likely to be 
gratified, thereby disqualifying them at one and the same time, for 
attaining any of the real enjoyments of the present life within their 
reach, or for gaining the promised blessings of the life to come; but 
what is worse than all, in presenting a continual variance between 
their own precepts and practice, and substituting worldly motives as 
inducements to acquire knowledge, rather than the love and practice of 
wisdom and virtue, as absolutely essential to happiness, both in our 
present and future state of existence.

In speaking of the obstacles created by teachers as a class, I charged 
them with deficiency of moral courage in pursuing the course essential 
to the maintenance of that high station in society to which all well 
qualified teachers who faithfully discharge their duties are justly 
entitled. I accused them of making the business of teaching a mere 
stepping-stone to some other pursuit, rather than a regular profession 
for life; and, of course, neglecting the necessary means to give it 
that respectability and influence in society which it ought to have, 
and certainly would possess, if they took the same care to prepare 
themselves to become good teachers, that other men take to distinguish 
themselves in the particular professions which they have finally 
determined to pursue. Another charge against them was, that instead of 
always aiding each other as members of the same fraternity, their 
insane jealousy often operated in such a way, as to bring their whole 
class into disgrace and contempt; that their grand panacea for 
stimulating to study, is _emulation_—a nostrum, which may perhaps cure 
the disease of idleness, but will leave in its place those diabolical 
passions—jealousy, envy, hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness; 
that their favorite punishments generally are corporeal ones, which 
can never do more than effect some temporary amendment of their 
pupil's conduct, without producing any in their bad principles; that 
the application of these punishments—these skin-deep remedies—is much 
oftener a process to work off the teacher's own angry passions, than 
to cure the pupil's faults—these last being considered rather as 
school annoyances, to be put out of the instructer's way with the 
least possible trouble and delay, than as deep-rooted diseases of the 
heart, requiring the utmost tenderness and skill in the methods of 
cure—diseases too, which must utterly destroy the sufferer's 
happiness, unless radically conquered. I also endeavored to show, that 
in their modes of teaching as well as in the books taught, they either 
obstinately follow the course in which they themselves have been 
taught, thereby precluding themselves from adopting any real 
improvements which the progress of society may produce; or they run 
wild in pursuit of every new project which the reckless spirit of 
innovation is so constantly obtruding on the public. It was likewise 
alleged against them, that their efforts, even when most zealously 
made, were too generally directed, solely to stocking the minds of 
their pupils with words, instead of being applied with still greater 
assiduity to fortifying their hearts with just principles of thought 
and action; that they made education to consist simply in what is 
called school learning, instead of rendering it a development as 
perfect as possible, of all our faculties, both intellectual and 
physical; hence the ascendancy given to mere scholastic and scientific 
acquirements, over those great moral and religious principles, without 
a thorough knowledge and practice of which, man, although educated, is 
little better than a beast of prey, furnished with increased powers of 
doing mischief. But the worst perhaps of all the faults ascribed to 
teachers, is, that they rarely manifest any particular interest in the 
moral and religious improvement of their pupils—any strong anxiety for 
their future happiness—any great solicitude for the correctness of 
their conduct, farther than the teacher's own ease and reputation are 
concerned; in a word, any of those kind, affectionate feelings towards 
them, which will almost invariably secure their warmest attachment, 
and at the same time establish an influence over them immeasurably 
more {614} powerful that can possibly be created by any other means.

In illustrating the obstacles to education created by pupils, I 
endeavored to show, that they too generally look upon learning as 
physic, rather than food; that they mistake both the nature and extent 
of their teacher's authority over them, and consequently, of their own 
obligations to obedience; that they view all holidays or hours stolen 
from school as positive gains, rather than losses—at least of time, if 
nothing else; that to thwart their teachers is a proof of 
independence—to cheat them, an evidence of genius; that their own 
tastes and judgments are very soon deemed better guides for them, than 
their teacher's; that going to school at all, is a business, rather to 
please their parents than to benefit themselves—a most irksome 
restraint upon their natural liberty—a bondage which they may break as 
often as they can; and consequently, that their teachers are jailors, 
hired to confine, to teaze, and to punish, rather than good friends, 
ever ready to show them the best paths to knowledge, virtue, and 
happiness. I charged them generally with mistaking, while at school, 
the mere mechanical process, called “going through their books,” for 
thoroughly understanding and mastering their contents; hence such 
pupils always measure their scholarship, solely by the length of time 
they spend at school, and the number of pages which they there read, 
instead of estimating it by the amount of really useful acquirement. I 
likewise attempted to show that pupilage is viewed by vast multitudes 
of youth, as the period for idleness—for reckless enjoyment, rather 
than earnest and assiduous preparation for fulfilling faithfully all 
the important duties of adult life; that the great moral laws made for 
the government of mankind in general, were not, as they believe, made 
for boys and girls at school—or that they may break almost any of them 
with impunity, provided their teachers do not detect them; that no 
thought nor care for forming their future characters need molest them, 
until after they leave school, which will be quite soon enough to 
undertake so troublesome a business; and, of course, that they may 
offend as often as inclination prompts them—not only against good 
manners—but truth, justice, and honor, without the least hazard to 
their reputations. To crown the obstacles to correct education, 
created by the faults and errors of youth, I will state one omitted in 
its proper place, which prevails to a most deplorable extent; it is 
the belief, that the matters usually taught in schools, such as will 
enable the pupils to get a college diploma, comprehend the whole of 
what is called _education_; and that these requisites to collegiate 
honors are to be obtained, if at all, merely for worldly purposes, not 
as auxiliary means only, towards perfecting, as far as practicable, 
all those admirable faculties bestowed on us by God himself for the 
noblest of all uses—that of promoting human happiness, both in time 
and eternity.

Superadded to all these formidable obstructions to education as it 
should be, many more arise from other classes of society than parents, 
teachers, and scholars. The chief of these are, the want of 
persevering zeal in this vital cause, and the general neglect of all 
whose business it should be to inquire minutely and thoroughly into 
that part of the management of schools, which, very rarely, if ever, 
is made the subject of newspaper publication or individual scrutiny. 
Yet is this, beyond all comparison, the most important; I mean the 
particular methods of instruction, and the conduct of the teachers 
towards their pupils both _in_ and _out_ of school.

It is really not enough for the public to be told that at such and 
such schools, all arts, sciences, languages and accomplishments are 
taught _dirt cheap, and in the shortest imaginable time_—admitting the 
possibility of any such incredible promises being fulfilled. The main 
points—the great, essential groundwork of all right education, are 
_the moral discipline—the punishments and rewards—but above all, the 
motives and inducements to study_, which the teachers inculcate; for 
_if this part of the process be essentially wrong, no other part can 
well work rightly_. Into all these particulars, continual, earnest, 
and diligent inquiries should be made by competent judges—not to 
expose nor to injure individuals, but to supply what is deficient, and 
to correct what is wrong in all schools. Teachers themselves would not 
be long in setting about the work with due diligence, when they found 
public sentiment opposed to any part of their practice; and the 
community in general more disposed minutely and judiciously to 
investigate all such particulars relative to the management of 
schools, as it is always important, should be thoroughly known and 
understood. Most persons judge of schools by what they hear—not by 
what they see, or certainly know; and so little concern is usually 
felt about them, by any but those who have children there, that none 
else scarcely ever ask any questions on the subject. The consequence 
is, that although many will occasionally _talk_, as they do about 
various other matters which they do not understand, yet they rarely 
ever _judge_ correctly. Idle gossip—the spirit of 
detraction—ignorance, and malice—will do infinitely more harm to these 
establishments, than the partiality of friendship, which is often 
equally blind, can ever do good; for the work of _pulling down_ is 
always an easier, and frequently, to many, a much more agreeable task, 
than _building up_. Another great benefit which would result from so 
close and accurate a scrutiny as the one recommended, would be, that 
the investigators, and through them the public, would learn to make 
somewhat more charitable estimates of the difficulties which all 
teachers, especially of large schools, have always to encounter from 
the faults and vices of their scholars, aggravated by the interference 
of ignorant, injudicious, and immoral parents. All who would open the 
eyes of their understanding would certainly discover, that not a few 
of these difficulties infest even female schools, wherein the common 
opinion seems to be, at least with most parents in regard to their own 
daughters, that “nothing can in any wise enter that defileth;” or, in 
other words, that “the beau ideal” of woman—all innocence, purity and 
loveliness—is the real character of all her female children, and 
inseparably attaches to them, wherever found, whether at home or 
abroad. Such a discovery, possibly, might also lead such all-confiding 
parents to the painful, but salutary suspicion, that _they themselves_ 
may have been, by early neglect on their part, the real cause of these 
sore evils. Notwithstanding these parental hallucinations in regard to 
daughters, all experience proves that girls differ from boys in their 
faults and vices, only according to the degree of their exposure in 
early life, to the contraction of bad principles and bad habits. What, 
in reality, are {615} schools, either of boys or girls, but the world 
in miniature, annoyed and distracted by nearly all the same faults and 
vices—in a mitigated form, it is true, yet still operating to the 
extent of their respective spheres, and in proportion to the power of 
the peculiar temptations by which the pupils are assailed, as well as 
of the good and bad principles which they carry with them from home? 
This is true as the Gospel itself—yet where are the parents who could 
bear to have any of these follies and vices ascribed by this rule to 
their own children, especially if they were daughters, or would 
believe the accusation, if made? What would become of the luckless 
teachers who would have candor and hardihood enough to venture on such 
revolting disclosures? In all probability the loss of employment would 
be the consequence, if nothing worse befel them. Yet, that disclosures 
of this kind might very frequently and most justly be made in regard 
to many individuals in all large schools, none can possibly doubt, who 
will deliberately reflect on the composition of very many of these 
institutions. What would be the result of such reflection? Why, that 
many of the scholars have traits of character nearly as bad as could 
well be expected at so early a period of life, and habits such as 
inevitably lead to moral degradation and destruction, if not radically 
cured during the period of pupilage. Children of all grades of 
capacity, from the highest to the lowest—of all degrees of moral and 
literary acquirement, from a considerable portion of culture and 
improvement, to a very deplorable state of ignorance, idleness, and 
vice, and of all imaginable varieties of dispositions and tempers, are 
often found huddled together in these institutions. The unavoidable 
consequence is, that innumerable obstacles of almost invincible power 
to obstruct the progress of education, are continually presenting 
themselves—that numerous acts are committed to deplore, and a thousand 
things practised for which there can be no cure, unless both parental 
authority and public sentiment will steadily and most actively 
co-operate with the teachers, both in devising and applying the proper 
remedies. But how can this co-operation possibly be made, while the 
necessity for it is undiscerned—while the obstacles created by each 
party remain uncorrected, and the current coin between parents and 
teachers continues to be flattery and deception, instead of full and 
confidential disclosures by the last, of the children's faults and 
misdeeds, met by efficient support from the first, in every measure of 
salutary discipline? A reformation however, in these momentous 
particulars, is among the last things thought of, in regard to 
schools, where, in countless instances, the limbs and bodies of the 
pupils appear to be deemed much better worth training than their 
hearts and souls. If the first and last lesson taught a child, before 
it quits its home to be placed under other teachers, be, that the 
admiration and applause of the world must be the chief objects of 
pursuit, what success can the subsequent instructers possibly expect, 
who venture to inculcate a different lesson? What hope can they 
rationally entertain of substituting the love of wisdom and virtue—the 
fear of sin, and the holy desire of pleasing our Maker in all things, 
for the passions of pride, vanity, and ambition, sucked in almost with 
the mother's milk? Would it do to acquiesce so far in this primary 
instruction, as to tell the pupils that they must cherish these 
passions, but beware how they direct them? Would not such prescription 
be quite on a par in folly with granting a child inclined to 
drunkenness, liberty to drink every day to the point of intoxication, 
or with exposing ono who had any other vicious propensity, to 
opportunities of indulging it? The truth is, that if children are 
turned over immediately from the parent's to the teacher's hands, with 
passions rarely or never restrained—vicious inclinations and wills 
unsubdued—stubbornness, idleness, and insubordination habitually 
indulged, the tutor who attempts their correction has scarcely a 
possible chance of success. The very first serious effort would 
probably soon cause the removal of such pupils, who would be almost 
sure to complain, and would as surely be believed; for parents who 
spoil their children, are, most unfortunately, often found to confide 
in their veracity just in proportion as they should distrust it. But 
should the teacher's efforts to reform, fail to produce 
misrepresentations to the parents, they would usually be met by some 
such remonstrance as the following:—My father and mother never used to 
care about such things, and why should _you_? What right have _you_ to 
condemn and forbid that which _they_ suffered to pass unnoticed, and 
therefore, probably approved? Is the prospect any better, when there 
is no chance of appeal from the tutor's authority, nor of improper 
interference from such parents or guardians as have neither sense nor 
experience to know what is best for the children? It certainly _ought 
to be_, provided the instructers were well qualified for their 
offices. But alas! _they too_ are often equally unfit, either from 
temper, ignorance, or subservience to the prevalent follies, 
prejudices, or culpable practices of the time present. If those whom 
it seems their interest to please, happen to be wrong-headed—unsettled 
in _their_ principles, and vicious in _their_ conduct, these suppliant 
teachers permit all _their_ abstract notions of right to vanish into 
thin air, and will frequently abandon, not only their modes of 
teaching, but the matters to be taught, although confident of their 
great importance, that they may keep in favor with such really 
worthless patrons. It may be urged, at least, in mitigation of this, 
as well as several other faults of teachers, that they have to act 
both a difficult and most arduous part; for they have many wills, 
opinions, and principles besides their own to consult; many pernicious 
whims and wayward caprices to encounter; numerous prejudices to 
overcome; and not a few practices to oppose, which have either the 
parental sanction openly avowed in their favor, or that silent 
acquiescence in them, on which most children rely with equal 
confidence. Possessing little more than a mere nominal authority, and 
having always much work expected from them—such, for example, as 
making models of good conduct and literary acquirement out of all 
kinds of children—not only the well trained, but those who have been 
immeasurably petted and indulged—not only the talented, but the 
stupid—teachers are driven to the expedient of taking what generally 
appears to them “the shortest cut.” This is, if possible, to produce 
among their pupils, that anxious struggle for pre-eminence and victory 
over each other in scholarship, which can neither be excited nor kept 
alive without calling into action some of the worst passions of the 
human heart. But such struggle being recommended by the imposing 
misnomer of “noble, generous {616} emulation,” passes without 
examination into its moral tendencies, and is almost every where 
resorted to, as the only effectual means to secure diligence, ardor, 
and perseverance in the pursuit of scholastic knowledge. To fulfil, 
therefore, the unreasonable expectation of such persons as seem to 
calculate on a child's education being finished with almost as great 
despatch as a dexterous cooper sets up and turns off his flour 
barrels—as well as to save themselves trouble, seems to be the chief, 
if not the only reason why teachers have so generally cultivated the 
principle of emulation in their schools, as a species of 
“king-cure-all.” It is a poor excuse however, for instilling into the 
youthful mind a poison which rarely fails to baffle all the future 
efforts of moralists and divines who attempt its extirpation. That it 
is entirely unnecessary, has been again and again demonstrated by some 
of the most eminent writers, and most successful teachers who have 
ever lived. All who are concerned in the business of education should 
make common cause against this fell destroyer of the soundest 
principles of instruction; and he or they who could succeed in its 
utter extinction, would deserve the united blessings of every parent 
and child in the United States.

The following very striking remarks, from “A practical view of 
Christian Education in its earliest stages,” by T. Babington, member 
of the British Parliament, are so apposite to my present purpose, that 
I cannot forbear to quote them. In speaking of the father's duty, this 
admirable writer says—“He must hold out examples to his child in such 
a way as _not to excite emulation_. To imitate an example is one 
thing: to rival any person, and endeavor to obtain a superiority over 
him, is another. It is very true, as is maintained by the defenders of 
emulation, that it is impossible to make progress towards excellence 
without outstripping others. But surely there is a great difference 
between the attainment of a superiority over others, being a mere 
consequence of exertions arising from other motives, and a zeal to 
attain this object, being itself a motive for exertion. Every one must 
see that the effects produced on the mind in the two cases will be 
extremely dissimilar. Emulation is a desire of surpassing others, for 
the sake of superiority, and is a very powerful motive to exertion. As 
such, it is employed in most public schools; but in none, I believe, 
ancient or modern, has it been so fully and systematically brought 
into action, as in the schools of Dr. Bell and Mr. Lancaster. Whatever 
may be the merits of the schools of either of these gentlemen in other 
respects, (a question which it is unnecessary to enter,) in _this_ 
they appear to me to commit such an offence against christian morals, 
that no merits could atone for it. I cannot but think emulation an 
unhallowed principle of action, as scarcely, if at all, to be 
disjoined from jealousy and envy, from pride and 
contention—incompatible with loving our neighbor as ourselves—and a 
principle of such potency, as to be likely to engross the mind, and 
turn it habitually and violently from the motives which it should be 
the great business of education to cherish and render 
predominant—namely, a sense of duty, and gratitude, and love to God.” 
Instead of enlarging on this subject, I beg leave to refer to Mr. 
Gisborne's remarks upon it, in his “Duties of Women.” “If emulation 
(says he) is an unhallowed motive, it cannot innocently be employed, 
whatever good effects may be expected from it. _We must not do evil 
that good may come._ But if any christian should deem it not 
absolutely unhallowed, few will deny, I think, that it is questionable 
and dangerous. Even then, in this more favorable view of emulation, 
ought it to be used, unless it can be shown to be necessary for the 
infusion of vigor into the youthful mind, and for securing a 
respectable progress in literature? I can say, from experience, that 
it _is not necessary_ for the attainment of those ends. In a numerous 
family with which I am well acquainted, emulation has been carefully 
and successfully excluded; and yet the acquirements of the different 
children have been very satisfactory. I can bear the same testimony 
with respect to a large Sunday School with which I have been connected 
for many years. I have often heard of _virtuous_ emulation—but can 
emulation ever be so characterized in a christian sense? Whether it 
may in that loose sense of virtue which those adopt who take the 
worldly principle of honor for their rule, I will not stop to inquire.

“_But it is not sufficient not to excite and employ emulation on plan 
and system, as a stimulus in education—great care ought to be taken to 
exclude it._ And great care will be necessary, for it will be 
continually ready to show itself; and if not checked, it will soon 
attain strength, strike its roots deep in the heart, and produce 
bitter fruits, which, in the eyes of a christian, will be 
ill-compensated by the extraordinary vigor and energy it will give to 
scholastic studies. When examples are held out for imitation, (a very 
different thing, be it remembered, from emulation,) or _as warnings_, 
the child must be made sensible that its state in the sight of God is 
rendered neither better nor worse by the virtues or the faults of 
others, except so far as they may have influenced, or may have failed 
to influence, its own conduct—that it ought to love its neighbor as 
itself, and to rejoice in every advance made by another in what is 
good, and to lament over all his faults and defects, without one 
selfish thought being suffered to check the joy or the concern—that it 
ought therefore to wish all its companions all success in their common 
studies, with the same sincerity with which it wishes its own 
success—and to be affected by their faults and failures in the same 
manner it would be by its own. It should be made sensible, in 
proportion as it may give way to feelings the reverse of these, that 
its ‘eye will be evil because others are good’—and it will act in 
opposition to the injunction, ‘mind not every one his own things, but 
every one also the things of others,’ and to a whole host of 
Scriptural precepts and examples. These things must be inculcated, not 
by lectures in general terms, but by applying such views to all the 
little incidents which call for them as they successively arise. The 
child must also be made sensible, how much better it is for himself 
that his companions should be eminent for laudable attainments and 
good qualities; for that, in proportion to their excellences in these 
respects, they will be useful and estimable companions, and ought to 
be objects of his affection. All little boasts of having done better 
than this or that brother or sister, and every disposition to 
disappointment when _they_ succeed best, should be most carefully 
checked, and the lesson of ‘rejoicing with them that do rejoice, and 
of weeping with them that weep,’ must be very diligently inculcated.”

{617} To these authorities of Babington and Gisborne, I believe might 
be added that of every writer of any eminence on the subject of 
education, from the first who denounced emulation as an unchristian 
and most pernicious principle of action, to the most distinguished of 
our own times. Yet, strange to say, it continues to be made the 
master-wheel of the whole machinery of instruction in almost all the 
schools of the United States. Very few exceptions can any where be 
found. The deleterious nostrum is administered far more extensively 
than any quack medicine ever yet invented—nay, than all of them put 
together; and common sense and christian morality interpose their 
warning cries in vain. Parents, teachers, and scholars are all playing 
into each others hands, (if I may so express myself,) to perpetuate 
this fatal quackery; but the sin lies principally at the doors of the 
first. _They_ influence and direct, mediately or immediately, the 
whole system of education; and if _they_ will not commence the 
Herculean work of reformation, it must remain an utterly hopeless 
undertaking, since none else have either the authority or the power to 
make it. Self-amendment therefore in _them_, must necessarily precede 
amendment in others. But how is _this_ to be brought about, when the 
leaders themselves, or rather those who should be so, in this vital 
work, are just as blind generally to their own faults, as so many 
insane persons; while the few who can see them, have not enough moral 
courage even to attempt their extirpation. The great popularity of 
emulation is easily explained: it saves parents the difficulty and 
trouble of explaining and enforcing the duty, demonstrating the 
advantages, and portraying the pleasures of literary, scientific, and 
moral acquirements; for teachers also, it is the same labor-saving 
process; while it imparts to the pupils themselves a stimulus to 
mental effort, similar to that which alcohol produces on bodily 
exertion—a stimulus that excites feeling, while it deadens judgment, 
and irresistibly transforms benevolence into the most unqualified 
selfishness. And thus it is, that instead of genuine christian 
morality and true religion being made the only basis of all education, 
a spurious principle of most pernicious tendency, fatal alike to both, 
is substituted for them. _Such a principle is emulation_, however 
sophistry may disguise, or our own bad passions recommend it. The 
victory for which it constantly goads us to struggle, _must be 
obtained_, cost what it may to the peace, the fame, or the happiness 
of others.

It may perhaps be objected, that if the moral and religious 
instruction of children were as much and as closely attended to as I 
seem to require, no time would be left for any thing else; and 
consequently, that on the principles here recommended, the mind would 
soon be miserably contracted by bigotry and fanaticism. Very far 
should I be, even if I had the privilege, from restraining the powers 
of the understanding, or limiting their exercise only to moral and 
religious subjects; although these, if prosecuted to their full 
extent, embrace quite enough for man's happiness in both worlds. No, 
God forbid; let these powers be carried to their highest point of 
attainable perfection—let them be most assiduously, most unceasingly 
cultivated to the latest period of human life, for such is the divine 
will of Him who bestowed them all. But I would invariably have it done 
in perfect accordance _with His will_, and solely for the promotion of 
human happiness—our own, of course, as well as that of others. _It 
never should be done_, for the wretchedly selfish, contemptible 
purpose of surpassing each other, and obtaining the applause of beings 
equally frail, imperfect, and sinful with ourselves.—Shall I be asked, 
if I would exclude the love of praise from human motives? Assuredly I 
would, if it cannot be used without being made a paramount principle. 
For however pure it may appear, at first, there is always so much 
impurity mixed with it, especially when it results in active 
emulation, that almost all who are nurtured upon such diet, soon learn 
to feed upon the garbage of indiscriminate applause, when they cannot 
procure the nicer dishes of this species of mental aliment. The taste 
for it is perpetually becoming more and more depraved by 
indulgence—whereas the love of God, and of wisdom and virtue as _his_ 
requirements, can never run to excess, nor can ever operate in any 
other way than to enrich, improve, and exalt the soul for all the 
great purposes, both temporal and eternal, to which it was originally 
destined. Shall we be told that the first motive is so much easier to 
inculcate than the last, as to produce a necessity for resorting to 
it? I shall continue to deny the fact until the experiment can fairly 
be made. This has never yet been done in a sufficient number either of 
families or schools, to furnish the necessary proof, to say nothing of 
the utter incompatibility of the two kinds of motive as controlling 
principles of conduct. Let us endeavor to illustrate this by numbers. 
If a hundred children under the process of education, are constantly 
urged on in their course by the stimulants of emulation and ambition, 
for one who is taught that these are not proper motives of action, 
(and I believe the proportion is still greater,) ought we to wonder 
that ninety-nine should be found _both emulous and ambitious_—should 
be found preferring the _lesser_ to the _greater_ good? Ought we to 
feel any surprise if human praise, present, palpable, and certain—held 
up too as the most desirable thing _in this world_, should be much 
more highly esteemed, than the remote, and with very many, the 
doubtful prospect of gaining something, they know not what, in a world 
to come—by acting as if human praise, however delightful, should _not 
be_ the mainspring of our conduct in the present life? Yet where shall 
we turn our eyes or ears, and not find it so? Where shall we search 
without finding this cancer shooting its fatal roots into the very 
centre even of the youngest hearts? The process begins with the 
nursery slang of—“dear, sweet, precious little darling!—ar'n't you the 
most beautifullest, the best, the smartest little child in the whole 
world? and sha'n't you be far before them all?” This inordinate, 
immeasurable excitation is continued in all possible forms and 
modifications, until the well grown son or daughter is transferred to 
some distant school with the valedictory dose of—“Farewell, my dearest 
child—be sure never to let any of your schoolmates get before you in 
your studies; you must outdo them all, or you will disgrace yourself 
and family.” With such food, thus seasoned by nurses, parents, 
teachers, companions and all, from the first dawnings of intellect to 
its maturity, when the youth of our country issue forth from their 
schools, academies, and colleges, “with all their blushing honors 
thick upon them,” where will the young brain be found that will not be 
turned with pride, vanity, and ambition? Where will {618} be the young 
lady whose heart will not sicken at the thought of a rival in beauty 
or accomplishments?—where the young gentleman who would not be ready, 
should he deem it necessary, to assert his imaginary supremacy with 
sword and pistol, against all who might appear likely to cross his 
path, or mount the ladder of worldly honors and distinctions faster 
than he could? The driest tinder will not sooner blaze from contact 
with a lighted match, than will the passions of all young men, thus 
educated, take fire, and consume both others and themselves, if their 
selfish views of any kind are likely to be disappointed by conflicting 
claims to selfish gratifications. Can any persons, in their senses, 
believe it will be enough to save their sons and daughters from pride, 
vanity, and ambition, occasionally to tell them, “take care, my good 
children, you must not be either proud, vain, or ambitious,” although 
they themselves are continually sowing the seed of these vices, and 
using all suitable means to make them vegetate and ripen. Would it not 
be stark madness in parents to expect that their sons should obey 
their injunctions to sobriety, if they placed them under continual 
temptations to get drunk; or, that their daughters could long remain 
innocent, if exposed constantly to all the allurements of vice in its 
most seductive forms? Yet equally mad are all parents who first 
subject their children to all the corrupting influences of merely 
worldly morals, and then expect from them such uniform examples of 
virtuous conduct as can flow from no other imaginable source but the 
morality and religion of the Gospel of Christ Jesus himself. For the 
immoral propensities and vices of children, there is no other radical 
cure under heaven than christianity; but alas! in many, even of the 
most popular schools in the United States, both christian morals and 
the christian religion, if not actually a species of contraband, are 
yet _untaught_ as an essential part of the regular scholastic course.

Human happiness being acknowledged on all hands to be the only 
legitimate object of all education—happiness both here and 
hereafter—it has always seemed to me passing strange, that we should 
act in regard to the vegetable kingdom, where mere abundant 
fructification is the only object, on much more rational principles 
than we do in relation to that to which we ourselves belong. For 
example, from _the tops_ of such plants as man has subjected to his 
culture, we never expect even _leaves_, still less _fruit_, until we 
have first taken good care to give _their roots_ all the appliances 
which we believe necessary and proper. But a course nearly opposite is 
generally pursued with the human subject. We go to work most 
laboriously upon the _head_, before we so much as think of the 
_heart_, which may well be called the root of all our actions. 
Teachers themselves too frequently take it for granted, that every 
thing which ought to be done in this behalf has already been done at 
home, and is therefore no part of _their_ business. But the deplorable 
fact is, that in very many cases, nothing, or worse than nothing, has 
there been done. In every such instance, the all-essential duty, 
however often neglected, of teachers, is to exert every faculty they 
possess for remedying so deadly an evil, since no great and permanent 
good can ever be imparted to the pupil without it. But _is this done 
generally_, or even in many instances? To prove that _it has not been 
done_, an appeal has been made to the experience of all who have well 
examined this subject, and I challenge a denial. It has been affirmed 
that our schools in general, from the lowest to the highest, do not 
sufficiently attend to the inculcation of moral and religious 
principles—do not make them, as it were, the foundation, cement, and 
finishing of all the various materials which contribute to form the 
superstructure called _Education_. The charge is certainly a very 
serious one; but fortunately, if it be unjust, the difficulty of 
disproving it will not be very great. It may be done, first, by the 
various public notices of what the conductors of our schools generally 
promise to do for those confided to their care; and second, by an 
exposition, fully and faithfully made, how far and in what manner 
these promises are fulfilled. Shall we find, in a majority of these 
notices, any thing more than a brief, general declaration, “to attend 
strictly to the manners and morals of the pupils?” If we can, then are 
they acquitted so far as _public pledges_ can go. Have we yet been 
informed, that in a majority of these schools a regular and constant 
course of moral instruction is given, and that religious principle, 
not only in the abstract, but in practice, is earnestly and most 
assiduously inculcated by every means in the power of the teachers? 
Then ought they to be acquitted also, on the score of _performance_. 
But let the appeal be made to these two tests when it may, and the 
melancholy truth of my assertion will flash conviction on the most 
incredulous minds. We shall find very many schools where languages, 
sciences, arts and accomplishments are well taught; while few, very 
few will be discovered, in which _that alone_ which makes all these 
things of any permanent value, is taught _at all_, or taught in such a 
manner as to enable young people correctly to discriminate between the 
various species of knowledge, and to assign to each its just measure 
of real, intrinsic worth. For proof of this assertion, I would ask 
what body of trustees or visitors (call them what you please,) of our 
schools, do we ever hear of, making inquiries into any thing more than 
the literary qualifications and decent characters of those who either 
have, or offer to take charge of them? Would this be the case?—could 
it possibly happen, if religious and moral instruction held the rank 
which it ought to do, in their estimates of the comparative value of 
the matters to be taught? If the christian code of morals, the 
christian system of faith, have any advantage whatever over the faith 
and practice of those who think that they can do very well _without_ 
christianity, or at least with a mere nominal belief in it, _ought 
such inquiries ever to be neglected?_—nay, should it not be considered 
an imperative duty always to make them? How many of our schools of any 
kind do we hear of, wherein even the formality of daily prayers, and 
regular attendance at places of public worship, are either insisted 
upon or recommended? Is this done in a majority of them? If not, how 
can the neglect be explained, but on the ground of disbelief in the 
duty and utility of these practices? And yet we are said to live _in a 
christian community!_ and much offence, I presume, would be taken, 
were any person to address the public as if the contrary were the 
fact. But as trees must be judged by their _fruit_—not by their 
_names_, so must communities as well as individuals be characterized, 
rather by their practices than their professions.

There is still another and far stronger proof of our {619} assertion, 
that moral and religious instruction is much and very generally 
neglected in our schools. Let any one who chooses to make the 
experiment, take, indiscriminately, any number of young persons, of 
both sexes, who have just left school, and ask them—“are you members 
of any particular christian church? If you are not, have you formed 
any distinct, settled religious opinions in consequence of the course 
of religious instruction received from your teachers? Has any regular, 
earnest, unremitting effort been made to instil into your minds the 
general principles of christianity?” I verily believe that the 
multitude answering in the negative would shock any one who had the 
least particle of true religion in him. To this opinion I have been 
led, not by vague conjecture, but by much inquiry and observation.

It may perhaps be urged, that even theological schools—schools 
exclusively devoted to moral and religious instruction, sometimes turn 
out infidels, hypocrites, and profligates upon society. I admit the 
fact, but deny that any inference can fairly be drawn from it which 
could, in the slightest degree, invalidate the assertion that moral 
and religious instruction should ever be made the basis of all 
education. But one method indeed, occurs to me, by which this vital 
truth (as I firmly believe it to be) could be rendered even doubtful. 
It would be fairly to compare, if practicable, the numbers of 
worthless young persons from all our schools of every kind. Then, if 
the proportion from theological institutions was greater than from any 
other, or even should it prove as great, the peculiar kind of 
instruction there given might well be deemed worthless. But if this 
proportion really be smaller, almost beyond calculation smaller, as I 
verily believe it will be found, it must be as clear as a cloudless 
sun that the religious and moral principles taught in theological 
schools, are infinitely more available in making good and virtuous 
men, than all the other principles put together which are taught in 
other schools, and are consequently greatly superior to them, even 
_for this world's use_. Shall I be asked by the scoffers at religion, 
if I would educate all our boys for parsons? I will reply by another 
question—will not the scoffers themselves be willing to educate their 
children for heaven, if there _be such a place_? If there _be not_, 
what could they possibly lose, even in the present life, by having 
them taught to believe that truth, justice, mercy, and charity in its 
broadest sense, with all other good qualities that exalt man to his 
highest state of moral and intellectual excellence, have no other sure 
foundation, no other permanent sanction, but christianity? As a mere 
matter of worldly calculation, and upon the supposition that there is 
error, or at least _the risk of it_ on both sides, any rational man 
would think that the point should be settled forever, even by so 
simple an argument as the one used by Crambé with his master Martinus 
Scriblerus, when invited to join a society of free-thinkers. Crambé's 
advice was, “by no means to enter into their society unless they would 
give him sufficient security to bear him harmless from any thing that 
might happen after this life.” This is a kind of calculation which 
must always have some weight even with the most reckless, hardened 
sinner. As here presented in the identical words of Dean Swift, it may 
possibly have the appearance to some, of unbecoming levity on so 
momentous a subject. But I trust not, as nothing is more remote from 
my own intentions. No matter which can possibly engage our attention, 
can bear the smallest comparison with this in importance; and in this 
respect, the reformation of our schools throughout the country, is a 
subject of the deepest—the most vital interest. In many, very many of 
them, no religious instruction whatever is given; nor indeed, is there 
any regular, systematic course of moral study pursued as the most 
essential of the whole course; but (as I have before remarked) 
languages and sciences—sciences and languages, alternated in all 
imaginable modes and forms, constitute nearly the whole process of 
education for our sons; while our daughters, to compensate for their 
not being allowed to go quite so deep into such matters, have their 
feet and fingers taught to execute many truly marvellous tricks—and 
moreover, are instructed in the grand art of getting husbands by 
“dress and address,” as the quintessence of female education.

The sum and substance of all my remarks on this, as on former 
occasions, will prove, I hope, that many great and radical obstacles 
exist to the adoption and practice of a correct system of education, 
which are far from being necessary evils, although the various 
mischiefs done by them may be considered as working most fatally on 
the very vitals of society. Many of these obstacles have been, most 
justly, as I believe, ascribed to parents—many to teachers, numerous 
others to scholars, and not a few to the public in general. Whether 
these last will find any parents willing to acknowledge them, is more 
than I can tell. But believing that their existence cannot be 
denied—for they are seen and deeply felt every where—the conclusions 
to be drawn from such facts remain in their full force.

These are, that the teaching of _the heart_ must always precede that 
of _the head_; that _right motives_ must be inspired before _good 
conduct_ can be expected, and that the Logadian plan of building 
houses from the tops downwards, must not be so closely imitated in 
rearing our edifices of education, if we wish them to answer any other 
than a very temporary and comparatively contemptible purpose. In other 
words, we must take care always to commence with _the foundations_, 
and have _them_ exactly as they should be, or the superstructures can 
never be either useful or durable to the extent they might be made. 
These foundations are—_not the alphabet_, nor _the arithmetical 
characters_, nor _grammars_, nor _dictionaries_, nor _foreign 
languages_, nor _sciences_—_but the love of God and man to be 
displayed in overt acts rather than by empty professions, and to 
govern, in fact, the whole life._ To make our entire work 
indestructible _hereafter_, as well as estimable in the highest degree 
_here_, the main pillars, as well as the corner stones and whole 
groundwork must be—aye, _must necessarily, absolutely, unconditionally 
be_, such as will pass inspection in the next life, as well as in the 
present. This brings us back to what has heretofore been so much and 
so earnestly insisted upon—the unqualified, the sacred obligation of 
all who have any thing to do, from first to last, with educating the 
youth of our country, to make, as far as practicable, not only _their 
motives_, but _the ultimate ends_ of their whole course of study, such 
as may bear examination at the last great and awful day of our final 
account before the Almighty Judge of heaven and earth. This most 
momentous truth of a final judgment in {620} another state of 
existence, for all “our deeds done in the body,” instead of being the 
first thing taught to our children as soon as their minds are capable 
of receiving truth at all, is generally left to find its way into them 
as it may—to be forced upon them in after life, as it rarely fails to 
be, by the terrors, the remorse of a guilty conscience, reproaching 
them for the commission of deeds against which early moral and 
religious instruction might effectually have guarded them. Yes, my 
friends, if there be any truth in God's word, such instruction _would 
guard_—_would save them_ from these terrors and this remorse. What 
awful responsibility then attaches to all those who neglect to give 
it! What an appalling consideration should it be, that thousands upon 
thousands of our youth are taught—so far as parental example _can 
teach_, to smother all thoughts of a final judgment in feasting; to 
drown them in intoxication; to forget them in the long and deadly 
sleep of a bestial debauch; or to banish them from the heart by the 
various pursuits of vanity, pride, avarice and ambition! Yet most of 
these very parents themselves well know, that all such sensualities 
and indulgences together are utterly unavailing always, to ward off 
the dark, solemn hour of serious reflection and agonizing remorse, 
which _will_ come, soon or late, to all offenders against the laws of 
God. Then rushes on the startling remembrance of all their misspent 
hours—their vicious pursuits—their criminal deeds, to haunt their 
guilty imaginations with ceaseless terrors, and to leave them no rest 
but in the temporary oblivion procured by a repetition of some long 
practised debauchery or other. Such must inevitably be the fate, in a 
greater or less degree, of all who act as if no future accountability 
attached to them for present conduct; unless indeed, their profligacy 
has been so great, so incessant, as to have silenced entirely “the 
still, small voice of conscience;” and _then_, the sooner death sweeps 
them from the face of the earth the better—certainly for society, and 
none the worse probably for themselves. But what, my dear friends, 
does all this prove? Is it not demonstration strong as proof from holy 
writ, that religious and moral principle should invariably be made the 
basis of _all education_, and that nothing which is called education 
should be suffered to be carried on, unless in close connection with, 
and subordination to this all-absorbing truth of final and eternal 
punishment for sin—of final and eternal happiness for a life of 
holiness and virtue in the present world?

If this reasoning be just, why is it that a course of moral and 
religious instruction is either entirely omitted, or so little 
regarded in nearly all our schools, except such as are theological? 
Could it possibly be the case, if religious and moral principles were 
deemed just as essential among all orders of men, as in the clerical 
order? Yet if these principles be equally necessary to all, why is a 
matter so highly important—so indispensable to the well being and 
happiness of society—left in a great measure, to chance? Why are young 
persons at school, suffered to infer from the silence of their 
instructers, that no particular attention to this subject need be 
given, unless by those who design to become professional teachers of 
religion? Is it denied, even by infidels, that the principles and 
motives of conduct, so far as they can possibly be imparted by human 
means, are matters of infinitely more importance among the things to 
be taught, than any others which can be imagined under the name of 
knowledge? So far then, both believers and unbelievers agree. Both 
concur in the necessity of first instructing every child in that 
system of ethics which is to serve them through life as a rule of 
action; because all other information without this must be stock that 
they know not how to apply. Yet, neither infidels nor christians 
generally, if at all, give this vital instruction in any such manner, 
as to prove to their children, that they estimate it very far above 
all other, in the scale of real value. The necessity of imparting it 
being equally admitted by the adherents of the worldly system of 
morals, and by the believers in that system left to us by our blessed 
Saviour himself, as the only sure guide to happiness, either here or 
hereafter, neither party can find any justification for their most 
shameful neglect. By this, they leave those whom it is their sacred 
duty to guide, without either chart or compass to steer their course 
through all the difficulties and dangers of life. Some religious 
parents and teachers there are, who express such a mortal dread of 
what they please to call _sectarianism_, that they will not venture to 
teach even the great fundamental truths of religion, in which all 
christians, at least, entirely agree; and thus, religious instruction 
of every kind is excluded from the course of these marvellously 
scrupulous persons. Others again, who, without believing one word of 
the Holy Scriptures, are yet willing, as a matter of prudence, to 
treat both them and their doctrines with external respect—say, that 
_they_ teach nothing which is _contrary_ to christian morality and 
religion. Although it would be easy to prove that silence in such a 
cause is little, if any better than open hostility, I will meet the 
assertion in a more direct way, by denying its truth. The fact is, 
that in every school in the United States, wherein moral and religious 
instruction is neglected, many things are taught which _are contrary_ 
to the principles of christianity. To prove this, look at the 
direction given to the conduct of the pupils—the motives by which they 
are actuated, and the objects at which they are taught to aim. Are not 
these _all worldly_? Are not many of them _absolutely forbid_ by the 
plainest precepts of christianity? And what more need be asked to 
demonstrate the truth of my accusation? Numerous exemplifications have 
already been given of the false morality, and consequently false 
religion imbibed, if not actually taught, both under the parental 
roof, and in our schools. In fact, the instances are so abundant, that 
I have scarcely ever attempted to trace the immoral and irreligious 
opinions of any persons whatever to their primitive source, without 
discovering that these opinions were derived chiefly from the precepts 
and examples of their early instructers. Motives being the source of 
all actions, and principles their regulators, both _must be made_ what 
they _ought to be_, or the actions themselves can never be morally 
good: yet most teachers appear to think that the principles and 
motives of their pupils are matters with which they have little or no 
concern. If their heads be filled with what is called scholastic 
learning—if they can be made punctually to obey scholastic rules, the 
instructers generally deem their part of the business of teaching 
accomplished, and the hearts of their scholars are left to form 
themselves. But what, in reality, can avail all the scholastic 
learning in the world, unless the possessors are first inspired {621} 
with the only true and proper motive for acquiring it, at the same 
time that they are taught its only justifiable use? This motive is 
social, philanthropic, heavenly; it is the love of God and his 
creatures. It impels to unceasing beneficence on earth, and leads us 
to look to heaven for our final reward. But the motives encouraged at 
least, if not openly taught in a great majority of schools, as well as 
by most parents, are essentially selfish and exclusive: for their 
objects are personal fame and personal aggrandizement, to be gained at 
any expense whatever, of mortification and suffering to others, which 
successful rivalry can inflict, or eager, insatiate competition can 
procure. Such motives and such morality interpose no effectual bar to 
the indulgence of any strong passion which happens to seize upon the 
individual governed by them, provided only such indulgence be openly 
tolerated by fashion, or silently permitted. For example, they never 
prevent our sons from drunkenness, gambling, or blowing out each 
other's brains for the most trivial causes imaginable, while they 
almost encourage, by failing to mark with utter reprobation, a species 
of profligacy too revolting to be mentioned. In regard to our 
daughters, the prevalent system of instruction cherishes a passion for 
dress—for public amusements of all kinds in which females are 
permitted to join—for company keeping—for general admiration—which 
unfits them for domestic life, and leaves their hearts a prey to all 
the tormenting distractions of envy, jealousy, and disappointed pride 
and vanity. Against these vices so destructive to the happiness of 
both sexes, I know of no regular course whatever of religious and 
moral instruction in our schools generally, especially of the 
preparatory kind. Recitations in languages, and elementary books of 
science, with a little writing and cyphering, comprise the sum total 
of the matters taught; and whether the children are Mohammedans, 
heathens, infidels or christians, is an affair which seems to be 
thought not properly cognizable by teachers at all. Here let me once 
more repeat, that I never would make, even had I the power, any 
alteration whatever in our systems of instruction, which would tend, 
in the slightest degree, to prevent the youth of our country from 
reaching the highest attainable excellence in all the justifiable 
pursuits of life. But I would have it thoroughly and deeply impressed 
on their hearts, under all circumstances—at every period of their 
pupilage, and at all times, _that truly moral conduct resulting from 
genuine religious principles, is “the one thing needful,” first and 
far above all, both for time and eternity_. Nothing should ever be 
taught in _any_ school, high or low, great or small, but in complete 
subordination to this most momentous, most vital truth: nor should any 
teacher whatever be suffered to neglect making _this_ the chief object 
of pursuit for every scholar under his or her care.

This plan alone, with God's blessing to aid it, can ever achieve the 
so much needed scholastic reforms and amendments in the modes and 
general scope of parental instruction. This alone can ever materially 
diminish that enormous mass of vice and crime, with all their 
soul-sickening consequences, which renders this world a scene of such 
constant, indescribable wretchedness in so many of its aspects. And 
who are _they_, my friends, that make it so? Who are the poor, 
forlorn, outcast wretches, that have brought disgrace upon their sex, 
shame on their families, and endless woe upon themselves? Are they 
not, in almost every case, the miserable victims of infidel opinions 
imbibed in early youth, under parents and teachers who have incurred 
the deep and deadly guilt of neglecting to take care of their precious 
souls, until the critical hours for correcting their evil propensities 
had forever passed away? Who compose that motley, most pitiable group 
of both sexes, and of almost all ages, with which our jails and 
penitentiaries are filled? Who are the shedders of their brother's 
blood? Who the robbers and murderers for gold, for revenge, for lust? 
Who the hellish destroyers of female honor, purity and peace—the 
perpetrators of crimes that carry ruin, misery and death into the 
peaceful abodes of domestic life, tearing asunder the nearest and 
dearest ties of our existence, and outraging alike all laws, both 
human and divine? Are they persons who have been morally and 
religiously educated from infancy, or such as have been most 
shamefully, most guiltily neglected in these all important 
respects—such as have hardly so much as heard of any other bonds—any 
other fetters to restrain their criminal passions—to prevent their 
atrocious deeds, than the gossamer filaments of a mere worldly 
morality? Alas! my friends, the bare contemplation of such 
heart-rending results, from the neglect or perversion of education, is 
enough to make every mother of an infant yet guiltless of actual sin, 
press the little innocent still closer to her bosom than she would do 
from the ordinary impulse of maternal love, in shuddering apprehension 
of what may be its future fate. It is enough to make every father 
tremble in considering the future destiny of his child, lest some 
neglect of duty, some false instruction, some vicious example on his 
part, should bring this child of his heart to misery and destruction. 
Will _you_ then, my dear hearers, do nothing to prevent such 
consummation, either as regards your own offspring or that of others? 
Can _you_, who have so much power—so deep an interest too in this 
momentous matter—can _you_ deliberately and seriously contemplate 
these crying evils, this enormous aggregate of human guilt and woe, 
without ascribing it principally to our defective systems of 
education, and without some secret dread lest _you yourselves 
individually_ may have, in some way or other, either directly or 
indirectly, contributed to augment it? Will you not add to your power 
of establishing, patronizing and regulating schools, the still more 
effectual influence of _your example_ in the early instruction of your 
children, to make education what it should be, in all its branches? 
Can there be any thing that concerns us in the present life—is there 
any thing in the whole compass of thought, which should excite half 
such deep, heart-felt, all absorbing anxiety, as to remove this deadly 
curse of ignorance and vice from our land and nation? That it _is 
removable_—at least in a degree beyond all calculation, greater than 
we can judge from beholding its present widely spread mischief, none 
can doubt who believe in the scripture assurance, that if we train up 
our children in the way they shall go, they will not depart from it; 
or who confide in the extent to which, by the blessing of God, all 
human beings may be improved, both in knowledge and virtue, by means 
of education. Not only our own happiness, but that of our children and 
children's children, to the latest generation, are at stake; and it 
depends upon _you_, my friends, _you_, who, in full {622} proportion 
to your numbers, can direct and control the education of the present 
race, whether this happiness shall be increased or destroyed to a 
degree which it has never yet reached. Upon _your_ precepts and 
examples, while your children are under your own care, and upon _your_ 
choice of preceptors, when you confide them to the care of others, it 
depends—whether these children shall prove curses or blessings to 
themselves, to their parents, and to their country. Let _all our 
resources then_, both mental and physical—_all_ our available means, 
both of talent and wealth, be applied to the requisite extent, for the 
attainment of so glorious a purpose. The individuals who achieve it—if 
it ever is to be achieved, will merit the highest honors—the richest 
rewards that this world can bestow, and will enjoy all the happiness 
promised in the next, to the greatest benefactors of the human race.

And now, my friends, in bidding you farewell, permit me freely, but 
respectfully, to address my few concluding remarks still more 
personally to yourselves. _Ye parents_, who are conscious of faults 
that obstruct the education of your own offspring and are anxious to 
mend them—_ye_ who still have children to be instructed, and cherish 
that deep solicitude for their continual improvement in knowledge and 
virtue, which it is your most sacred duty to cherish—_ye teachers_, 
who justly estimate the nature and extent of the momentous trusts 
confided to your honor, and the fatal consequences of neglecting to 
fulfil them—_ye young men and maidens_, who are still under 
pupilage—behold, I beseech you, the moral mirror which I have held up 
to your view. Search it again and again, and if you discern therein 
any similitude to your own defects, let it not be seen in vain. Oh! 
suffer it not to pass away “like the morning cloud or the early dew,” 
but set _instantly_, _earnestly_, _perseveringly_, about the vital 
work of extirpation, as your only hope for happiness either here or 
hereafter. Learn to consider—nay, _never for a moment to forget_, that 
nothing called education can have a shadow of pretence to be 
pronounced complete, but that which has for its basis the Gospel of 
Christ as well as its divine morality—that to act on every occasion as 
_this_ directs, is true wisdom—and that to gain the power of doing so, 
you must cherish in your hearts, through all the vicissitudes of life, 
the same heavenly dispositions and sentiments which the pious Cowper 
has so feelingly expressed in the following admirable lines.

  _Thou_ art the source and centre of all minds,
   Their _only_ point of rest, _Eternal Word!_
   From _thee_ departing they are lost, and rove
   At random, without honor, hope, or peace.
   From _thee_ is all that soothes the life of man,
   His high endeavor and his glad success,
   His strength to suffer, and his will to serve.
   But oh! thou bounteous giver of all good,
  _Thou_ art of _all_ thy gifts—thyself the crown.
   Give what thou canst, _without thee_ we are poor,
   And _with thee_ rich, take what thou wilt away.




THE RAINBOW.


“The Rainbow,” by Campbell, “Triumphal Arch,” &c. is indeed a glorious 
piece, and worthy at once of the subject and the poet. Nor does it 
derogate much from his genius, though it does a little perhaps from 
his honesty, that he has borrowed (without acknowledgment) two or 
three of the finest thoughts and phrases in it from an older bard, a 
certain Henry Vaughan, who flourished about two centuries ago, and 
whose poems, says Montgomery, “amidst much harshness and obscurity, 
show gleams of rare excellence.” Thus these lines of Vaughan,

  How bright wert thou when Shem's admiring eye,
  Thy burning, flaming arch did first descry;
  When Zerah, Nahor, Haram, Abram, Lot,
  The youthful _world's gray fathers_, in one knot,
  Did, with intentive looks, watch every hour
  For thy new light, and trembled at each shower

evidently suggested that fine stanza of Campbell—

  When o'er the green undeluged earth
    Heaven's covenant thou didst shine,
  How came the _world's gray fathers_ forth
    To watch thy sacred sign.

But the verse which follows is an admirable addition of his own.

  And when its yellow lustre smiled,
    O'er mountains yet untrod,
  Each mother held aloft her child,
    To bless the bow of God.

This finishes the picture, and makes it perfect. And Vaughan's two 
first lines,

  Still young and fine, but what is still in view,
  We slight as old and soil'd, though _fresh_ and new,

together with his two last,

  Who looks upon thee from his glorious throne,
  And minds the covenant betwixt ALL and ONE,

obviously kindled Campbell's two closing stanzas—

  As _fresh_ in yon horizon dark,
    As _young_ thy beauties seem,
  As when the eagle from the ark
    First sported in thy beam.

  For faithful to its sacred page,
    Heaven still rebuilds thy span,
  Nor lets the type grow pale with age
    That first spoke peace to man.

A splendid improvement indeed! In short, Campbell's Rainbow (or the 
best part of it, from the fifth verse to the end,) is but a sort of 
_secondary_ of Vaughan's, though it is not in this case, as in nature, 
fainter, but _triumphantly_ brighter and more beautiful than the 
first.[1]

[Footnote 1: Perhaps the reader may like to see Vaughan's piece 
entire. Here it is.

THE RAINBOW.—_By Henry Vaughan._

  Still young and fine! but what is still in view
  We slight as old and soil'd, though fresh and new;
  How bright wert thou when Shem's admiring eye,
  Thy burning, flaming arch did first descry;
  When Zerah, Nahor, Haram, Abram, Lot,
  The youthful world's gray fathers, in one knot,
  Did, with intentive looks, watch every hour
  For thy new light, and trembled at each shower.
    When thou dost shine, darkness looks white and fair;
  Storms turn to music, clouds to smiles and air;
  Rain gently spends his honey-drops, and pours
  Balm on the cleft earth, milk on grass and flowers.
    Bright pledge of peace and sunshine! the sure tie
  Of thy Lord's hand, the object of his eye!
  When I behold thee, though _my_ light be dim,
  Distant and low, I can in _thine_ see Him,
  Who looks upon thee from his glorious throne,
  And minds the covenant betwixt _All_ and _One_.]


{623}


RIGHT OF INSTRUCTION.

Quare quoniam de re publica quærimus, hoc primum videamus quid sit id 
ipsum quod quærimus.

       *       *       *       *       *

Est igitur, inquit Africanus, res publica _res populi_; populus autem 
non omnis hominum coetus quoquo modo congregatus, sed coetus 
multitudinis juris consensu et utilitatis communione sociatus.

       *       *       *       *       *

Quare cum _penes unum_ est omnium summa rerum, _regem_ illum unum 
vocamus, et _regnum_ eius rei publicae statum.

       *       *       *       *       *

Itaque si Cyrus ille Perses _iustissimus fuit sapientissimusque rex_, 
tamen mihi populi res; ea enim est, ut dixi antea, publica; non maxime 
expetenda fuisse illa videtur, cum regeretur _unius nutu_. Ac modo si 
Massilienses nostri clientes per delectos et principes cives _summa 
iusticia_ reguntur, inest tamen in ea condicione populi _similitudo 
quædam servitutis_.

       *       *       *       *       *

Cur enim regem appellem Jovis optimi nomine hominem dominandi cupidum 
aut _imperii singularis_, populo oppresso dominantem, non _tyrannum_ 
potius?

_De Re Publica._


For the Literary Messenger to contain temperate articles upon general 
politics, and political economy, is in the humble opinion of the 
individual now writing, as manifestly proper, as it would be obviously 
the reverse for it to embark in the slightest degree in party strife. 
He was therefore decidedly pleased with the appearance of an article 
of the temper and tone of the letter in the last number upon the RIGHT 
OF INSTRUCTION. That article has so universally been attributed to the 
pen of the amiable and learned JUDGE HOPKINSON, that it would be 
affectation not to consider him as its author. This avowal, whilst it 
renders the boldness of an attempt at reply the more fearfully 
conspicuous, also renders more glaringly manifest the impropriety of 
suffering the gauntlet so gallantly thrown by so able and courteous a 
champion into the teeth of all Virginia's chivalry, to remain 
unaccepted. The fear that business, or inertness, or a belief that the 
question is settled, should prevent our distinguished men from 
entering the lists, and thus leave the impression that the cause of 
the Honorable Judge was deemed too righteous for our knights to risk 
the fate of the combat, has induced one little fitted for the 
controversy, with no little trepidation, to enter the lists. To drop a 
stale metaphor, I will venture to suggest a few plain reasons for 
thinking the argument of the Judge not entirely conclusive.

The Virginia doctrine of instructions is thus laid down by the Judge. 
“I understand that doctrine to be, that the instructions of a State 
Legislature to a Senator of the United States, are an authoritative 
lawful _command_, which he is bound implicitly to obey, and which he 
cannot disobey without a violation of his official duty as a Senator, 
imposing upon him the obligation to resign his place if he cannot, or 
will not, conform to the will of his Legislature.” There is but one 
fault to be found with this definition, which is the insertion of the 
word “_official_” instead of the word “_moral_.” We hold the 
obligation to obey instructions or resign to be a moral duty of the 
man, incident to the acceptance of the office, rather than the 
_official_ duty of the Senator. The latter duties are prescribed by 
the constitution, the former are established by general principles of 
political ethics. This distinction may seem to be rather nice than 
important, since the establishment of either would lead to the same 
practical result. But as we are now discussing the propriety of that 
result, it is important to know precisely upon what principles the 
right is based, lest we lose our cause by a mistake in terms. If we 
contended for the official duty of the Senator, we could look _only_ 
to the constitution for the establishment of the right, but contending 
for the moral duty as an honorable man and an honest politician, we 
may look to any source not incompatible with the provisions of that 
instrument. The learned Judge proceeds, after laying down his 
definition to state his objections. The doctrine appears to him “to be 
absolutely incompatible with the cardinal principles of our 
constitution, as a representative government; to break up the 
foundations which were intended to give it strength and stability, and 
to impart to it a consistent, uniform, and harmonious action; and 
virtually, to bring us back to a simple, turbulent democracy, the 
worst of all governments—or rather, no government at all.” We 
Virginians must be permitted to join issue with the Judge upon each of 
these conclusions, and I for one must confess that my mind is not 
satisfied either by the ingenuity or learning displayed by him. But as 
his reasons for his conclusions are developed in the progress of his 
argument, perhaps it will be better to unfold our objections to his 
conclusions whilst following his reasoning.

The Judge sustains his views in the first place, by combatting the 
arguments of some writer in the Richmond Enquirer, who had endeavored, 
it appears, to sustain the republican doctrine by the federal 
authority of MESSRS. KING, JAY and HAMILTON, and for this purpose 
quotes their speeches in the New York Convention, which adopted the 
federal constitution. The Judge also sustains his opinions upon 
general principles. He labored under the disadvantage of not having 
the debates of the New York Convention before him, and was therefore 
compelled to reason upon the isolated extracts quoted in the Enquirer, 
without examining the context of the speeches for modifications or 
explanations of the particular expressions quoted. The present writer 
having neither the debates in the New York Convention or the Enquirer 
before him, cannot enter into this branch of the subject. This he 
regrets, because, although the question is one which must be decided 
upon its merits, and not upon authority, yet to prove that the federal 
doctrines of the present day are contrary to those entertained by the 
founders of their own party, who were eminent and patriotic men, and 
largely concerned in the foundation of our government, would divest 
their doctrine of all the respect and sanctity which great names and 
great antiquity will sometimes give even to principles intrinsically 
wrong. The Judge then wisely endeavored to defend the federal 
patriarchs from our republican heresies, and made an effort to carry 
the war into Africa by showing, that even some of our republican 
fathers had repudiated our cherished doctrine. But has he succeeded in 
either? Without entering into that branch of the subject, we may be 
permitted to glance at his reasoning.


“Let us see. Mr. King is represented to have said, that ‘the Senators 
will have a _powerful check_ in those _who wish for their seats_.’ 
This is most true—and in fact it is to this struggle for place that we 
owe much of the zeal for doctrines calculated to create vacancies. Mr. 
King proceeds—‘And the State Legislatures, if they find their 
delegates erring, can and will _instruct them_. Will this be no 
check?’ The two checks proposed, in the same {624} sentence, and put 
upon the same footing, are the vigilance of those who want the places 
of the Senators, and the instructions which the State Legislatures can 
and will give to them. They are said to be, as they truly are, 
_powerful checks_, operating with a strong influence on the will and 
discretion of the Senator, but not as subjecting him, _as a matter of 
duty_, either to the reproaches of his rivals or the opinions of the 
Legislature. To do this, a check must be something more than powerful; 
it must be irresistible, or, at least, attended by some means of 
carrying it out to submission—some penalty or remedy for disobedience. 
I consider the term _instruct_, as here used, to mean no more than 
counsel, advise, recommend—because Mr. King does not intimate that any 
right or power is vested in the Legislature to compel obedience to 
their instructions, or to punish a refractory Senator as an official 
delinquent. It is left to his option to obey or not, which is 
altogether inconsistent with every idea of a _right to command_. Such 
a right is at once met and nullified by a right to refuse. They are 
equal and contrary rights.”


Here were two checks proposed by Mr. King to prevent misconduct in a 
Senator. The first was a continuing check, and would always operate 
upon his conduct, unless he was willing to give his rivals a great 
advantage, and would control him if he wished a re-election. The other 
was a check in the hands of the Legislature, ready to be applied to 
the _prevention_ of any _specific_ act of mischievous tendency by the 
Senator, and seems to have no connection in Mr. King's mind with the 
first check mentioned. The question put by him seems to imply that his 
mind considered this check as positively and inevitably effectual in 
any case in which it might be applied. We must remember that he was 
arguing in favor of adopting the constitution, and offered a second 
check by which honor and duty would control the Senators, upon whom 
the fear suggested in the other check would have no effect. But let us 
consider them with Judge H. in connection, and suppose that Mr. King 
meant to consider the two checks as parts of one whole, and that the 
instructions would be a check _because_ others wished for the seat. 
This construction would make it very clear that Mr. K. thought the 
Senator would be obliged to obey or _resign_, because unless such was 
his duty, his competitors for the seat could not possibly accomplish 
their wishes by means of instructions. Mr. K. only called the first a 
_powerful check_, and not _both_, as the Judge inadvertently says. 
With regard to the last, Mr. K. triumphantly asks, “_will this be no 
check?_”—as if he considered that as conclusive, and this check 
certainly operative in cases to which the first would not extend. It 
is true Mr. K. says nothing about the power of the Legislature to 
enforce obedience, because they have no such power, but he puts an 
interrogatory, which he clearly thinks cannot be answered in the 
negative, and leaves the question as if the duty of obedience was too 
clear for dispute. If this was not his idea, whence his triumphant 
manner? Did any body ever doubt the power of a Legislature to advise 
or petition their Senators? Then why parade so paltry and worthless a 
right with so much pomp, and as a valuable security to the States? 
What good was this right to do those who wished for the seats?

What if the State Legislatures do not have power to punish? They have 
no power to punish any official delinquences in the Senator, however 
gross and palpable, or any other violation of moral duty. They have no 
right, if they enjoyed the gift of divination, to prescribe the course 
of the Senator by law, providing for all contingences, nor can they 
order punishment by an ex post facto law, or cause punishments to be 
inflicted without a regular judicial trial, for any offence, except an 
immediate violation of their own order. Even if a Senator violates his 
positive pledge, the Legislature cannot punish him. They appear to be 
in this respect like all other constituencies, at the mercy of their 
representatives. Whether he acts morally or officially wrong, they 
cannot as constituents punish him. Impeachment seems to be the only 
remedy provided by any constitution, for any delinquency of any 
Legislator acting in his official capacity; and this being in the 
hands of the body to which he belongs, is generally inefficient. It 
seems to be a sufficient answer to all arguments founded upon the 
incapacity of the Legislature to punish for a violation of this 
particular duty, to say that it cannot punish for a violation of any 
duty. Can it be hence inferred that the Senator has no duties? Unless 
it can, our adversary's argument is defective. Suppose it had the 
power to punish generally for what it deemed offences? Can any one 
doubt that it would punish this as one of the highest? But the power 
of _subsequent_ punishment, or its absence, can neither create or 
extinguish a _previous_ moral or official duty.

The Judge, in my humble judgment, begs the question, when he says, “it 
is left to his _option_ to obey or not”—“a right to command is at once 
met and nullified by a right to refuse.” Our doctrine contends that he 
has no right to refuse, but we grant that he has the physical _power_ 
to disobey, without the moral right. The only option which we allow 
him is that of resigning or obeying. If he resigns, of course, in 
ceasing to be our representative or servant, our commands cease to be 
of any force with regard to him.

The verbal criticisms entered into by the Judge, do not appear to me 
to sustain his case. To instruct is doubtless in its primitive meaning 
to _teach_, but the question is, when applied to the Senator,—teach 
what? Not certainly to give general information. Is it to impart 
superior knowledge upon the specific question to the Senator? This 
militates against the federal doctrine of the superior wisdom of the 
Senator; it supposes the legislative wisdom to be greater than his, 
and of course, as such, it ought to prevail. For what purpose would 
they enlighten him, if he was not bound to pursue the proper course 
thus pointed out? It must be remembered that _teach_ does not mean to 
advise or request. If this legislative teaching, is not to give 
general information, or impart superior wisdom in particular cases, or 
request, or advise a particular course, only one thing remains to 
which the word teach can be applied, and that is the _will_ or 
_wishes_ of the Legislature; and the fact of teaching would seem to 
imply that he was to do their will if he knew what it was. They never 
teach unless they believe he intends to act contrary to their wishes, 
and their instructions are to inform him that he the servant has 
mistaken the will of his principal, and thus instruction given in 
cases of misapprehension or mistake of the will of the constituent, 
becomes the polite term for a command in other cases. This 
signification of command, is also one of the regular meanings of the 
word. Johnson gives “Authoritative mandate” as one of its 
significations. To give less force than this to the word, would make 
the Legislatures mere petitioners, and their _instructions_ to 
Senators have precisely the force of their _requests_ to the members 
of the House of Representatives. But none of our writers, old or 
modern, ever {625} considered these _requests_ as any sort of check 
upon the House of Representatives; but all look to the Senate as a 
check upon that body, and to check the Senate they say the State 
Legislatures may instruct. If requests will be of any avail as a 
check, why go around Robin Hood's barn, to bring them to bear?—why not 
have said at once, the State Legislatures may instruct their members 
in the House of Representatives? “Will this be no check?” Since an 
example has been set by such high authority, of investigating valuable 
rights by the light of the verbal critic's lamp, let us see if Dr. 
Johnson will not extend a hand to save the people as well as to prop 
their masters. He defines a representative to be “One exercising the 
vicarious power given by another”—and vicarious is “_Deputed_,—
_Delegated_,—_Acting in place of another_.” We can find no authority 
here for one who acts in a representative capacity, to act according 
to his own will, and in direct opposition to the will of those in 
whose place he acts.

The idea advanced by JUDGE HOPKINSON, of the impropriety of the 
Senator's acting upon the _dictation_ of others, and his _own 
responsibility_, seems a little disingenuous. The agent must be 
considered as released from all responsibility, when he is ordered by 
his principal to do a particular act. If he thinks that act illegal, 
or dishonorable, he need not do it, but he ought to resign. And all 
the responsibility rests upon the instructing Legislature. He has no 
right to set up his opinion or conscience as supreme law for any one 
but himself, and he is bound to presume that his constituents honestly 
differed in opinion with him. If he disobeys, he will find that the 
people will think it quite as probable that one man was wrong from 
corruption, as that a majority of their immediate representatives were 
corrupt. We do not maintain that “it is the official duty of the 
Senator to obey _in all cases_,” but it is his moral duty in all cases 
in which he is instructed to do a possible act, to obey or resign. But 
says, Judge H., he may by his resignation defeat his constituents. Be 
it so—the responsibility is upon them; but they cannot be defeated in 
as great a degree, by having no representative, as by being 
misrepresented. No vote is better than a vote against ourselves. Admit 
the reverse to be true, and can an involuntary, accidental defeat of 
the people's wishes, by a conformity to principle, be any excuse for a 
wilful and predetermined defeat of their will? Can the Senator say, if 
I had resigned, my successor might not have arrived in time to vote 
for you, and so I held to my place, and voted against you? When Judge 
H. contends that the will of the people may be defeated by the 
resignation of the Senator, and that he ought therefore not _to 
resign_, he admits that the will of the constituent ought to prevail, 
and of course that instructions ought to be obeyed.

The argument which contends that a Senator should not resign when he 
receives instructions which he cannot conscientiously obey, because 
his successor may obey, and thus perhaps violate the constitution, 
seems the most fallacious of all. It seems that because he has sworn 
as Senator to support the constitution, he must not resign. This oath 
surely only applies to his Senatorial career, and when his place is 
resigned his oath is expunged. If construed with the strictness 
required by the Judge, it would prevent his ever leaving his seat, or 
resigning, or declining a re-election. He would be bound always to be 
a Senator, if he possibly could, for fear his successor should violate 
the constitution. He has no more right to believe that his successor 
of the next month will violate the constitution, than his successor 
ten years hence. And if his oath requires him to hold on to defeat the 
one, it is equally obligatory with regard to the other, as far as any 
exertions on his part can effect the object. Thus Senators would be 
bound by their oaths to continue in office for life, if they could.

I have been a little surprised at seeing such language as the 
following from the pen of JUDGE HOPKINSON. “The people may instruct 
and the Legislatures may enjoin, and both will always, doubtless, be 
attended to with a deep respect and a powerful influence; but if with 
all this respect and under this influence, the representative or the 
Senator cannot, in his honest and conscientious judgment, submit 
himself to them, does he violate his official duty, and is he bound to 
relinquish his office? This is the question, and no affirmative answer 
to it, or any thing that implies it, can be found in any of the 
writings or speeches of any of the distinguished men at that time. The 
doctrine is of a later date; it is not coeval with the constitution, 
nor with the men who formed it.”

The Judge seems to me here to shift his ground in some degree. He 
evidently considers the instructions as doing something more than 
giving information, for the Senator could not _be convinced_ either by 
_respect_ or _influence_. To instruct a representative, generally 
supposes a difference of opinion between the agent and principal. If 
this difference does not exist, the instructions will of course be 
obeyed, and no question arises. If it does exist, the Senator is bound 
to obey or resign, or he is not. If the latter is the correct 
doctrine, he must disobey, because his conscientious conviction 
requires him not to obey. Instructions then must either convince his 
reason, or be entirely inoperative. It is mockery to talk of respect 
and influence. It would be criminal in a Senator to be swerved from 
the conscientious conviction of his mind as to his duty, by respect 
for any men or their influence, however exalted they might be. To say 
that a Senator is not bound to obey or resign, because his conscience 
requires him to retain his seat and disobey—but that he will in fact 
sometimes obey from respect or influence, is reasoning about as 
correctly as it would be to say, “That he ought not to be held 
responsible because he is honest, but that he may be trusted because 
he is corrupt, or will at least stretch his conscience from respect to 
us.”

But it was not for the purpose of noticing this little discrepancy 
that the passage was quoted. It was for the purpose of noticing the 
charge, that our “doctrine is of a later date; not coeval with the 
constitution or the men who formed it,” which is indeed a startling 
opinion to come from a gentleman of the acknowledged candor and 
learning of JUDGE HOPKINSON. The opinion was expressed in the haste of 
private correspondence, and upon investigation will not be adhered to. 
The doctrine was not only existing and well understood prior to our 
constitution, but was coeval with representation. That the agent 
should conform to the express will of his principal, is so natural, 
that we cannot doubt its establishment at once, wherever the valuable 
representative principle has been introduced into government. It is 
one of its chief recommendations. We {626} have recorded evidence of 
the exercise of this power many times, and from remote periods, in the 
British Parliament. Many of these instances of command and obedience 
are collected by MR. LEIGH in his Report to the Virginia Legislature 
in 1812. The British Parliament was the great model upon which our 
statesmen framed our constitutions, and with its principles and 
history they always evinced an astonishing familiarity. We cannot 
suppose them ignorant of this great and obvious principle—a principle, 
beyond all question, of much more doubtful propriety in England then, 
and even now, than it can ever be in this country; because in England 
a few places elect representatives for the whole body of the people. 
But even there the true theory prevails, and the wisdom to which the 
constitution looks as governing the whole country, is that of the 
electors, and not the delegates. However small, ignorant, or obscure 
the place may be which sends a member, in that place the constitution 
supposes the wisdom to reside which is necessary to give one vote in 
Parliament, and not in the _individual_ through whom the vote is 
given. If the constitution is in error, reform that, but do not usurp 
powers for the representatives. Hence the fate of the eloquent Burke 
before the electors of Bristol. In distributing more equally the 
elective power, our ancestors evinced both their justice and their 
wisdom. They saw no reason for supposing one portion of the country 
possessed of much more wisdom than another, whilst all alike required 
protection. The power of instructions and short terms they supposed a 
sufficient check to enable the people to protect themselves. Abundant 
evidence may be adduced to show that those great men were familiar 
with the importance, and obligation, and frequent exercise of this 
right. To prove this, we need go no farther than the Debates of the 
Virginia Convention which adopted the federal constitution. That 
constitution was no where more thoroughly discussed, or more warmly 
opposed, or opposed by men of more ability, than in that convention. 
Yet in their debates we find the right asserted both by opponents and 
advocates of the constitution; the one party contending that the right 
was not sufficiently secured by power to enforce its obligation—the 
other that the nature of the office, and the character of the men, 
would be a sufficient guarantee of their obedience. Instructions are 
frequently mentioned as a regular, legitimate, unquestionable mode of 
_controlling_ the will of the representative. And the idea of 
disobedience is never suggested except in connection with other 
possible gross moral and official misconduct. Disobedience seemed to 
be considered as treachery to the constituent. As my authority is not 
accessible to all of your readers, you must allow me to quote 
liberally to sustain my opinions, at the hazard of encumbering your 
pages.

At page 69, MR. JOHN MARSHALL, so happily characterized by JUDGE 
HOPKINSON as “that great and pure man, that true and fearless 
patriot,” in answer to an argument of PATRICK HENRY, founded on the 
asserted rejection of the constitution by certain states, says, “New 
Hampshire and Rhode Island have rejected it, he tells us. New 
Hampshire, if my information be right, will certainly adopt it. The 
report spread in this country, of which I have heard, is that the 
representatives of that state having, on meeting, found they were 
INSTRUCTED TO VOTE AGAINST IT, RETURNED TO THEIR CONSTITUENTS, without 
determining the question, to convince them of their being mistaken, 
and of the propriety of adopting it.” This was a matter of 
overwhelming importance to the people of New Hampshire, in which their 
representatives were convinced that they ought to decide in a 
particular way, but being instructed differently, they would not carry 
out their own views, though in fact correct; but the whole convention 
resigned, to endeavor to convince them of their error. MR. MARSHALL 
quotes this instance of a whole body being prevented by instructions 
from doing the only work which they assembled to do, as a matter by no 
means astonishing or culpable, though he himself was of the same 
opinion with the representatives of New Hampshire. It was an example 
of good principle worthy of all imitation.

There are a few more remarks in the same speech which we cannot 
forbear from quoting. PATRICK HENRY was afraid to trust the power over 
both the sword and the purse to Congress, and was very jealous of the 
clause allowing Congress the power to keep secret certain matters, 
supposing that under the mantle of public necessity they would conceal 
their votes, and would violate the rights and instructions of their 
constituents without being detected. To this MR. MARSHALL says, “The 
honorable gentleman has asked, if there be any safety or freedom when 
we give away the sword and the purse? Shall the people at large hold 
the sword and the purse, without the _interposition_ of their 
representatives? I apprehend that every gentleman will see the 
impossibility of this. Must they then not trust them to others? To 
whom are they to trust them but to representatives who are 
_accountable_ for their conduct?” He then shows that secrecy is 
allowed in the British government, and proceeds thus. “We are 
threatened with the loss of our liberties by the possible abuse of 
power, notwithstanding the maxim, that _those who give may take away_. 
It is the people who give power and can take it back. What shall 
restrain them? They are the _masters_ who gave it, and of whom their 
_servants_ hold it.” We cannot doubt that one holding these sound 
republican principles, then at least, approved the noble example of 
resignation on account of instructions, which he had just before 
quoted.

PATRICK HENRY was the great champion of the opposition in that 
convention, and so decidedly federal in his construction of its terms 
after its adoption, that he was afterwards elected to oppose MR. 
MADISON'S celebrated resolutions of '98. Yet we find him admitting the 
_right_ of instruction in its fullest extent throughout the state and 
federal governments, and never seeming to suppose that the obligation 
would be doubted, but at the same time contending with a wonderful 
forecaste that the responsibility of our representatives would be no 
protection to us, because though instructed, they would be out-voted 
by other delegates who could not be instructed by us. He says at page 
230, “He tells us responsibility is secured by direct taxation. 
_Responsibility_, instead of being increased, _will be lost_ forever 
by it. _In our state governments our representatives may be severally 
instructed by their constituents._ There are no persons to _counteract 
their operations. They can have no excuse for deviating from our 
instructions._ In the general government other men have power over the 
business. When oppressions may take place, our {627} representatives 
may tell us we contended for your interest, but we could not carry our 
point, because the representatives from Massachusetts, New Hampshire, 
Connecticut, &c. were against us. Thus, sir, you may see there is no 
real responsibility.” Here are instructions referred to as a complete 
security in the state government against _any_ legislation objected to 
by the people, and as completely obligatory upon our representatives 
from the state in Congress, and only failing to be a complete 
protection there too, because _we_ cannot _instruct_ the 
representatives of New Hampshire, &c. He places the representative in 
the attitude of apologizing, not for disobedience, but failure in 
accomplishing the wishes of the people. Disobedience did not seem to 
enter his imagination, much less the right to disobey.

In another place we find the same great orator plainly referring to 
the exercise of this right, as one of the greatest bulwarks of 
freedom; and inveighing against the constitution because it gives the 
Senators the _power_ (not the _right_) to disobey with impunity. He 
would have the legislature to possess the power to _recall_ in cases 
of disobedience. Look to his remarks at pages 252 and 253. He says, 
speaking of the project to barter away the navigation of the 
Mississippi to Spain, and the right of the United States to that 
navigation—“American interest was fully understood—New Jersey _called_ 
her delegates for having voted against this right. Delegates may be 
called and _instructed_ under the present system, but not by the new 
constitution. The measure of the Jersey delegates was averse to the 
interest of the state, and they were recalled for their conduct.” In 
this paragraph he did not mean to say that instructions would not be 
given, or ought not to be obligatory, but that bad men would have it 
in their _power_ to disobey without fear, _because_ they could not be 
_recalled_. This at least is the only construction which will make his 
language consistent with that previously quoted, and that which now 
follows, from the same speech and the same page. “At present you may 
appeal to the voice of the people, and send men to Congress 
_positively instructed_ to obey your direction. You can recall them if 
their system of policy be ruinous. But can you, in this government, 
recall your Senators? or can you _instruct_ them? YOU MAY INSTRUCT 
THEM, and offer your opinions; but if they think them improper, _they 
may_ disregard them.” Here he thinks it would be a breach of duty to 
disregard them, and he objects to leave the _power_ of disobedience in 
the hands of Senators, without the power to recall them, which he 
thinks made the control over them complete under the confederation, 
and would make it so under the constitution. But surely the power of 
subsequent punishment, or of providing against future mischief, from 
the hands of the same individual, does not create an antecedent duty 
either moral or official. The suggestion of punishment or prevention, 
implies the previous or possible violation of an existing duty. And 
the absence of a power to punish or prevent, cannot diminish the 
obligation of such duty, if admitted to exist. HENRY considered the 
force of instructions complete, by the mere power to recall, which 
certainly could not undo or invalidate the act done in violation of 
instructions; he therefore considered this recalling power necessary 
to make bad men perform the duty of obedience. He was satisfied with 
the articles of confederation, yet those articles do not mention a 
power to instruct, or a punishment for disobedience, any more than the 
present constitution. The subsequent power to punish by recall is the 
only difference. If we continue the same sentence, we shall find that 
he has coupled disobedience with bribery, and complains equally of 
absence of power to punish either. “If they give away, or sacrifice 
your most valuable rights, can you _impeach_ or _punish_ them? If you 
should see the Spanish ambassador bribing one of your Senators with 
gold, can you punish him? Yes—you can _impeach_ him before the Senate. 
A majority of the Senate may be sharers in the bribe—will they 
pronounce him guilty who is in the same predicament with themselves? 
Where, then, is the security? I ask not this out of triumph, but 
anxiously to know if there be any real security.” It would seem from 
this that the old patriarch was not thoroughly convinced of the 
incorruptibility of Senators, and wished to provide some mode of 
punishment for their offences, from the high moral crime of 
disobedience, to the petit larceny business of taking a bribe—and he 
even supposed a majority of the Senate might be guilty of the latter 
offence!

The views of this illustrious man, and zealous champion of freedom, 
are still further developed at page 283. He is there again expressing 
his fears that the transactions in the Houses of Congress will be kept 
secret, and clearly thinks there would be no danger, if our 
representatives were all good men and would obey instructions, except 
that of being overruled by a majority. “But it will be told that I am 
suspicious. I am answered to every question, that they will be _good 
men_. In England they see daily what is going on in Parliament. They 
will hear from their Parliament in one thirty-ninth part of the time 
that we will hear from Congress in this scattered country. Let it be 
proposed in England to lay a poll tax, or enter into any measure that 
will _injure one part and produce emoluments to another_; intelligence 
will fly quickly as the rays of light to the people. They will 
INSTRUCT their representatives to oppose it, _and_ will petition 
against it, _and_ get it prevented or redressed instantly. 
_Impeachment_ follows quickly a violation of _duty_. Will it be so 
here? You must _detect_ the offence and punish the _defaulter_. How 
will this be done when you know not the _offender_, even though he had 
a previous design to commit the _misdemeanor_? Your Parliament will 
consist of sixty-five. Your share will be ten out of the sixty-five. 
Will they not _take shelter_ by saying they were _in the 
minority_—that the men from New Hampshire and Kentucky _out-voted_ 
them? Thus will _responsibility_, that great pillar of free 
government, be taken away.” He thus thinks the clause of secrecy will 
be used as a shield to conceal the _offenders_ who violate 
instructions, or otherwise betray their constituents.

MR. NICHOLAS, in reply to some of these remarks by HENRY, says at page 
257, “But we are not to calculate any thing on New Jersey. You are 
told she gave INSTRUCTION to her delegates to vote against the cession 
of that right (the navigation of the Mississippi.) Will not the _same 
principles_ continue to operate upon the minds of the people of that 
state?

“We cannot recall our Senators. _We can give them instructions_, and 
if they manifestly neglect _our_ interest, we have sufficient security 
against them. The dread {628} of being _recalled_ would impair their 
independence and firmness.”

MR. NICHOLAS thinks the _dread_ of being _recalled_ would impair 
independence and firmness; not the dread of being instructed, as 
contended for at the present day. He considers instructions as an 
efficient mode of insuring the desired course upon any specific 
question, on which it might be necessary to resort to them, but that a 
power of recall would produce a vaccillation and weakness in the 
course of the Senator, which might be highly mischievous. He clearly 
thinks the Senator _must_ follow the wishes of his constituents, when 
specially instructed as to their will; but when not instructed, that 
he ought firmly and independently to act as he thinks best, and not as 
if he was in perpetual dread of losing his seat. He wishes a 
preventive remedy and not a punishment. No Senator ought to _fear_ 
instructions, because they do not punish or injure him; on the 
contrary, they remove a fearful responsibility from his shoulders—a 
responsibility so great as to make the power of _recall_ a constant 
source of terror: because a recall would disgrace him as far as the 
Legislature could produce that effect by its displeasure. But if a 
Senator either obeys instructions or resigns from conscientious 
scruples, he reaps honor instead of disgrace. A Legislature might 
recall, from caprice, or faction, or the envy of influential men, and 
the stigma could not be avoided by any good conduct on the part of the 
Senator; but if he is instructed, whether from any improper cause, or 
from the best, he cannot be injured or disgraced unless he wilfully 
disobeys. If the instructions are bad, and he either obeys or resigns, 
all the odium must fall upon the instructing Legislature, and not upon 
him. He will be sustained by their common ultimate masters, the 
people, and the Legislature will not.

Can it now be said that this doctrine is a new one, conjured up long 
since the formation of the constitution? When we find that instrument 
sustained in the convention by one party, on the ground that this very 
right existed in sufficient force in the State Legislatures, and would 
be regarded by men of sufficiently high standing and integrity to be 
elected Senators—and opposed by the other party, at one time, because 
the Legislature had no power to punish a violation of the right 
admitted to exist, and at another, because though complied with, it 
would not afford adequate protection, because our instructed delegates 
might be defeated and overruled by a majority coming from other 
States. In these debates MR. MADISON had so many objections of a 
graver import to answer, that he never seems to have thought it worth 
while to answer, specially, arguments based upon the mere possibility 
of the violation of an admitted duty by representatives of as high 
character as the Senators were likely to be—because all such arguments 
were answered specially by his coadjutors, (as in the instance of Mr. 
Nicholas) and generally by himself, in frequent asseverations that 
objections of that character, founded on the frailty of human nature, 
struck at the root of representation, and sapped the foundation of 
republican government. If his silence upon this particular subject was 
not a direct sanction of the arguments of his coadjutors, it certainly 
cannot be construed into disapprobation of their doctrine.

Since we cannot find this illustrious statesman opposed to us in the 
debates of the Virginia Convention, let us follow him to the pages of 
“The Federalist,” so triumphantly quoted by JUDGE HOPKINSON, and see 
if he is there opposed to this sacred principle.

A right so important, so often asserted in his presence as existing, 
so frequently exercised in those times, if disapproved, should have 
been directly denounced in the letters of Publius. That great work 
left little to conjecture in the thorough examination which it gave of 
the rights reserved or the powers conferred by the constitution. Every 
objection which the talent of its opposers, or the ingenuity of its 
friends could imagine, was ably discussed. This right is no where 
denied or objected to. The passages on which Judge H. relies, do not 
in my opinion sustain him. Nothing can be found in the numbers 62 and 
63, specially quoted, unfavorable to the exercise of this right, or 
the force of the obligation of instructions. In those numbers, Mr. 
Madison is meeting two objections, of a similar character, to the 
constitution of the Senate. The one founded on the impossibility of 
recall, and the other the protracted duration of the term. The 
objections to the power of recall, we have already partially 
considered, and shown the wide difference which exists between that 
power and the right to instruct, as they affect the course of the 
Senator—the one being a power which may benefit a Senator, and cannot 
injure him, the other placing him and his character in a great measure 
at the mercy of jealous rivals, or the caprice of the factious. To 
have a very short term, would manifestly have an effect upon the 
Senator analagous to that produced by the power to recall. The fear of 
being turned out would operate as injuriously upon his firmness and 
independence as the fear of being recalled. Indeed it would be a 
source of greater terror, as the Legislatures could be more easily 
induced not to re-elect an officer whose term had expired, than to 
resort to the harsh measure of recalling one in the midst of his 
career. Both these objections were then of a similar character. Either 
of the powers demanded, would diminish the firmness and impair the 
independence of the Senator—prevent a sufficient continuation in 
office to ensure an adequate amount of information in public affairs 
to enable him to regulate foreign matters with skill, or pursue any 
uniform course of enlightened policy—and either would at the same time 
deprive the Senate of one of its principal badges of usefulness, as a 
check to the House of Representatives, with which it would have been 
too similar in its character and term of office to resist effectually 
its impulses to yield to popular opinion, or, as the Judge perhaps 
more properly expresses it, popular feeling. But none of these 
objections apply to instructions. They do not eject the Senator from 
office, unless he differs with his constituents upon some important 
question of constitutional law which is about to be practically acted 
upon; or unless he has in some manner committed his honor in 
opposition to his constituents. In either of these cases, the 
mischiefs of ejection sink to insignificance compared with the 
mischiefs of continuance. Upon the constitutional point he ought to 
presume the united wisdom of the two branches of his Legislature to be 
more capable of judging than his own; and if he has committed his 
honor, he ought to suffer, and not his constituents. In either case, 
the resignation is the privilege {629} of the Senator, to enable him 
to remove himself from a delicate situation. It is not produced by the 
Legislature—it is no punishment—it is not a legal or official 
ejectment from office—it carries no stigma with it—it is an obedience 
to the requisitions of delicacy, and lofty honor, and not a compliance 
with the mandates of the Legislature. We instruct, and propriety, 
reason, and authority say _he_ must obey; but justice says he may 
resign, if he cannot obey with honor. As well might it be objected to 
us, that we do not compel a Senator never to resign. Resignations for 
instructions no more shorten the term than other resignations; and as 
long as any are allowed, we must allow those made to save the 
conscience or honor. This is the only refuge; for duty requires 
obedience, and it would be dishonorable to disobey. The Senator, who 
is called a representative, has no right to save his conscience at the 
expense of his constituents, and throw their whole political weight in 
a direction precisely opposite to their express wishes. Instructions 
then neither vary or shorten the term of office. If they are obeyed, 
what harm is done? The will of the constituent has prevailed, as it 
ought to do, by the theory of our government. What if he resigns? The 
State is without a Senator, by his voluntary act to save his honor, 
and his successor perhaps carries into effect the will of his 
constituents. Where is the breach in the constitution? The same result 
might happen, because the Senator did not like his colleagues, or was 
in ill health, or embarrassed in circumstances, or accepted a federal 
office, or wished to travel, or engage in agriculture. If it is 
unconstitutional for a Senator to resign because his conscience or 
honor require him not to obey instructions, then is it equally 
unconstitutional for him to resign for any of these reasons, or any 
others which might occur to him. His failure to resign, or the want of 
power to compel resignation, cannot absolve him from the duty of 
obedience.

Instructions to Senators are always given by a solemn, deliberate, 
recorded act, passed by an organized body of representatives, 
responsible themselves to the people. Every delegate must account for 
the principles involved in his vote; but this responsibility is not 
generally held over him so rigidly when he votes for a Senator, unless 
he votes under express instructions, or the candidates represent 
opposite political principles. Many excuses may be given for voting 
for A in preference to B, though the latter may be most popular with 
the immediate constituents of the delegate; but the principles in the 
instructions must be fairly met and fully justified, to satisfy the 
people. Hence a greater responsibility is secured by instructions than 
by frequent elections.

A Senator who loves his country more than his place, can never _fear_ 
instructions. They cannot, of course, then impair his independence or 
his firmness. The most which the fear of them ever could effect, would 
be to make him do the will of his constituents, which could surely do 
him no special harm. It was never supposed that the duration of office 
was to make a Senator firm against his constituents, and independent 
of their expressed will. But he was to be firm against his own fears, 
and independent of the House of Representatives or popular commotion. 
He is surely sufficiently far removed from the latter, when it can 
only affect him through the deliberate voice of two separate houses of 
the State Legislature. And then in truth it cannot affect _him_—_he_ 
has nothing to dread: it only affects _the vote_ of which he is the 
depository, and cannot remove him from his place. Is there no 
difference between a disposition to cater to every temporary whim or 
caprice which may sweep over the multitude, for _fear_ of not being 
re-elected at the end of a short term, and a voluntary obedience to 
their deliberate will, expressed through two branches of their 
representatives? The House of Representatives will be sensitive at 
once to any commotion among the people. A temporary and dangerous 
excitement might lead them into improper acts, for _fear_ of being 
turned out at the end of their short term. This house was expected to 
be thus sensitive, but the Senator's tenure of six years was given as 
a check to prevent this tendency from carrying the other house too 
far. That cannot be called a popular commotion which reaches him by 
the deliberate voice of two separate legislative bodies, acting under 
responsibility; but must be assumed by the Senator to be the 
deliberate judgment of all the people: it is, at all events, the 
deliberate judgment of all to whom he has a right to look. The 
Legislature has power by the constitution to elect him, and this 
carries with it the right to instruct him. But they exercise both 
these powers vicariously, and if they mistake the will of the people, 
they are responsible for their instructions, not the Senator for his 
obedience. His responsibility is removed by obedience or resignation. 
If he is “the anchor against popular fluctuations,” it is proper that 
like all other anchors, he should be hauled up when a favorable and 
permanent breeze enables the ship to proceed; and of this—not the 
anchor, but—those above it must judge. And if he hooks his fluke too 
deeply in the moorings, it is clear that unless there is a “capstan 
and cable” somewhere, he transcends the sphere of his utility, and 
does more harm than good by making a temporary stay a permanent 
fixture. PATRICK HENRY wanted to give the Legislature power in such 
cases to _cut_ the cable; and I think it would be well if such a power 
could be lodged with the _people_ in cases of disobedience, or other 
flagitious offences on the part of Senators.

But to meet the argument of the Judge fully, it is only fair to quote 
it:


“Mr. Madison's second reason for having a Senate, or second branch of 
the Legislative Assembly, is thus stated: ‘The necessity of a Senate 
is not less indicated by the propensity of all single and numerous 
assemblies to yield to the impulse of sudden and violent passions, and 
to be seduced by factious leaders into intemperate and pernicious 
resolutions.’ If this is true of the House of Representatives of the 
United States; if their intemperate and pernicious resolutions are to 
be guarded against and controlled by the more sedate and permanent 
power of the Senate, how much stronger is the reason when applied to 
the Legislatures of the States? Having their narrow views of national 
questions, and their local designs and interests as the first objects 
of their attention, it seems to me to be a strange absurdity to put 
the Senate as a guard and control over the House of Representatives, 
and then to have that Senate under the direction and control of the 
Legislatures of the States—or it may be, on a vital question, under 
the direction of the Legislature of the smallest State in the Union. 
Are there no local impulses and passions to agitate these 
Legislatures? no factious leaders to seduce them into intemperate and 
pernicious resolutions—and to induce them to prefer some little, local 
advantage, to ‘the general welfare?’ To give to the Senate the power, 
the will, and the courage to oppose and control these sudden and 
violent passions in the more popular branch of our national 
legislature, Mr. Madison says, ‘It ought moreover to possess _great 
firmness_, {630} and consequently ought to hold _its authority_ by a 
tenure of considerable duration.’ But what can that firmness avail, 
how will it be shaken, of what possible use will it be, if the Senator 
is bound to follow the dictates of a changing body, subject, 
emphatically to sudden impulses and seductions, at a distance from the 
scene of his deliberations, and deprived of the sources of information 
which he possesses, and acting in a _different sphere of duty_ from 
that he moves in? Firmness in an agent who has no will of his own, no 
right to act but on the dictation of another, would not only be 
superfluous, but a positive evil and disqualification. It would 
produce struggles and perhaps refusal, where his duty was to submit. 
The more pliable the instrument in such a case, the belter would it 
answer the purposes it was designed for. To be firm, says Mr. Madison, 
the Senator must hold his authority by a tenure of considerable 
duration. But how can this be, if he is to hold it from year to year 
as the Legislature of his State may change its opinion on the same 
subject, and require him to follow these changes or to resign his 
place? The tenure of the Constitution, as Mr. Madison understood it, 
is essentially changed by this doctrine. These changes of opinions and 
measures are, in the opinion of Mr. Madison, a great and dangerous 
evil in any government, and show ‘the necessity of some stable 
institution’ such as our Senate was intended to be—but such as it 
cannot be on this doctrine of instructions.”


I must admit my inability to perceive the propriety of the Judge's 
conclusions from Mr. Madison's premises. He is afraid of instructions, 
because _single_ and numerous bodies are apt to yield to passion and 
faction, and he hence thinks it absurd to place the Senate as a check 
upon the House of Representatives, if the State Legislatures are to 
remain as a check upon the Senate. There seems to be a double fallacy 
in this. Does the Senate possess an exclusive patent of exemption from 
faction and passion, and the other frailties of human nature, to which 
the House of Representatives and _both_ branches of the State 
Legislature, are to be held peculiarly liable? The Senate, as a body, 
would not be _checked_ by the State Legislatures, unless a _majority_ 
was instructed; and if this was the case, we must suppose instructions 
sanctioned by so many bodies to be the dictates of true wisdom, and 
not the offspring of faction and passion. If only a few Senators are 
instructed, we must suppose the object to be deemed important by the 
instructing States; and so far from the likelihood of sudden or 
violent passion, or the seductions of factious leaders thus affecting 
Legislation, we find the securities proposed by Mr. Madison quadrupled 
in numbers, increased by the distance of the bodies, and doubled by 
the difference in their constitution. If two federal legislative 
bodies are likely to ensure the defeat of faction and passion, when 
both belong to the same government—the members of both are members of 
the same political parties, and both meet at the same place, how much 
less likely is passion or faction to succeed _by means of 
instructions_, when it has first to encounter the federal House of 
Representatives, and then in succession a State House of Delegates, 
and a State Senate, and lastly the chance of an uninstructed, or 
differently instructed majority in the federal Senate. Surely Judge H. 
forgot the dignity and candor of the philosophical inquirer, and in 
vindication of a favorite theory, assumed the armor of a partizan, 
when he contended, that the faction and passion intended to be 
defeated by the constitution of the Senate, would be promoted by 
adding additional checks—checks, too, which we cannot doubt were 
contemplated as one of the principal means of rendering the check 
afforded by the Senate effective. So far from promoting hasty, 
passionate, or factious legislation, do not these numerous checks 
present almost too many difficulties to the execution of the 
deliberate will of the people, which the Judge admits ought to govern? 
In doubtful questions, when parties are nicely balanced, a few 
recreant representatives, in either of the _four_ bodies, can easily 
defeat any measure, however necessary, or earnestly desired by their 
constituents. If we suppose with the Judge, that the Senate is to be 
entirely controlled by the State Legislatures, then we should have 
_fifty-three_ different deliberative bodies, representing the people 
in different capacities, and by different ratios, acting upon _one 
subject_. No measure could be carried through this ordeal by faction 
or passion, and instead of bringing us “back to a simple turbulent 
democracy,” we should have the best and the greatest quantity of 
checks upon turbulent legislation, of which any country could boast. 
If measures thus passed were not wise, it must be because the 
intelligence of the country is defective, and not because it is 
blinded by passion. The same reasoning applies to the instructions of 
any less number than the whole, because the uninstructed Senators must 
be presumed to act in accordance with the opinions of their 
constituents, and thus whether the instructed members carry their 
point, or are overruled by a majority, the deliberate sense of the 
community governs. But upon the theory of Judge H., not the sense of 
the community, whether deliberate or vaccillating, but the arbitrary 
and adverse will of the _individuals_ who happen to be Senators, 
disposes of every thing which we hold dear—not only the lives and 
fortunes of our people, but the very constitution of our country. If a 
_State_ may have “narrow views,” so may an _individual_. If a State 
may not wish to be taxed to cut a little inland canal, two thousand 
miles off, a Senator may wish an embassy, or a department, or a bank 
accommodation, or a federal judgeship. But if the States do have local 
views and interests, are they not bound to protect them, and have they 
not _equal votes_ in the Senate for this very purpose? Mr. Jay says, 
“enlightened policy will soon teach that the interests of the whole 
can only be promoted by a proper regard for the interests of the 
parts.” If the States wish to oppress others, or advance themselves at 
the expense of all, they will be certainly overruled by the majority. 
If they wish to protect themselves from oppression, they ought to have 
weight, and no human being should have power to throw their own weight 
against them.

The people of the states would be peculiarly destitute of protection, 
if they could not instruct their Senators, because from the size of 
the districts and number of the constituents, it would be extremely 
difficult, if not impossible, to instruct a member of the House of 
Representatives, and hence PATRICK HENRY'S uneasiness for fear the 
Senator should disobey. What if the Senate should be “on a vital 
question under the control of the smallest state in the Union?”—Are 
the two houses of the Legislature of the smallest state less honest or 
less intelligent, than the individual Senator, who by supposition is 
about to oppose his own constituents and at least half of his 
co-Senators? Where is the evil? The will of the Legislature, which is 
responsible, prevails over that of the Senator, who is not 
responsible, unless he is for disobedience. Which adjustment of the 
question ought, by the theory of our government, to be {631} most 
satisfactory? We cannot hold instructions to be an evidence of 
_passion_ or _faction_ in the Legislature, but disobedience we must 
hold to be a ground for suspecting the Senate. If neither of these 
operated, I can conceive no reason for not resigning, when obedience 
would be wicked or disgraceful. If Mr. Madison required firmness and 
independence in the Senator, against the instructions of his own 
constituents, as well as against the acts of the House of 
Representatives, as Judge H. supposes, then it is clear that he knew 
and understood the right, and its obligation, _and feared it_, and 
wished to provide against it, by protecting the Senator from its 
force. If such was his purpose, how egregiously has he failed—how 
bungling has been his work—how disingenuous his course—how unlike in 
all respects, is this to the other works of that great man? The length 
of term did not protect from instructions, because a Senator of one 
year may be instructed as well as one of six years. Where is the 
protection against this awful right? Mr. M. knew that it existed under 
the articles of confederation, and was exercised, yet he did not 
prohibit it in the constitution. He feared the power to recall, and he 
took away that; but it seems he feared this right, and left it. It is 
true that he provided no punishment for disobedience, but none existed 
under the confederation, and none had ever been found necessary in the 
British Parliament, the Convention of New Hampshire, the Congress, or 
the State Legislatures. If he feared the right, he must have wished it 
uprooted, yet he left it precisely as he found it. He was particularly 
cautious in concealing his antipathy in the Virginia Convention and 
the Federalist. In the latter he speaks of firmness necessary to 
resist the House of Representatives, and transient popular commotions 
which might affect that body, and I doubt not he meant to require 
firmness in obedience to instructions against the wishes of the House 
of Representatives as much as in any thing else. In the Virginia 
Convention he heard loud calls for the protection of the right, yet 
never denied its existence.

Suppose a question arises in the House of Representatives dangerous to 
a state. It is carried in that body by passion or faction against such 
manifestations of popular will as can be given. It is believed the 
Senators will go the same way. The people have no resource left, but 
instructions through their State Legislature. If this has no effect, 
our servants are our masters, and we are ruled by an oligarchy the 
more odious, because it presents us with a mockery of representation.

But it seems that Mr. Madison thinks the Senate “may be sometimes 
necessary as a defence _to the people_ against _their own temporary 
errors and delusions_; he justly applauds the _salutary interference_ 
in critical moments, of some respectable and temperate body of 
citizens, to check the misguided career, and to suspend the blow 
mediated by _the people against themselves_, until reason, justice, 
and truth can regain their authority over the public mind.” This is 
correct reasoning, but it cannot apply to the States or their 
Legislatures, but must allude to the people of the Union and the House 
of Representatives. The Senate cannot defend the people of any state 
from their _own temporary delusions_, or afford a _salutary 
interference_ with the proceedings of a State Legislature. The latter 
body is supposed competent to act for itself, and not to require the 
_protection_ of the United States Senate, and still less of an 
_individual Senator_. This argument might be urged _in favor_ of a 
Senator instructing a State Legislature, with more propriety than 
_against_ the reverse operation, because under the present system the 
State Legislatures have no connection with the United States Senators 
unless they instruct them, and thus if they choose to be wilful and 
refuse to instruct them, which by this new construction would be to 
ask his advice, they may ruin the people by their temporary errors and 
delusions, without ever giving their Senator the power to save them by 
the salutary interference of his “respectable and temperate” mandate.

But it is admitted that a _temporary_ delusion may possibly exist 
among the people, which may induce the House of Representatives to 
pass acts so dangerous that it may be necessary for the Senate to 
“_suspend_” them. “But the _deliberate_ sense of the community, ought 
and ultimately will prevail.” And yet a Senator has _power_ to defeat 
this deliberate sense, as well as the _temporary_ errors and 
delusions. He may _suspend_ a good act, or he may fail to _suspend_ a 
bad act. He may not only not concur with the House of Representatives 
when he ought, but he may concur with it when he ought not. Shall we 
have no “capstan and cable” to draw up our anchor in the one case, and 
no power to throw it out in the other? Must the temporary delusion 
prevail over the people's rights for six years, or the deliberate 
sense be delayed its healthy action for six years? Either question may 
be of vital and immediate importance. The single vote may saddle us 
with an enormous bank, with a controlling capital and an unlimited 
charter, or an oppressive tariff, which could not be repealed without 
ruin to many, or continued without ruin to ourselves. The temporary 
delusion may be a spirit of fanaticism, which may annihilate at a 
single blow, and forever, political peace and domestic happiness in 
half the Union, and yet the Senator may be infected with the 
contagion. A judgeship for life, or boundless wealth, may warp honest 
opinions, or buy up bankrupt profligacy. In short, a Senator may be 
sometimes wrong as well as the House of Representatives and the two 
branches of a State Legislature, and if he is a despot for the time of 
his election, he may do infinite mischief:—if he can be controlled by 
his State Legislature in particular votes by special instructions, he 
cannot do much harm, and may do as much good as the wisdom of his 
state, which is wiser than he is, will permit. Mr. Madison, when he 
spoke of the _interference_ of the Senate, never could have meant to 
characterize the solemn and deliberate acts of a _State Legislature_, 
as the _temporary errors and delusions of the people_. Besides being 
too accurate in his language for this construction, he could not but 
believe that instructions would convey at least the best judgment of a 
majority of the Legislature. And he could not suppose it necessary for 
the United States Senator to protect the people against the best 
judgment of their own Legislature. The State Legislatures, in 
practice, possess the sovereign authority of the State; they make 
laws, and dispose of our persons and property; shall we appeal from 
them to their creature, the Senator, for _protection?_

If MR. MADISON had meant this he would certainly not only have 
prohibited State instructions to the Senator, but enforced Senatorial 
instructions to the {632} Legislature. Why were we left without this 
protection from our temporary errors and delusions in so many 
important cases, and only provided with it in those cases in which we 
venture to instruct Senators? This doctrine proves too much. Why was 
Mr. Madison silent in our Convention, when his coadjutors asserted 
this right? When HENRY so often objected a want of power to enforce 
it, why did Mr. M. not say at once it did not exist, and end the 
objection? If he had said so, and contended for the correctness of his 
position on the ground that the Senator must be firm against his own 
masters, and independent of his own constituents, to protect the 
people of the States from themselves, would this constitution have 
been ratified by Virginia? Never. One blast of HENRY'S soul-stirring 
bugle would have called all his kindred spirits around him—he whose 
keen scent could snuff tyranny in the tainted gale, would have spurned 
an elective as haughtily as he had an hereditary tyrant—the debates 
would have ended there—the friends of the constitution and of Madison 
would have deserted him—the deceptive parchment would have been 
trodden under foot, and its noble champion left its only advocate. No 
one can read HENRY'S anxious searching after the responsibility of 
Senators, and his earnest calls for the power of enforcing obedience, 
and believe it would have been otherwise. He laughs to scorn the 
argument that they will be good men, from which MR. MADISON wishes him 
to infer that they would obey. With what withering contempt then would 
he have received a proposition to make them _constitutionally_ 
independent, as he feared they would be actually? And to have told him 
that this was necessary to make them _firm against us_, would have 
been only an aggravation of the insult.

It is surprising to hear JUDGE HOPKINSON say, that the hundreds of 
individuals who compose the State Legislatures, from all parts of 
their respective states, “have no means of knowing the public 
sentiments which are not equally open to the Senators; nor are their 
inducements to conform to them more persuasive and strong.” If this 
was not an error, it would be perhaps best for the legislatures to 
delegate their powers to several individuals, and go home. Those wise 
men, whose judgment is capable of protecting the state from its own 
errors, and at the same time, know so well public sentiment, and have 
every inducement to conform to it, would constitute the best 
legislature. But so much of an error is the first part of the 
proposition deemed, that the usual and most accurate method of 
examining into popular sentiment, is by the sentiments of the 
representatives. Each is supposed best to know and to represent the 
opinions of his own county or district, and their united will is 
thought to be as accurate an approximation to the will of the people 
as human ingenuity can make. There is nothing else which affords us 
even data for estimating that will. The individual Senator has not 
probably a better knowledge of the wishes of the people than many of 
the single individuals who compose the legislature, especially if he 
is sent from a remote state, and has been long absent.

The inducements which the Senator may have to conform to the will of 
the people, may be as persuasive and strong as those of the members of 
the state legislature; and if they are, he will obey, unless his 
inducements to conform to the will of some one else are more 
persuasive and stronger. A Senator is a great man, and may expect 
executive promotion if this or that man is President, or this or that 
measure carried. We must suppose the latter inducements to 
preponderate, when he frustrates the will of the people, expressed in 
the only form in which it can reach him.

The Judge again quotes MR. MADISON. “MR. MADISON goes so far as to 
say, that as our governments are entirely _representative_, there is a 
total exclusion of the people, in their collective capacity, _from any 
share_ in them.” This is true, and makes it the more iniquitous to 
deprive them of any share through their representatives. If they can 
neither act themselves, or act by their representatives, they only 
elect masters, and it is nonsense to say the will of the people 
prevails. Mr. M. could only have meant that no act of the people, in 
their collective capacity, was a governmental act; he did not mean to 
say that they were slaves, who periodically elected masters, but that 
they should never act in person, and only by their servants. The 
inference drawn from this remark, viz: that the Senator ought not to 
be bound by the will of all the people in his state, must be 
fallacious. If all the people of a state came to the Senate chamber, 
and wished to give a vote, they could not vote except through their 
Senator. It is so ordained in the constitution; but how can it be 
thence inferred that the Senator is not bound to obey them? This 
however is impracticable, and the Senator can only know the will of 
his state through the legislature. That body constitute his 
constituency. Whether it properly represents the people or not, is a 
question between its members and the people. No Senator would have 
thought of looking beyond his own constituents, but from the fact that 
_they_ happen to act vicariously. If the same number of individuals, 
not being representatives, were selected by the constitution to elect 
Senators in the several states, it is clear that the Senators could 
not look to the public opinion of any persons except the electors. We 
must presume that the constitution meant to place the full power of 
instruction (if the right exists) exclusively in that body in which it 
had sufficient confidence to place the power of selection, and which 
only could practically exercise it. If the Senator does doubt, or is 
even sure that the legislature does not conform to the will of its own 
constituents, it will afford him no excuse for a similar violation. If 
a representative can look at all beyond the opinions of those who have 
a right to vote, then there is no limit. Where there are high freehold 
qualifications to suffrage, and instructions are given by every voter, 
a delegate may say, “The unqualified individuals outnumber you, and I 
will assume that they think differently”—nay, he may say, “the women, 
the children, the free blacks, paupers, Indians and slaves think 
differently, and they are a majority of my constituents.” What then 
becomes of those guards and checks in the constitutions, which presume 
superior wisdom in a particular class of persons, or that certain 
rights require especial protection, if the delegate may thus, by 
creating a new and fancied constituency for himself, and one too which 
can never act upon him, and the opinions of which can never be known 
either by instructions or elections, set aside the sovereignty vested 
by the constitutions? This would establish a government of petty 
tyrants, under ideal responsibility to a fancied constituency. Why was 
the election of Senators not given at once to the {633} people of the 
states? I have no doubt one of the principal reasons was the 
impossibility of instructing. I do not believe Virginia would have 
adopted the constitution, with no means of instructing Senators. If 
the people of the states had elected, the legislature would then have 
only had power to request them, as it now has over the members of the 
House of Representatives. The legislature possessed the double 
advantage of facility of action, and a comparison and a discussion of 
views from all quarters, in selection and instruction, neither of 
which could be possessed by the people. The members of the legislature 
are Senatorial electors, chosen for that purpose by the federal 
government, and cannot strip themselves of the power and give it to 
the people of their state—nor could a state convention take it away 
from them. What right, then, has a federal Senator to say the people 
of Ohio do not sanction instructions given by her legislature, any 
more than to say the people of Maine or Louisiana do not sanction the 
same instructions. He has as much to do with the people of one state 
as of another.

Let us hear the Judge again.


“_Instruction and resignation_ are not the means proposed by Mr. 
Madison to protect us from the corruption or tyranny of the Senate. He 
suggests no interference, in any way, on the part of the State 
Legislatures with their Senators, nor any control over them, during 
their continuance in office; but finds all the safety he thought 
necessary, and all that the constitution gives, in the ‘_periodical 
change_ of its members.’ In addition to this, much reliance, no doubt, 
was placed, and ought to be so, on the expectation that the State 
Legislatures would appoint to this high and responsible office, only 
men of known and tried character and patriotism, having themselves a 
deep stake in the liberties of their country, and bound by all the 
ties of integrity and honor to a faithful discharge of their trust.”


Mr. Madison is here again providing against a rottenness in the 
Senate, which would not only set instructions at defiance, but every 
moral and political duty. He says, in effect, “you are afraid of a six 
years tenure, but you need not fear that, because at any given period 
only one third can have that duration, one third will hold for four, 
and one only for two years. Fear of not being re-elected, or a 
decreasing interest in the usurped power, will prevent them from 
corruption, tyranny, disobedience, and other iniquities. If all were 
at the same time tyrants of six years duration, you would be in 
danger; but the shortening term of some, and the hope that others will 
stay honest, is your protection. The honest ones will obey you from 
principle, the corrupt from fear.” This I conceive to be his opinion 
written out. For, says Mr. Nicholas in his presence, “we can instruct 
them”—and Patrick Henry says, in effect, “If they are bad men they 
will not obey—we ought to have a power of impeachment or recall, to 
make them obey; the rotation is not in my opinion sufficient surety of 
their obedience.” In those days goodness was thought to ensure 
obedience, but now it is thought if they are good men, “bound by all 
the ties of integrity and honor to a faithful discharge of their 
duty,” they will not obey, or need not, because so intelligent and so 
good—as if obedience was not the highest duty, or misrepresentation 
was the part of a faithful representative.

But let us look to the Federalist as we did to Dr. Johnson, in behalf 
of the other party. We find MR. MADISON, as well as his great 
coadjutors, HAMILTON and JAY, speaking of the Senate, not as a little 
oligarchy, or Holy Alliance of absolute sovereigns for six years, but 
as an assembly of the _States_. Measures, says he, will have to be 
approved first by a majority of the people, and then by a majority of 
the _States_. The States will be interested in preventing this, or 
carrying that. Thus again indicating the necessity of giving the 
_States_ an influence over the _people of the Union_. Among the 
reasons for giving the elections to the State Legislatures, he says it 
not only favored a select appointment, “but gives to the State 
_governments_ such an agency in the formation of the federal 
government, as _must secure the authority of the former_, and may form 
a convenient link between the two systems.” The link is formed by the 
election, but if the Senators then become independent and firm against 
their constituents, what _secures the authority_? The federal argument 
supposes the Senator at the moment of his election, to lose all 
connection with his State, and become entirely a federal officer, 
representing all the United States. If this is true, how is State 
authority secured by his election? Mr. Madison's argument in favor of 
the Senate, based upon the assertion that every resolution or law will 
have to pass first a majority of the people, and then a majority of 
States, is a gross fallacy, if the States have nothing to do with the 
matter. He says, this “complicated check on government may prove 
injurious,” &c.; but how is it more _complicated_, if the Senators are 
independent, than the British Parliament is rendered by the House of 
Lords, or any State government by its Senate? He also speaks of the 
power of the larger _States_ to defeat small _States_ when 
unreasonable, by power over the supplies.

But there is yet better evidence of Mr. Madison's opinion upon this 
subject than all this. He has himself as a legislator, exercised the 
right. I have not the instructing resolutions before me, but I 
discover the fact from my copy of the resolutions of '98, '99, and the 
debate of 1800.[1]

[Footnote 1: _House of Delegates, Monday, January 20, 1800._

_Resolved_, That five thousand copies of the Report of the Select 
Committee, to whom were referred the answers of several States upon 
the Resolutions of the last Legislature, the said answers [and also 
the _instructions to the Senators_ of this State in the Congress of 
the United States, together with the names of those who voted on each 
of these subjects,] be printed without delay; and that the Executive 
be requested, as soon as may be, to distribute them equally, in such 
manner as they shall think best, among the good people of this 
Commonwealth.

  Attest,

  WILLIAM WIRT, C. H. D.
  H. BROOKE, C. S.

_Note by the Publisher_.—The part contained in brackets is not 
embraced in the present publication.]

We approach now the last ground taken by the Judge, and that on which 
we should have supposed ourselves most impregnable—I mean the 
_Constitution_. I should have said there is nothing in that instrument 
to forbid, or which is inconsistent with the right to instruct, and 
therefore it exists. And for this, with many other authorities, we 
might have quoted JOHN MARSHALL, (Virginia Debates, 297-8.) “MR. JOHN 
MARSHALL asked if gentlemen were serious, when they asserted that if 
the State governments had power to interfere with the militia, it was 
by implication? If they were, he asked the committee whether the least 
attention would not show that they were mistaken? The State 
governments had not derived their powers {634} from the general 
government. But each government derived its powers from the people; 
and each was to act according to the powers given it. Would any 
gentleman deny this? He demanded if powers not given were retained by 
implication? Could any man say so? Could any man say that this power 
was not retained by the States, as they had not given it away? For, 
says he, does not a power remain till it is given away? The _State 
Legislatures had power to command and govern their militia before, and 
have it still, undoubtedly, unless there be something in this 
Constitution that takes it away._”

This power, like that of regulating the militia, was claimed and 
exercised by the State Legislatures before this Constitution, and is 
not taken away; therefore, by the reasoning of MR. MARSHALL, in whose 
presence this right was frequently asserted, it still exists, not _by 
implication_, but as an original power not given away. But JUDGE 
HOPKINSON pursues a reverse mode of reasoning, and thinks the right 
does not exist—first, because not expressly granted by the 
Constitution—and secondly, because no form of proceeding is prescribed 
by which a refractory Senator could be compelled to obey. We must 
answer to the first, that the power is not granted but reserved, and 
is always understood to exist where representation exists, unless 
expressly prohibited. For the second, we must say, that no human 
ingenuity could devise a mode of compelling a refractory Senator to 
obey, because he may keep his purpose concealed until he votes; and 
that a power of subsequent punishment has never been given to 
_constituents_ over their delegates in any representative government, 
and would be more objectionable and dangerous in this case than any 
other, on account of the peculiar relative situation of the two 
governments. The _power_ of disobedience, of giving bad votes, and 
voting from corruption instead of conviction, is in the hands of all 
representatives, without power of punishment in the hands of 
constituents—can it thence be inferred that they have the _right_ thus 
to act? The Constitution requires, for wise purposes, an indefinite 
and absolute power of attorney irrevocable for six years, and any form 
of punishment, to be effective, must interfere with this requisition. 
There are legal powers, which it would be a gross violation of moral 
duty to execute, and we must hope for some principles of virtue to 
actuate our Senators as well as other fiduciaries, without keeping 
their limbs always bound in cords, and their necks under the axe. 
There was no power to punish for this offence under the confederation. 
The power to recall was distinct from it, and though it might punish 
offences, could not create duties. Our instructions are private. The 
Senate has nothing to do with them. Our Senator may burn them. The 
Senate cannot punish him, and we could not, if he took a bribe. 
Suppose a legislator is always intoxicated, or spends his nights in 
riot, or gaming, and is thus rendered stupid and inefficient, or 
careless. This will be admitted to be a violation of duty, but his 
constituents cannot prevent it, or punish him. Constituents have no 
power even to compel attendance, nor can they recall for 
non-attendance, whether produced by wickedness or misfortune; and yet 
MR. JAY says—“All the States will have an equal influence in the 
Senate, _especially_ while they continue to be careful in appointing 
proper persons, and _insist_ on their punctual attendance.” There is 
no such power given in the Constitution. If they cannot instruct they 
cannot insist upon attendance. The word “_especially_” here shows that 
the writers of the Federalist did not consider the influence of the 
States and of their Senators as by any means synonimous, but looked to 
the former to control the latter, by appointing proper persons, or 
such as would obey.

The Judge thinks this power cannot flow, from the circumstance of the 
Senators receiving their _appointment_ from the State Legislatures. He 
says, the President and Senate _appoint_ Judges—“but are they to obey 
them?” Surely not. The Judges do not, either in fact or in theory, 
_represent_ the President and Senate. Nor are they appointed to attend 
to their interests or _legislate_ for them. The power does not flow 
from the faculty of appointing, but from the relation of constituent 
and representative. The Judge is elected for the soundness of his 
judgment, his knowledge of law, and his nice powers of discrimination 
in deciding controversies between the parties before him. He is the 
agent of nobody, and represents only the justice of the country, which 
requires him to be free from any extraneous influence. The Senator is 
elected for the skill and ability and faithfulness with which he will 
_represent_ our interests and wishes. He is our attorney, not our 
judge. He is under our control, and we are not subject to his 
jurisdiction.

Let us suppose with the Judge, the case of a number of attornies, with 
powers irrevocable for six years, and indefinite within certain 
limits—the acts of a majority of attornies to be binding on all the 
principals, but the power of choosing any individual as attorney left 
open to the principals. Could they not be instructed? Could not the 
principals require a valid bond and security to obey or resign? If the 
attornies could judge exclusively of the limitations, and could bind 
their principals, might they not be tyrants and absorb all the 
fortunes of their principals. If selected to attend to the foreign 
trade of a set of merchants, they might control their domestic trade 
and interfere in their household matters. What injustice is done to 
any principal when the same right is extended to all? Is there not 
reciprocity? Is the right not a necessary protection? If a minority 
instructs for bad purposes it is overruled; if a majority instructs, 
its will ought to prevail. The advocate of the opposite doctrine 
supposes a right of the co-principals in the will of the delegate in 
opposition to that of his master, to be violated by our doctrine. Is 
this a part of the bargain?—a legitimate advantage?—Is the association 
not for mutual advantage, but to enable the cunning man to overreach 
his copartner by the ignorance or treachery of his agent? What may be 
a gain to-day may be a source of ruin to-morrow. Unless this game of 
overreaching is played, where is the loss by instructions? They must 
be either out-voted, or accord with the will of a majority. Do not 
proxies in joint stock companies always vote as directed by their 
principals? Would it be thought honorable to hold a proxy and disobey 
the will of the principal? What have the co-principals to do with the 
reason for the agent's acts? Whether he obeys the will of his 
principal, or his own will, they are equally bound, and the question 
is between him and his employer. They have still less right to object 
to his resignation, because the agent is nothing in the contract, but 
the _act_ is every thing. Whether the agent {635} is bound by oaths 
and bonds and security to obey, or is left free, he is equally a legal 
agent.

But is it fair to judge of rights which appertain to the structure of 
our government, and are necessary for its proper administration, and 
the safety of the people, by analogy to a private association of 
individuals, whose rights, if not regulated by express contract, are 
regulated by the arbitrary dictates of positive law? You may suppose a 
private association to be regulated by any principles which you may 
please to fancy, and hence may suppose the right of instruction to 
exist or not at your pleasure. But you cannot infer from what you 
suppose to exist in this fancied compact, that an analogous right does 
or does not exist in the great positive governmental compact. That 
must be tried by its positive terms, and not by fanciful analogies.

Wherever a Constitution rests the power to elect _a representative_, 
there lies the power to instruct. A Senator is responsible only for 
his own conduct, not that of his constituents; if their instructions 
are not approved by the people, they are responsible. Shifting 
responsibility destroys responsibility. If a Senator may defeat the 
will of his constituents in any case, he may in all, however unanimous 
the people and the legislature may be, and however important and 
permanent the consequences of his vote. If his firmness and 
independence may defeat his constituents, and he call solemn acts of 
the legislature temporary delusions, so may he under a delusion, 
defeat the deliberate wisdom of the people. Persons now living have 
seen Senators disobey and defeat the deliberate judgment of the 
people, expressed by several successive legislatures, sanctioned by 
repeated State elections, and sustained by the concurrent opinions of 
a majority of the States, the House of Representatives, and a vast 
majority of the American people. If this is right, then our government 
is under the control of a despicable and vexatious aristocracy.

The Judge contends that we must extend our doctrine to cases of 
impeachment, or give it up. It must embrace every thing or nothing. If 
the State Legislature has the power of exception, it may instruct in 
some cases of impeachment, and forbear in others. It may instruct to 
condemn or acquit. If the Senator can make the exceptions, then says 
the Judge, this power is an _empty name_. This is too true. The 
Senator can have no power to make exceptions, and yet under this 
assumed right nine-tenths of the disobedience which has ever been 
committed has been cloaked. The Judge has never heard whether 
impeachments were included in the doctrine, because he is the first 
person who ever broached that doctrine. When the Senate sits as a 
court of impeachment, or upon executive appointments, they cease to be 
our _representatives_, they become ex officio jurors or councillors of 
State, and in either capacity we have no more right to instruct them 
than we have to instruct the Chief Justice, or the President. They 
cease to be Legislators, and belong for the time to the Executive, or 
Judicial departments. In both cases private rights are concerned, 
character and opinion is involved, and evidence may be taken. Judgment 
is to be given and not a law passed. We can instruct to do an act, but 
not to form an opinion—to vote, but not to give judgment as to fitness 
for office, or the propriety of rejecting an officer. We do not see 
the force of the Judge's reasoning which forces our doctrine to apply 
to impeachments. The Senator acts in two capacities, as distinct as if 
they were held by two individuals. They are held up in the Federalist 
as judicious exceptions to the maxims which require the legislative, 
executive, and judicial departments to be separate. The Senator takes 
a new oath in trying impeachments. We have no more right to instruct 
our Senators when made judges or councillors by the constitution, than 
when made permanent judges or ministers or heads of department by the 
President. And the inability to instruct in the latter cases, had as 
well be brought up against us as in the former, as a reason for not 
instructing them when acting as _our representatives_. We can _will_ 
an act to be done, _but not_ that the innocent are guilty, or the 
reverse. The Judge's definition ought to have exceptions for these 
cases, unless he holds them as all others do, as excluded _of course_ 
by their nature from the controversy.

In fine, this is a right which the Legislatures can, will and ought to 
exercise. They can and ought to demand pledges, which no honorable man 
could disregard. Is there not always an implied pledge from the nature 
of the office and the understanding upon the subject? Nay, is there 
not in Virginia at least a tacit pledge given by all Senators elected 
since the adoption of MR. LEIGH'S report and resolutions in 1812?—The 
last of those resolutions is in these words—“_Resolved_, That after 
this solemn expression of the opinion of the General Assembly, on the 
right of instruction, and duty of obedience thereto, _no man ought 
henceforth to accept the appointment of a Senator of the United States 
from Virginia, who doth not hold himself bound to obey such 
instructions._” Is not acceptance of office under this resolution a 
tacit pledge, as binding as express words could make it?

I must conclude, having already occupied too much space in your 
valuable magazine, but the subject was too interesting and important 
to justify one in attempting to vindicate our cherished doctrines from 
the attack of so able a champion as JUDGE HOPKINSON, in too cursory an 
examination of his views. In conclusion, I must remark, that although 
we have to lament the misfortune of differing with that able and 
learned gentleman, and the lamented and illustrious MARSHALL, we feel 
no doubt of the support of HENRY, JEFFERSON, and

ROANE.[2]

[Footnote 2: One word more. This article was written in great haste 
for the August number. Instead of this an addition to his letter was 
published by _Judge Hopkinson_, under his own name, in that number. It 
requires notice as imperiously as his letter. It _must_ be noticed in 
the October Messenger. But _briefly_, very _briefly_. Subsequent 
investigation has satisfied the writer, that the Judge's opinions, 
both as to the _novelty_ and _weakness_ of our doctrines, are much 
less supported, either by _authority_ or _reason_, than he had 
supposed, when he was writing this article. He thinks even the Judge 
himself may be convinced that “politicians of a later date” than the 
adoption of the constitution, are not the “authors of the doctrine of 
instructions.”    R.]




DEATH OF THE PATRIOT.

BY W. GILMORE SIMMS.


  Unembitter'd by hate, and untroubled by strife,
    Shall the Patriot we loved, to the dark grave descend,
  Whilst the foes of his well-spent, political life,
    Have forgot each distinction in the wide term of friend.

  Each doubt that had whisper'd against him before,
    Each feeling of Envy, of Jealousy, Hate—
  Now awed into silence and sorrow, deplore,
    Nor seek to detract from the fame of the great!  {636}

  And great may we call _him_, whose mind in its scope,
    No barrier could limit, no danger could tame;
  Whose love for his country kept pace with the hope
    That prompted her efforts and led her to fame—

  Whose eye overlooking the clouds and the coil
    That grow with the darkness and din of the hour,
  Beheld from afar the reward of his toil,
    And hailed the bright promise that told of her power—

  Whose soul to its purpose and attributes true,
    Sublimed far beyond mere humanity's scan,
  Toiled fearlessly still for the glory in view,
    The rights, and the triumph, and freedom of man!—

  No voice in that cause was more potent or free,—
    No spirit more fearless, no feeling more strong,
  And its eloquence bold, like a stream from the sea,
    Bore down, all resistless, each bulwark of wrong.

  Oppression grew humbled—the tyrant grew pale,—
    Ancient Error, in fear for her temple and tower,
  Arrayed her foul agents, and strove to assail,
    But in vain—the brave spirit that grappled her power.

  And down went her bulwarks, and snapp'd was her chain,
    Her subtle pretences like webs, torn apart,
  Left man, as creation first spake him,—again,
    Unshackled by Error, by Power, by Art!

  And this was his triumph! The first of that band,
    The high, the unshaken, unselfish and true,
  Who dared in the front of the danger to stand,
    Defying its force, and defeating it too.

  Make his grave in the rock which the pilgrim may see,
    And seek, o'er the fathomless waves of the deep;
  But his monument build in the hearts of the free,
    The treasure most dear that a freeman can keep.

  And shed not a tear when ye think on his name,
    And mourn not his loss, who, in dying, has given,
  A record of triumphs, the proudest in fame,
    A charter of freedom as lovely as Heaven.




BRITISH PARLIAMENT IN 1835.

NO. III.

THE HOUSE OF LORDS.


Exalted as is the situation of the presiding officer of the House of 
Lords, particularly when he is at the same time high-chancellor of 
England, he has not, as speaker, the authority of the same officer in 
the lower House. The Peers address themselves to the House, and not to 
the presiding officer, when they rise to speak; this officer has not 
the power to decide to whom the floor belongs, or to call a member to 
his seat; the House itself regulates all its internal police.

The mode of their election is the evident cause of this difference in 
the power of the two speakers; the one is chosen by the Throne, a 
power unconnected with the Lords; while the House of Commons elects 
its own speaker.

At five o'clock the presiding officer of the House of Lords appears on 
the woolsack, escorted by the usher of the black-rod and the 
mace-bearer. If three Peers be present the speaker can open the 
session; so that three individuals may form a House of Lords. The 
votes of two of them may reject a bill that has been passed 
unanimously by the six hundred and fifty-four delegates of the people!

It is not very unusual to see the House of Lords reduced to this 
legislative trinity. But let us suppose some important question to be 
the order of the day—no matter what. The hall will then be full—the 
majority of the Peers will be in their seats.

Glancing over the numerous heads of the compact crowd below, your 
attention will be attracted by many even in the centre of the Hall, as 
it would be by the principal steeples of a great city, of which you 
caught a birds-eye-view from some neighboring eminence.

The three round wigs of the three clerks of the House, are among the 
first objects that will catch your eye, seated as they are, at their 
official table, with their backs turned towards you. Opposite to 
these, their faces turned to you, are the three uncovered heads of 
Lord Rolle, the Marquis of Wellesley and Lord Holland; farther on, the 
two long wigs of the masters in chancery; and beyond, under the golden 
hangings of the throne, the official and huge wig of the speaker, 
which raises itself up with all the dignity of the tower of a 
cathedral, among the belfries of a city.

Let this principal wig, then, be our point of departure; starting from 
it we will run over the different quarters of the chambers, as in 
exploring London, we would guide ourselves by the dome of St. Paul. At 
the present time, the weight of this huge presidential head-dress is 
not supported by a Chancellor. The great seal is in commission. The 
individual who sits with that air of noble ease on the woolsack is 
Lord Denman, the temporary speaker of the chamber, since the overthrow 
of the whig ministry preceding that of Sir Robert Peel. His manner 
would quickly inform you that the situation is not a novel one to him. 
In fact, he has been for many years Chief Justice of England. It was 
at the very bar of the House of Lords that he began to play an 
important political part; in 1820, he defended, with Lord Brougham, 
Caroline, the queen of George IV, against the heavy charges then 
brought against her by her royal husband. Could he have flattered 
himself at that period with the hope that he should one day become a 
Peer himself, and President of that chamber, before which he appeared 
as an humble advocate? It was not every ambitious lawyer who dared at 
that day to dream of the 400,000 of francs of salary that appertains 
to that lordly perruque.

Distinguished as he has been in his profession, it is neither the 
profound knowledge, nor the great eloquence of Lord Denman that has 
secured his extraordinary good fortune. It should rather be attributed 
to an indescribable but harmonious dignity of language, of person, and 
manner. You would think the senatorial throne had need of just such a 
man; M. Ravez himself was not more formed by nature for the presiding 
officer of a deliberative body. But this excellence, a little {637} 
theatrical, of a majestic carriage and appearance, is not the chief 
merit of the noble Lord; his highest praise is that he remains the 
same man under the purple, that he was when dressed in the simple 
black gown of an advocate. A supreme magistrate, seated on the steps 
of the throne, he is still the affable and liberal counsellor of the 
court of chancery.

To the right of the speaker, and on your left, in a recess into which 
the glass of those folding doors permits but a doubtful light to 
enter, do you not see a confused mass of wax and ruddy faces, of white 
robes and black surplices? These are the three crowded benches of 
bishops and archbishops. Formerly they were not so eager to make use 
of their legislative privileges. At the present time every man is at 
his post; the church is supported by all its pillars. The Catholic 
emancipation has wakened up these _millionnaire_ prebendaries from the 
lethargic sleep into which the gold with which they are stuffed, had 
plunged them. They keep strict watch around their heaps of wealth. It 
will not be their fault if some crumbs from their splendid banquet be 
thrown to starving Ireland.

If you have only seen these prelates in the House of Lords or in the 
pulpit in full dress, you have examined but half the picture. You must 
observe them in private, in their foppish and gallant city dress. Do 
you ask what dashing personage that is, in a frock of the finest black 
cloth, his head covered with a hat of the longest beaver fur, with 
broad brims fastened up by cords of silk, galloping along the 
pavements of Regent street? A singular cavalier, in fact; and one who 
will still more astonish you when he leaps from his horse, and enters 
his club-house, his riding whip in his hand, affording you a better 
opportunity for observing his masonic-like costume, his high black 
_guetres_ and black apron. Behold a very noble and very reverend 
Bishop of England.

And this other person dressed, after the same fashion, who is leaping 
from that open carriage, filled with young women, whose fair skins and 
rosy cheeks cannot fail to catch your eye, as we are crossing 
Westminster place? This, too, is a bishop, whose wife and daughters 
have just accompanied him to the parliament house.

But let us follow these noble Lords spiritual to their seats in the 
hall of legislation.

Figure to yourself an old woman with a face yellow and lank; let her 
bend under the weight of fourscore years; wrinkle her forehead with as 
many furrows as you can; let her voice be sharp and broken; let her 
eyes be uncertain, restless and suspicious: would this creature not be 
a faithful picture of his grace the Archbishop of Canterbury, the 
first prelate of England, now seated alone on the highest bench of the 
church? Is it not the very image of superstition itself? Decrepid, 
crouching, shivering!

This venerable Archbishop, superannuated and unfit for all service as 
he appears to you, has strength enough to speak the moment that any 
question in the least touches the revenues of the church. Upon such 
occasions his speeches invariably commence with many laudable 
reflections on the advantages of tolerance, and as certainly end by 
wishing damnation to popery both on earth and in heaven. This is at 
least the object of these discourses, for it is no very easy matter to 
seize their exact signification. His grace, who holds his 
archbishopric of providence, has not however received from the same 
divine source, the gift of expressing his religious rancor with much 
ease or elegance. It always costs him a world of labor to put together 
his anti-Catholic homilies, incoherent and broken as they are. One 
would not say that gall flows from the lips of this mild prelate; he 
rather spits it out.

Do you not observe behind his grace, that little yellowish man with 
the eye of a caged tiger, constantly moving himself about, now leaning 
forward, now appearing so impatient, playing and jumping about on his 
bench: it is the bishop of Exeter, one of the sturdy pillars of the 
fanatic church militant. This man is the most cunning and dangerous 
foe to liberty; his evil nature clothes itself with all the seduction 
of the most amiable manners. No one among these noble and holy 
hypocrites has such exquisite politeness; or such gentle and 
insinuating address. Never did a cat better conceal its claws under 
the velvet of its feet.

The bishop of Exeter is not distinguished by the same quickness in 
replying to an adversary, that he is in attacking him; perhaps, I 
should rather say, that in his gentle warfare he never permits himself 
to act on the defensive. Listen to him, as he rises with the greatest 
humility, his little square black cap in his joined hands; his wallet 
is filled with denunciations—it must be emptied. Doubtless it grieves 
him, a man of peace, to have to war against temporal power! But why 
does temporal power presume to pare down the luxuriant dimensions of 
spiritual power? Oh! the charitable prelate, hear him! How his 
treachery smiles upon the lips! how ingenuously it scratches! Never 
had taunting so much _onction_—never was aggression so timid. Who is 
there that would have this trembling modesty in throwing discord in 
the midst of such an assembly? So soon as they are once struggling 
together, nothing remains for him to say. Whigs and tories tear 
yourselves to pieces, the good bishop will not interrupt you; he has 
discharged his duty as a protestant pastor. Tear yourselves to pieces. 
He sits down quietly, and contemplates the _melée_; tranquilly and at 
his ease, he laughs in his sleeve as he counts the blows that fall 
upon the minister. God forgive him! I believe his foot keeps time with 
the blows!

If I were to describe the thirty Protestant Bishops crowded together 
in this place, I would show you perhaps three or four almost whigs, 
and who rather more resemble christians, and among these particularly 
the brother of Lord Grey, the chief of this almost imperceptible 
spiritual minority; but enough of these specimens of the surplice. We 
will leave the bishops to our right. The first bench that we encounter 
after theirs, going towards the bar of the house, is that of the 
ministers. Here we will pause awhile.

Let us stop before this person in a gray hat, and dark brown 
riding-coat, carelessly supporting himself on his cane. The heat of 
the weather is extreme. To be more at his ease, he has, rather 
unceremoniously, taken off his cravat. If you were to meet him in St. 
James' Park, his favorite promenade, cantering on horseback, or 
walking on foot, his large nostrils snuffing the breeze, his head 
thrown back, his eyes sparkling and full of disdain, with his tall 
figure, and robust and soldierly appearance, you would take him for 
some old colonel on half pay, certainly not for the first Lord of the 
Treasury. {638} Nevertheless this person is Lord Melbourne, the leader 
of the government.

But examine a little closer and more attentively this physiognomy; the 
expression of it is complex; it is a mixture of pride, indolence, and 
irritability. In this you have the whole secret of the talent and the 
fortune of this minister. It is almost a miracle that his natural 
indolence should have allowed him the ambition to aspire to the first 
office of the state; at least, I do not believe that he would have had 
the energy to have maintained himself long in that position, if it had 
not been disputed. It is because he had been once thrown out, that he 
is in office now. In throwing him down, they struck the mainspring of 
his strength; so he has rebounded, and in consequence has again raised 
himself to power, and re-established himself more solidly and more 
obstinately than ever. Such are those natures whose dormant energies 
require to be awakened by the lash of insult. In 1834, Lord Melbourne 
was but an inert and powerless whig; in 1835 he is a radical whig; he 
has made the throne capitulate, he has wounded the church, he 
threatens the peerage—why is this? Because you have offended him, 
because you have chased him from office. You alone can diminish his 
power. His eloquence has no other moving power than that which he 
derives from obstacles thrown in his way. Suffer him to go on, to 
speak as he pleases—his words will grow feeble, and his speech drag 
itself laboriously along; cross his path, throw any thing in his way, 
he rebels, he is hurried along, he grows heated, he drags you with 
him, he is eloquent! His whole person, his whole soul is wrapped in 
his discourse. There is nothing studied, nothing solemn; all is 
sudden, involuntary. He, who but a moment since, was so grave, so 
subdued, now clinches his hands, now throws his arms out with 
violence, now leaps almost from the very floor; his angry declamation, 
his accents of indignant contempt proceed from the bottom of his 
entrails. Now his passion suffocates him: he no longer breathes; his 
discourse is interrupted; a profound silence ensues. At this moment he 
exhibits the trembling and magnificently impassioned air of Casimir 
Perier.

Lord Melbourne is the most original speaker, and the most peculiar in 
either house of parliament; perhaps the most impassioned, if not the 
greatest and the most perfect. As a statesman I have great respect for 
his moderate character; he is a progressive, bold, and thorough whig; 
but he is not a whig—an improvident aristocrat, who never inquires to 
what extremities the principles which he has inscribed on his banner 
may lead.

The member on the left of Lord Melbourne, of smaller stature than the 
noble premier, fat, all his limbs well rounded, yet not over large, 
with a frank and open countenance, is the Marquis of Lansdowne, the 
president of the council. You know that in England this office does 
not entitle the person who fills it to any pre-eminence over his 
colleagues; he is their speaker, and only presides over their 
deliberations. Their true leader and chief is the first lord of the 
treasury. The Marquis of Lansdowne plays his part with honor to 
himself in the House of Lords, and usefully in the cabinet. In a 
discussion he generally follows Lord Melbourne; his language is 
masculine and studied, his voice firm and sonorous, but his utterance 
is heavy and monotonous; he has evidently more words than ideas; he 
says trifling things, _les riens_, with too much solemnity; this 
regular and invariable emphasis destroys the effect of his best 
efforts. I could wish that he would spare a few of those thundering 
gesticulations, during which be strikes the clerks' table with such 
furious violence. It is a vulgar practice that should be left to Lord 
Londonderry, who sits before him across the table. This style of 
argument is much more becoming in a pugilist than an orator. I have 
been present, occasionally, when the noble Marquisses replied to each 
other with the air of two people trying the strength of their arms, or 
hammering together on an anvil.

Those who recollect Mr. Pitt, observe a good deal of resemblance 
between the argument of that great statesman and the style of Lord 
Lansdowne's speeches. It is from Mr. Pitt that the President of the 
Council has acquired the habit of embodying a whole argument in one 
immense period, cut up into a thousand parts; but the supreme tact of 
Mr. Pitt always enabled him to lead his hearers, with infallible 
certainty, to the point he had in view, by cross and apparently 
opposite ways. The Marquis of Lansdowne is but too happy if he can 
extricate himself in safety from the labyrinths of his own 
parentheses.

That other angular figure, hipped, with a long stiff neck buried in a 
thick white cravat, not unlike a French provincial notary, is Lord 
Duncannon, the first Commissioner of Woods and Forests, and of the 
Privy Seal. He sits on the right of Lord Melbourne, and is one of the 
most useful members of the cabinet. Stammerer as he is, he speaks 
often, and always willingly; he wants words more than thoughts; his 
_sang froid_ often serves him in the stead of wit, though he 
occasionally strikes an adversary very happily, and gives double 
effect to his hits by the air—the most innocent and candid in the 
world—with which he administers them.

The other Ministers in the House of Lords hardly deserve any 
particular notice; if of any service in council, they certainly are 
not on the floor of the House. The long, dark, impassible figure of 
Lord Auckland is rarely drawn from its retreat; it is only when some 
question touches the affairs of the admiralty, of which he is the 
first Lord, that a few bashful words escape him. Lord Glenelg, 
recently elevated to the Peerage, as rarely suffers himself to be 
drawn into a debate, if the colonies have nothing at stake. Lord 
Glenelg has had his days of eloquence, and was much more distinguished 
in the Commons when simple Mr. Grant. Assuredly he is no longer a 
young man, for his head is covered with gray hairs, though he looks to 
be older than he really is. He is completely worn out, both in soul 
and body, and is one of those mystic sensualists who sacrifice real 
existence to the mysterious dreams of an opium-eater.

An enormous, round, pale bald head, with great black eyes, and huge 
white whiskers, resting on broad shoulders, is every thing that 
remains of Lord Holland, the nephew of Fox, and once an accomplished 
orator of his uncle's school, and a tolerable writer. Of the rest of 
his body nothing can be said; the gout has eat him up by little and 
little, and he ends, absolutely, like a fish. It is only after much 
time and exertion that his two crutches transport him to the end of 
the bench on {639} which he sits, opposite Lord Melbourne. Moreover, 
his chancellorship of the Duchy of Lancaster is not such a sinecure as 
people have said; he supports his colleagues at least with all the 
vigor of his lungs, if with no great strength of argument. He assumes 
the responsibility of applauding their speeches, and acquits himself 
conscientiously of the duty, for he makes more noise with his cheers 
and ‘hears’ alone, than all the rest of the Whig party put together. 
It is quite an amusing spectacle to see this stump of a man, bawling 
out his applauses, looking for all the world like one of those Chinese 
toys representing a great fat buffoon, which, loaded at the bottom, 
and without legs, constantly resumes its upright position, however 
often it may be thrown to one side or the other.

Literary history will remember Lord Holland, on account of his 
biography of Lope de Vega. I am reminded by this work of an anecdote 
of the noble lord, which does much more honor to his politeness than 
to his generosity. In 1832, a poor refugee Spaniard, whose only 
property in the world consisted of three unpublished manuscript 
comedies of the celebrated Castillian poet, determined to go to London 
for the purpose of selling them to the illustrious whig commentator, 
whom he thought would naturally give more for them than any other 
person. However, in the presence of so great a nobleman, the timid 
emigrant did not dare to speak of any price for them; he simply 
offered him his three valuable manuscripts. The visit and the present 
were very graciously received, and in exchange for the one and the 
other, the stranger received the next morning Lord Holland's card and 
a copy of the life of Lope de Vega. There are some occasions on which 
the English are magnificent; but their liberality never exercises 
itself to any great extent but in public. For example, they would 
glory in throwing a set of diamonds to an Italian _chanteur_ in a 
crowded theatre.

Clearing the table of the ushers, at one leap, we find ourselves in 
the very head quarters of the tory opposition. Here are the ministers, 
belonging to the House of Lords, of the late conservative 
administration. All of them are past middle age, and (like the present 
whig ministers) are between fifty and seventy, the greater part being 
over sixty.

Let us proceed at once to the generalissimo, seated in the centre, on 
the second bench, his arms folded over his breast. He is asleep, I 
suppose; he breathes with difficulty, his body being pressed in by the 
black coat closely buttoned; but they wake him; he takes off his hat 
hurriedly, and exposes his white hair cut close to his head. Observe 
that thick chin which protrudes itself and works without ceasing, 
those retreating lips, that great crooked nose, those brilliant and 
steady blue eyes, that face yellow and bronzed; is it not the very 
countenance of Punch, only not quite so rubicund? Does not that lank 
and bony body resemble some wooden automaton, some old jointed doll?

Who would not be seized with surprise at the sight of this man? Behold 
the man of the most extraordinary good fortune of the age! Behold the 
man who conquered Napoleon, and who has lived twenty years on his 
laurels! It is not only in war that he has succeeded; peace has not 
been less profitable to him; he has ruled in the council as in the 
camp; his caprice has, for a long time, governed an intelligent and 
free people. He is the king of the last aristocracy in the world. 
Happy man! what honors has he failed to obtain that he ever desired to 
possess? He finds himself suddenly a learned man, without having ever 
studied any thing. Law and theology have decreed him their honors—the 
universities have made him their chancellor. Even more, the exclusive 
circles of the West End themselves, have recognized his supremacy. He 
has seen generations of dandies decay and fall every autumn, while he, 
their patriarch, remains as firm as ever. The inconstant winds of 
fashion have not torn a single leaf from his crown; he has continued 
in fashion for the quarter of a century. If you follow him this 
evening to some _rout_ in Grosvenor Square, you will see him throned 
on a couch. Around him a swarm of belles and grandams flutter, each 
one endeavoring to catch a word, or a smile, or a look from the hero. 
You will see, (for the hero is deaf, and there is no familiarity which 
is not permitted to him,) you will see the most favored among them in 
his arms, his black wrinkled hands resting on their white shoulders. 
Happy man! It is true that you may read on the buckle of the garter 
that surrounds the leg of the Septuagenarian, in letters of 
diamond—“Honi soit qui mal y pense,” the motto of his order. Happy 
man! and by what mysterious power have you been thus enabled to 
succeed every where and with all persons? Oh! I know not! Perhaps to 
the small share of patient prudence and of inert common sense, that a 
narrow ball-proof forehead may contain, your success may be due. 
Perhaps to the beneficent rays and the partiality of that capricious 
star which so mysteriously lights the way of the predestined!

But look—who speaks—it is the Duke of Wellington! What labor! he 
tosses about his head! he grasps with his withered fingers the back of 
the bench that is before him! he seems as if he would drag from every 
place around him ideas which he cannot otherwise possess himself of. 
At last he draws from his brain some fragments of incoherent phrases 
and unconnected reasoning. All this, good and bad, ends in a sort of 
speech not very unreasonable; he enables you to guess for yourself 
what he wished to say, though he has not himself said it. He is an 
orator and a statesman, as he is a great coxcomb and a great 
general,—by destiny.

The tories of the House would be ungrateful if they forgot that it is 
the Duke of Wellington alone who has for a long time preserved them, 
by the vigorous and almost military discipline by which he has 
regulated their intemperate fury. He cannot be disobeyed with 
impunity. In the beginning of this very session Lord Londonderry was 
severely reprimanded for having engaged in a skirmish which the 
general had not authorized. At present, however, the evil spirits of 
the party seem to grow weary of the wise moderation of their chief. At 
least, if he does not quickly reduce them to obedience, they will, in 
spite of him, engage in a conflict with the people. But let his grace 
beware; should his soldiers induce him even to head his forces in this 
unequal combat, he will not find the same good luck that attended him 
at Waterloo.

An expression of silly and impotent ferocity characterizes the face on 
the left of the Duke of Wellington; not a hair upon his head, but on 
each side enormous whiskers perfectly white. One would say it was some 
{640} old Turk of the carnival or the theatre, who had lost his 
turban; but you should see this grotesque creature standing erect. It 
is so badly placed on its long legs, as to be unable to move without 
stumbling. You might upset it by your breath. Very constant in its 
attendance at the House, it is always busy when there. You are 
incessantly annoyed by the squeaking, scolding voice that proceeds 
from this great body: not that he often speaks, but excels all others 
in his applauses of tory speeches. He is the counterpart of Lord 
Holland, and it is his duty to counteract the ‘hears’ and ‘hurrahs’ of 
the latter. You would not have supposed that this was a very 
illustrious personage—illustrious at least by birth, as Lord Brougham 
once very irreverently remarked: nevertheless, it is a Royal 
Highness—it is the eldest brother of the king who plays the part of an 
impudent applauder of the incendiary speeches of an unpopular 
aristocracy. It is a prince of the blood who degrades his rank in this 
impotent farce. Truly, this Duke of Cumberland is badly advised; his 
military glory does not entitle him to play the tricks of a bully! and 
as his conscience must often recall to his memory certain private and 
public peccadilloes, he would be wise not to remind the world of them 
quite so often by his bravadoes. The public have not forgotten that 
strong suspicions of violent murder, of the basest seduction, and of 
incest, have stained an existence, which nothing but its adventitious 
rank has, perhaps, saved from the vengeance of the law. The Grand 
Master of the Orange Lodges is also sufficiently well known in 
Ireland. There is but little chance that he will ever have occasion to 
assert his rights to the throne. But would it not be wise to 
anticipate the possibility? In these times of popular sovereignty 
legitimacy does not always ensure a crown.

That fat Lord, with his chin graciously reposing on his well gloved 
hand, and a _bouquet_ of red pinks in his button hole, is the father 
of Viscount Castlereagh, and was in his day a distinguished dandy. He 
retains all the elegance that is compatible with a large belly and 
sixty years. You can still admire his form in spite of his fatness, 
which threatens to burst at every point through his riding coat. The 
good taste which distinguishes his toilette, and contends even against 
the advances of old age, does not unfortunately characterize the 
legislative conduct of Lord Londonderry. He is the most indiscreet 
speaker in this House, in which all extravagance or violence is rare. 
The habit of interrogating ministers, and especially on all matters 
connected with Spain, in which country he formerly served as a colonel 
of huzzars, is almost a disease with him. Good a tory as he is, he has 
too much zeal; and I am entirely of the opinion of M. de Talleyrand, 
that nothing can be more unfortunate than too much of that quality. 
This rashness of the old huzzar brings down upon him, now and then, 
severe rebuffs from the generalissimo. O'Connell has perfectly 
described the old marquis, when he called him half-maniac—half-idiot. 
He is not a bad man; but nature has rather liberally endowed him with 
that sort of broken eloquence which supplies the want both of language 
and thought, by the profusion and vehemence of gesture. He is always 
too much pleased to display his cambric handkerchief in public. In my 
opinion, the whigs would have gained as much as the tories, by 
suffering him to have departed on his embassy to St. Petersburg.

We must pass by Lord Aberdeen, Lord Wharncliffe and Lord Ellenborough, 
whom you see seated around the Duke of Wellington; they are his 
principal aids-de-camp, and were formerly ministers with him. They are 
prudent and cunning tories, if not moderate ones, and express 
themselves well; but we have not room to give full length portraits of 
them. An epic catalogue does not describe every soldier of the two 
armies, not even every officer; and our article is more modest than an 
Iliad. For the best reasons then, we must content ourselves with 
pointing out with the finger the chief heads of our assembly.

To complete the review, we must finish our tour of the Chamber, with 
the ranges of benches to our left. Do you observe up there on the 
third row of benches, with its back against the wall, that figure of a 
monkey dressed in a light colored wig, with its mouth awry, and 
looking as if it was employed in cracking nuts? Far as this noble Lord 
is seated from the head quarters of the tories, he is nevertheless one 
of their most important and redoubtable captains. He has been twice 
Lord High Chancellor, and held that office in the late cabinet of Sir 
Robert Peel; this person is Lord Lyndhurst. Like Lord Brougham, he 
passed from the bar, through the House of Commons, to the woolsack. 
His extreme ugliness has nothing about it that can be considered 
vulgar; on the contrary, he is the only lawyer I have ever seen who 
had the air of a man of the world, and the polished manner of one who 
had been a courtier. He is more than a lawyer; he is a most finished 
orator, always clear, pithy, skilful, well-disciplined, and never 
tedious, but concise and agreeable. His voice is full, grave, and 
generally calm, but always capable of raising itself to the occasion; 
he only grows warm when some personal but secret vexation disturbs 
him. He is not troubled with a conscience; the privilege of dispensing 
with which, he retains as a lawyer, though he has in other respects 
managed to throw off the peculiarities of his profession. Formerly he 
was an ultra whig. At heart he is still only an advocate, though 
interested with the aristocracy, and affecting their polished good 
breeding. He is a tory just now, because toryism has paid him 
liberally for his pleadings. To-day, if the reformers could offer him 
higher distinctions, he would discover, I am afraid, in his bag, an 
abundance of arguments for reform.

Before turning the corner of the extreme left, let us pause a moment 
to observe three personages, who centre in themselves all the ultra 
toryism of the House. They are seated by the side of each other, at 
the end of the last bench on this side.

The first, with a long, rough body, with a white cravat, dressed in 
tawdry clothes, coarsely built, and looking like a clown, is the Duke 
of Newcastle. Observe that dull, sottish eye—those long, erect ears. 
See with what interest he listens! what attentive stupidity! 
Nevertheless, you may rest assured that he does not understand a word 
of what he hears. The words of a speaker have to knock a long while at 
the door of his dull brain; he never fully comprehends an idea but 
after a week's mature deliberation. Generally, at the end of a 
session, he begins to understand the speech of the king, pronounced at 
its opening. A sort of brutal and furious hatred against every thing 
that he conceives to savor of reform, serves him in lieu of any other 
{641} understanding. The rough lessons which the indignation of the 
people have beaten into him, have not been able to teach any prudence 
to his blind instincts. All his recriminations are impressed with the 
dullness of his slow mind. The peerage might be killed and buried this 
winter—it would not be sooner than the next spring that his Lordship 
would order his horses, and drive to the House of Lords to argue 
against Catholic emancipation.

The other two persons, are those of two noblemen in great credit with 
the church, even more of fanatics than tories. Neither of them is 
deficient in a certain oratorical fury, which, however, savors much 
more of the pulpit than the Parliament.

In the first place, that fanatical looking figure which is watching 
you with a fiery black eye, playing with the ruffles of his shirt, 
with the knobs of his umbrella, is Lord Winchelsea; an honest man, 
probably, and a furious, but sincere protestant. There is an 
appearance of conviction in the intemperate homilies that he 
improvises for the House of Lords, or the columns of the Standard, 
which in some measure palliates their haughty intolerance. This noble 
zealot, even while he is preaching up the persecution of popery, 
persuades himself, I am confident, that his own apostleship will 
secure him martyrdom.

As to that other personage—that huge and deformed colossus, whom you 
would take for a chosen _cuirassier_ discharged from service in 
consequence of excessive fatness—though his protestant mysticism may 
be of rather larger calibre, I should be inclined to put less faith in 
his relics. This Lord Roden—for it is Lord Roden—was in his youth a 
miscreant, who acknowledged neither God nor Devil, and worshipped only 
his dinners and his debaucheries. But in the middle of one of those 
nights of excess, he had a vision somewhat like that which cried out 
to Swedenbourg—_You eat too much._ From that moment, submissive to 
supreme advice, the Earl of Roden reformed his diet and his irregular 
habits, and he has become by degrees, the evangelical and political 
preacher that he is at the present time. In other respects this 
conversion has in no degree diminished his _embonpoint_; and his new 
piety does not prevent his being a most furious Orangist, ever ready, 
if permitted, to sacrifice to his monarch a magnificent hetacomb of 
Irish Catholics.

Let us, for the present, cross the chamber, in giving a _coup d'œil_ 
to the benches ranged before the bar, and facing the throne. These are 
called the _independent_ benches. The majority of the peers whom you 
observe seated there have been ministers. The greatest, both in 
personal appearance and public fame, is Lord Grey. Observe his tall 
person, how thin, frail, and bent it seems! After his seventieth year 
he was unable to give himself up any longer to public affairs; he 
wanted physical strength to continue the arduous labor of reform. He 
himself placed the load on shoulders which he had accustomed to bear 
it; and finally resigned both power and the active part he formerly 
took in parliamentary discussion. Let justice be rendered to him while 
still living; he has been a bold and loyal statesman; as soon as he 
found the helm entrusted to his hands, he steered the ship of state on 
principles that he had for thirty years recommended. He has not proved 
a miserable traitor to his promises and his past history, as the 
perjured ministers of revolutionary origin in France, the worthless 
product of that gloriously useless revolution of July. He is the first 
whig who ever dared to carry into practice his own principles. 
Assuredly, it required something more than ordinary determination to 
open to reform that wide gate, which he knew could never again be 
closed.

In addition to this, he was no common speaker. The impression of his 
dignified, convincing and penetrating oratory, is still deeply 
impressed on the recollection of those who were accustomed to hear 
him; the air and manner of a great nobleman, which always 
distinguished him, gave additional force to his authority. The noble 
affability of his manners would remind you of the old Duke of 
Montmorency-Laval. There is this difference between them, that Lord 
Grey did not succeed in forming and supporting his ministry alone by 
the influence of his fine manners, as the _ci-devant_ plenipotentiary 
of Charles X at Vienna, did in respect to his embassies.

The other nobleman of coarse appearance, still fresh and blonde, is 
the Earl of Ripon, politically better known by his second title of 
Viscount Goderich. He also was raised for a moment to the top of the 
ministerial ladder; but it does not appear that he has made up his 
mind to remain in private life, into which situation his incapacity 
made him so soon fall back. However, if he aspires to reascend, he has 
not taken the right road to accomplish his designs; it is no longer 
the period when one may balance between two opinions, or feed on two 
political parties. It would be a double mistake in him to persist in 
his attempts to reseize the reins of supreme authority. The confusion 
of his reasoning as well as of his ideas, when he attempts to speak, 
proves very clearly that he does not possess the clear and firm head 
necessary to manage the furious horses of the chariot of state.

The Duke of Richmond has never raised himself to the same sublime 
elevation; he is one of those poor nobles whose liberalism must be 
maintained by high and lucrative employments. He is one of those 
aristocratic worthies, always ready for any sort of military or civil 
work, and all sort of salaries. Lieutenant General and _aid-de-camp_ 
of the king, his grace has not hesitated to stoop to manage the mails, 
and to become a member of a whig cabinet. At the present moment, he 
has the bearing of one who flatters himself with the chimerical hope 
of a _juste-milieu_ administration, of which he would be a member. 
Louis XVIII would have placed him in his upper house. The noble duke, 
remarkable for a false air of Parisian elegance, which distinguishes 
his carriage from that of our great men, usually so full of stiffness 
and formality; yet I do not think that any of the modern great men of 
France have ever, as the Duke of Richmond often does, crossed their 
legs and raised their feet higher than the level of their heads, in 
full session, for the purpose of better viewing themselves in their 
polished boots.

Excepting the Duke of Wellington, we have not yet met a single 
nobleman who can call himself truly fashionable. Ah! but see here is 
Lord Alvanley. Yes, this little man, erect, bloated, swollen, 
breathless, careless, ill-dressed, with nothing _recherché_ about him 
but his yellow gloves, and looking as if he had just come from a 
debauch to which he was anxious to return, is {642} one of the chief 
representatives of modern fashion in the House of Lords. Formerly he 
was a whig; now he is a tory, or rather he is a _bon convive_, and 
belongs to the party which gives the best dinners and suppers. As the 
tories are distinguished for their sumptuous entertainments—therefore 
he is a tory. He ought not to have waited until he was ruined to have 
become a conservative. No matter! having eaten up his own property, he 
now helps others to do the same thing; he pays with his company and 
his gaiety. He has, in fact, a rich vein of humor; one might make a 
large volume of his witticisms. He is always sober at the House. It 
was his evil genius which inspired him on one occasion to grapple with 
O'Connell; the contest was unequal; the agitator wields the most 
deadly _repartee_. Fashionable and witty as Lord Alvanley is, he will 
nevertheless retain, during his life, graved on his forehead, the 
title of _bloated buffoon_, inflicted on him by the rude adversary 
whom he so imprudently attacked.

This young man of a handsome form, gracious in his appearance, and of 
striking mien, going out of the House, is the Earl of Errol. He votes 
with the ministry, although he is almost a member of the royal family. 
He is, in fact, a son-in-law, _sous-officiel_, of William IV, having 
married one of the illegitimate daughters of his Majesty. I should be 
glad to show you his brother-in-law, the Earl of Munster, the 
illegitimate issue of the same illustrious parent; but he rarely 
attends the sittings of Parliament. High and profitable sinecures have 
been showered upon these noble Earls. You see that in this age of 
constitutional governments, calling themselves moral and economical, 
sovereigns still shower, after the manner of Louis XIV, wealth and 
honors on their bastards.

You would hardly ask the name of that old man, so withered by age, 
whose slender legs are pushed into those old fashioned boots, with his 
twisted queue leaping about on the shining and powdered collar of an 
old blue frock. You would say it was some old French emigrant, 
forgotten in 1814 by the Restoration, and left on this side of the 
water. Observe how he moves to and fro; it is his constant motion. The 
eighty years of the Earl of Westmoreland do not prevent his being the 
most stirring and active tory in the House. He has been a member of 
the cabinet; and occasionally, at distinct intervals, he will still 
raise his old voice in defence of his old cause. Immediately on the 
adjournment of the House, you may see him mount an old horse, as lank 
as himself, and gallop off. It is perhaps a mere fancy, but it seems 
to me that on the day the old Earl and his horse fail to return, 
toryism will be no more. In spite of myself I am accustomed to embody 
in this old man, all that remains of energy and strength in that dying 
party. He looks like the last living and moving form in the midst of 
the inanimate skeletons of this aristocracy, so fast crumbling into 
dust.

If you have observed that other old man, so nimble and busy, with his 
spectacles thrown back on his forehead, and looking in every direction 
around him with his large fish-like eyes, you have remarked that he 
runs incessantly from bench to bench, finding something to whisper in 
every one's ear; and have doubtless taken him for one of the ushers of 
the House, for he has on the same dress that they are accustomed to 
wear—a black French coat, and a wig-bag of black _taffeta_. That is 
Lord Shaftesbury, a descendant of the celebrated earl of that name, 
one of the first essayists in the English language; a writer whose 
works are distinguished equally for the classical character of their 
style, and the wit and spirit that characterize them. The merits of 
the present Earl of Shaftesbury are not of the same exalted species; 
he is an active and industrious man. When toryism was in power (for he 
is a strong tory) he managed to secure the profitable office of 
president of the committees, and in that situation he exhibited all 
the patient and practical intelligence which the office demanded. He 
is also one of the vice-speakers of the House, and occasionally he 
exhibits his little black person on the red woolsack; but as he is 
only allowed to figure in that situation in his ordinary, unimposing 
costume, the honor is a rare one; it is only in the last extremity 
that he enjoys it, when there is no other possible speaker. An English 
Chamber does not consider that it is presided over with sufficient 
dignity, or even legally, unless it be by a wig and gown.

Thanks to St. George, we are now beyond the crowd of tories, and have 
doubled the second angle of the bar; returning towards the throne, 
passing by the benches on the left, we find ourselves among the whigs, 
who will not delay very much our progress, for the ranks are not very 
close on this side. Alas! how many vacancies. A glance at some of 
these generous, solitary peers, and our tour will be ended: we shall 
then have finished our long voyage around the Chamber.

The Earl of Radnor is one of the small number of disinterested whigs, 
who advocate reform for itself, and not as a means of securing 
themselves a seat at the feast of power; he discharges his duties as a 
liberal peer, actively, conscientiously, and with that rectitude and 
firmness which you would anticipate from his erect, nervous, and 
inflexible bearing. He is not a very flowery speaker; but it is 
necessary to listen to him when he rises; he has the tone of hardy and 
vigorous honesty, which constrains the attention of an audience.

With more diffidence and timidity in his manner of speaking, the same 
virtues of sincere and free devotion to public liberty, distinguish 
the Marquis of Clanricarde. There is about this young nobleman a sort 
of mental grace, which veils the deformity of his features; his flat 
nose, sunken eyes, and cadaverous complexion, do not disgust you; you 
have never seen extreme ugliness so becoming; it is a death's head, 
smiling and perfectly agreeable. The Parisian world is sufficiently 
well acquainted with the Marquis of Clanricarde. Thanks to the caustic 
wit of his lady, the daughter of Canning, who amused herself the last 
year with so much cruelty, at the expense of its _bourgeois_, 
pedantic, and quasi-legitimate aristocracy.

We are now entering the head quarters of the little army of whigs. In 
the rear is Lord Plunket, a member of the administration, though 
without a seat in the cabinet. Truly, Ireland, of which he is 
Chancellor, has more than one cause of bitter complaint against her 
unnatural child. The ungrateful wretch! he betrayed his country to 
provide for himself and family; he preferred fortune to renown; and 
paid his own honor for the honors with which he has clothed himself! 
But Cobbett and the patriot Irish have chastised him rudely enough. 
Ireland is like all other mothers; she opens {643} her arms to all her 
misled children that are disposed to return to her bosom.

Then let there be full pardon for the wealthy old lawyer; let his 
faults be forgotten, since he recalls his honorable youth, and once 
more volunteers in the service of the holy cause. The assistance of 
such an intellect as that of Plunket is not to be despised; age has 
not obscured in the least the matchless clearness of his powerful 
reason; there is not a dark corner in the most obscure question that 
he does not exhibit as clear as noonday; and it is not only by this 
power of lucid argument that he is distinguished. Weak and good 
natured, and crippled by the gout, as he appears, forced, whenever he 
rises to speak, to support himself with one hand on his cane, he has 
that fierce and sturdy determination which enables him to throw in the 
face of toryism all its humiliating truths, and is never disconcerted 
by even the most violent interruptions: his irony wounds and 
overwhelms the more that it is always concealed under an air of the 
most country-like simplicity.

At the extremity of this bench, which touches that of the ministers, 
you have recognized Lord Brougham; he is the very living caricature of 
whom the printshops in the Strand have shown you so many portraits. 
Observe his long face, his long legs, his long arms, the whole 
incoherent mass of his person. The expression of his countenance has 
something ferocious about it; there is certainly in this brain a small 
grain of madness; his small piercing eyes sparkle from the bottom of 
their sockets; a convulsive motion opens and shuts incessantly his 
enormous mouth; you would be alarmed did not the good nature of that 
thick, cocked-up nose, reassure you.

Do not be alarmed that the learned lord starts and appears so 
violently agitated—he is on a gridiron; he is tortured, because others 
are speaking, and he is constrained to be silent. To speak is to do an 
injury to Lord Brougham.

But the speaker is now seated; Lord Brougham has leapt from his seat; 
he is on his feet; he has regained the floor; he retains it, and will 
not easily part with it; he has declared that he has but two words to 
say; if you have any business to attend to, go about it; at the end of 
two hours you may return, you will find him in the midst of his 
argument. It is much to be regretted that long experience of the bar 
and the parliament have not moderated a mind of this temper. He has 
just uttered a most cutting sarcasm—observe how he dulls its effect by 
reiterating and expanding it. He has perfectly established the 
impregnable strength of an argument; he proceeds to overthrow it 
himself, that he may build up others upon its ruins; it is thus his 
indiscretion injures the best cause and deforms his ablest discourses. 
Like an imprudent æronaut, he bursts his balloon and falls with it to 
the earth, in consequence of having filled it too full. We who are 
hearers, like well enough to be convinced by an argument, or to smile 
at a piece of irony; but we can comprehend an allusion. We are 
mortified at having every thing explained so elaborately. The more you 
persist in it, the more weary we become. Your obstinacy in doubting 
our intelligence—wounds and vexes us.

This excess of pedantry is the principal defect in the oratory of Lord 
Brougham. He has been well called the school-master. I do not deny his 
extraordinary gifts as a learned debater, always caustic and 
indefatigable; but these extravagant discourses are out of all 
proportion, above all in the House of Lords, which treats all 
questions in a summary way, and in some degree after the fashion of 
the drawing room. It is a great want of tact not to suit oneself to 
one's audience. The manner of Henry Brougham was much more suitable to 
the House of Commons, where discussions are more full, and where one 
is less prepared to come to an early conclusion; he still retains the 
lawyer. He has never been able to throw off the violent and comic 
gestures of the gown, storming and thundering, in reciting a date or a 
section of a law. Without doubt his harangues fatigue him as much as 
they do those who listen to him; he does not spare himself, bawling 
and gesticulating without any regard to his own person; he bends and 
twists himself like a posture master; he dances and leaps with his 
words; he perspires and grows heated, but he leaves the hearer cold; 
his is not the eloquence which inflames the blood.

I would censure Lord Brougham more severely as a writer than as a 
speaker; for Lord Brougham is also a writer, and a good deal too much 
of one. The melancholy activity which distinguishes him, pushes him on 
incessantly to fill the reviews with his economical, political, 
scientific, historical, and theological essays, and to heap up 
pamphlet on pamphlet; if his writings were characterized by a finished 
style or new ideas, the evil would not be half so great; there is, 
however, eternally the same excessive flood of words; and on paper, 
where they cannot evaporate, it becomes even more intolerable. Though 
on his own part it has not been an interested speculation, I cannot 
pardon him for having been the father of that leprous, cheap 
literature, which, pretending to diffuse useful knowledge, has only 
displayed false opinions, ignorance, and bad writing. In France, where 
this disastrous invention has been so quickly perfected, there is good 
cause to curse in all sincerity its author. It is not his fault 
however, that the French have permitted their worthless laborers to 
infect, as they have done, all their literary field, with these tares 
which threaten to choke the promising harvest of their young poetry.

Let us examine Lord Brougham as a politician. Here we find him still 
more imperfect. I acquit him of the charge of having offered his 
support to the conservatives, on the condition of their securing him 
his chancellorship; this is a calumny of his enemies. I wish he had 
never had any thing to do with toryism. It is not his fault however, 
that he has not again become a whig officer. It is said that it is the 
whigs who object to his joining their ministry, and who have refused 
him the seals. Experience has proved that he is less dangerous as an 
enemy than as a friend. He is neither tory nor whig; nor is he a 
radical; he is however at present among the radicals. He is of no 
party, if it be not his own, the party of Lord Brougham.

The case of Lord Brougham ought to afford a salutary example to M. 
Dupin, his friend. There are many curious analogies between these two 
celebrated lawyers; they resemble each other strikingly in their 
countenances, in their fortune, in their inconsistencies, and in their 
extravagancies. M. Dupin does not preside more soberly over the 
Chamber of Deputies, than Lord Brougham did over that of the Lords. He 
is also a {644} lawyer who fills the speaker's chair, and speaks 
himself much more willingly than he accords the permission to another. 
I grant you that his eloquence is of better metal, more powerful, more 
solid, more triumphant; that his blows are heavier and more mortal; 
but should he ever succeed in reaching the power after which he 
aspires, I doubt if his temperament will allow him to sustain himself 
half the time that the petulance of our ci-devant chancellor remained 
seated on the woolsack.




IANTHE.

BY MORNA.


    Oh! if to die in life's young hours,
  Ere childhood's buds are burst to flowers;
  While Hope still soars on tireless wing,
  Where skies are bright with changeless Spring;
  Ere Sorrow's tear has dimm'd the eye,
  That late with rapture's glance was swelling;
  Or Grief has sent the bursting sigh
  In silence to its lonely dwelling:
  Oh! if to part with this world only,
  Where all is cold, and bleak, and lonely—
  To welcome in those happier spheres,
  The loved and lost of parted years;
  If this give pain, or waken sadness,
  Oh! who can tell the more than madness
  Circling thro' life the hearts that bear
  The chains that wounded spirits wear—
  To live, and yet to feel thro' life
  The aching wish, the ceaseless strife—
  The yearnings of a bleeding breast,
  To sink within the grave to rest;
  To smile, when every smile must wear
  The hue and coldness of despair;
  To weep, or only strive in vain
  To waken tears, that ne'er again
  Shall cool the fever of that eye,
  Whose fountains are forever dry:
  When joys are gone, and hope has fled,
  And friends are changed, and love is dead,
  And we are doomed alone to wait,
  And struggle with a bitter fate—
  Left like some lone and towering rock,
  To brave the ocean's battling shock,
  'Till broken by some mightier wave,
  That bears it to a lonely grave.
  My early years, how coldly bright
  The memory of their parted light
  Falls round the heart, whose cords are broken,
  Or, only strung to suffering's power,
  When struck in grief's o'erwhelming hour,
  Give back to sorrow's touch a token.
  My sire, alas! they say he died
  When in the flower of manhood's pride:
  I stood beside that parent's bier,
  And wondered why the big bright tear
  Was coursing down my mother's cheek;
  She took my hand, but could not speak—
  I kiss'd her then, and sadly smiled,
  Nor felt I was an orphan child.
  My Mother! how the thoughts of years,
  With all their smiles, and all their tears,
  Rush with the memory of her name
  Upon me—and I seem the same
  Bright, careless child she looked upon,
  And joyed to call her fair-haired son:—
  Oh, I remember well the time
  She led me to our favorite bower;
  It was in Spring's sweet, sunny prime,
  And just at sunset's dying hour,
  When woods, and hills, and waters seem
  Wrapt in some soft, mysterious dream—
  When birds are still, and folded flowers
  Their dark green lids are peering through,
  Waiting the coming evening hours,
  Within each bright cup to renew
  The wasted wealth of morning dew—
  When spirit voices seem to sigh
  In every breeze that wanders by—
  And thoughts grow hushed in that calm hour,
  Beneath its soft, subduing power.
  She knelt, and breathed to heaven a prayer,
  “That God would guard that orphan there”—
  Then turned, and with a faltering tone,
  She took my hand within her own,
  And said, “I ne'er should find another
  To love me as she loved me then”—
  And I could only say, “my Mother!”
  And fall upon her neck again,
  And bathe it with my burning tears—
  The bleeding heart's most precious rain—
  That I had hoarded there for years,
  And hoped to never shed again;
  Nor knew, alas! how soon the heart,
  When all its early ties are parted,
  Will link it to some kindred heart—
  That wounded bird and broken-hearted
  Are soonest won, and cling the longest
  To those who seek their ruined wealth.

         *       *       *       *       *

    She died, and then, alas! I thought
  My cup of suffering was o'erfraught—
  No voice to cheer, when sorrow's power
  Assailed me in her darkest hour—
  No lip to smile, when hope was bright,
  No eye to glad me with its light—
  No heart to meet my throbbing heart—
  No prayer to lift my thoughts above,
  When murmuring tears were forced to start—
  No Father's care!—no Mother's love!

    Ye, that have known in life's young spring,
  The fondness of a Mother's love,
  Oh guard it, 'tis an holy thing,
  A priceless treasure from above!
  And when, on life's tempestuous sea,
  Thy shatter'd bark by storm is driven,
  'Twill be a beacon-light to thee,
  A guiding star, by memory given,
  To lead thy wandering thoughts to Heaven.

    The Spring renews the leafless tree,
  And Time may check the bosom's grief—
  And thus it wrought a change on me,
  But oh! mine hour of Spring was brief.

    They are who tell us, “love's a flower,  {645}
  That only blooms in cloudless skies—
  That gaily thrives in pleasure's bower,
  But touched by sorrow, droops and dies.”
  Not so was ours! we never loved
  'Till suffering had our spirits proved,
  And then there seemed a strange communion,
  Sinking our souls in deathless union:
  Such power hath love to render dear
  The hearts that grief hath made so near,
  That we had loved each other less,
  Save for our very loneliness.

    Her gentler spirit was not formed
  To war with stern misfortune's storm,
  And soon we felt, that day by day
  She yielded to a slow decay,
  Wearing unseen her life away.
  And yet so sweet the smile that played
  On lips that ne'er a sigh betrayed—
  So calm the light that lingering slept
  In eyes that ne'er for pain had wept,
  We could not grieve, but only pray,
  That when that light should pass away,
  The faint, sad smile might linger yet,
  And vainly teach us to forget.

    She died! I know not when or where—
  I never knew—for silent there
  I stood, unconscious, strange and wild,
  In all save thought and tears, a child;
  For sorrow's channels then were sealed,
  Or flowed too deep to be revealed.

    I stood beside her grass-grown grave,
  And saw the boughs above it wave;
  And then I felt that I was changed—
  That reason, late so far estranged,
  Had won me from my spirit's madness,
  To settled grief and silent sadness:
  I placed bright flowers above her grave,
  And nursed them with my warmest tears,
  And for my grief a balm they gave,
  The memory of departed years.

    Ianthe! o'er thine early tomb
  The Summer's winds are gently blowing,
  And fair white flowers, the first to bloom,
  Around thy narrow home are growing;
  And o'er it twines the changeless myrtle,
  Fit emblem of thy spirit's love!
  And near it mourns the gentle turtle,
  And I, how like to that lone dove!
  While every leaf, and flower, and tree
  Is fraught with memory of thee.

    And oh! if true, who tell us death
  Can never quench its purer fires—
  That not with life's last faltering breath,
  The soul's immortal love expires;
  If heart meets kindred heart above,
  Shall we not greet each other there?
  Say, was not ours a deathless love?
  Too deep, too strong for life to bear!
  Then let us hope to meet again,
  Ere long, in guiltless transport there,
  With bliss for all the grief and pain
  We here on earth were doomed to share,
  And love on, through unending years,
  Uncheck'd by time, unchang'd by tears.




A TOUR TO THE ISTHMUS:

_Filled in from the Pencillings of an English Artist_.

BY A YANKEE DAUBER.

          Painting is welcome;—
  The painting is almost the natural man;
  For since dishonor traffics with man's nature,
  He is but outside. These pencilled figures are
  Even such as they give out.

_Timon of Athens_.


III.

Chagres—The Castle—Mine Host—No English and no Spanish for two—Mule 
Riding—A Fit-out for Panama—Up in the World—The Stone Ladder—A Yarn.

It is now some weeks since I opened my note book, and I confess the 
cause to be pure idleness alone. However, my pencil meanwhile has not 
lain dormant, as my portfolio will convince you. After all, _cui 
bono?_ Why should a fellow be expected to write a journal on 
shipboard? The record of one day upon a voyage is the record of all 
others. This day we see “a booby,” (an animal not rare, you will say, 
on shore) the next, perhaps, a turtle, and on the next we may be 
amused with a short skirmish between a whale and a sword-fish, or a 
more deadly one between contending shoals of hostile sharks: then we 
see “Cape Fly-away,” and after that we see——nothing!

Our voyage to Chagres, instead of five days, was extended to fifteen. 
The pilots live on board, and make a point of lying out for a wind or 
a tide, until they have laid in sustenance enough to last them while 
another ship shall demand their services, and then convoy their 
patient victims into port. But we got in at last, and were thankful.

The scenery here is surpassingly lovely, rich beyond any description 
of which my pen or pencil is capable. I found great delight in being 
once more on land, after my tedious passage—for I profess, without a 
blush, to be a determined land-lubber, you are aware—and began to look 
about me with as much greenness as a country boy on his first visit to 
the Metropolis. With the exception of the old Gothic castles of my own 
country, that at Chagres is the finest I have ever seen. It occupies a 
great space of ground, and is remarkable for its strong and massive 
walls, reaching to a great height, and commanding the whole town as 
well as the river and coast. The prospect from this castle's walls is 
full of the richest and most varied beauty.

Finding that our vessel was likely to be detained for some days at 
Chagres, I determined to cross the Isthmus, and visit Panama. Owing to 
the want of industry, or rather to the most consummate laziness, which 
is a characteristic of the natives, I was three whole days endeavoring 
to engage any one to carry me up the river. The consequence was that, 
the river, in the mean time, having risen prodigiously, I was four 
days and a half, including of course the four nights, on a route of 
about forty or fifty miles! During this time I went on shore {646} at 
night, sleeping on the ground with a billet of wood for my pillow, and 
disturbed in my slumbers by droves of pigs, which as they rooted up 
the soil around me, paid no sort of attention to my convenience. 
Occasionally a horse would browse down to my couch, and reach his long 
neck over me as I lay, to nibble a cornhusk or a yam on the other side 
of my pillow—and as to the cows, they were perpetually snuffing at me. 
I say nothing, though I felt much, of the musquitoes!

With what delight did I behold the landing place, which, after my 
rough journey, was pointed out to me by my conductor. They who are 
accustomed to travel in Europe and America, can have no idea of it. 
Here I hastened to present my letters to Signor P——, a gentleman who 
was to be my host while I staid. Our conversation was rather limited, 
as you may readily conceive, when I mention that he could not speak a 
word of my language, nor I a syllable of his, which was 
Castillaña—(they never say ‘_Spanish_’ there.) But the language of 
actions is often more eloquent than that of words—at least so thought 
I, when my host ordered a comfortable repast to be placed before me, 
consisting of fricasseed fowl, and Vermicelli soup, with a magnum of 
generous claret. This was certainly a delightful exchange for my five 
days fast upon half boiled rice and plaintains, as were my soft pillow 
and quiet apartment a great improvement upon my nocturnal 
accommodations while on the route.

Early the next morning I found myself mounted on the back, or to be 
more exact, I should say something like a half mile _above_ the back, 
of an animal which I had at first some difficulty in naming. In all my 
life, (albeit something of an equestrian, as _you_ know,) I was never 
so put to it to take an advantage of my knowledge of horsemanship. 
Conceive me placed high above a tall raw-boned mule's back, (the 
saddle one of the old Saracenic or Moorish pattern, fastened by a 
multiplicity of strands, made of hair rope, to a ring tied to the 
saddle by a single loop of leather,) and at the mercy of this single 
string to guide not one of the gentlest of beasts, reminding the 
reader of Peter Pindar of the ass, “with retrograding rump and 
wriggling tail,” jumping alternately to each side of the street, and 
occasionally turning round and kicking sidewise, like a cat in search 
of her tail, or a dog vainly attempting to rid himself of the 
_addendum_ of a tin-kettle! What a merry figure I must have cut!

My mule was a picture in himself. I have already called him 
raw-boned,—and you may deduce his _coup d'œil_ from this attribute. 
Add, however, the details of the beast, and you shall acknowledge that 
he was _sui generis_. His ears stuck straight out to the front, sure 
sign of wicked intentions, and the nose was curled into a thousand 
ill-natured wrinkles. The horse-cloth was made like a hearth-rug, 
heavy, matted, and thick, and on the top of that was placed a straw 
pad about four inches thick, to prevent the pressure of the saddle 
from hurting him. Surmounting this mountainous ridge was the saddle 
itself, and such a one! It was the real demipique of the middle ages, 
and was doubtless two hundred years old itself. The leather was 
originally a bright tan-color, but was now grown black and glossy by 
age and wear, and as hard as if made of iron. So hard was it that I 
turned the edge of my knife, in endeavoring to cut a strap which gave 
way during my ride. On this pyramidal pinnacle, which I have described 
stone by stone, as it were, behold me seated. The reins are handed me 
by the groom, who undertakes the whole guidance and direction of the 
process of mounting, as any departure from his regulations in this 
respect would result in the total overthrow of the whole mass upon 
which the rider is doomed to sit. Being mounted, I discovered that the 
stirrups were thrown over the saddle, and the strap connecting them 
tied in a knot, beside which was another, formed by the tying of the 
girth in a similar manner; this last being improved by the strap of 
the crupper brought through a hole behind in the saddle and made fast 
to the pommel. All these knots (reminding me of Obadiah's in “Tristram 
Shandy,”) stood up in front and rear, and as there was no pad above as 
there was below, to prevent the manifold injuries that were like to 
result to the rider upon such an establishment, you may judge of the 
consequences of riding a hard trotting mule, thus caparisoned, for 
twenty seven miles. I shall carry the scars I got, to my grave, if I 
survive to the age of Methusalem. The bridle was a rope of hair, as 
was the halter beneath, and the bit—oh ye gods! what a bit! It weighed 
at the very least ten pounds avoirdupois, and hung down full twelve 
inches below the jaws of the mule. Lo, there was I, in a coarse straw 
hat, and a queer cotton travelling toggery, with a pair of spurs, such 
as John of Gaunt might have used, being made of brass, with a shank 
six inches long, tied by a strap which first went round the foot, and 
then three or four times round the leg, each spike in the rowel being 
an inch and a half long, the whole forming a _tout ensemble_, worthy 
of the pencil of George Cruikshank or Horace Vernet. As neither of 
them are at hand, take the accompanying sketch, rudely done to the 
life by my own pencil.

You will see by the foregoing description, the sort of animal and 
equipments with which Signor P—— favored me. I assure you it is not in 
the least caricatured, either as the figure or accompaniments are 
concerned. The pencilling will give you an idea of the sort of road 
upon which I travelled from Cruzes, the residence of my host, to 
Panama. About halfway on, I stood upon a hill overlooking two oceans 
at once. I saw on the one side the bay of Panama, and the Caribbean 
sea on the other. As I proceeded, I came to a spot, where, for several 
yards, the ascent is up a kind of stone ladder. It is in a narrow 
pass, where, between two banks of twelve to eighteen feet in height, 
there is a continued face of black rock, worn so smooth by a constant 
run of water, as to afford the mules only the small holes made in the 
crevices by their predecessors, as the means of ascent. As they 
dragged themselves up in this manner by these rude steps, I could not 
but admire the sure footedness of the animals. While on the open 
ground, they are full of tricks, and are constantly trying to displace 
their rider, but so soon as they find themselves in a difficult pass 
like that I have described, they seem to say to themselves—“Come, 
come, no fooling now—let's be steady,” and in a moment they are the 
steadiest and soberest of animals.

This pass is called the Governor's Fall, from this circumstance. A 
governor of the territory, in the times of the early Spaniards, was 
ascending it, on his way to Panama, when his mule, less sure footed 
than my own, fell backward with him, and killed him instantly. The 
{647} anecdote startled me a little, as may be easily imagined, 
related to me as it was on the very spot, and under circumstances 
precisely similar to those under which it occurred. However, vanity 
came to my aid, and prompted me to endeavor to perform what the 
governor had so fatally failed in accomplishing, and my attempt was 
successful.


IV.

Panama—A Scotsman—Architecture—A Gold Story—Tobago—A Beauty—The 
Sketcher in Love—The way to live on Pine Apples—Snakes—A Perilous 
Bath.

I arrived at Panama in eight hours, an astonishingly short time 
considering the roads, and as there are no boarding or lodging houses 
in the town, I made my way at once to the grand square, where I had a 
letter of introduction to a braw Scot, Mr. McK——, who received
me like a brother Briton. His hospitality displayed itself in some 
novel ways. As my luggage was still on the road, I was stripped and 
bathed in brandy, to counteract the effects of a severe wetting I had 
received on my journey, and equipped _cap à pie_ from the wardrobe of 
mine host. He was very tall, and his linen trowsers hung around me “as 
a purser's shirt upon a handspike,” to use a nautical simile of more 
expressiveness than elegance. I was indebted to my new friend even for 
the loan of a hat, mine having been substituted at Cruzes for a negro 
hat to ride in. This last article of my travelling equipments seemed 
to scandalize the good Panamians not a little.

It was a treat to me, living as I had been for six years in a new 
country, to find myself once more among such stately ruins and antique 
edifices, as the churches, monasteries, colleges and nunneries, which, 
erected upon the first introduction of christianity into Southern 
America, are still standing either in part, or entire. My portfolio 
will show you with what warmth and enthusiasm I greeted them. The 
ruins of the monastery of St. Francesco, and the college of the 
Jesuits, are as beautiful specimens of architecture as can be 
imagined. They were built with all that taste of design and 
gorgeousness of finish, which the founders of them derived from the 
Moors of Grenada. I spent much time in wandering among their massive 
columns and fallen entablatures, their heavy lofty walls and 
sculptured ruins.

The wealth of the town is not great at present, although I heard many 
Panamians speak of the abundance which existed ten or fifteen years 
ago, when sacks of gold were wont to lie like any other heavy 
merchandize, all night in the principal street, with no one near to 
watch them. No one thought of stealing, for no one wanted aught. It 
was, in truth, “the golden age.” I, of course, as you will do, 
probably, received this legend with some few reserved doubts of its 
authenticity. As a _pendant_ to it, I was also informed of a curious 
custom that at the same time prevailed in the Isthmus. In the dance, 
if a gentleman wished to make himself acceptable to a lady, he would 
take his hand full of small golden coin, and throw it among the circle 
of spectators, (every one is admitted to the dances,) so that it 
became a matter of fashionable boast among the fair ones, “I have had 
so many pieces thrown for me,” etc. etc. But things are not now “as 
they used to was,” and a Panamian is now apt to consider the 
possession of a real regular immutilated doubloon a god-send: the 
currency being in what they call _cut money_—that is, the large coin 
cut or divided into bitts of the denomination of dollars, reals, &c. 
&c.

While at Panama I made a trip to some of the Pacific Islands in the 
neighborhood: the principal one I visited was Tobago, one of the most 
curious and striking spots I have ever seen. The island is about eight 
miles in length, and four or five in breadth, rising into a high hill 
in the centre, thickly wooded, and yet there is not a tree upon the 
island, that does not bear a fruit. I was there during a church 
festival, and there was uninterrupted dancing the whole week. Some of 
the women are very beautiful, and among them there was one to whom I 
had nearly lost my heart during the short time I was at Tobago, so 
transcendant was her beauty. I do not call it loveliness—it was 
passion, (and so my fit was soon over.) She had no face—do you know 
what I mean? it was all _feature_. Excuse a dauber's smacking of “the 
shop.” And then what a model was she for the sculptor! A fine though 
not a high forehead, upon which the jetty hair was most simply yet 
tastefully parted; eyes large and dark as the hair; but with _such_ a 
fire in them! Her nose was beautifully chiselled, and her disparted 
lips disclosed teeth more white than pearl. Her form, so youthful was 
she, was not developed, and figure, as such, she had none. But what 
passion was in that soul! She crossed my path in the dance, at church, 
on the island's beach, and every where it was the same—she was all 
soul. I saw her angry, and I thought I would not rouse her for the 
world; and then, _reveried_ I, what must she be, if in love! The 
thought threw me into a brown study, out of which I awoke, and I soon 
began to feel completely in love—but it was with the _pine_ apples of 
Tobago! Never ate I such delicious fruit before as this, the abundant 
product of the island I have described. For my own part I quite forgot 
my Katinka, and gave myself up to the fascinations of a cheaper and 
more easily accessible luxury. I used to consume, upon an average, 
eight pine apples _per diem_, without fear of cholera, dispepsia, or 
any of the train of “ills that flesh is heir to.” There was a place 
they called “The Bishop's Bath,” formed in a rock by the constant 
running of a stream of pure water, and sufficiently deep for a bath. 
Here several of us were wont to meet every day and refresh ourselves 
with the delicious coolness of the water—our host always despatching a 
servant with a hamper of pines, as an accompaniment of our bath. Upon 
our return a profusion of fruits awaited us: melons, pines, cocoas, 
mangoes, &c &c. These we would eat from the table, or as we lay upon 
our beds. All this was too luxurious for me, and I began to feel sure 
that if I were to give myself up unyieldingly to the fascinations 
around me, while at this island of Pomona, I should never be fit for 
any thing else again as long as I lived.

I enjoyed my rambles about the island very much at first, but soon 
began to learn the old lesson of the thorn under the rose, the bitter 
mingled with the sweet, the drop of poison in the cooling cup, &c. 
Throughout New Grenada, there are thousands of snakes, the bite of 
almost all of which is fatal. That of the black snake, the species so 
common and so innocent in the United States, is as poisonous here as 
the rattlesnake is there. So I soon began to confine myself to the 
coast, and gave up rambling. I remember one occasion, upon which I 
{648} got a deuse of a fright. I had been bathing, and had left the 
water but about five minutes, when a gentleman, who was undressing to 
go into the same bath, perceived and pointed out to me a small snake 
swimming about in it, very much at his ease. We took the reptile out 
and killed it on the margin of the basin. It was a small red snake, 
marked with black rings, and its bite is instant death. It is a common 
opinion that island snakes are harmless. It may be so—but I had rather 
take the theory for granted without a practical illustration of it in 
my own person.

We returned to Panama in time to witness the bull fights, which last 
three or four days, in August, the anniversary of the revolution which 
resulted in the independence of New Grenada. I must sharpen my pencil, 
and nib my pen afresh to tell you of my amusement during those three 
or four days.

       *       *       *       *       *




SACRED SONG.

  “Where are now the blooming bowers.”


  Where are now the blooming bowers
    That I saw in early May?
  Where are all those fairest flowers
    That were soon to pass away?
  And the Loves my bosom nourished,
    And the Joys that still came on?
  Like those flowers, once they flourished,
    Like those flowers, they are gone.

  Fancy now no more shall borrow
    Beams of beauty from the skies;
  Hope no more, to soothe my sorrow,
    Whisper, “brighter suns shall rise.”
  Yet one thought my soul shall cherish,
    For the word of God is sure,
  And the heavens and earth shall perish,
    But his mercy shall endure.




THE TWO SISTERS.

BY MADAME JULIE DELAFAYE-BRÉHIER.

[Translated from the French.]

  ... On a peu de temps à l'être (belle,)
  Et de temps à ne l'être plus!

_Madame Deshoulières_.


In a parlor furnished with much taste, and from the half-opened 
windows of which were seen the winding walks, and “alleys green,” of a 
park, filled with magnificent and shady trees, two young ladies were 
employing themselves in those delicate works, which have become the 
portion of our sex, and which, whilst they appear to occupy the 
fingers only, serve also to divert the mind in a pleasant manner, and 
even to give a greater facility to the current of thought. One of the 
females, either by chance or design, had placed herself opposite a 
mirror, where she could not lift her eyes from her work, without 
seeing herself reflected therein, adorned in all the brightness of a 
beauty of seventeen years, who might have served as a model to the 
sculptor, as a study to the painter. A rich profusion of black hair, 
in the tasteful adjustment of which, Art had so nicely seconded the 
gift of Nature, that it was scarcely possible to say to which its 
elegance was owing, set off the snowy whiteness of the neck and face; 
and I would add, (if I may once more be permitted to avail myself of 
the superannuated comparison,) that the freshest rose could alone 
compare its beauty with the carnation of her cheek and lip; to these 
charms were added, a form of the most graceful proportions; and, all 
that the youthful may borrow, with discernment, from the art of the 
toilette, had been employed to increase, still farther, beauty already 
so attractive.

Half concealed beneath the draperies of the window, near which she had 
placed herself to obtain a more favorable light, the other female 
pursued her occupation with undistracted attention; a certain gravity 
appeared in her dress, in her countenance, and in her physiognomy 
altogether. Her eyes were beautiful, but calmness was their chief 
expression; her smile was obliging, but momentary; the brilliant hues 
of youth, now evidently fading on her cheeks, less rounded than once 
they were, appeared but as the lightest shadings of a picture; 
sometimes, indeed, deepened by sudden and as transient emotion, like 
the colors which meteors throw on the clouds of the heavens in the 
evening storms of summer. The gauzes, the rubies, the jewels, with 
which the young adorn themselves, were not by her employed merely as 
ornaments; she availed herself of them, to conceal with taste, the 
outrages of years; for the weight of more than thirty years was 
already upon her; and the ingenious head dress with which she had 
surmounted her hair, served to hide, at the same time, some silvery 
tell-tales, which had dared thus prematurely, to mingle with her long 
tresses of blond.

“There's broken again! look at that detestable silk!” said the younger 
female, throwing her work on to a sofa; “I will not do another stitch 
to day.”

She rose, and approaching the mirror before her, amused herself by 
putting up afresh the curls of her hair.

“You want patience, Leopoldine,” answered her sister, looking on her 
affectionately, “and without that will accomplish nothing. You will 
require patience as well to conduct you through the world, as to 
enable you to finish a purse.”

“I know the rest, my sister,” replied the younger, smiling. “Do you 
forget that a certain person has charged himself with the duty of 
teaching me the lesson? Ten purses, like that which I am embroidering, 
would not put me out of patience so much as this silence of M. de 
Berville. Can you conceive what detains him thus?” added she, seating 
herself near her sister, “for, in fact, he loves me, that is certain, 
and nothing remains but for him to avow the fact to my aunt Dorothée.”

“This looks very like presumption,” my dear Leopoldine, pursued the 
elder sister, “and that is not good; what can it signify to you what 
he _thinks!_ I hope your happiness does not depend on him.”

“My happiness? oh! doubtless not, but, in a word, Stephanie, he is a 
suitable person, and if he will explain himself——”

“It will then be time to think of him; until then, my sister, I beg of 
you to see in M. de Berville but an {649} estimable friend of our 
family, an amiable man whose society we honor. A young person should 
never hasten to give up her heart—above all, to one who has not asked 
it.”

“Be easy on that subject, sister; I mean to keep a good watch over 
mine; the venture of your heroine of romance will never tempt me; but 
this is the fact, sister, I do not wish to remain an _old maid_.”

At these words, which Leopoldine spoke inconsiderately, the 
countenance of Stephanie was flushed with a sudden crimson, and for a 
moment shone with as beautiful a brightness as that of her young 
sister.

“There is a condition worse than that,” answered the former, with 
lively emotion; “it is, to have formed an ill-assorted union.”

“Indeed, my sister, I did not dream I should give you offence,” 
replied the young female, much embarrassed, “but the world is so 
strange! you know this yourself. Thus I cannot conceive how it is that 
you have remained single.”

“If no one has wished to espouse me,” added Stephanie, smiling.

“What! In reality? Can such a thing be possible?”

“Assuredly, although I believe it is a case which rarely happens, and 
I grant did _not_ happen to me, for I found many opportunities of 
entering the married state, but not one which was suitable.”

“You were, perhaps, difficult to please?”

“I think not. Whilst yet young, about your age, my hand was sought by 
one who lacked nothing but a fortune, or at least, an estate, capable 
of supporting him in respectable society. Our parents, at that time, 
deprived of the rich heritage which they have recovered since your 
birth, refused him my hand, for a motive, which I have since, though 
by slow degrees, learnt to appreciate, but which then rent my heart. 
My thwarted inclination left me with an indifference as to marriage; 
it was the way in which my youth resented its injury. I would have 
none but a husband after my own heart; not finding such a one, I 
resigned myself to be no more than an _old maid_, finding it more easy 
to bear the unjust scorn and ridicule of frivolous people, than to 
drag on to my tomb under a yoke, troublesome and oppressively heavy.”

“Do you not sometimes feel regret?”

“No, Leopoldine; that condition, which appears to you so frightful, 
has its happinesses, as well as the other states of life. I have 
shaped my resolution with a regard to the wounds of self-love, which I 
have had to endure; I have called into my aid the arts and letters, 
which it is so difficult for married females to cultivate with 
constancy, without prejudice to their domestic duties; and lastly, 
when by the death of our dear parents, I found myself in charge of 
your childhood, in concert with our worthy aunt, my liberty became 
doubly dear to me. Had I been a wife and mother, I should not have 
been able to devote myself to you as I have done. Have I not had 
reason, then, to remain unmarried?”

“Well, if I should tell the truth, Stephanie, after all you have said, 
I should better like to be ill matched, than not matched at all.”

“This perverseness gives me pain, my child,” replied the elder sister, 
“but I will believe that it is for want of reflecting on the matter 
that you talk thus.”

An aged lady, the aunt of the two sisters, came in at this moment, 
holding in her hand a closed parasol, which she used as a support. She 
seated herself in an arm chair, resting her feet on a footstool, which 
Leopoldine placed for her. After regarding for a while both her 
nieces, with a look of complacency, she thus addressed them.

“They tell me that M. de Berville is at the entrance of the avenue. 
For which of your sakes is it he honors us with so frequent visits? 
For my own part, I am quite at a loss to say. The more I observe him, 
the less I can divine his intentions.”

“You would be jocular with us, aunt,” answered Stephanie, “there can 
be no doubt as to his choice; it is as if any one could hesitate 
between a mother and her daughter.”

“But he has not explained his views,” rejoined the aunt, “and it is 
very fine for you to make out you are old, my niece; I find you still 
very young, compared with me.”

“You forget too, aunt,” added Leopoldine, in a lively tone, “that M. 
de Berville is, to the full, as old as my sister. If merit alone was 
sufficient, I should have reason to fear in her a dangerous rival; but 
my amiable sister is without pretensions; she knows that youth is an 
all-powerful advantage, although in reality a very frivolous one, 
perhaps——”

“Good heavens!” exclaimed the aunt, “take heed, my child; reckon not 
too much upon that youth, nor even on the beauty which accompanies it; 
I have seen strange things in my time; and a man capable of holding 
himself neutral so long, is not one of those who may be subjugated 
with a ruby, or caught by a well-disposed bouquet of flowers.”

A smile of incredulity passed upon the lips of Leopoldine, who was 
about to make an answer in accordance with that smile, when M. de 
Berville was announced. Although of an age somewhat too mature for a 
_very_ young man, his dignified and elegant manners, his fine figure, 
his distinguished intellect, his reputation as a man of honor, 
together with his fortune, made him “a match” which no young lady 
could deem unworthy; and I have made the reader already acquainted 
with the favorable sentiments entertained towards him by the beautiful 
Leopoldine. Stephanie entertained full as high an opinion of his 
merits as her younger sister; it may be even, that being best able to 
appreciate the estimable character of M. de Berville, she rendered to 
it the most justice; but she received him simply as a mother who 
believes she has met the future protector of her daughter, and 
endeavored, by innocent means, to bring to a successful issue the plan 
of happiness which she had secretly conceived. The aunt, piquing 
herself on her skill in finesse, sat observant of the actors in that 
scene, hoping to penetrate from their behavior, into their most secret 
thoughts. As to Leopoldine, the veil of modesty, beneath which she 
sought to conceal her real feeling, was not sufficient entirely to 
conceal the joy of the coquette, rejoicing in the triumph of her 
charms. Yet that joy and that triumph received some checks; for she 
did not appear, even during that visit, to occupy exclusively the 
attention of M. de Berville, as though she alone was the object he 
came to visit. The conversation took a serious and instructive 
turn—one little suited to the taste of the young and frivolous. They 
discoursed of the sciences, the arts, and of {650} literature: I have 
said that Stephanie had made these things a source of comfort and 
recreation—that she had occupied her mind in such pursuits, not for 
the purpose of display, but as a charm to her leisure hours; such a 
companion as M. de Berville was well adapted to value rightly the mind 
and the knowledge of Stephanie. She suffered herself to be drawn into 
the current of the various topics of conversation with a pleasure very 
natural; and Madame Dorothée plainly perceived that de Berville was 
even more pleased than her amiable niece.

Proud of her youth and beauty, Leopoldine had disdained 
instruction—neglecting, for childish gaiety, the lessons of her 
masters and the recommendations of her sister; music and dancing were 
the only arts that she would consent to cultivate; those, because they 
might serve to make her shine in the world. Incapable of taking part 
in the interesting conversation which was going on before her, ennui 
began to show its effects on her charming figure—moodiness took 
possession of her spirits, and fits of yawning, ill suppressed, 
threatened each moment to betray her. M. de Berville, altogether 
occupied in the pleasure he was enjoying, perceived it not, but 
Stephanie, guessing the misery of her sister, contrived adroitly to 
introduce the subject of music; and, thereupon, begged of her sister 
to sit down to the piano. She knew that her sister's voice was 
considered remarkably fine by M. de Berville, and hoped by this means 
to recall his attention to her, but the old aunt thought she could 
perceive that M. de Berville found need to task all his politeness to 
hide the disagreement he felt to the proposition; and Stephanie 
herself discerned much of coldness in the compliments which he 
addressed to the pretty songstress.

Botany is a science peculiarly suitable to females who reside in the 
country; it is a source of ingenious discoveries, and of pleasures 
equally elevated and delightful. Under the shade of trees, or the 
fresh greensward, on the banks of the river and the brook, and on the 
sides of the rock, are its charming lessons inscribed. M. de Berville 
loved the science, and offered to teach it to the two sisters; they 
accepted the offer, the elder from taste, the young Leopoldine from 
coquetry, seeing no more in it than an opportunity of displaying her 
lightness and her gracefulness, in running here and there over the 
grass, to gather the flowers. She insisted upon one condition, 
however, which was, that they should only go out in the mornings and 
evenings, so as not to expose their complexions to the heat of the 
sun. Stephanie approved of these precautions. The care taken by a 
female to preserve her personal advantages has in it nothing 
blameable, and Stephanie was the first in setting the example of this 
to her sister; but on more than one occasion, the desire to possess 
herself of some flower, rare or curious, carried her above the fear of 
darkening her skin a little; whilst Leopoldine, the miserable slave of 
her own beauty, could not enjoy any of the pleasure freely and without 
fear. One circumstance—and it is of a grave character—will show to 
what an extent she was capable of sacrificing every thing to her 
frivolous vanity.

A burning state of the atmosphere was scorching up all nature; the sun 
at its highest point of splendor, presented the image of that 
celestial glory, before which the angels themselves bow down and 
worship; the withered plants bent beneath the solar ray; the birds 
were silent in the depth of the wood; the locust alone, interrupted by 
his shrill cry, the silence of creation. Bathed in sweat, the reaper 
slept extended on the sheaf, whilst the traveller, in a like repose by 
the side of some shaded fountain, awaited the hour when the sun, 
drawing nearer to the horizon, should permit him to continue his 
journey.

In an apartment, from which the light and heat were half excluded, 
surrounding a table covered with plants, Stephanie and Leopoldine were 
listening to M. de Berville, whilst he explained to them the ingenious 
system of Linnæus, or the more easy system, the “great _families_” of 
Tournefort, when a letter was brought in for Madame Dorothée, who was 
engaged in reading.

“Sad news! sad news!” she exclaimed, addressing her nieces. “Our 
excellent neighbor, Madame Rével, has met with a horrible accident; it 
is feared that her leg is broken.”

“Good heavens! can such an accident have happened?” cried Leopoldine. 
“And yesterday she was so well! We will go to see her to-morrow 
morning. Shall we not, Stephanie?”

“To-day rather, Leopoldine, to-day. Let us not defer for an instant 
the consolation which it may depend on us to impart to her.”

“Well, then, this evening, after the sun has set.”

“No, no, let us set out immediately, and we will pass, beside her, the 
rest of the day; M. de Berville will, I know, excuse us.”

“Impossible!” answered Leopoldine, “go out, so hot as it is! it would 
be wilfully to seek a _coup de soleil_, which would make us perfect 
blacks for the rest of the summer.”

“We can shield ourselves with a veil—with our parasols——”

“I should not feel myself safe in a sack; and for nothing in this 
world would I leave this house till the day is over.”

“You forget, Leopoldine, with what courage Madame Rével came from her 
house alone, on foot, in the middle of a December night, in spite of 
the frost and the snow, to attend you when you had the measles, 
because they told her you had expressed a wish to see her instantly.”

“Well, sister, I would sooner confront a cold north wind than the 
sun.”

“The heat can no more be stopped than the cold, Leopoldine.”

“Nothing is so frightful as a black skin.”

“Sister, though I knew I should become as black as an African, I would 
not leave our friend without consolation at such a time; I will go 
with our servant girl; believe me, you will hereafter be sorry you did 
not follow my example.”

“Permit _me_ to accompany you, Miss,” said M. de Berville, taking his 
hat.

“Really,” answered Stephanie, “I do not know that I ought to consent 
to it; an hour's walk beneath a burning sun——”

“I fear not the sun any more than yourself,” interrupted de Berville, 
“and perhaps the support of my arm may not be altogether unserviceable 
to you.”

Leopoldine permitted them to depart, in spite of the reproaches with 
which her conscience now addressed her. She remained at home, sad and 
humiliated, {651} arguing within herself, that M. de Berville ought to 
have joined her in endeavoring to prevent Stephanie from going, whom, 
for the first time, she secretly accused of wishing to appear virtuous 
at her expense. Madame Dorothée very shortly added to her discontent, 
by reflections which her niece was far from wishing to hear.

“Don't reckon, Leopoldine, upon having made any impression on M. de 
Berville,” said she; “decidedly, the more I observe him, the more I am 
assured he does not dream of marrying _you_.”

“With all the respect which I owe to your sagacity, aunt,” responded 
Leopoldine, in a peevish tone, “permit me to be of a different 
opinion: it is impossible but that the assiduities of M. de Berville 
must have some object, and as to that object there cannot be any 
doubt. If he delays to make it known, it is because he wishes to 
_study_ me, as my sister says. I do not think I have any cause for 
alarm on the subject.”

“Suppose it should be of your sister he thinks——”

“She would be nearly the last he would think of,” exclaimed the young 
maiden, breaking out into a fit of immoderate laughter. “What! a 
_young_ damsel of thirty-two, who has gray hairs, wrinkles, (for she 
has wrinkles round the eyes—I have seen them plain enough;) a young 
lady in fact, whom people take to be my mother! what an idea! But I 
see what has suggested it; it is that promenade at noonday—a mere act 
of politeness, at which M. de Berville was, I doubt not, enraged at 
heart.”

“Not so; that circumstance has only weight from that which preceded 
it. I grant, my dear niece, that there is between you and your sister 
a difference of fifteen years; and that certainly is a great 
difference; you dazzle at first sight; but only whilst they regard her 
not. M. de Berville was in the beginning charmed by your graces; but 
if I am not deceived, it is not those which retain him here. You have 
been to him as the flambeau which conducts into the well illuminated 
hall, which instantly makes pale, by outshining, the light of the 
flambeau. Pardon me for the comparison.”

“That is to say, it is by me he has been drawn to my sister, and now 
she has eclipsed me.”

“She cannot eclipse you in beauty, nor youthfulness; but her mind, her 
knowledge, the qualities of her heart, appear perhaps advantages 
sufficiently precious to cause to be forgotten those which she lacks; 
and I shall not be astonished to hear that M. de Berville had taken a 
liking to, and had actually espoused her, in spite of her thirty-two 
years.”

“If he is fool enough to prefer my sister to me, I——Away with such an 
absurd thought; it is impossible,” added Leopoldine, casting at the 
same time, a glance towards a mirror.

In spite, however, of the very flattering opinion which she 
entertained of herself, a jealous inquietude had crept into her heart, 
and she examined more attentively her sister and M. de Berville when 
they returned together. The accident which had befallen Madame Rével 
was found to be less serious than it was at first thought to be; the 
limb was not broken; but through the satisfaction which she felt on 
this account, Stephanie exhibited in her countenance an expression of 
uneasiness which was not usual with her. The two sisters were at 
length alone together, when Leopoldine questioned Stephanie as to the 
cause of her apparent agitation.

“I feel, I confess, a surprise, mixed with chagrin,” she replied. “M. 
de Berville, whom I so sincerely desired to see you accept as a 
husband—who appeared to come here only on your account——”

“Well, sister!”

“He has offered me his hand.”

“I don't see any thing that there is so _very_ sad in all this,” 
responded Leopoldine, dissimulating, (for she was choaking with rage) 
“if M. de Berville likes _old maids_, it is not me, certainly, that he 
should choose.”

“This it is, which is to me a matter of sadness,” continued Stephanie, 
“that rivalry, which was as little wished for as foreseen, will, I 
fear, alienate your affection from your sister, since you can already 
address me in words of such bitterness.” And the tears suddenly 
inundated her face.

At sight of this, Leopoldine, more frivolous than insensible, 
convinced of her injustice, threw herself into the arms of Stephanie.

“Pardon me, my kind sister, I see well that it is not your fault, but 
you must also agree that this event is humiliating to me; for, in 
truth, I was the first object of his vows: that man is inconstant and 
deceitful.”

“No, Leopoldine, that is unreasonable. Attracted by the advantages 
which you have received from Nature, he had hoped to have found in 
you, those also which you would have acquired, if my counsels could 
have had power to persuade you. Your want of information, your 
coquetry, the ridiculous importance you attach to your beauty, have 
convinced him that you could not be happy together. What do I say? You 
never can be happy with any one, unless you come to the resolution to 
count as nothing those charms so little durable, which sickness may 
destroy at once, and which time, in its default, is causing every 
instant to disappear. To adorn her mind, mature her reason, form her 
heart, are all things which the young female should not neglect to do, 
whether homely or handsome. That beauty, on which you have reckoned 
with so much confidence—to which you have sacrificed the sacred duties 
of friendship—in what way has it benefitted you? One who is neither 
young nor beautiful has carried away your conquest, although she, 
perhaps precisely, _because_ she dreamed not of doing it. Profit by 
this lesson, so as, during the beautiful years which remain to you, to 
instruct and correct yourself. Another Berville will, I hope, present 
himself, who, won like the first, by your external graces, shall 
recognize, on viewing you more nearly, those good qualities, more 
surpassingly beautiful.”

Leopoldine opened her soul to her sister's persuasions; she followed 
her counsels with docility, and soon reaped the benefits. Stephanie 
became Madame de Berville, and continued to act as a mother to her 
sister till she too was married. The sufferings and the fatigues of 
maternity were not slow, when they came, in effacing the remarkable 
beauty of Leopoldine; but there remained to her so many precious 
qualities, so much of solid virtue—of the graces of the mind, that the 
loss of personal charms were scarcely perceived, and the young wife 
was neither less cherished by her family, nor less courted by the 
world, than if her beauty had been an abiding charm.


{652}


THE BARD'S FAREWELL.

BY JOHN C. McCABE.


  Sweet Muse, I remember, when first to thy spell
  My young heart submitted—how bright was the dream!
  How I trembled with joy as thy murmurings fell
  On my ear, like the flow of a star-litten stream!

  This world is too cold for the spirit of song,
  'Tis the child of a purer and holier sphere;
  It should live where oppression, nor malice, nor wrong,
  Dare wring from the dim eye of misery a tear.

  It should dwell where 'twas born—in the deeply blue skies,
  When from chaos our world sprang to beauty and light;
  When the “stars of the morning” in joyous surprise,
  Struck their harp strings of fire so holy and bright.

  It should dwell where the Cherubim strike their bold lyres—
  It should live where the Seraphim songs find their birth;
  It should breathe where the presence of Godhead inspires,
  But never, oh never, be dweller on earth.

  For the heart where it lives is cold poverty's slave,
  And those whom it blesses, are curst by the world;
  And its votary unhonored is borne to that grave
  At whose mound are the dark shafts of calumny hurl'd.

  Then, farewell, dear soother of many an hour!
  And, farewell sweet visions indulged in so long,
  Like the banish'd bird quitting its favorite bower,
  I leave yet lament thee, sweet spirit of song!

_Richmond, Va. 1836_.




MY BOOKS.


On the south side of my house, and communicating with my chamber, is a 
little room about twelve feet square. The two windows in its southern 
wall open a pleasant prospect to the eye. Immediately below lies my 
little garden; beyond are the grounds of my richer neighbors, 
presenting an agreeable medley of woods and meadows; about half a mile 
farther, a small river meanders through a fertile valley, beyond which 
a beautiful stretch of rich and thickly settled country is bounded at 
the distance of three or four miles by a range of low hills. This 
little apartment, which is one of the most cheerful in the house, is 
my favorite resort. Here are my books, and it passes by the various 
names of the Library, the Study, and the Book Room. The greater part 
of three sides of the room is hidden by the shelves containing my 
literary treasures; and perhaps I rather underrate their number when I 
say that I own two thousand volumes. This is a great number for a man 
of my limited means to possess, but upwards of forty years have been 
spent in their collection. About fifty or sixty of the most valuable I 
am indebted for to several departed friends, who have thus remembered 
me. These which I have placed upon three shelves in a corner, are 
amongst those I prize most highly. Many of them I have picked up at 
auctions at sundry times, for sometimes not a tenth of their value, 
and the stalls which are to be found in the streets of some of our 
principal cities have supplied not a few. They are of all sizes, 
shapes, and ages, and a regiment of Fantasticals has more pretensions 
to the title of an uniformed body than they have. I have not attempted 
classifying them according to their subject matter, thinking their 
numbers too few to need it. They are rather grouped, as indeed the 
shelves require, according to their sizes. There are, however, few of 
them upon which I could not lay my hands as readily as if assisted by 
a formal arrangement. Sundry gaps here and there, which have existed 
for many long months, and some of them for years, show that my 
acquaintances (I will not call them my friends,) have been equally 
expert in laying their hands upon them. Who has the first volume of my 
Knox's Essays? Why does he not call for the second? I can assure him 
that I at least do not think, to borrow the auctioneer's phrase, that 
“each volume is complete in itself.”

Whilst I am proud of calling myself master of many rare and curious 
tomes, on the other hand, I must confess, that many works of what are 
entitled the British Classic Authors are not to be found upon my 
shelves. I do not possess a single volume of Sterne's works, looking 
upon him as a disgrace to his cloth, and a hypocritical whiner 
concerning a sensibility which his life testified that he was far from 
really feeling; nor do I think that there is enough Attic salt in his 
writings to preserve his grossnesses from being offensive. For the 
same reason I have not a complete copy of Swift. Of those selections 
from the works of popular authors commonly styled their “Beauties,” I 
have not, I think, half a dozen volumes; and I have very few of the 
works of the minor poets, being somewhat of Horace's opinion 
concerning middling poets. But such as it is, my little stock of books 
is dear to me, and I purpose in the present paper to say something of 
a few of the volumes.

That quarto standing in the corner of one of the lower shelves, which 
time has deprived of half its cover and the greater part of a 
frontispiece representing the Council of Trent, is a work published in 
the year 1692, and entitled the “_Young Student's Library_, containing 
extracts and abridgements of the most valuable books published in 
England, and in the foreign journals, from the year sixty-five to this 
time; to which is added, a new essay upon All Sorts of Learning, 
wherein the use of the Sciences is distinctly treated on—by the 
Athenian Society. Also, a large Alphabetical Table, comprehending the 
contents of this volume, and of all the Athenian Mercuries and 
Supplements, &c. Printed in the year 1691. London: printed for John 
Dunton, at the Raven in the Poultry.” This may be looked upon as one 
of the oldest specimens of the periodical review. The essay upon All 
Sorts of Learning, is divided into sections treating of Divinity, 
History, Philosophy, Law, Physic and Surgery, Arithmetic, Poetry, 
Painting, Geometry, Astronomy, Navigation, &c. &c.—each section 
followed by a copious list of the most approved works upon the subject 
more particularly treated of. An arrangement somewhat similar to that 
of the subjects above enumerated, appears to have been followed in the 
Young Student's Library, which opens with reviews of the works of Dr. 
Lightfoot, Dr. Barrow, and Bishop Usher. Near the beginning of the 
volume, is a notice {653} of a work published in Rotterdam, and 
entitled “The Accomplishment of Prophecies, or the Deliverance of the 
Church Near at Hand,” by a Mr. Jurieu, the first sentences of which 
will give us an idea of the paucity of readers one hundred and fifty 
years ago compared with their number at present. “_This work has made 
such a noise, that there are two thousand copies disposed of in four 
or five months,_ and yet there are but a very few gone into France, 
which would have taken off a great many if it were suffered that it 
might be disposed of there, this considerable part of Europe being 
almost nothing, by report, in respect of the bookseller's trade: _one 
would think that the first edition should have sufficed_—nevertheless, 
there was soon occasion for the second, and it is that which 
occasioned Mr. Jurieu to add to this work the additions which are to 
be marked.” If we suppose that only one hundred copies went to France, 
there remain nineteen hundred copies for the readers of the rest of 
Europe, and the disposal of these in four or five months is evidently 
looked upon as a great sale, and one which was likely to suffice. How 
would the Athenian Society have stared, to learn that in a century and 
a half a book would not be considered popular if two thousand copies 
were not sold in a week in the city where it was published. There is 
an interesting paper near the close of the book, concerning a work 
entitled “The Education of Daughters, by Mr. Feuelon, _Abbot_, 
according to the copy printed at Paris. Md. by Peter Alouin, 1687, in 
twelves.” The Abbot seems to have been a man of much good sense, as 
will appear from a few extracts from the review. “This is a matter of 
one of the most grave and important concerns of life. Mr. Abbot 
Feuelon concerned at the negligence wherewith virgins are educated, 
thought he could not better consecrate his cares than to the 
instruction of this fair sex. Fathers, in reference to public good, or 
by a blind inclination to young men, abandon their daughters almost 
without giving them any education—_notwithstanding_, saith he, _they 
are destined to fulfil the duties which are the foundations of human 
life, and which decide that which most nearly concerneth mankind._ 
There is then nothing more important than the precepts that are given 
us here. And indeed the source of men cannot be too pure. But the 
difficulty of succeeding is greater than is imagined. For if to give a 
good education to young women be to be removed entirely from the 
world, to apply them to what concerneth housewifery and 
house-government, it is to be feared that their restlessness and 
natural curiosity will push them upon other impertinent 
accomplishments.... Some pretend also that it is not less dangerous to 
let maids take pleasure in reading and frequent conversation, fearing 
they should fall into the extremities of the learned and knowing 
women, who never come down from heroism and refined wit.” 
Blue-stocking ladies were not more popular formerly than now. Mr. 
Feuelon recommends the _suaviter in modo_ as follows. “After that, 
coming to a more advanced age, he saith, that nothing backwards young 
women so much as the bad humors of those mothers who make perpetual 
lessons, and render virtue odious by too much preaching on't: Wisdom 
ought not to be shewn to this age but under a smiling countenance, and 
under a pleasant image. The most serious occupation ought to be 
seasoned with some honest pastimes; and a familiar and open conduct 
makes more progress than a more severe education, and a dry and 
absolute authority. Notwithstanding it's the common injustice of 
mothers, who taking always an austere and imperious countenance, judge 
not of pleasures but by the sorrow and care of their age, instead of 
judging thereof by the joy and sportings they had in times past. It 
falleth out often, that they cry out against pleasures because they 
themselves cannot taste of them. Howbeit, we cannot be old as soon as 
we come into the world; and Mr. Abbot Feuelon condemneth these 
constraining formalities, and these dim ideas of virtue, which render 
it sad and tedious to young women. Notwithstanding, continueth our 
author, as they are destined to moderate exercises, it is good to give 
them a slight imploy, for idleness is an unfathomable source of 
troublesomeness; and besides, the wandering imagination of a young 
woman turns itself easily towards dangerous objects. Therefore also he 
will not have them to accustom themselves so much to sleep, because 
that mollifies the body, and exposes the mind to the rebellion of the 
senses.

“Mr. Abbot Feuelon condemns utterly romances, because, according to 
him, young women fall into passions for chimerical intrigues and 
adventures. Being charmed with what they find tender and marvellous in 
them, what a distaste is it to them to abase themselves unto the 
lowest part of housewifery, and to this ordinary life we lead? He is 
not yet altogether against their learning some languages, but he 
rejects the Italian, because its only proper to read dangerous books, 
and he prefers the Latin tongue by reason of the DIVINE OFFICE. But 
without mentioning other inconveniences, he forgot that Ovid and 
Martial are poisoners far more pernicious than Amintas and Pastor 
Fido; for besides the obscenity of Martial, there is in Ovid all that 
love can inspire most tender, most ingenious, and most delicate. In 
truth, it were a thing to be wished for, that the modesty of a young 
woman should make her ignorant of all things that concern love; but it 
is convenient enough to know it in order to prevent it as much as 
possible. At least it was the advice of Madame de Chartres, a grave 
authoress in these matters, and which well may be opposed to Mr. Abbot 
Feuelon. The greatest part of mothers imagine (saith the author of the 
Princess of Cleves) that it is sufficient not to speak of gallantry 
before young persons, to make them keep from it. On the contrary, 
Madame de Chartres often depainted love to her daughter. She would 
tell her what there was pleasing in it, the more easily to persuade 
her of the misfortunes whereinto engagements lead us.

“This conduct hath something in it very acute. For nothing is more 
dangerous than to expose a young woman to know love by an interested 
person's mouth, who far from making her observe the troubles that 
follow this passion, hath no greater care than to hide them from her. 
So that it is very hard that a young person should resist love, whilst 
never hearing mention made of it, she begins to know it by that which 
is taking in it: and how shall she defend herself from a passion which 
only promisseth sweetnesses, and which offers such pleasing baits!”

It appears that there is a chapter devoted to the faults of young 
women. “Mr. Abbot Feuelon says that they must be corrected for those 
tears they shed {654} so cheap,” and that “they have always been 
reproached with a marvellous talent of speaking;” but he endangers the 
cure of the first offence, by admitting that “a handsome woman, when 
she is in tears, is by the half more handsome.” The reviewer states 
that the Abbot does not spare them for those “precipitate decisions of 
the curious ladies, which so much displease men of good judgment. A 
poor man of a Province, saith he, will be the ridicule of five or six 
_a-la-mode_ ladies, because his peruke is not of the best make, or 
because he wants a good grace, though he hath an upright heart, and a 
mind just and solid: when a courtier is preferred, whose whole deserts 
consist in fashions and cooks, and who hideth a low heart and false 
mind under an exterior politeness.

“Finally, he inveighs mightily against the vanity of women, their 
violent desire of pleasing, and the passion of dressing themselves, 
which they make their most important business. He pretends that this 
haughtiness draws after it the ruin of families, and the corruption of 
manners; and he neatly decides _that Beauty is noisome, if it doth not 
advantageously serve, to marry a young woman_”—which sentence the 
reviewer pronounces to be a little rigorous, and refutes at 
considerable length.

Farther on is a notice of a work entitled “A Treatise of the 
Excellency of Marriage; of its Necessity, and the Means of Living 
happily therein: where is an Apology made for Women against the 
Calumnies of Men. By James Chausse, Master of the Court Rolls. Printed 
at Paris—1685,” a work which might be advantageously republished at 
the present day. Mr. Chausse appears to have had a very exalted 
opinion of the married state, as the following passage must testify. 
He says, that “the most favorable judgment of the wisest about a 
single life is, that 'tis a virtue neither good nor bad, and that 
being without action, it is a kind of vice. He maintains that God made 
two sexes in nature, to shew they cannot subsist without being joined 
together; he sends us to learn of the animals, amongst which the 
mutual love of males for females, and females for males, is common to 
every individual. After this he considers men as men in a state, in a 
family, and in a church, and he says that in all these regards they 
are obliged to marry—because, adds he, 'tis necessary to endeavor to 
preserve their own kind, as they are citizens to the republic, 
successors to their families, and servants to the church; he speaks 
very large upon these three duties, and considering the beauty and 
perfections of man, he is wrapped up in admiration, and says, can 
there be any thing more noble than the ambition of producing creatures 
so perfect? He asks, if it is possible that we should be so much moved 
with the glory of making a fine book, drawing a beautiful picture, or 
a handsome statue, and should not be sensible of the glory of making a 
man? This appears so noble and admirable, that all men that we read of 
in Scriptures have thought themselves very happy in it, as Ibstan and 
Abdan, of which the first had thirty sons and thirty daughters, and as 
many sons and daughters in law; and the second had forty sons, and 
thirty grandsons, whom he saw altogether on horseback. ‘O God, (cries 
he out) can any thing be added more to the happiness of a father—can 
any thing be seen more memorable in the life of man!’ In my opinion, 
it exceeds all the acts of Cæsar and Alexander—such an increase is 
more noble than any act that can be found in history. Hence he 
supposes that Augustine had acquired more glory, if instead of leaving 
so many books, he had furnished the world with thirty children; and he 
would persuade us that the invention of Archimedes and Des Cartes are 
trifles in comparison of the exploits of a simple country fellow, who 
helps to people the world by lawful means; I say lawfully, for the 
author thinks no offspring good that is not from marriage. He 
fortifies his proofs as much as possible, and goes back to the ancient 
Jews, observing that marriage being one of these things that generally 
happen sooner or later, it is better to engage ourselves in happy 
time, than after a thousand declamations against it, whilst we are 
hurrying on to old age, when marriage can produce nothing but 
vexatious consequences.”—Then follows a dissertation upon the second 
marriages of widows, too long for me to quote.

The work of Mr. Chausse was written to persuade a gentleman, for whom 
he had a high regard, to marry; and he takes up all the possible 
objections he could think of in the following order. First, all those 
founded upon the conduct of women; second, those upon the nature of 
marriage itself; and third, the objection that marriage is an 
unsupportable yoke. Under the last head, the author gives the 
following directions for making a good marriage. “First, after having 
recommended ourselves to God, who presides in a more particular manner 
over that state, we make a choice of such a person as pleases us, and 
who has an agreeable temper. It would not be unpleasing to have her 
handsome; but since 'tis not very common to find such a one, we ought 
to be contented if she please us, whether she does others or no; and 
that 'tis not always advantageous for the wife to please all the 
world: but 'tis not sufficient to be pleased with her beauty, except 
there be a sympathy in humors. The author advises us to study the 
genius of those we design to marry, that we may the better succeed, in 
spite of the address that some make use of to hide their weakness; he 
adds, for the better security, that we may choose one that is young, 
and resides near our own habitation. In the first place, he advises to 
a choice in a well ordered family, and to observe the equality of 
condition and fortune, and to take care that she has no such 
pre-engagements as may make her marry him by constraint.” (This latter 
matter the young ladies now take care of themselves.)

The following is the conclusion of the review. “'Tis a good 
observation that the author, who in his book exhorted men to marry, 
says not a word to persuade virgins to the same. He well foresaw that 
this silence would surprise some of his readers—therefore he has put 
them out of pain in the preface, by acquainting them that virgins are 
sufficiently convinced of the necessity of marriage, therefore want no 
exhortations thereto; 'tis certain, says he, that though a virgin 
never proposes marriage, because of her modesty, there is nothing she 
so passionately wishes for; her heart often gives her mouth the lie; 
she often says I will not, when sometimes she dies for desire.”

My limits will not permit my quoting from any other reviews in the 
work, though much instructive and entertaining matter might be culled 
therefrom. I must, however, give a few specimens of the Alphabetical 
Table at the end of the work, which will give us some idea {655} of 
the questions which “the wisdom of our ancestors” was occupied with:

  Adam and Eve, whether they had navels?
  Apprentice, whether loses his gentility?
  Angels, why painted in petticoats?
  Adam and Eve, where had they needles?
  Ark, what became of it after the flood?
  Babel Tower, &c. what was the height of it?
  Bugs, why bite one more than another?
  Born with Cawls, what signifies it?
  Brothers born two in one, had they two souls?
  Balaam a Moabite, how could he understand his Ass?
  Clergy's Wives and Children, why unhappy?
  Females, if went a courting more marriages than now?
  Hairs, an equal number on any two men's head?
  Husband, whether lawful to pray for one?
  Kings of England, can they cure the evil?
  Lion, whether it won't prey upon a virgin?
  Mermen and Mermaids, have they reason?
  Marriage of a young man and an old woman wholesome?
  Marry, which best a good temper or a shrew?
  Negroes, shall they rise so at the last day?
  Phœnix, why but one?
  Peter and Paul, did they use notes?
  Queen of Sheba, had she a child by Solomon?
  Queen of Sheba, if now alive, whither she?
  Salamander, whether it lives in the fire?
  Swoon, where is the soul then?
  Wife, whether she may beat her husband?
  Women, if mere machines?
  Women, whether not bantered into a belief of being angels?
  Women, whether they have souls?
  Women, when bad, why worse than men?

Here is a volume of Almanacs—poor Richard's Almanacs, published by Dr. 
Franklin for so many years, and enriched with his moral and economical 
maxims. Many of the prefaces are amusing, and I shall give you three 
or four. Here is that to the Almanac for 1744.

“_Courteous Reader_—This is the twelfth year that I have in this way 
labored for the benefit—of whom?—of the public, if you'll be so good 
natured as to believe it; if not, e'en take the naked truth—'twas for 
the benefit of my own dear self—not forgetting in the meantime our 
gracious consort and dutchess, the peaceful, quiet, silent lady 
Bridget. But whether my labors have been of any service to the publick 
or not, the publick I acknowledge has been of service to me. I have 
lived comfortably by its benevolent encouragement, and I hope I shall 
always bear a grateful sense of its continued favor.

“My adversary, J——n J——n, has indeed made an attempt to _outshine_ me 
by pretending to penetrate _a year deeper_ into futurity, and giving 
his readers _gratis_ in his Almanack for 1743, an eclipse of the year 
1744, to be beforehand with me. His words are, ‘The first day of 
_April_ next year, 1744, there will be a GREAT ECLIPSE of the sun; it 
begins about an hour before sunset. It being in the sign Aries, the 
House of Mars, and in the Seventh, shows heat, difference, and 
animosities between persons of the highest rank and quality,’ &c. I am 
very glad, for the sake of those persons of rank and quality, that 
there is _no manner of truth_ in this prediction: they may, if they 
please, live in love and peace; and I caution his readers (they are 
but few indeed, and so the matter's the less) not to give themselves 
any trouble about observing this imaginary great eclipse; for they may 
stare till they are blind without seeing the least sign of it. I might 
on this occasion return Mr. J——n the name of _Baal's false prophet_ he 
gave me some years ago in his wrath, on account of my predicting his 
reconciliation with the _Church of Rome_, (though he seems now to have 
given up that point) but I think such language between old men and 
scholars unbecoming; and I leave him to settle the affair with the 
buyers of his Almanack as well as he can, who perhaps will not take it 
very kindly that he has done what in him lay, (by sending them out to 
gaze at an invisible eclipse on the first of April) to make _April 
fools_ of them all. His old threadbare excuse, which he repeats year 
after year about the weather, ‘that no man can be infallible therein, 
by reason of the many contrary causes happening at or near the same 
time, and the unconstancy of the summer showers and gusts,’ &c. will 
hardly serve him in the affair of _eclipses_, and I know not where 
he'll get another.

“I have made no alteration in my usual method, except adding the 
rising and setting of the planets, and the lunar conjunctions. Those 
who are so disposed, may thereby very readily learn to know the 
planets and distinguish them from each other.

  “I am, dear reader, thy obliged friend,
                                   R. SAUNDERS.”

The Almanack for 1746 opens with the following poetical preface.

  Who is poor Richard? people oft inquire
  Where lives? what is he—never yet the higher.
  Somewhat to ease your curiositie
  Take these slight sketches of my dame and me.
    Thanks to kind readers and a careful wife,
  With plenty blessed I lead an easy life;
  My business writing; hers to drain the mead
  Or crown the barren hill with useful shade;
  In the smooth glebe to see the ploughshare worn
  And fill my granary with needful corn;
  Press nectarous cider from my loaded trees,
  Print the sweet butter, turn the drying cheese.
  Some books we read, though few there are that hit
  The happy point where wisdom joins with wit,
  That set fair virtue naked to our view
  And teach us what is decent, what is true.
  The friend sincere and honest man with joy,
  Treating or treated oft our time employ.
  Our table neat, meal temperate, and our door
  Opening spontaneous to the bashful poor.
  Free from the bitter rage of party zeal
  All those we love who seek the public weal,
  Nor blindly follow Superstition's lore,
  Which cheats deluded mankind o'er and o'er.
  Not over righteous, quite beyond the rule,
  Conscience-perplexed by every canting tool,
  Nor yet where folly hides the dubious line,
  Where good and bad their blended colors join,
  Rush indiscreetly down the dangerous steep,
  And plunge uncertain in the darksome deep.
  Cautious if right; if wrong, resolved to part
  The innate snake that folds around the heart;
  Observe the mean, the motive and the end,
  Mending ourselves or striving still to mend.
  Our souls sincere, our purpose fair and free
  Without vain-glory or hypocrisy:
  Thankful if well, if ill we kiss the rod,
  Resign with hope and put our trust in _God_.

The preface for 1747 is as follows.

_Courteous Reader_,—This is the fifteenth time I have {656} 
entertained thee with my annual productions; I hope to thy profit as 
well as mine. For besides the astronomical calculations and other 
things usually contained in Almanacks, which have their daily use 
indeed while the year continues, but then become of no value, I have 
constantly interspersed _moral_ sentences, _prudent_ maxims, and 
_wise_ sayings, many of them containing _much good sense in very few 
words_, and therefore apt to leave _strong_ and _lasting_ impressions 
on the memory of young persons, whereby they may receive benefit as 
long as they live, when the Almanack and Almanack maker have been long 
thrown by and forgotten. If I now and then insert a joke or two that 
seem to have little in them, my apology is, that such may have their 
use, since perhaps for their sake light airy minds peruse the rest and 
so are struck by somewhat of more weight and moment. The verses on the 
heads of the months are also generally designed to have the same 
tendency. I need not tell thee, that not many of them are of my own 
making. If thou hast any judgment in poetry, thou wilt easily discern 
the workman from the bungler. I know as well as thou, I am no _poet 
born_, and indeed it is a trade I never learnt nor indeed could learn. 
If I make verses, 'tis in spite of nature and my stars I write. Why 
then should I give my readers _bad lines_ of my own, when good ones of 
other people are so plenty? 'Tis, methinks, a poor excuse for the bad 
entertainment of guests, that the food we set before them, though 
coarse and ordinary, is _of one's own raising, off one's own 
plantation, etc._ when there is plenty of what is ten times better to 
be had in the market. On the contrary, I assure ye, my friends, that I 
have procured the best I could for ye, and much good may't do ye.

I cannot omit this opportunity of making honorable mention of the late 
deceased ornament and head of our profession, MR. JACOB TAYLOR, who, 
for upwards of forty years, (with some few intermissions only) 
supplied the good people of this and the neighboring colonies with the 
most complete Ephemeris and most accurate calculations that have 
hitherto appeared in America. He was an ingenious mathematician, as 
well as an expert and skilful astronomer, and moreover no mean 
philosopher, but what is more than all, he was a PIOUS and HONEST man. 
_Requiescat in pace._

  I am thy poor friend to serve thee,
                              R. SAUNDERS.

The _science_ of astrology is very happily ridiculed in an ironical 
commendation of it in the Almanack for 1751.

“_Courteous Reader_,—Astrology is one of the most ancient sciences, 
held in high esteem of old by the wise and great. Formerly no prince 
would make war or peace, nor any general fight a battle; in short, no 
important affair was undertaken without first consulting an 
Astrologer, who examined the aspects and configurations of the 
heavenly bodies, and marked the lucky hour. Now the noble art (more 
shame to the age we live in) is dwindled into contempt; the great 
neglect us; empires make leagues and parliament laws without advising 
with us; and scarce any other use is made of our learned labors, than 
to find out the best time of cutting corns and gelding pigs. This 
mischief we owe in a great measure to ourselves; the ignorant herd of 
mankind, had they not been encouraged to it by some of us, would never 
have dared to depreciate our sacred dictates; but Urania has been 
betrayed by her own sons; those whom she had favored with the greatest 
skill in her divine art, the most eminent Astronomers among the 
moderns, the _Newtons_, _Halleys_ and _Whistons_, have wantonly 
contemned and abused her contrary to the light of their own 
consciences. Of these, only the last named, _Whiston_, has lived to 
repent and speak his mind honestly. In his former works he had treated 
_judicial astrology_ as a chimera, and asserted that not only the 
fixed stars, but the planets (sun and moon excepted) were at so 
immense a distance as to be incapable of any influence on this earth, 
and consequently nothing could be foretold from their positions; but 
now, in the memoirs of his life, published 1749, in the eighty-second 
of his age, he foretells, page 607, the sudden destruction of the 
Turkish Empire and of the House of Austria, German Emperors, &c. and 
Popes of Rome; the Restoration of the Jews and commencement of the 
Millenium, all by the year 1766, and this not only from Scriptural 
prophecies, but (take his own words) ‘from the remarkable 
_Astronomical_ signals that are to alarm mankind of what is coming, 
viz. the Northern Lights since 1715, the six comets at the Protestant 
Reformation in four years, 1530, 1531, 1533, 1534, compared with the 
seven comets already seen in these last eleven years, 1737, 1739, 
1742, 1744, 1746, and 1748—from the great annular eclipse of the sun 
July 14, 1748, whose centre passed through all the four monarchies 
from Scotland to the East Indies—from the occultation of the Pleiades 
by the moon each periodical month after the eclipse last July, for 
above three years visible to the whole Roman Empire—from the comet of 
A.D. 1456, 1531, 1607 and 1682, which will appear again about 1757 
ending, or 1758 beginning, and will also be visible through that 
Empire—from the Transit of Venus over the Sun May 26, 1761, which will 
be visible over the same Empire: and lastly, from the annular eclipse 
of the sun March 11, 1764, which will be visible over the same 
Empire.’ From these Astronomical signs he foretold those great 
events—that within sixteen years from this time, ‘the Millenium or 
1000 years reign of Christ shall begin; there shall be _a new heaven_ 
and _a new earth_; there shall be no more an infidel in Christendom, 
nor a gaming table at Tunbridge!’ When these predictions are 
accomplished, what glorious proofs will they be of the truth of our 
art! And if they happen to fail there is no doubt that so profound an 
Astronomer as Mr. Whiston, will be able to see _other_ signs in the 
heavens, foreshowing that the conversion of the infidels was to be 
postponed and the Millenium adjourned. After these great things, can 
any man doubt our being capable of predicting a little rain or 
sunshine? Reader, farewell, and make the best use of your years and 
your Almanacks, for you see that according to _Whiston_, you may have 
at most but sixteen more of them.

R. SAUNDERS.

_Patowmack, July 30, 1750._”

“_Great Events from Little Causes_,” is the title of a translation 
from a French work, published in Dublin in 1768. We may easily imagine 
how interesting such a work well executed must prove. It contains 
between fifty and sixty anecdotes from ancient and modern history. Had 
I room, I could copy nearly half the book without fearing to tire my 
readers, so true is it that “truth is strange, stranger than fiction.” 
From Roman {657} history, we have the overthrow of the regal 
government of Tarquin traced back to Collatinus' praise of his wife 
Lucretia, the abolition of the Decemvirate to the passion of Appius 
Claudius for Virginia, and the raising of the Plebeians to the 
Consular Dignity to the jealousy of a woman against her sister. We are 
reminded that the discovery of Cataline's conspiracy was owing to the 
disgust of Fulvia towards her lover, and that the ugliness of another 
Fulvia occasioned a civil war between Antony and Octavius. Among the 
passages from modern history are the following.

“_A quarrel which arose between two men of mean condition, the one a 
Genoese and the other a Venitian, occasions a terrible war between the 
Republics of Venice and Genoa, about the year 1258._

“Genoa withdrew itself from the dominion of the successors of 
Charlemagne, and in spite of all the troubles and divisions with which 
she was agitated, as well as intestine civil wars, she preserved her 
liberty. Europe, then peopled by Barbarians, was ignorant of the 
advantages of commerce; Genoa built ships and brought into Europe the 
productions of Asia and Africa; she amassed immense riches and became 
one of the most flourishing cities of the world. Venice followed her 
example and became her rival.

“These two republics, whom commerce made known to all nations, soon 
had establishments in all parts of the known world. They had a 
considerable one in the city of Acre, which, on account of its 
situation and largeness of its harbor, was very commodious to those 
who traded along the coast of Syria. The Genoese and Venitians had 
between them more than one-third of the city, where they lived subject 
to the laws of their respective countries.

“Neither the difference of customs nor even interest itself, which 
among merchants is an astonishing circumstance, occasioned any discord 
between them. They lived many years in as perfect an union as if they 
had been of the same nation and of joint interests. But if the 
ordinary motives of division among men were not capable of disturbing 
these two nations, we shall see them in arms against each other from a 
trifling and at the same time a very singular cause. Two men of the 
very lowest condition, the one a Genoese and the other a Venitian, who 
were no other than porters to the merchants fell out about a bale of 
goods which were to be carried. From words they came to blows. The 
merchants who at first gathered round them only by way of amusement to 
see the battle, at length took part in the quarrel, each assisting 
their countrymen. They grew warm and fought together; so that much 
blood was spilt and a deal of damage done on both sides. Complaints 
were soon carried to Genoa and Venice. The magistrates of each 
republic agreed that satisfaction should be made for the damage, 
according to the estimation of several arbitrators appointed for that 
purpose. The Genoese being condemned to make a more considerable 
reparation than the Venitians, delayed to furnish what was demanded of 
them. The Venitians piqued at the unfaithfulness of the Genoese, 
resolved to do themselves justice; and having surprised all the 
Genoese vessels which were in the port of Acre, set them on fire. The 
Genoese would have retaliated this injury on the Venitians, but the 
latter were on their guard and prevented them; a battle however ensued 
much more bloody than the first. Genoa and Venice resolved to support 
their merchants; they each fitted out a considerable fleet; that of 
the former was beaten, and the Genoese were obliged to abandon their 
settlements at Acre: the Venitians razed their houses and forts and 
destroyed their magazines. The Genoese irritated at this defeat, used 
their utmost efforts to put their fleet again into a condition to 
attack the Venitians. Every citizen offered to venture his person and 
fortune to revenge the outrage committed against his country. The 
Venitians informed of these preparations neglected no precautions to 
oppose them. The sea was covered with ships, an engagement ensued, 
much blood was spilt, and many brave citizens lost on both sides. In 
short, after a long and cruel war, in which the two republics reaped 
nothing but shame for having entered into it, they made peace.”

“_The boldness with which wine inspired a shoemaker at Genoa, 
occasioned the government of that republic to be changed._

“All republics have been torn by civil wars: ambition hath ever 
kindled discord therein. In the history of those states we see 
continually the nobles assuming more than their rights, and by their 
injustice exhausting the patience of the people, who arming themselves 
at the instigation of an ambitious person and guided by rage alone, 
brave the laws and commit the most terrible disorders.

“Genoa was not exempt from these evils; we meet with nothing in the 
writers who have transmitted its history, but troubles and calamities: 
it is a chain of revolutions. Towards the middle of the fourteenth 
century, the people, impatient under the tyranny of the nobility, 
murmured. There were some among them who sacrificed the welfare and 
tranquillity of the public to their ambition and to their interest: 
they took advantage of the discontent of the people, and irritated 
them by seditious discourses; they took up arms, and the nobility, to 
avoid the blows with which they were threatened, promised to grant 
whatever should be demanded of them.

“The populace were desirous that an _Abbé of the People_ should be 
elected. His office was to sustain the interests and liberties of the 
people, and to counterbalance, in a great measure, the authority of 
the _captains_, who were then the magistrates of the republic.

“An assembly was accordingly held for the election of an _Abbé of the 
People_. Vast numbers went to the place of meeting, and every one gave 
his voice; but as they all spoke at once nobody was understood. The 
tumult increased, the people began to grow warm, and were ready to 
proceed to blows; when a shoemaker, who at that instant was just come 
from a drinking house, passing by the assembly, mixed among the crowd, 
and getting upon a little eminence that fell in his way, being 
emboldened by the fumes of the wine, he bawled out as loud as he was 
able, ‘Fellow citizens, will you hearken to me?’ This invocation 
struck their ears, and immediately all eyes were fixed upon him; and 
the Genoese who were about to tear each other to pieces, all joined in 
a hearty laugh. Some bade him hold his peace, others encouraged him to 
speak on, and others again threw dirt at him; all laughed. This 
orator, without being in the least disconcerted, said, ‘I think myself 
obliged to tell you that you ought to {658} nominate to the dignity of 
_Abbé of the People_, an honest man; and I know of none more so than 
Simon Boccanegra. You ought to appoint him.’

“Simon Boccanegra was a perfectly honest man; the amiableness of his 
character, his generosity and many other virtues had procured him the 
love and esteem, both of the nobility and commonalty. He was one of 
the principal families among the citizens, and his relations had 
filled with universal applause the dignities of the republic. The 
person who first occupied the place of _Captain of the People_ was one 
of his ancestors.

“In short, his merit occasioned them to pay attention to the 
shoemaker's harangue. The name of Boccanegra became the general cry; 
every one insisted upon his being elected _Abbé of the People_, and 
they presented him with the sword, which was the mark of his dignity: 
but he returned it, saying, that he thanked the people for the good 
will they had shown him, and that as none of his ancestors had been 
Abbé of the People, he would not be the first who should introduce 
that office into his family. He was willing to avail himself of the 
humor into which he found the speech of the shoemaker had thrown the 
people to attain the lead in the republic.

“The people who are seldom moderate in their affection any more than 
in their hatred, immediately cried out, ‘Boccanegra, Lord of Genoa.’ 
This artful ambitious man said he was ready to submit to the will of 
the people, to be _Abbé_ or _Lord_ according as they should ordain. 
This feigned humility pleased the people, as he expected; they 
repeated Lord Boccanegra! and he was proclaimed perpetual Doge. So 
that the speech of a drunken shoemaker occasioned the government of 
Genoa to be transmitted from nobles to the people, and a single man to 
become sole master in the state.”

With the headings of a few other examples I shall conclude.

“The severity of an Empress to her daughter was the occasion of 
Attila's ravaging Gaul and Italy, and of the foundation of the city of 
Venice.”

“The inability of a person who had lost a considerable sum at dice to 
pay the same immediately, was the cause that the Vandals settled in 
Africa, went to ravage Italy and sack Rome.”

“The assassination of Chilperic, king of France, was occasioned by his 
giving Fredegonde his wife, a blow with a switch in play.”

“A repartee of the Empress Sophia, consort of Justinian II, is the 
cause of the Lombards invading Italy and establishing themselves 
there.”

“The kingdoms of Naples and Sicily were established in consequence of 
a duel fought by two Norman barons.”

“The beauty of a young Turk who lived at Antioch is the occasion of 
cruel wars between England and France.”

“A yellow goat occasions the death of three Khans of the Tartars, and 
the destruction of several cities.”

“Francis I, king of France, having promised a lady, of whom he was 
enamored, to meet her at Lyons in the month of March, occasions him to 
lose the battle of Pavia, himself to be made prisoner and reduces 
France to the brink of ruin.”

“The love of Margaret, duchess dowager of Burgundy, for a young Jew, 
occasions Brittany to be re-united to France, and England to be rent 
by civil wars.”

“A blow with a cane, being given by a German to a Genoese, who was 
looking at the carriage of a mortar-piece, which was broken in one of 
the streets of Genoa, occasions the Austrians to be driven from that 
city, and the republic of Genoa to recover its liberty.”

In view of such things, may we not say with a poet whose name I have 
forgotten—

  “Think naught a _trifle_ though it small appear,
   Small sands the mountain, minutes make the year,
   And trifles life; your care to trifles give,
   Else you may die ere you have learned to live.”




_Editorial._[1]

[Footnote 1: Some misapprehensions having arrisen, it may be as well 
to state that _all after_ this word “Editorial,” is strictly what it 
professes to be.]


To the Editor of the Southern Literary Messenger.

_Sir_,—In your August number (page 573) is a quotation from Mr. 
Burke's speech to the Electors of Bristol, upon the subject of 
instructions from constituents to their representatives. Will you 
oblige me by giving another passage or two from that speech, which 
will show how inapplicable Mr. Burke's remarks are to our country. 
Immediately after the word “arguments,” at the end of your last 
quotation, Mr. Burke proceeds thus:


“To deliver an opinion is the right of all men; that of constituents 
is a weighty and respectable opinion, which a representative ought 
always to rejoice to hear, and which he ought always most seriously to 
consider. But _authoritative_ instructions, _mandates_ issued, which 
the member is bound blindly and implicitly to obey, to vote and to 
argue for, though contrary to the clearest conviction of his judgment 
and conscience, these are things utterly unknown to the laws of THIS 
LAND, and which arise from a fundamental mistake of the whole order 
and tenor of our CONSTITUTION.

“Parliament is not a _congress_ of ambassadors from different and 
hostile interests, which interests each must maintain as an agent, and 
advocate against the other agents and advocates; but Parliament is a 
deliberative assembly of _one_ nation, with _one_ interest, that of 
the whole; where, not local purposes, not local prejudices ought to 
guide, but the general good, resulting from the general reason of the 
whole. You choose a member indeed, but when you have chosen him, he is 
not a member of Bristol, but he is a member of _Parliament_.”


This theory of each member's representing not those who chose him, but 
the whole nation, gave rise to what was called _virtual_ 
representation, when the people of America complained that they had no 
representatives in Parliament. Is it not evident, that under our 
CONSTITUTION, if every member represents his own constituents, _all_ 
will be represented? It was different indeed under the rotten borough 
system of England, now happily exploded. Mr. Burke was elected to 
Parliament, but having voted, under pretence of consulting the general 
good, for many measures obnoxious to the people of Bristol, he was 
defeated when he attempted to be re-elected. The making of loud 
professions of interest in the public welfare, and desire for the 
general good, accompanied by a neglect of immediate duties, reminds 
one of professions of universal philanthropy from the lips of a bad 
husband and a bad father.

  Yours respectfully,
                 Q. V. Z.

{659} [Our correspondent, in supposing Mr. Burke's remarks 
“inapplicable to this country,” seems to be misled by the word 
“congress.” Had not this term been appropriated to our National 
Assembly the paragraph would have escaped attention. The whole is 
applicable, we think, fully, even to “Congress” itself. Write “our 
General Legislature” in place of “Parliament,” “assembly” instead of 
“congress,” for “Bristol” read “Virginia,” and we see no difficulty 
whatever.


Our general legislature is not an assembly of ambassadors from 
different and hostile interests, which interests each must maintain as 
an agent, and advocate against the other agents and advocates; but our 
general legislature is a _deliberative_ [Mr. B. has italicized 
deliberative] assembly of _one_ nation, with _one_ interest, that of 
the whole. You choose a member indeed, but when you have chosen him, 
he is not a member of Virginia, but a member of our general 
legislature.


We can see no inapplicability here, nor is a word of the paragraph to 
be denied, when made referrible to us. Mr. Burke, we apprehend, wished 
simply to place a representative and _deliberative_ assembly, 
consisting of delegates from various sections of _one_ nation, in 
contradistinction to a meeting of ambassadors from a number of 
distinct and totally hostile powers. In the former case, supposing the 
judgment, rather than the will of the people, to be _represented_, he 
allows of no “authoritative mandates” from the constituent to the 
representative—in the latter instance, and in such instance alone, he 
can imagine the binding power of letters of instruction from home, 
upon the ambassadors assembled.

In regard to the “making of loud professions of interest in the public 
welfare, and desire for the general good, accompanied by a neglect of 
immediate duties”—we conceive that, in the case of Burke, or in any 
similar case, if the passage of a law is to operate for the general 
good, yet for the individual harm of the Senator's constituents, then 
the Senator has but one “immediate duty”—to vote for it.]




CRITICAL NOTICES.


PHILOTHEA.

_Philothea: A Romance. By Mrs. Child, Author of the Mother's Book, &c. 
Boston: Otis, Broaders & Co. New York: George Dearborn._

Mrs. Child is well known as the author of “Hobomok,” “The American 
Frugal Housewife,” and the “Mother's Book.” She is also the editor of 
a “Juvenile Miscellany.” The work before us is of a character very 
distinct from that of any of these publications, and places the fair 
writer in a new and most favorable light. Philothea is of that class 
of works of which the Telemachus of Fenelon, and the Anarcharsis of 
Barthelemi, are the most favorable specimens. Overwhelmed in a 
long-continued inundation of second-hand airs and ignorance, done up 
in green muslin, we turn to these pure and quiet pages with that 
species of gasping satisfaction with which a drowning man clutches the 
shore.

The plot of _Philothea_ is simple. The scene is principally in ancient 
Athens, during the administration of Pericles; and some of the chief 
personages of his time are brought, with himself, upon the stage. 
Among these are Aspasia, Alcibiades, Hippocrates, Anaxagoras of 
Clazomenœ, Plato, Hermippus the comic writer, Phidias the Sculptor, 
Artaxerxes of Persia, and Xerxes his son. Philothea, the heroine of 
the tale, and the grand-daughter of Anaxagoras, is of a majestic 
beauty, of great purity and elevation of mind. Her friend, Eudora, of 
a more delicate loveliness, and more flexile disposition, is the 
adopted daughter of Phidias, who bought her, when an infant, of a 
goat-herd in Phelle—herself and nurse having been stolen from the 
Ionian coast by Greek pirates, the nurse sold into slavery, and the 
child delivered to the care of the goat-herd. The ladies, of course, 
have lovers. Eudora is betrothed to Philæmon. This Athenian, the son 
of the wealthy Cherilaus, but whose mother was born in Corinth, has 
incurred the dislike of Aspasia, the wife of Pericles. She procures 
the revival of an ancient law subjecting to a heavy fine all citizens 
who married foreigners, and declaring all persons, whose parents were 
not both Athenians, incapable of voting in the public assemblies, or 
of inheriting the estates of their fathers. Philæmon, thus deprived of 
citizenship, prevented from holding office, and without hope of any 
patrimony, is obliged to postpone, indefinitely, his union with 
Eudora. The revival of the obnoxious law has also a disastrous effect 
upon the interests of Philothea. She is beloved of Paralus, the son of 
Pericles, and returns his affection. But in marrying, she will bring 
upon him losses and degradation. Pericles, too, looks with an evil eye 
upon her poverty, and the idea of marriage is therefore finally 
abandoned.

Matters are thus situated, when Philothea, being appointed one of the 
Canephoræ, (whose duty it is to embroider the sacred peplus, and to 
carry baskets in the procession of the Panathenaia,) is rigidly 
secluded by law, for six months, within the walls of the Acropolis. 
During this time, Eudora, deprived of the good counsel and example of 
her friend, becomes a frequent visitor at the house of Aspasia, by 
whose pernicious influence she is insensibly affected. It is at the 
return of Philothea from the Acropolis that the story commences. At 
the urgent solicitation of Aspasia, who is desirous of strengthening 
her influence in Athens by the countenance of the virtuous, Anaxagoras 
is induced to attend, with his grand-daughter, a symposium at the 
house of Pericles. Eudora accompanies them. The other guests are 
Hermippus, Phidias, the Persian Artaphernes, Tithonus a learned 
Ethiopian, Plato, Hipparete the wife of Alcibiades, and Alcibiades 
himself. At this symposium Eudora is dazzled by the graces of 
Alcibiades, and listens to his seductive flattery—forgetful of the 
claims of Hipparete, the wife of Alcibiades, and of Philæmon, her own 
lover. The poison of this illicit feeling now affects all the action 
of the drama. Philothea discovers the danger of her friend, but is 
sternly repulsed upon the proffer of good advice. Alcibiades is 
appointed a secret interview by Eudora, which is interrupted by 
Philothea—not however before it is observed by Philæmon, who, in 
consequence, abandons his mistress, and departs, broken-hearted, from 
Athens. The eyes of Eudora are now opened, too late, to the perfidy of 
Alcibiades, who had deceived her with the promise of marriage, and of 
obtaining a divorce from Hipparete. It is Hipparete who appeals to the 
Archons for a divorce from Alcibiades, on the score of {660} his 
notorious profligacy; and, in the investigations which ensue, it 
appears that a snare has been laid by Aspasia and himself, to entrap 
Eudora, and that, with a similar end in view, he has also promised 
marriage to Electra, the Corinthian.

Pericles seeks to please the populace by diminishing the power of the 
Areopagus. He causes a decree to be passed, that those who denied the 
existence of the Gods, or introduced new opinions about celestial 
things, should be tried by the people. This, however, proves injurious 
to some of his own personal friends. Hermippus lays before the 
Thesmothetæ Archons an accusation of blasphemy against Anaxagoras, 
Phidias, and Aspasia; and the case is tried before the fourth assembly 
of the people. Anaxagoras is charged with not having offered victims 
to the Gods, and with having blasphemed the divine Phœbus, by saying 
the sun was only a huge ball of fire,—and is condemned to die. Phidias 
is accused of blasphemy, in having carved the likeness of himself and 
Pericles on the shield of heaven-born Pallas, of having said that he 
approved the worship of the Gods merely because he wished to have his 
own works adored, and of decoying to his own house the maids and 
matrons of Athens, under the pretence of seeing sculpture, but in 
fact, to administer to the profligacy of Pericles. He is also adjudged 
to death. Aspasia is accused of saying that the sacred baskets of 
Demeter contained nothing of so much importance as the beautiful 
maidens who carried them; and that the temple of Poseidon was enriched 
with no offerings from those who had been wrecked, notwithstanding 
their supplications—thereby implying irreverent doubts of the power of 
Ocean's God. Her sentence is exile. Pericles, however, succeeds in 
getting the execution of the decrees suspended until the oracle of 
Amphiaraus can be consulted. Antiphon, a celebrated diviner, is 
appointed to consult it. He is absent for many days, and in the 
meantime Pericles has an opportunity of tampering with the people, as 
he has already done with Antiphon. The response of the oracle 
opportunely declares that the sentences be reconsidered. It is 
done—Phidias and Anaxagoras are merely banished, while Aspasia is 
acquitted. These trials form perhaps the most interesting portion of 
the book.

Chapter XI introduces us to Anaxagoras, the contented resident of a 
small village near Lampsacus in Ionia. He is old, feeble, and in 
poverty. Philothea watches by his side, and supports him with the 
labor of her hands. Plato visits the sage of Clazomenæ in his retreat, 
and brings news of the still-beloved Athens. The pestilence is 
raging—the Piræus is heaped with unburied dead. Hipparete has fallen a 
victim. Pericles was one of the first sufferers, but has recovered 
through the skill of Hippocrates. Phidias who, after his sentence of 
exile, departed with Eudora to Elis, and grew in honor among the 
Eleans—is dead. Eudora still remains at his house, Elis having 
bestowed upon her the yearly revenues of a farm, in consideration of 
the affectionate care bestowed upon her illustrious benefactor. 
Philæmon is in Persia instructing the sons of the wealthy Satrap 
Megabyzus. Alcibiades is living in unbridled license at Athens. But 
the visiter has not yet spoken of Paralus, the lover of Philothea. 
“Daughter of Alcimenes,” he at length says, (we copy here half a page 
of the volume, as a specimen of the grace of the narrative)—


“Daughter of Alcimenes, your heart reproaches me that I forbear to 
speak of Paralus. That I have done so, has not been from 
forgetfulness, but because I have with vain and self-defeating 
prudence sought for cheerful words to convey sad thoughts. Paralus 
breathes and moves, but is apparently unconscious of existence in this 
world. He is silent and abstracted, like one just returned from the 
cave of Trophonius. Yet beautiful forms are ever with him in infinite 
variety; for his quiescent soul has now undisturbed recollection of 
the divine archetypes in the ideal world, of which all earthly beauty 
is the shadow.”

“He is happy, then, though living in the midst of death,” answered 
Philothea. “But does his memory retain no traces of his friends?”

“One—and one only,” he replied. “The name of Philothea was too deeply 
engraven to be washed away by the waters of oblivion. He seldom 
speaks; but when he does you are ever in his visions. The sound of a 
female voice accompanying the lyre is the only thing that makes him 
smile; and nothing moves him to tears save the farewell song of 
Orpheus to Eurydice. In his drawings there is more of majesty and 
beauty than Phydias or Myron ever conceived; and one figure is always 
there—the Pythia, the Muse, the Grace, or something combining all 
these, more spiritual than either.”


The most special object of Plato's visit to Anaxagoras is the bearing 
of a message from Pericles. Hippocrates has expressed a hope that the 
presence of Philothea may restore, in some measure, the health and 
understanding of Paralus, and the once ambitious father has sent to 
beg the maiden's consent to a union with his now deeply afflicted son.


“Philothea would not leave me even if I urged it with tears,” replied 
Anaxagoras, “and I am forbidden to return to Athens.”

“Pericles has provided an asylum for you, on the borders of Attica,” 
answered Plato, “and the young people would soon join you after their 
marriage. He did not suppose that his former proud opposition to their 
loves would be forgotten; but he said hearts like yours would forgive 
it all, the more readily because he was now a man deprived of power, 
and his son suffering under a visitation of the gods. Alcibiades 
laughed aloud when he heard of this proposition; and said his uncle 
would never think of making it to any but a maiden who sees the 
zephyrs run, and hears the stars sing. He spoke truth in his profane 
merriment. Pericles knows that she who obediently listens to the 
inward voice, will be most likely to seek the happiness of others, 
forgetful of her own wrongs.”

“I do not believe the tender hearted maiden ever cherished resentment 
against any living thing,” replied Anaxagoras. “She often reminds me 
of Hesiod's description of Leto:

  Placid to men and to immortal gods;
  Mild from the first beginning of her days;
  Gentlest of all in Heaven.

She has indeed been a precious gift to my old age. Simple and loving 
as she is, there are times when her looks and words fill me with awe, 
as if I stood in the presence of divinity.”

“It is a most lovely union when the Muses and the Charities inhabit 
the same temple,” said Plato. “I think she learned of you to be a 
constant worshipper of the innocent and graceful nymphs, who preside 
over kind and gentle actions. But tell me, Anaxagoras, if this 
marriage is declined, who will protect the daughter of Alcimenes when 
you are gone?”

The philosopher replied, “I have a sister Heliodora, the youngest of 
my father's flock, who is Priestess of the Sun, at Ephesus. Of all my 
family, she has least {661} despised me for preferring philosophy to 
gold; and report bespeaks her wise and virtuous. I have asked and 
obtained from her a promise to protect Philothea when I am gone; but I 
will tell my child the wishes of Pericles, and leave her to the 
guidance of her own heart. If she enters the home of Paralus, she will 
be to him, as she has been to me, a bounty like the sunshine.”


Philothea assents joyfully to the union, although Chrysippus, the 
wealthy prince of Clazomenæ, has made her an offer of his hand. 
Anaxagoras dies. His grand-daughter, accompanied by Plato, and some 
female acquaintances, takes her departure for Athens, and arrives 
safely in the harbor of Phalerum. No important change has occurred in 
Paralus, who still shows a total unconsciousness of past events. The 
lovers are, however, united. Many long passages about this portion of 
the narrative are of a lofty and original beauty. The dreamy, 
distraught, yet unembittered existence of the husband, revelling in 
the visions of the Platonic philosophy—the anxiety of the father and 
his friends—the ardent, the pure and chivalric love, with the 
uncompromising devotion and soothing attentions of the wife—are 
pictures whose merit will not fail to be appreciated by all whose good 
opinion is of value.

Hippocrates has been informed that Tithonus, the Ethiopian, possesses 
the power of leading the soul from the body, “by means of a 
soul-directing wand,” and the idea arises that the process may produce 
a salutary effect upon Paralus. Tithonus will be present at the 
Olympian Games, and thither the patient is conveyed, under charge of 
Pericles, Plato and his wife. On the route, at Corinth, a letter from 
Philæmon, addressed to Anaxagoras, is handed by Artaphernes, the 
Persian, to Philothea. At the close of the epistle, the writer 
expresses a wish to be informed of Eudora's fate, and an earnest hope 
that she is not beyond the reach of Philothea's influence. The 
travellers finally stop at a small town in the neighborhood of 
Olympia, and at the residence of Proclus and his wife Melissa, “worthy 
simple-hearted people with whom Phidias had died, and under whose 
protection he had placed his adopted daughter.” The meeting between 
this maiden and Philothea is full of interest. The giddy heart of 
Eudora is chastened by sorrow. Phidias had desired her marriage with 
his nephew Pandœnus—but her first love is not yet forgotten. A letter 
is secretly written by Philothea to Philæmon, acquainting him with the 
change in the character of Eudora, and with her unabated affection for 
himself. “Sometimes,” she writes, “a stream is polluted in the 
fountain, and its waters are tainted through all its wanderings; and 
sometimes the traveller throws into a pure rivulet some unclean thing, 
which floats awhile and is then rejected from its bosom. Eudora is the 
pure rivulet. A foreign strain floated on the surface, but never 
mingled with its waters.”

The efforts of Tithonus are inadequate to the effectual relief of 
Paralus. We quote in full the account of the Ethiopian's attempt. Mrs. 
Child is here, however, partially indebted to a statement by 
Clearchus, of an operation somewhat similar to that of Tithonus, 
performed either by the aid, or in the presence of Aristotle. It will 
be seen that even the chimeras of animal magnetism were, in some 
measure, known to the ancients. The relation of Clearchus mentions a 
diviner with a spirit-drawing wand, and a youth whose soul was thereby 
taken from the body, leaving it inanimate. The soul being replaced by 
the aid of the magician, the youth enters into a wild account of the 
events which befell him during the trance. The passage in “Philothea” 
runs thus.


Tithonus stood behind the invalid and remained perfectly quiet for 
many minutes. He then gently touched the back part of his head with a 
small wand, and leaning over him, whispered in his ear. An unpleasant 
change immediately passed over the countenance of Paralus. He 
endeavored to place his hand on his head, and a cold shivering seized 
him. Philothea shuddered, and Pericles grew pale, as they watched 
these symptoms; but the silence remained unbroken. A second and a 
third time the Ethiopian touched him with his wand, and spoke in 
whispers. The expression of pain deepened; insomuch that his friends 
could not look upon him without anguish of heart. Finally his limbs 
straightened, and became perfectly rigid and motionless.

Tithonus, perceiving the terror he had excited, said soothingly, “O 
Athenians, be not afraid. I have never seen the soul withdrawn without 
a struggle with the body. Believe me it will return. The words I 
whispered, were those I once heard from the lips of Plato. ‘The human 
soul is guided by two horses—one white with a flowing mane, earnest 
eyes, and wings like a swan, whereby he seeks to fly; but the other is 
black, heavy, and sleepy-eyed—ever prone to lie down upon the earth.’ 
The second time I whispered, ‘Lo, the soul seeketh to ascend!’ And the 
third time I said, ‘Behold, the winged separates from that which has 
no wings.’ When life returns, Paralus will have remembrance of these 
words.”

“Oh, restore him! restore him!” exclaimed Philothea, in tones of 
agonized intreaty.

Tithonus answered with respectful tenderness, and again stood in 
profound silence several minutes, before he raised the wand. At the 
first touch, a feeble shivering gave indication of returning life. As 
it was repeated a second and a third time, with a brief interval 
between each movement, the countenance of the sufferer grew more dark 
and troubled, until it became fearful to look upon. But the heavy 
shadow gradually passed away, and a dreamy smile returned, like a 
gleam of sunshine after storms. The moment Philothea perceived an 
expression familiar to her heart, she knelt by the couch, seized the 
hand of Paralus, and bathed it with her tears.

When the first gush of emotion had subsided, she said in a soft low 
voice, “Where have you been, dear Paralus?” The invalid answered, “A 
thick vapor enveloped me, as with a dark cloud; and a stunning noise 
pained my head with its violence. A voice said to me, ‘The human soul 
is guided by two horses; one white, with a flowing mane, earnest eyes, 
and wings like a swan, whereby he seeks to fly; but the other is 
black, heavy, and sleepy-eyed—ever prone to lie down upon the earth.’ 
Then the darkness began to clear away. But there was strange 
confusion. All things seemed rapidly to interchange their colors and 
their forms—the sound of a storm was in mine ears—the elements and the 
stars seemed to crowd upon me—and my breath was taken away. Then I 
heard a voice saying, ‘Lo, the soul seeketh to ascend!’ And I looked 
and saw the chariot and horses, of which the voice had spoken. The 
beautiful white horse gazed upward, and tossed his mane, and spread 
his wings impatiently; but the black horse slept upon the ground. The 
voice again said, ‘Behold, the winged separates from that which hath 
no wings!’ And suddenly the chariot ascended, and I saw the white 
horse on light, fleecy clouds, in a far blue sky. Then I heard a 
pleasing silent sound—as if dew-drops made music as they fell. I 
breathed freely, and my form seemed to expand itself with buoyant 
life. All at once I was floating in the air, above a quiet lake, where 
reposed seven beautiful islands, full of the sound of harps; and 
Philothea slept at my side, with a garland on her head. I asked, ‘Is 
{662} this the divine home whence I departed into the body?’ And a 
voice above my head answered, ‘It is the divine home. Man never leaves 
it. He ceases to perceive.’ Afterward, I looked downward, and saw my 
dead body lying on a couch. Then again there came strange 
confusion—and a painful clashing of sounds—and all things rushing 
together. But Philothea took my hand, and spoke to me in gentle tones, 
and the discord ceased.”


The mind of Paralus derives but a temporary benefit from the skill of 
Tithonus, and even the attendance of the patient upon the Olympian 
games (a suggestion of Pericles) fails of the desired effect. A 
partial revival is indeed thus brought about—but death rapidly ensues. 
The friends of the deceased return to Athens, accompanied by the 
adopted daughter of Phidias. Philothea dies. Not many days after the 
funeral ceremonies, Eudora suddenly disappears. Alcibiades is 
suspected (justly) of having entrapped her to his summer residence in 
Salamis. The pages which follow this event detail the rescue of the 
maiden by the ingenuity of two faithful slaves, Mibra and Geta—the 
discovery of her father in Artaphernes the Persian, whom she 
accompanies to the court of Artaxerxes—her joyful meeting there, and 
marriage with Philæmon, after refusing the proffered hand of Xerxes 
himself.

In regard to the species of novel of which “_Philothea_” is no ignoble 
specimen, not any powers on the part of any author can render it, at 
the present day, popular. Nor is the voice of the people in this 
respect, to be adduced as an evidence of corrupted taste. We have 
little of purely human sympathy in the distantly antique; and this 
little is greatly weakened by the constant necessity of effort in 
conceiving _appropriateness_ in manners, costume, habits, and modes of 
thought, so widely at variance with those around us. It should be 
borne in mind that the “_Pompeii_” of Bulwer cannot be considered as 
altogether belonging to this species, and fails in popularity only in 
proportion as it does so belong to it. This justly admired work owes 
what it possesses of attraction for the mass, to the stupendousness of 
its leading event—an event so far from weakened in interest by age, 
rendered only more thrillingly exciting by the obscurity which years 
have thrown over its details—to the skill with which the mind of the 
reader is prepared for this event—to the vigor with which it is 
depicted—and to the commingling _with this event_ human passions 
wildly affected thereby—passions the sternest of our nature, and 
common to all character and time. By means so effectual we are hurried 
over, and observe not, unless with a critical eye, those radical 
defects or difficulties (coincident with the choice of epoch) of which 
we have spoken above. The fine perception of Bulwer endured these 
difficulties as inseparable from the groundwork of his narrative—did 
not mistake them for facilities. The plot of “_Philothea_,” like that 
of the Telemachus, and of the Anarcharsis, should be regarded, on the 
other hand, as the mere vehicle for bringing forth the antique 
“manners, costume, habits, and modes of thought,” which we have just 
mentioned as at variance with a popular interest to-day. Regarding it 
in this, its only proper light, we shall be justified in declaring the 
book an honor to our country, and a signal triumph for our 
country-women.

Philothea might be introduced advantageously into our female 
academies. Its purity of thought and lofty morality are 
unexceptionable. It would prove an effectual aid in the study of Greek 
antiquity, with whose spirit it is wonderfully imbued. We say 
wonderfully—for when we know that the fair authoress disclaims all 
knowledge of the ancient languages, we are inclined to consider her 
performance as even wonderful. There are some points, to be sure, at 
which a scholar might cavil—some perversions of the character of 
Pericles—of the philosophy of Anaxagoras—the trial of Aspasia and her 
friends for blasphemy, should have been held before the Areopagus, and 
not the people—and we can well believe that an erudite acquaintance of 
ours would storm at more than one discrepancy in the arrangement of 
the symposium at the house of Aspasia. But the many egregious blunders 
of Barthelemi are still fresh in our remembrance, and the difficulty 
of avoiding errors in similar writings, even by the professed scholar, 
cannot readily be conceived by the merely general reader.

On the other hand, these discrepancies are exceedingly few in 
Philothea, while there is much evidence on every page of a long 
acquaintance with the genius of the times, places, and people 
depicted. As a mere tale, too, the work has merit of no common 
order—and its purity of language should especially recommend it to the 
attention of teachers.


SHEPPARD LEE.

_Sheppard Lee: written by himself. New York: Harper and Brothers._

Like Philothea, this novel is an original in _American_ Belles Lettres 
at least; and these deviations, however indecisive, from the more 
beaten paths of imitation, look well for our future literary 
prospects. Thinking thus, we will be at the trouble of going through 
briefly, in detail, the plot and the adventures of Sheppard Lee.

The hero relates his own story. He is born “somewhere towards the 
close of the last century,” in the State of New Jersey, in one of the 
oldest counties that border upon the Delaware river. His father is a 
farmer in good circumstances, and famous for making good sausages for 
the Philadelphia market. He has ten children besides Sheppard. Nine of 
these die, however, in six years, by a variety of odd accidents—the 
last expiring in a fit of laughter at seeing his brother ridden to 
death by a pig. Prudence, the oldest sister, survives. The mother, 
mourning for her children, becomes melancholy and dies insane. 
Sheppard is sent to good schools, and afterwards to the College at 
Nassau Hall, in Princeton, where he remains three years, until his 
father's decease. Upon this occurrence he finds himself in possession 
of the bulk of the property; his sister Prudence, who had recently 
married, receiving only a small farm in a neighboring county. After 
making one or two efforts to become a man of business, our hero hires 
an overseer to undertake the entire management of his property.

Having now nothing to do, and time hanging heavily on his hands, 
Sheppard Lee tries many experiments by way of killing the enemy. He 
turns sportsman, but has the misfortune to shoot his dog the first 
day, and upon the second his neighbor's cow. He breeds horses and runs 
them, losing more money in a single hour than his father had ever made 
in two years together. At the suggestion of his overseer he travels, 
and is robbed of his baggage and money, by an intelligent gentlemanly 
{663} personage from Sing-Sing. He thinks of matrimony, and is about 
coming to a proposal, when his inamorata, taking offence at his 
backwardness, casts her eyes upon another wooer, who has made her an 
offer, and marries him upon the spot.

Upon attaining his twenty-eighth year, Mr. Lee discovers his overseer, 
Mr. Aikin Jones, to be a rogue, and himself to be ruined. Prudence, 
the sister, tells our hero moreover, that he has lost all the little 
sense he ever possessed, while her husband is so kind as to inform him 
that “he is wrong in the upper story.” A quarrel ensues and Mr. Lee is 
left to bear his misfortunes alone.

In Chapter V, we have a minute description of the state of the 
writer's affairs at this epoch, and it must be owned that his little 
property of forty acres presented a sufficiently woe-begone 
appearance. One friend, however, remains steadfast, in the person of 
our hero's negro servant, Jim Jumble—an old fellow that had been the 
slave of his father and was left to him in the will. This is a 
crabbed, self-willed old rascal, who will have every thing his own 
way. Having some scruples of conscience about holding a slave, and 
thinking him of no value whatever, but, on the contrary, a great deal 
of trouble, our hero decides upon setting him free. The old fellow, 
however, bursts into a passion, swears he will _not_ be free, that Mr. 
Lee is his master and shall take care of him, and that if he dares to 
set him free he will have the law of him, “he will by ge-hosh!”

At length, in spite of even the services of Jim Jumble, our hero is 
reduced to the point of despair. His necessities have compelled him to 
mortgage the few miserable acres left, and ruin stares him in the 
face. He attempts many ingenious devices with a view of amending his 
fortune—buys lottery tickets which prove all blanks—purchases stock in 
a southern gold mining company, is forced to sell out at a bad season, 
and finds himself with one-fifth the sum invested—gets a new coat, and 
makes a declaration to a rich widow in the neighborhood, who makes him 
the laughing stock of the country for his pains—and finally turns 
politician, choosing the strongest party, on the principle that the 
majority must always be right. Attending a public meeting he claps his 
hands and applauds the speeches with so much spirit, that he is 
noticed by some of the leaders. They encourage him to take a more 
prominent part in the business going on, and at the next opportunity 
he makes a speech. Being on the hurrah side he receives great 
applause, and indeed there is such a shouting and clapping that he is 
obliged to put an end to his discourse sooner than he had intended. He 
is advised to set about converting all in the neighborhood who are not 
of the right way of thinking, and the post office in the village is 
hinted at as his reward in case the county is gained. Mr. Lee sets 
about his task valiantly, paying his own expenses, and the hurrahs 
carry the day. His claim to the post-officeship is universally 
admitted, but, in some way or other, the appointment is bestowed upon 
one of the very leaders who had been foremost in commending the zeal 
and talents of our author, and in assuring him that the office should 
be his. Mr. Lee is enraged, and is upon the point of going over to the 
anti-hurrahs, when he is involved in a very remarkable tissue of 
adventure. Jim Jumble conceives that money has been buried by Captain 
Kid, in a certain ugly swamp, called the Owl-Roost, not many rods from 
an old church. The stories of the negro affect his master to such a 
degree that he dreams three nights in succession of finding a treasure 
at the foot of a beech-tree in the swamp. He resolves to dig for it in 
good earnest, choosing midnight, at the full of the moon, as the 
moment of commencing operations. On his way to the Owl-Roost at the 
proper time, he passes by the burial ground of the old church, and the 
wall having fallen down across his path, he strikes his ankle against 
a fragment—the pain causing him to utter a groan. To his amazement 
this interjection of suffering is echoed from the grave yard; a voice 
screaming out in awful tones, O Lord! O Lord! and, casting his eyes 
around, our hero beholds three or four shapes, whom he supposes to be 
devils incarnate, dancing about among the tomb-stones. The beech-tree, 
however, is finally reached in safety, and by dint of much labor a 
large hole excavated among the roots. But in his agitation of mind the 
adventurer plants an unlucky blow of the mattock among the toes of his 
right foot, and sinking down upon the grass, “falls straightway into a 
trance.”

Upon recovering from this trance, Mr. Lee finds himself in a very 
singular predicament. He feels exceedingly light and buoyant, with the 
power of moving without exertion. He sweeps along without putting his 
feet to the ground, and passes among shrubs and bushes without 
experiencing from them any hindrance to his progress. In short, he 
finds himself to be nothing better than a ghost. His dead body is 
lying quietly beside the excavation under the beech-tree. Mr. Lee is 
entirely overcome with horror at his unfortunate condition, and runs, 
or rather flies, instinctively to the nearest hut for assistance. But 
the dogs, at his approach, run howling among the bushes, and the only 
answer he receives from the terrified family is the discharge of a 
blunderbuss in his face. Returning in despair to the beech-tree and 
the pit, he finds that his body has been taken away. Its disappearance 
throws him into a phrenzy, and he is about to run home and summon old 
Jim Jumble to the rescue, when he hears a dog yelping and whining in a 
peculiarly doleful manner, at some little distance down in the meadow. 
Coming to a place in the edge of the marsh where are some willow 
trees, and an old worn fence, he there discovers to his extreme 
surprise, the body of a certain well-to-do personage, Squire 
Higginson. He is lying against the fence, stone dead, with his head 
down, and his heels resting against the rails, and looking as if, 
while climbing, he had fallen down and broken his neck.

Our hero pities the condition of Mr. Higginson, but being only a 
ghost, has no capacity to render him assistance. In this dilemma he 
begins to moralize upon the condition of Mr. H. and of himself. The 
one has no body—the other no soul. “Why might not I”—says, very 
reasonably, the ghost of Mr. Lee, “Why might not I—that is to say my 
spirit—deprived by an unhappy accident of its natural dwelling—take 
possession of a tenement which there remains no spirit to claim, and 
thus, uniting interests together, as two feeble factions unite 
together in the political world, become a body possessing life, 
strength, and usefulness? Oh, that I might be Squire Higginson!”

The words are scarcely out of his mouth, before our hero feels himself 
vanishing, as it were, into the dead man's nostrils, “into which his 
spirit rushes like a {664} breeze,” and the next moment he finds 
himself John Hazlewood Higginson, Esquire, to all intents and 
purposes—kicking the fence to pieces in a lusty effort to rise upon 
his feet, and feeling as if he had just tumbled over it. We must here 
give a couple of pages in the words of the author.


“God be thanked,” I cried, dancing about as joyously as the dog, “I am 
now a respectable man with my pockets full of money. Farewell then, 
you poor miserable Sheppard Lee! you raggamuffin! you poor wretched 
shote! you half-starved old sand-field Jersey Kill-Deer! you vagabond! 
you beggar! you Dicky Dout! with the wrong place in your upper story! 
you are now a gentleman and a man of substance, and a happy dog into 
the bargain. Ha! ha! ha!” and here I fell a laughing out of pure joy; 
and giving my dog Ponto a buss, as if that were the most natural act 
in the world, and a customary way of showing my satisfaction, I began 
to stalk towards my old ruined house, without exactly knowing for what 
purpose, but having some vague idea about me, that I would set old Jim 
Jumble and his wife Dinah to shouting and dancing; an amusement I 
would willingly have seen the whole world engaged in at that moment.

I had not walked twenty yards, before a woodcock that was feeding on 
the edge of the marsh, started up from under my nose, when clapping my 
gun to my shoulder, I let fly at him, and down he came.

“Aha, Ponto,” said I, “when did I ever fail to bring down a woodcock? 
Bring it along, Ponto, you rascal—Rum-te, ti, ti! rum-te, ti, ti!” and 
I went on my way singing for pure joy, without pausing to recharge or 
to bag my game. I reached my old house, and began to roar out, without 
reflecting that I was now something more than Sheppard Lee, “Hillo! 
Jim Jumble, you old rascal! get up and let me in.”

“What you want, hah?” said old Jim, poking his head from the garret 
window of the kitchen, and looking as sour as a persimmon before 
frost. “Guess Massa Squire Higginson drunk, hah? What you want? Spose 
I'm gwyin to git up afo sunrise for notin, and for any body but my 
Massa Sheppard?”

“Why you old dog,” said I, in a passion, “I am your Master Sheppard; 
that is, your Master John Hazlewood Higginson, Esquire; for as for 
Sheppard Lee, the Jersey kill-deer, I've finished him, you rascal; 
you'll never see him more. So get down and let me into the house, or 
I'll——”

“You will hah?” said Jim, “you will _what?_”

“I'll shoot you, you insolent scoundrel!” I exclaimed in a rage—as if 
it were the most natural thing in the world for me to be in one; and 
as I spoke I raised my piece; when “bow-wow-wow!” went my old dog 
Bull, who had not bitten a man for two years, but who now rushed from 
his kennel under the porch, and seized me by the leg.

“Get out Bull, you rascal,” said I, but he only bit the harder; which 
threw me into such a fury, that I clapped the muzzle of my gun to his 
side, and having one charge remaining, blew him to pieces.

“Golla-matty!” said old Jim, from the window, whence he had surveyed 
the combat; “golla-matty!—shoot old Bull!”

And with that the black villain snatched up the half of a brick, which 
I suppose he kept to daunt unwelcome visiters, and taking aim at me, 
he cast it so well as to bring it right against my left ear, and so 
tumbled me to the ground. I would have blown the rascal's brains out, 
in requital of this assault, had there been a charge left in my piece, 
or had he given me time to reload; but as soon as he had cast the 
brick, he ran from the window, and then reappeared, holding out an old 
musket, that I remembered he kept to shoot wild ducks and muskrats in 
the neighboring marsh with. Seeing this formidable weapon, and not 
knowing but that the desperado would fire upon me, I was forced to 
beat a retreat, which I did in double quick time, being soon joined by 
my dog Ponto, who had fled, like a coward, at the first bow-wow of the 
bull-dog, and saluted in my flight by the amiable tones of Dinah, who 
now thrust her head from the window, beside Jim's, and abused me as 
long as I could hear.


Our hero finds that in assuming the body of Squire Higginson, he has 
invested himself with a troublesome superfluity of fat—that he has 
moreover a touch of the asthma—together with a whizzing, humming, and 
spinning in the head. One day, while gunning, these infirmities prove 
more than usually inconvenient, and he is upon the point of retreating 
to the village to get his dinner, when a crowd of men make their 
appearance, and setting up a great shout, begin to run towards him at 
full speed. Hearing them utter furious cries, and perceiving a 
multitude of dogs in company, he is seized with alarm and makes for 
the woods. He is overtaken however, charged with the murder of 
Sheppard Lee, and committed by Justice Parkins—a mass of evidence 
appearing against him, among which that of Jim Jumble is not the least 
important, who swears that the prisoner came to his house, shot his 
bull-dog, threatened to blow his brains out, and bragged that he had 
“just finished Mr. Lee.”

In this dilemma our hero relates the whole truth to the prosecuting 
attorney, and is considered a madman for his pains. The body of 
Sheppard Lee, however, not appearing, the prisoner is set at liberty, 
and takes his way to Philadelphia in the charge of some new friends 
appertaining to him as John Hazlewood Higginson, Esquire. He finds 
himself a rich brewer, living in Chestnut Street, and the possessor of 
lands, houses, stocks, and Schuylkill coal-mines in abundance. He is 
troubled nevertheless with inveterate gout, and a shrew of a wife, and 
upon the whole he regrets his former existence as plain Sheppard Lee. 
Just opposite our brewer's residence is the dwelling of Mr. Periwinkle 
Smith, an aristocrat, wealthy or supposed to be so, although some 
rumors are abroad touching mortgages. He has an only daughter, and 
among her frequent visitors is one Isaac Dulmer Dawkins, Esq., a young 
dandy of the first water, tall, slim, whiskered, mustached, of pure 
blood, and living on his wits. This personage is often noted by our 
hero, upon his passage to and from the house of Mr. Smith. Suddenly 
his visits are discontinued—a circumstance which the brewer has soon 
an opportunity of explaining to his satisfaction. Going to the 
Schuylkill for the purpose of drowning himself, and thus putting an 
end at once to the gout and the assiduities of Mrs. Higginson, our 
hero is surprised at finding himself anticipated in his design by I. 
Dulmer Dawkins, Esq. who leaps into the river at the very spot 
selected for his own suicide. In his exertions to get Mr. D. out, he 
is seized with apoplexy—reviving partially from which, he discovers a 
crowd attempting to resuscitate the dandy.


“I could maintain,” says our hero, “my equanimity no longer. In the 
bitterness of my heart I muttered, almost aloud, and as sincerely as I 
ever muttered any thing in my life, ‘I would I were this addle-pate 
Dawkins, were it only to be lying as much like a drowned rat as he!’ I 
had not well grumbled the last word, before a sudden fire flashed 
before my eyes, a loud noise like the roar of falling water passed 
through my head, and I lost all sensation and consciousness.”


{665} As I. Dulmer Dawkins, our friend finds himself beset by the 
duns, whom he habitually puts off by suggestions respecting a rich 
uncle, of whose very existence he is sadly in doubt. Having ceased to 
pay attention to Miss Smith, upon hearing the rumors about the 
mortgages, it appears that he was jilted in turn by a Miss Betty 
Somebody, and thus threw himself into the river in despair. His 
adventures are now various and spirited, but his creditors grow 
importunate, and vow they will be put off no longer with the old story 
of the rich uncle, when an uncle, and a rich one, actually appears 
upon the tapis. He is an old vulgar fool, and I. Dulmer Dawkins, 
Esquire, is in some doubts about the propriety of allowing his claim 
to relationship, but finally consents to introduce the old quiz, son 
and daughter, into fashionable society, upon considering the pecuniary 
advantages to himself. With this end he looks about for a house, and 
learns that the residence of Periwinkle Smith is for sale. Upon 
calling upon that gentleman however, he is treated very civilly 
indeed, being shown the door, after having sufficiently ascertained 
that the rumors about the mortgages should have been construed _in 
favor_ of Mr. Smith—that he is a richer man than ever, and that his 
fair heiress is upon the point of marriage with a millionaire from 
Boston. He now turns his attention to his country cousin, Miss Patty 
Wilkins, upon finding that the uncle is to give her forty thousand 
dollars. At the same time, lest his designs in this quarter should 
fail, he makes an appointment to run off with the only daughter of a 
rich shaver, one Skinner. The uncle Wilkins has but little opinion of 
I. Dulmer Dawkins, and will not harken to his suit at all. In this 
dilemma our hero resorts to a trick. He represents his bosom friend 
and ally, Mr. Tickle, as a man of fashion and property, and sets him 
to making love to Miss Patty, in the name of himself, I. Dulmer. The 
uncle snaps at the bait, but the ally is instructed to proceed no 
farther without a definite settlement upon Miss Patty of the forty 
thousand dollars. The uncle makes the settlement and matters proceed 
to a crisis—Mr. Tickle pleasing himself with the idea of cheating his 
bosom friend I. Dulmer, and marrying the lady himself. A farce of very 
pretty finesse now ensues, which terminates in Miss Patty's giving the 
slip to both lovers, bestowing her forty thousand dollars upon an old 
country sweetheart, Danny Baker, and in I. Dulmer's finding, upon 
flying, as a dernier resort, to the broker's daughter, that she has 
already run away with Sammy, Miss Patty Wilkins' clodhopper brother.

Driven to desperation by his duns, our hero escapes from them by dint 
of hard running and takes refuge, without asking permission, in the 
sick chamber of old Skinner, the shaver. Finding the old gentleman 
dead, he takes possession of his body forthwith, leaving his own 
carcase on the floor.

The adventures in the person of Abram Skinner are full of interest. We 
have many racy details of stock-jobbing and usury. Some passages, of a 
different nature are well written. The miser has two sons, and his 
parsimony reduces them to fearful extremity. The one involves him 
deeply by forgery; and the other first robs his strong box, and 
afterwards endeavors to murder him.


It may be supposed that the misery now weighing me to the earth was as 
much as could be imposed upon me; but I was destined to find before 
the night was over that misery is only comparative, and that there is 
no affliction so positively great, that greater may not be 
experienced. In the dead of the night, when my woes had at last been 
drowned in slumber, I was aroused by feeling a hand pressing upon my 
bosom; and starting up I saw, for there was a taper burning upon a 
table hard by, a man standing over me, holding a pillow in his hand, 
which, the moment I caught sight of him, he thrust into my face, and 
there endeavored to hold it, as if to suffocate me.

The horror of death endowed me with a strength not my own, and the 
ruffian held the pillow with a feeble and trembling arm. I dashed it 
aside, leaped up in the bed, and beheld in the countenance of the 
murderer the features of the long missing and abandoned son, Abbot 
Skinner.

His face was white and chalky, with livid stains around the eyes and 
mouth, the former of which were starting out of their orbits in a 
manner ghastly to behold, while his lips were drawn asunder and away 
from his teeth, as in the face of a mummy. He looked as if 
horror-struck at the act he was attempting; and yet there was 
something devilish and determined in his air that increased my terror 
to ecstacy. I sprang from the bed, threw myself on the floor, and, 
grasping his knees, besought him to spare my life. There seemed indeed 
occasion for all my supplications. His bloated and altered visage, the 
neglected appearance of his garments and person, and a thousand other 
signs, showed that the whole period of his absence had been passed in 
excessive toping, and the murderous and unnatural act which he 
meditated, manifested to what a pitch of phrenzy he had arrived by the 
indulgence.

As I grasped his knees, he put his hand into his bosom, and drew out a 
poniard, a weapon I had never before known him to carry; at the sight 
of which I considered myself a dead man. But the love of life still 
prevailing, I leaped up, and ran to a corner of the room, where I 
mingled adjurations and entreaties with loud screams for assistance. 
He stood as if rooted to the spot for a moment; then dropping his 
horrid weapon, he advanced a few paces, clasped his hands together, 
fell upon his knees, and burst into tears, and all the while without 
having uttered a single word. But now, my cries still continuing, he 
exclaimed, but with a most wild and disturbed look—“Father I won't 
hurt you, and pray dont hurt _me!_”


Horrors such as these induce our hero to seek a new existence. Filling 
his pockets with money, he sets off in search of a corpse of which to 
take possession. At length, when nearly exhausted, a drunken fellow, 
apparently dead, is found lying under a shed. Transferring the money 
from his own person to that of the mendicant, he utters the usual 
wish, once, twice, thrice—and in vain. Horribly disconcerted, and 
dreading lest his charm should have actually deserted him, he begins 
to kick the dead man with all the energy he has left. At this 
treatment the corpse suddenly becomes animated, knocks our hero down 
with a whiskey jug, and makes off with the contents of his pockets, 
being a dozen silver spoons, and four hundred dollars in money. This 
accident introduces us to the acquaintance of a genuine 
philanthropist, Mr. Zachariah Longstraw, and this gentleman being at 
length murdered by a worthy ex-occupant of Sing-Sing, to whom he had 
been especially civil, our hero reanimates his body with excessive 
pleasure at his good fortune. The result is that he finds himself 
cheated on all sides, is arrested for debt, and is entrapped by a 
Yankee pedlar and carried off to the South as a tit-bit for the 
anti-abolitionists. On the route he ascertains (by accidently 
overhearing a conversation) that the missing body of Sheppard Lee, 
which {666} disappeared in so mysterious a manner from the side of the 
pit at the Owl-Roost, was carried off by one Dr. Feuerteufel, a 
German, who happened to be in search of subjects for dissection, and 
whose assistants were the dancing spectres in the church yard, which 
so terribly disconcerted our hero when on his way to the beech-tree. 
He is finally about to be hung, when a negro who was busied in 
preparing the gallows, fortunately breaks his neck in a fall, and our 
adventurer takes possession of his body forthwith.

In his character of Nigger Tom, Mr. Lee gives us some very excellent 
chapters upon abolition and the exciting effects of incendiary 
pamphlets and pictures, among our slaves in the South. This part of 
the narrative closes with a spirited picture of a negro insurrection, 
and with the hanging of Nigger Tom.

Our hero is revived, after execution, by the galvanic battery of some 
medical students, and having, by his sudden display of life, 
frightened one of them to death, he immediately possesses himself of 
his person. As Mr. Arthur Megrim, he passes through a variety of 
adventures, and fancies himself a coffee-pot, a puppy, a chicken, a 
loaded cannon, a clock, a hamper of crockery ware, a joint stock, a 
Greek Demi-God and the Emperor of France. Dr. Feurteufel now arrives 
in the village with a cargo of curiosities for exhibition—among which 
are some mummies. In one of them our hero recognizes the identical 
long missed body of Sheppard Lee.


The sight of my body thus restored to me, and in the midst of my 
sorrow and affliction, inviting me back, as it were, to my proper 
home, threw me into an indescribable ferment. I stretched out my arms, 
I uttered a cry, and then rushing forward, to the astonishment of all 
present, I struck my foot against the glass case with a fury that 
shivered it to atoms—or at least the portion of it serving as a door, 
which, being dislodged by the violence of the blow, fell upon the 
floor and was dashed to pieces. The next instant, disregarding the 
cries of surprise and fear which the act occasioned, I seized upon the 
cold and rigid hand of the mummy, murmuring “Let me live again in my 
own body, and never—no! never more in another's!” Happiness of 
happiness! although, while I uttered the word, a boding fear was on my 
mind, lest the long period the body had remained inanimate, and more 
especially the mummifying process to which it had been subjected, 
might have rendered it unfit for further habitation, I had scarcely 
breathed the wish before I found myself in that very body, descending 
from the box which had so long been its prison, and stepping over the 
mortal frame of Mr. Arthur Megrim, now lying dead on the floor.

Indescribable was the terror produced among the spectators by this 
double catastrophe—the death of their townsman, and the revival of the 
mummy. The women fell down in fits, and the men took to their heels; 
and a little boy who was frightened into a paroxysm of devotion, 
dropped on his knees, and began fervently to exclaim

  Now I lay me down to sleep,
  I pray the Lord my soul to keep.

In short, the agitation was truly inexpressible, and fear distracted 
all. But on no countenance was this passion (mingled with a degree of 
amazement) more strikingly depicted than on that of the German Doctor, 
who, thus compelled to witness the object of a thousand cares, the 
greatest and most perfect result of his wonderful discovery, slipping 
off its pedestal and out of his hands, as by a stroke of enchantment, 
stared upon me with eyes, nose and mouth, speechless, rooted to the 
floor, and apparently converted into a mummy himself. As I stepped 
past him, however, hurrying to the door, with a vague idea that the 
sooner I reached it the better, his lips were unlocked, and his 
feelings found vent in a horrible exclamation—“Der tyfel!” which I 
believe means the devil—“Der tyfel! I have empalm him too well!”


Sheppard Lee now makes his way home into New Jersey (pursued however 
the whole way by the German Doctor, crying “Mein Gott! Ter Tyfel! and 
stop mine mummy!”) and is put to bed and kindly nursed after his 
disaster by his sister Prudence and her husband. It now appears (very 
ingeniously indeed) that, harassed by his pecuniary distress, our hero 
fell into a melancholy derangement, and upon cutting his foot with the 
mattock, as related, was confined to bed, where his wonderful 
transmigrations were merely the result of delirium. At least this is 
the turn given to the whole story by Prudence. Mr. Lee, however, 
although he partially believes her in the right, has still a shadow of 
doubt upon the subject, and has thought it better to make public his 
own version of the matter, with a view of letting every body decide 
for himself.

We must regard “Sheppard Lee,” upon the whole, as a very clever, and 
not altogether unoriginal, _jeu d'esprit_. Its incidents are well 
conceived, and related with force, brevity, and a species of 
_directness_ which is invaluable in certain cases of narration—while 
in others it should be avoided. The language is exceedingly unaffected 
and (what we regard as high praise) exceedingly well adapted to the 
varying subjects. Some fault may be found with the conception of the 
metempsychosis which is the basis of the narrative. There are two 
general methods of telling stories such as this. One of these methods 
is that adopted by the author of Sheppard Lee. He conceives his hero 
endowed with some idiosyncracy beyond the common lot of human nature, 
and thus introduces him to a series of adventure which, under ordinary 
circumstances, could occur only to a plurality of persons. The chief 
source of interest in such narrative is, or should be, the contrasting 
of these varied events, in their influence upon a character 
_unchanging_—except as changed by the events themselves. This fruitful 
field of interest, however, is neglected in the novel before us, where 
the hero, very awkwardly, partially loses, and partially does not 
lose, his identity, at each transmigration. The sole object here in 
the various metempsychoses seem to be, merely the depicting of seven 
different conditions of existence, and the enforcement of the very 
doubtful moral that every person should remain contented with his own. 
But it is clear that both these points could have been more forcibly 
shown, without any reference to a confused and jarring system of 
transmigration, by the mere narrations of seven different individuals. 
All deviations, especially wide ones, from nature, should be justified 
to the author by some specific object—the object, in the present case, 
might have been found, as above-mentioned, in the opportunity afforded 
of depicting widely-different conditions of existence actuating _one_ 
individual.

A second peculiarity of the species of novel to which Sheppard Lee 
belongs, and a peculiarity which is _not_ rejected by the author, is 
the treating the whole narrative in a jocular manner throughout 
(inasmuch as to say “I know I am writing nonsense, but {667} then you 
must excuse me for the very reason that I know it”) or the solution of 
the various absurdities by means of a dream, or something similar. The 
latter method is adopted in the present instance—and the idea is 
managed with unusual ingenuity. Still—having read through the whole 
book, and having been worried to death with incongruities (allowing 
such to exist) until the concluding page, it is certainly little 
indemnification for our sufferings to learn that, in truth, the whole 
matter was a dream, and that we were very wrong in being worried about 
it at all. The damage is done, and the apology does not remedy the 
grievance. For this and other reasons, we are led to prefer, in this 
kind of writing, the _second_ general method to which we have alluded. 
It consists in a variety of points—principally in avoiding, as may 
easily be done, that _directness_ of expression which we have noticed 
in Sheppard Lee, and thus leaving much to the imagination—in writing 
as if the author were firmly impressed with the truth, yet astonished 
at the immensity, of the wonders he relates, and for which, 
professedly, he neither claims nor anticipates credence—in minuteness 
of detail, especially upon points which have no immediate bearing upon 
the general story—this minuteness not being at variance with 
indirectness of expression—in short, by making use of the infinity of 
arts which give verisimilitude to a narration—and by leaving the 
result as a wonder not to be accounted for. It will be found that 
_bizzarreries_ thus conducted, are usually far more effective than 
those otherwise managed. The attention of the author, who does not 
depend upon explaining away his incredibilities, is directed to giving 
them the character and the luminousness of truth, and thus are brought 
about, unwittingly, some of the most vivid creations of human 
intellect. The reader, too, readily perceives and falls in with the 
writer's humor, and suffers himself to be borne on thereby. On the 
other hand what difficulty, or inconvenience, or danger can there be 
in leaving us uninformed of the important facts that a certain hero 
_did not_ actually discover the elixir vitæ, _could not_ really make 
himself invisible, and _was not_ either a ghost in good earnest, or a 
bonâ fide Wandering Jew?


HAZLITT'S REMAINS.

_Literary Remains of the Late William Hazlitt, with a Notice of his 
Life by his Son, and Thoughts on his Genius and Writings, by E. L. 
Bulwer, M. P. and Mr. Sergeant Talfourd, M. P. New York: Saunders and 
Otley._

There is a piquancy in the personal character and literary reputation 
of Hazlitt, which will cause this book to be sought with avidity by 
all who read. And the volume will fully repay a perusal. It embraces a 
Biographical Sketch of Mr. H. by his son; “Some Thoughts on his 
Genius” by Bulwer; “Thoughts on his Intellectual Character,” by 
Sergeant Talfourd; a few words of high compliment contained in a 
Letter to Southey from Charles Lamb; a Sonnet, by Sheridan Knowles, on 
Bewick's portrait of the deceased; six other sonnets to his memory, by 
“a Lady;” and twenty-two Essays by Hazlitt himself, and constituting 
his “Literary Remains.” The volume is embellished with a fine head of 
the Essayist, engraved by Marr, from a drawing by Bewick.

William Hazlitt, upon his decease in 1830, was 52 years old. He was 
the youngest son of the Reverend William Hazlitt, a dissenting 
Minister of the Unitarian persuasion. At the age of nine he was sent 
to a day-school in Wern, and some of his letters soon after this 
period evince a singular thirst for knowledge in one so young. At 
thirteen, his first literary effort was made, in the shape of an 
epistle to the “Shrewsbury Chronicle.” This epistle is signed in Greek 
capitals _Eliason_, and is a decently written defence of Priestley, or 
rather an expression of indignation at some outrages offered to the 
Doctor at Birmingham. It speaks of little, however, but the 
school-boy. At fifteen, he was entered as a student at the Unitarian 
College, Hackney, with a view to his education as a dissenting 
minister, and here his mind first received a bias towards 
philosophical speculation. Several short essays were written at this 
time—but are lost. Some letters to his father, however, which are 
printed in the present volume, give no evidence of more than a very 
ordinary ability. At seventeen, he left College (having abandoned all 
idea of the Ministry) and devoted himself to the study of painting as 
a profession—prosecuting his metaphysical reading at spare moments. At 
eighteen, he commenced the first rough sketch of a treatise “On the 
Principles of Human Action.” At twenty, accident brought him 
acquainted with Coleridge, whose writings and conversation had, as 
might be expected, great influence upon his subsequent modes of 
thought. At twenty-four, during the short peace of Amiens, he visited 
Paris with a view of studying the works of art in the Louvre. Some 
letters to his father written at this period, are given in the volume 
before us. They relate principally to the progress of his own studies 
in art, and are not in any manner remarkable. After spending a year in 
Paris he returned to London, abandoned, in despair, the pencil for the 
pen, and took up his abode temporarily, with his brother John, in 
Great Russell Street, Bloomsbury. His treatise “On the Principles of 
Human Action,” a work upon which he seems to have greatly prided 
himself, (perhaps from early associations) was now completed, after 
eight years of excessive labor. He was not, however, successful in 
finding a publisher until a year afterwards—he being then 
twenty-eight. This was in 1805. In 1806, he published a pamphlet with 
the title of “Free Thoughts on Public Affairs.” In 1807, he abridged 
to one volume Tucker's large work in seven—the “Light of Nature,” and 
wrote for Messrs. Longman and Co. a “Reply to Malthus's Works on 
Population.” In 1808, he married Miss Stoddart, sister of the present 
Chief Justice of Malta. By this lady, who still lives, he had several 
children, all of whom died in early childhood, except the Editor of 
these “Remains.” Shortly after his marriage, he went to live at 
Winterslow, in Wiltshire. An English Grammar, written about this 
period, was published some years afterwards. In 1808, he also 
published a compilation, entitled “The Eloquence of the British 
Senate, being a selection of the best Speeches of the most 
distinguished Parliamentary Speakers, from the beginning of the reign 
of Charles I to the present time.” We are told also, that in the 
autumn of this same year he was “engaged in preparing for publication 
his ‘Memoirs of Holcroft’”—the first seventeen chapters of this work 
were written by Holcroft himself. {668} In 1811, Mr. Hazlitt removed 
to London and “tenanted a house once honored in the occupation of 
Milton.” In 1813, he delivered at the Russell Institution, a series of 
“Lectures upon the History and Progress of English Philosophy.” 
Shortly after this he became connected with the public press. For a 
short time he was engaged with the “Morning Chronicle” as a 
Parliamentary Reporter—but relinquished the occupation on account of 
ill health. He afterwards wrote political and theatrical criticisms 
for the “Champion,” the “Morning Chronicle,” the “Examiner,” and the 
“Times.” It was about this period, if we understand his biographer, 
that the collection of Essays appeared called “The Round Table.” Of 
these, forty were written by Mr. Hazlitt, and twelve by Leigh Hunt. In 
1818, his Theatrical Criticisms were collected and published under the 
title of “A view of the English Stage.” In this year also, he 
delivered at the Surrey Institution a series of Lectures on the “Comic 
Writers, and the Poets of England,” and on the “Dramatic Literature of 
the age of Elizabeth.” These were subsequently published in single 
volumes under their respective titles. In 1819, the whole of his 
Political Essays appeared in one volume. His next published work was 
the “Characters of Shakspeare's Plays.” In 1823, Mr. Hazlitt was 
divorced from his wife under the law of Scotland—shortly before this 
epoch having given to the world “Liber Amoris,” a publication for many 
reasons to be regretted. In this same year appeared a “Critical 
Account of the Principal Picture Galleries of England”—also the first 
series of “Table-Talk,” in two volumes, consisting of Essays on 
various subjects, a few of which had previously appeared in the 
“London Magazine.” In 1824, Mr. H. married Isabella, widow of Lieut. 
Col. Bridgewater, a lady of some property; proceeding, after the 
wedding, on a tour through France and Italy. “Notes” of this journey 
appeared in the “Morning Chronicle,” and were afterwards collected in 
a volume. In 1825, appeared the second series of “Table-Talk,” and the 
“Spirit of the Age,” a series of criticisms on the more prominent 
literary men then living. In 1826, the “Plain Speaker” was published, 
and another edition of the “Table-Talk.” At this period, and for some 
years previous, Mr. Hazlitt was a frequent contributor to the 
“Edinburgh Review,” the “New Monthly,” “Monthly,” and “London” 
Magazines, and other periodicals. In 1829, he published “Selections 
from the British Poets,” and in 1830, “Northcote's Conversations,” the 
“Life of Titian,” (in which Mr. Northcote had a large share, and whose 
name, indeed, appeared as author on the title-page) and his chief 
work, “The Life of Napoleon,” in four volumes. In August of this year 
he was attacked by a species of cholera, and on the 18th of September 
he died. We are indebted for the facts in this naked outline of Mr. 
Hazlitt's life, principally to the memoir by his son in the volume 
before us. The Memoir itself bears upon its face so obvious and indeed 
so very natural an air of the most enthusiastic filial affection and 
admiration, that we are forced to place but little reliance upon the 
critical opinions it advances.

The “Thoughts on the Genius of William Hazlitt,” by Mr. Bulwer, differ 
in many striking points from the “Thoughts” by Sergeant Talfourd, on 
his “Intellectual Character.” We give the preference unhesitatingly to 
the noble paper of Talfourd—a brilliant specimen of accurate thinking 
and fine writing. The article of Bulwer, indeed, seems to be a 
compulsory thing—an effort probably induced by earnest 
solicitation—and no labor of love. Hazlitt, moreover, was personally 
unknown to him. Sergeant Talfourd, on the contrary, appears to write 
with a vivid interest in the man, and a thorough knowledge of his 
books. Nothing more fully than is here said, need be said, on the 
character, on the capacities, or on the works of Hazlitt, and nothing 
possibly _can_ be said more happily or more wisely.

Of the Essays which constitute the body of the book before us, all 
have a relative—most of them a very high positive value. To American 
readers Hazlitt is principally known, we believe, as the Dramatic 
Critic, and the Lecturer on the Elder Poetry of England. Some of the 
papers in the present volume will prove the great extent and 
comprehensiveness of his genius. One on the “Fine Arts” especially, 
cannot fail of seizing public attention. Mr. Hazlitt discourses of 
Painting, as Chorley of Music. Neither have been equalled in their 
way. A fine passage of Hazlitt's on the _ideal_ commences thus—


The _ideal_ is not a negative, but a positive thing. The leaving out 
the details or peculiarities of an individual face does not make it 
one jot more ideal. To paint history is to paint nature as answering 
to a general, predominant, or preconceived idea in the mind, of 
strength, beauty, action, passion, thought, &c.; but the way to do 
this is not to leave out the details, but to incorporate the general 
idea with the details; that is, to show the same expression actuating 
and modifying every movement of the muscles, and the same character 
preserved consistently through every part of the body. Grandeur does 
not consist in omitting the parts, but in connecting all the parts 
into a whole, and in giving their combined and varied action; abstract 
truth or ideal perfection does not consist in rejecting the 
peculiarities of form, but in rejecting all those which are not 
consistent with the character intended to be given, and in following 
up the same _general idea_ of softness, voluptuousness, strength, 
activity, or any combination of these, through every ramification of 
the frame. But these modifications of form or expression can only be 
learnt from nature, and therefore the perfection of art must always be 
sought in nature.


“The Fight” will show clearly how the writer of true talent can 
elevate even the most brutal of themes. The paper entitled “My first 
acquaintance with Poets,” and that headed “Of Persons one would wish 
to have seen,” have a personal interest apart from the abilities of 
the writer. The article “On Liberty and Necessity,” that “On Locke's 
Essay on the Human Understanding,” and that “On the Definition of 
Wit,” bear with them evidence of a truth but little understood, and 
very rarely admitted—that the reasoning powers never exist in 
perfection unless when allied with a very high degree of the 
imaginative faculty. In this latter respect, Hazlitt (who knew and 
acknowledged the fact) is greatly deficient. His argumentative pieces, 
therefore, rarely satisfy any mind, beyond that of the mere logician. 
As a critic—he is perhaps unequalled. Altogether he was no ordinary 
man. In the words of Bulwer, it may justly be said—that “a complete 
collection of his works is all the monument he demands.”




The illness of both Publisher and Editor will, we hope, prove a 
sufficient apology for the delay in the issue of the present number, 
and for the omission of many promised notices of new books.






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