The barge she sat in, like a burnish'd throne,
Burnt on the water: the poop was beaten gold;
Purple the sails, and so perfumed that
The winds were lovesick; with them the oars were silver,
Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made
The water, which they beat, to follow faster,
As amorous of their strokes. For her own person,
It beggar'd all description: she did lie
In her pavilion, (cloth of gold, of tissue,)
O'er-picturing that Venus where we see
The fancy outwork Nature: on each side her
Stood pretty dimpled boys, like smiling Cupids,
With divers-color'd fans, whose wind did seem
To glow the delicate cheeks which they did cool,
And what they undid, did.
_Agr._ Oh, rare for Antony!
_Eno._ Her gentlewomen, like the Nereids,
So many mermaids, tended her i' the eyes,
And made their bends adornings: at the helm
A seeming mermaid steers; the silken tackle
Swell with the touches of those flower-soft hands,
That yarely frame the office. From the barge
A strange invisible perfume hits the sense
Of the adjacent wharfs. The city cast
Her people out upon her, and Antony,
Enthron'd i' th' market-place, did sit alone,
Whistling to the air, which, but for vacancy,
Had gone to gaze on Cleopatra too,
And made a gap in Nature.
_Antony and Cleopatra_. Act II. Sc. 2.
The operations of Shakespeare's creative imagination are rarely to be
observed more distinctly than in such instances as this, where we see
the precise source from which he drew, in all its original limitations
and native character. Books were to him like ingots of gold, which,
passing through the mint of his brain, came out thence stamped coin,
current for all time. Viewing some of his plays, it may be said, with no
real, though with apparent contradiction, that no man ever borrowed more
from books, and yet none ever owed less to them. For the Roman times
Plutarch served him, as Holinshed and Hall supplied him for his English
histories. Under Plutarch's guidance he walked through the streets of
ancient Rome, and became familiar with the conduct of her men. He is
more Roman than Plutarch himself, and by divine right of imagination he
makes himself a citizen of the Eternal City. While Shakespeare was using
Plutarch to such advantage, on the other hand, Ben Jonson seems to have
borrowed little or nothing from him in his Roman plays. He got what he
wanted out of the Latin authors, and he succeeded in Latinizing his
plays,--in giving to his characters the dress, but not the spirit of
Rome.
It was toward the end of the seventeenth century that Dryden's
translation appeared, and for about fifty years it held much the same
place with the reading public that North's had filled for previous
generations. It was, no doubt, in this version that Mrs. Fitzpatrick
amused herself during her seclusion in Ireland, as she tells Sophia
Western, with reading "a great deal in Plutarch's Lives." But this was
at length superseded by the translation of the brothers Langhorne,
which, spite of its want of vivacity, its labored periods, and formal
narrative, has retained its place as the popular version of Plutarch up
to the present day. One can hardly help wishing--so little of Plutarch's
spirit survives in their dull pages--that a similar fate had overtaken
these excellent men to that which carried off the gentle Abbé Ricard
with the _grippe_, when he had published but half of his translation of
the Philosopher of Cheronaea.
It is a proof of the intrinsic charm of Plutarch's Lives, that thus,
notwithstanding the imperfect manner in which they have been, up to this
time, presented to English readers, they should have been so constantly
and so generally read.[E] They have given equal delight to all ages and
to all classes. The heavy folio has been taken from its place on the
lower shelves in the quiet libraries of English country-houses, and been
read by old men at their firesides, by girls in trim gardens, by boys
who cared for no other classic. The cheap double-column octavo has
travelled in peddlers' carts to all the villages of New England, to
the backwoodsman's cabin in the West. It has taken its place on the
clock-shelf, with only the Bible, the "Pilgrim's Progress," and the
Almanac for its companions. No other classic author, with, perhaps, the
single exception of Aesop, has been so widely read in modern times; and
the popular knowledge of the men of Greece and Rome is derived more
from Plutarch than from all other ancient authors put together. The
often-repeated saying of Theodore Gaza, who, being once asked, if
learning should suffer a general shipwreck, and he had the choice of
saving one author, which he would select, is said to have replied,
"Plutarch,"--"and probably might give this reason," says Dryden, "that
in saving him he should secure the best collection of them all,"--this
saying is but a sort of prophecy of the decision of the common world,
who have chosen Plutarch from all the rest, and find, as Amyot says, "no
one else so profitable and so pleasant to read as he."[F]
[Footnote E: We have not spoken of Mr. Long's translations of Select
Lives from Plutarch, which were published in the series of Knight's
Weekly Volumes, under the title of _The Civil Wars of Rome_, because,
although executed in a manner deserving the highest praise, they
presented to English readers but a limited number of Plutarch's
biographies. Mr. Clough says, justly, in his Preface, that his own work
would not have been needed, had not Mr. Long confined his translations
within so narrow a compass.]
[Footnote F: "De tous les auteurs," says the Baron de Grimm, "qui nous
restent de l'antiquité, Plutarque est, sans contredit, celui qui a
recueilli le plus de vérités de fait et de spéculation. Ses oeuvres sont
une mine inépuisable de lumieres et de connaissance; c'est vraiment
l'encyclopédie des anciens." _Mémoires Historiques_, etc., I., 312.]
Nor is it merely the common mass of readers who have chosen Plutarch as
their favorite ancient. The list of great and famous men who have made
him their companion is a long one. Men of action and men of thought have
taken equal satisfaction in his pages. Petrarch, the first scholar of
the Revival, held him in high esteem, and drew from him much of his
uncommon learning. Erasmus, the first scholar of the Reformation, made
his writings a special study, and translated from the Greek a large
portion of his Moral Works. Montaigne has taken pains to tell us of his
affection for him, and his Essays are full of the proofs of it. "I never
seriously settled myself," he says, "to the reading of any book of
solid learning but Plutarch and Seneca."[G] And in another essay he
adds,--"The familiarity I have had with these two authors, and the
assistance they have lent to my age, and to my book wholly built up of
what I have taken from them, oblige me to stand up for their honor."[H]
And again he declares,--"The hooks I chiefly use to form my opinions are
Plutarch, since he became French, and Seneca."[I] The genial humanity
and liberal wisdom of Plutarch claimed the sympathy of Montaigne, while
his discursive style and love of story-telling suited no less the taste
of his disciple. Montaigne, as it were, makes Plutarch a modern, and
uses his books to illustrate the passing times. He introduces him to new
characters, and reads his judgment upon them. He finds in him a hundred
things that others had not seen. It is a wide step from Montaigne
to Rousseau, and yet, spite of the naturalness of the one and the
artificiality of the other, there were some points of resemblance
between them, and they harmonize in their love for a common master,
Rousseau has written of Plutarch as Montaigne felt,--"Dans le petit
nombre de livres que je lis quelquefois encore, Plutarque est celui
qui m'attache et me profite le plus. Ce fut la première lecture de mon
enfance, et sera la dernière de ma vieillesse; c'est presque le seul
auteur que je n'ai jamais lu sans en tirer quelque fruit."[J] Plutarch's
Lives was one of the few books recommended to Catharine II. of Russia,
as she herself tells us, wherewith to solace and instruct herself during
the first wretched years of her miserable married life. It is, perhaps,
not impossible to trace in some passages of her later life the results
of what she then read.
[Footnote G: _Essays._ Book I., Chapter 25.]
[Footnote H: _Essays_, II. 23.]
[Footnote I: _Ibid._ II. 10.]
[Footnote J: _Les Rêveries d'un Promeneur Solitaire._ Quatrième
Promenade.]
And thus we might go on accumulating the names of men and women whom
all the world knows, who have confessed their obligations to the old
biographer,--philosophers like Bacon, warriors like Bussy d'Amboise,
poets like Wordsworth; while many a one has owed much to him who has
made no open acknowledgment of his debt. Montaigne somewhere complains
of the unlicensed stealings from his author; and Udall, in his Preface
to the Apophthegms of Erasmus, declares,--"It is a thing scarcely
believable, how much, and how boldly as well, the common writers that
from time to time have copied out his [Plutarch's] works, as also
certain that have thought themselves liable to control and amend all
men's doings, have taken upon them in this author, who ought with
all reverence to be handled of them, and with all fear to have been
preserved from altering, depraving, or corrupting."[K]
[Footnote K: The following passage presents a view of some of the uses
to which Plutarch's narratives were turned during the Middle Ages. "Or
personne n'ignore que les chroniqueurs du moyen âge compilaient les
faits les plus remarquables de l'Écriture Sainte ou des histoires
profanes pour les mêler à leurs récits. C'est ainsi que ceux qui ont
écrit la vie de Du Guesclin ont mis sur le compte de ce héros ce
que Plutarque rapporte de plus mémorable des grands hommes de
l'antiquité."--SOUVESTRE. _Les Derniers Bretons._ I. 147.]
The question naturally arises, What are the qualities in Plutarch which
have made him so universal a favorite, which have attracted towards him
men of such opposite tempers and different lives? It is not enough
to say that all real biography is of interest,--that every man
has curiosity about the life of every other man, and finds in it
illustrations of his own. Other writers of lives have not had the same
fortune with Plutarch. For one reader of Suetonius or of Diogenes
Laërtius, there are a thousand of Plutarch. Nor is it that the subjects
of his biographies are greater or more famous than all other men. Some
of the noblest and best known men of Greece and Rome are omitted from
Plutarch's list.[L] The true grounds of the general popularity of
Plutarch's Lives are not to be found in their subjects so much as in
his manner of treating them, and in the qualities of his own nature, as
exhibited in his book. At the tomb of Achilles, Alexander declared that
he esteemed him happy in having had so famous a poet to proclaim his
actions; and scarcely less fortunate were they who had such a biographer
as Plutarch to record their lives. He himself has given us his
conception of the true office of a biographer, and in this has explained
in great part the secret of his excellence. "It must be borne in mind,"
he says, "that my design is not to write histories, but lives. And
the most glorious exploits do not always furnish us with the clearest
discoveries of virtue or vice in men; sometimes a matter of less moment,
an expression or a jest, informs us better of their characters and
inclinations than the most famous sieges, the greatest armaments, or the
bloodiest battles whatsoever. Therefore, as portrait-painters are more
exact in the lines and features of the face, in which the character is
seen, than in the other parts of the body, so I must be allowed to give
my more particular attention to the marks and indications of the souls
of men; and, while I endeavor by these to portray their lives, may be
free to leave more weighty matters and great battles to be treated of by
others."[M]
[Footnote L: In Rogers's _Recollections_, Grattan is reported as
saying,--"Of all men, if I could call up one, it should be Scipio
Africanus. Hannibal was perhaps a greater captain, but not so great and
good a man. Epaminondas did not do so much. Themistocles was a rogue."
It is curious that Themistocles is the only one of these men of whom we
have a biography by Plutarch. His Lives of Scipio and Epaminondas are
lost. Hannibal did not come within the scope of his design.]
[Footnote M: _Life of Alexander_, at the beginning.]
It is his fidelity to this principle, his dealing with events and
circumstances chiefly as they illustrate character, his delineation of
the features of the souls of men, that constitutes Plutarch's highest
merit as a biographer. He is no historian; he often neglects chronology,
and disregards the sequence of events; he omits many incidents, and he
avoids the details of national and political affairs. The progress of
the advance or decline of states is not to be learned from his pages.
But if his Lives be read in chronological order, much may be inferred
from them of the moral condition and changes of the communities in which
the men flourished whose characters and actions he describes. Biography
is thus made to cast an incidental light upon history. The successes
of Alexander give evidence of the lowering of the Greek spirit, and
illustrate the immemorial weakness of Oriental tyrannies. The victories
and the defeats of Pyrrhus alike display the vigor of Republican Rome.
The character and the fate of Mark Antony show that vigor at its ebb,
and foretell the near fall of the Roman liberties. Thus in his long
series of lives of noble Grecians and Romans, the motives and principles
which lay at the foundation of the characters of the men who moulded the
fate of Greece and Rome, the reciprocal influences of their times upon
these men and of these men upon their times, may all be traced with more
or less distinctness and certainty. It was not Plutarch's object to
exhibit them in sequent evolution, but, in attaining the object which he
had in view, he could not fail to make them manifest to the thoughtful
reader. His book, though not a history, is invaluable to historians.
But the character of Plutarch himself, not less than his method of
writing biography, explains his universal popularity, and gives its
special charm and value to his book. He was a man of large and generous
nature, of strong feeling, of refined tastes, of quick perceptions. His
mind had been cultivated in the acquisition of the best learning of his
times, and was disciplined by the study of books as well as of men. He
deserves the title of philosopher; but his philosophy was of a practical
rather than a speculative character,--though he was versed in the wisest
doctrines of the great masters of ancient thought, and in some of his
moral works shows himself their not unworthy follower. Above all, he was
a man of cheerful, genial, and receptive temper. A lover of justice and
of liberty, his sympathies are always on the side of what is right,
noble, and honorable. He believed in a divine ordering of the world,
and saw obscurely through the mists and shadows of heathenism the
indications of the wisdom and rectitude of an overruling Providence.
To him man did not appear as the sole arbiter of his own destiny, but
rather as an unconscious agent in working out the designs of a Higher
Power; and yet, as these designs were only dimly and imperfectly to
be recognized, the noblest man was he who was truest to the eternal
principles of right, who was most independent of the chances and
shiftings of fortune, who, "fortressed on conscience and impregnable
will," strove to live in the manliest and most self-supported relations
with the world, neither fearing nor hoping much in regard to the
uncertainties of the future, and who
"metus omnes et inexorabile fatum
Subjecit pedibus."
In his whole character, Plutarch shows himself one of the best examples
of the intelligent heathen of the later classic period. His Writings
contain the practical essence of the results of Greek and Roman life
and thought. His intellect, equally removed from superstition and
from skepticism, was open with a large receptiveness, which sometimes
approaches to credulity, to the traditions of early wonders, to the
reports of recent miracles, and to the stories of the deeds and sayings
of men.[N] The evidence upon which he reports is often insufficient to
establish the statements that he makes; but his readiness to tell the
current stories gives to his biographies a peculiar interest, adding
to their entertainment, and at the same time to their value as
representations of common beliefs and popular fancies. He is one of the
best story-tellers of antiquity, and from his works a series of "Percy
Anecdotes" of ancient men might easily be compiled. "Such anecdotes will
not," says he, in his Life of Timoleon, "be thought, I conceive, either
foreign to my purpose of writing lives, or unprofitable in themselves,
by such readers as are not in too much haste, or busied and taken up
with other concerns." It is this fulness of anecdote, which, perhaps,
more than any other quality of his writings, makes him the favorite
of boys as well as of men. He treasures up pithy sayings, and his own
reflections are often epigrammatic in expression, and always full of
good sense.
[Footnote N: There are two remarkable passages in the _Life of
Coriolanus_ which illustrate Plutarch's opinions upon these points. The
first (ii. 91) treats of the divine influence on the human will and
action; the second (ii. 97-98) relates to the mode of regarding events
seemingly incredible. This latter is peculiarly distinguished by its
good sense and clear statement. It closes with the memorable saying,
"Knowledge of divine things for the most part, as Heraclitus says, is
lost to us by incredulity."]
In his Life of Demosthenes, in a passage which is pleasant on account of
its personal reference, Plutarch speaks of the advantage that it would
be for a writer like himself to reside in some city addicted to liberal
arts, and populous, where he might have access to many books, and to
many persons from whom he might gather up such facts as books do not
contain. "But as for me," he says, "I live in a little town, where I am
willing to continue, lest it should grow less." And he goes on to excuse
himself for his imperfect knowledge of the Roman tongue, which unfits
him to draw a comparison between the orations of Demosthenes and of
Cicero. But, although his acquaintance with the structure and powers
of the language may have been insufficient to enable him to venture on
literary criticism, his acquaintance with the books of the Romans was
considerable, and he had thoroughly studied the Greek authors who had
written on Roman affairs. His own library, or the libraries to which he
had access at Chaeronea, must have been well furnished with the books
most important for his studies. He is said to quote two hundred and
fifty authors, some eighty of whom are among those whose works have been
wholly or partly lost. He made careful use of his materials, which were,
of course, more abundant for his Greek than for his Roman narratives.
"If we would put the Lives of Plutarch to a severe test," says Mr. Long,
than whom no one is better qualified to speak with authority upon the
subject, "we must carefully examine his Roman Lives. He says that he
knew Latin imperfectly, and he lived under the Empire, when many of the
educated Romans had but a superficial acquaintance with the earlier
history of their state. We must therefore expect to find him imperfectly
informed on Roman institutions; and we can detect him in some errors.
Yet, on the whole, his Roman Lives do not often convey erroneous
notions; if the detail is incorrect, the general impression is true.
They may be read with profit by those who seek to know something of
Roman affairs, and have not knowledge enough to detect an error. They
probably contain as few mistakes as most biographies which have been
written by a man who is not the countryman of those whose lives he
writes."
Yet, spite of his general accuracy and his impartial temper, the
representations which Plutarch makes of the characters which he
describes are not always to be accepted as fair delineations.
Unconscious prejudice, or misconception of circumstances and relations,
sometimes leads him into apparent injustice. Thus, for example, while he
bears hardly upon Demosthenes, and sets out many of his actions in too
unfavorable lights, he, on the other hand, interprets the conduct and
character of Phocion with manifest indulgence, and presents a flattered
portrait of a man whose death turned popular reproaches into pity, but
was insufficient to redeem the faults of his life.
Mr. Grote, in his History, passes a very different judgment upon these
two men from that to which one would be led by the perusal of Plutarch's
narratives merely. And it is an illustration, at once, of the honesty of
the ancient biographer, and of the ability of the modern historian, that
Mr. Grote should not infrequently derive from Plutarch's own account the
means for correcting his false estimate of the motives and the actions
of those whom he misjudged.
In an excellent passage in his Preface, Mr. Clough remarks that
"Much has been said of Plutarch's inaccuracy; and it cannot be denied
that he is careless about numbers, and occasionally contradicts his own
statements. A greater fault, perhaps, is his passion for anecdote; he
cannot forbear from repeating stories the improbability of which he is
the first to recognize, which, nevertheless, by mere repetition,
leave unjust impressions. He is unfair in this way to Demosthenes and
Pericles,--against the latter of whom, however, he doubtless inherited
the prejudices which Plato handed down to the philosophers.
"It is true, also, that his unhistorical treatment of the subjects
of his biography makes him often unsatisfactory and imperfect in the
portraits he draws. Much, of course, in the public lives of statesmen
can find its only explanation in their political position; and of this
Plutarch often knows and thinks little. So far as the researches of
modern historians have succeeded in really recovering a knowledge of
relations of this sort, so far, undoubtedly, these biographies stand in
need of their correction. Yet, in the uncertainty which must attend all
modern restorations, it is agreeable, and surely also profitable, to
recur to portraits drawn ere new thoughts and views had occupied the
civilized world, without reference to such disputable grounds of
judgment, simply upon the broad principles of the ancient moral code of
right and wrong. .... We have here the faithful record of the historical
tradition of Plutarch's age. This is what, in the second century of
our era, Greeks and Romans loved to believe about their warriors and
statesmen of the past. As a picture, at least, of the best Greek and
Roman moral views and moral judgments, as a presentation of the results
of Greek and Roman moral thought, delivered, not under the pressure
of calamity, but as they existed in ordinary times, and actuated
plain-living people, in country places, in their daily life, Plutarch's
writings are of indisputable value."
Of all the biographies contained in his work, none might excite greater
suspicion of incorrectness than that of Timoleon, on account of the
extraordinary character both of the man and of the incidents of his
career. His story reads like a romance of the ancient times, like a
legend of some half-mythical hero, rather than like the true account of
an actual man. There is, perhaps, none among his Lives which Plutarch
has written with greater spirit, with livelier sympathies, than this.
And yet, in spite of all its seeming improbability, there is little
reason to question its essential truth. It corresponds, with some minor
exceptions, with all that can be ascertained from other ancient authors
who wrote concerning the deliverer of Sicily; and even Mitford, with all
his zeal in the cause of tyrants, can find little to detract from the
praise of Timoleon, or to diminish our confidence in the truth of
Plutarch's account of him.
But, in addition to the interest that belongs to these biographies,
from their intrinsic qualities, as affected by the character of
Plutarch,--beside the interest which the common reader or the student
of biography and history may find in them, they possess a still deeper
interest for the student of human nature, in its various modifications,
under varying influences, and in different ages, from exhibiting to him,
in a long series, many of the chief characters of the heathen world
in such form as fits them for comparison with the prominent men of
Christian times. The question of the effect of Christianity upon the
characters and lives of the leading actors in modern history is not more
important than it is difficult of solution. Plutarch, better than any
other ancient writer, affords the means of estimating the motives, the
principles, the objects, of the men of the old time. We see in his pages
what they were; we see the differences between them and the men of later
days. How far are those differences exhibitions of inferiority or of
superiority? How far do they result from the influence of secondary
causes? how far from the change in religious belief?
No man who knows much of the course of history will venture to insist
greatly on any essential change for the better having been wrought as
yet by Christianity in the manner in which the affairs of the world are
carried on. Christianity has not yet been fairly tried. Nations
calling themselves Christian are still governed on heathen principles.
Christianity has been for the most part perverted and misunderstood. The
grossest errors have been taught in its name, are still taught in its
name. Falsehood has claimed the authority of truth, and its claim has
been granted. The stream which flowed out pure from its source has been
caught in foul cisterns, has been led into narrow channels, has been
made stagnant in desolate pools and wide-spread weedy marshes. The
doctrine of Christ has had thus far in the world but very few hearers
who have understood it. Many a modern creed might well go back to
heathenism for improvement. This perversion of Christianity is a
chief element in the difficulty of tracing the real influence of true
Christian teaching upon character. It is this which compels us to draw
a parallel, not so much between the actual characters of ancient and
modern times, if we would rightly understand the differences between
them, as between what we may assume to be the ideal standards of the
heathen and the Christian. But to treat this subject with the fulness
and in the manner which it deserves would lead us too far from Plutarch,
and we have done enough in suggesting it as matter for reflection to
those who read his Lives.
One of the most marked differences in the position of the ancient and
the modern man is that which has been quietly and gradually brought
about by science; but its effect is little recognized by the mass of men
or the most wide-spread churches. It is the difference of his recognized
relations to the universe. While this earth was supposed to be the
central point and main effort of creation, while the earth itself
was unknown, and all the regions of space were regarded as void and
untenanted, save by the inventions of fancy, man may have seemed to
himself a creature of large proportions and of considerable importance.
He measured himself with the gods and the half-gods, and found himself
not much their inferior. In reading Plutarch, one cannot fail to be
struck with the manly self-reliance of his best men of action. Their
piety had no weakness of self-abasement in it. They possessed a piety
toward themselves as well as toward the gods. Timoleon, who was attended
by the good-fortune that waits on noble character, erected in the house
which the Syracusans bestowed upon him an altar to [Greek: Automatia],
which, as Mr. Clough well remarks, in a note, "is almost equivalent to
Spontaneousness. His successes had come, as it were, of themselves." The
act was an acknowledgment of divine favor, and an assertion at the
same time of his individual independence of action. This spirit of
self-dependence was the grandest feature of Greek and Roman heathenism;
and it is in this, if in anything, that a superiority of character is
manifest in the men of ancient times. The famous passage in Seneca's
tragedy, in which Medea asserts herself as sufficient to stand alone
against the universe, contains its essence and is its complete
expression.
_Nutr._ Spes nulla monstrat rebus adflictis viam.
_Med._ Qui nil potest sperare, desperet nihil.
_Nutr._ Abiere Colchi; conjugis nulla est fides;
Nihilque superest opibus e tantis tibi.
_Med._ Medea superest; hic mare et terras vides,
Ferrumque, et ignes, et deos, et fulmina.
_Medea_, Act ii. 162-167.
Here is self-reliance at its highest point; the strength of resolute
will measuring itself singly and undauntedly against all forces, human
and divine.
But, as a necessary consequent of this spirit, as its implied complement
in the balance of human nature, we find, as a distinct trait in the
lives of many of the manliest ancients, an occasional prevalence of a
spirit of despondency, a recognition of the ultimate weakness of
man when brought by himself face to face with the wall of opposing
circumstance and the resistless force of Fate. Will is strong, but the
powers outside the will are stronger. Manliness may not fail, but man
himself may be broken. Neither the teachings of natural religion, nor
the doctrines of philosophy, nor the support of a sound heart are
sufficient for man in the crisis of uttermost trial. Without something
beyond these, higher than these, without a conscious dependence on
Omnipotence, man must sink at last under the buffets of adverse fortune.
Take the instances of these great men in Plutarch, and look at the end
of their lives. How many of them are simple confessions of defeat!
Themistocles sacrifices to the gods, drinks poison, and dies.
Demosthenes takes poison to save himself from falling into the hands of
his enemies. Cicero proposes to slay himself in the house of Caesar, and
is murdered only through want of resolution to kill himself. Brutus says
to the friend who urges him to fly,--"Yes, we must fly; yet not with
our feet, but with our hands," and falls upon his sword. Cato lies down
calmly at night, reads Plato on the Soul, and then kills himself; while,
after his death, the people of Utica cry out with one voice that he is
"the only free, the only undefeated man." It may be said that even in
suicide these men displayed the manliness of their tempers. True, but it
was the manliness of the deserter who runs the risk of being shot for
the sake of avoiding the risks and fatigues of service in war.[O]
[Footnote O: There is a striking passage in Seneca's treatise _De
Consolatione_, which may, perhaps, be not unfairly regarded as the
expression of a sentiment common among the better heathens in regard to
death,--a sentiment of profound sadness. He says,--"Mors dolorum omnium
solutio est et finis, ultra quam mala nostra non exeunt, quae nos in
illam tranquillitatem, in qua antequam nasceremur jacuimus, reponit."
xix. 4.]
Again, we must be content rather to hint at than to develop the matter
for reflection and study that Plutarch affords, and unwillingly pass by,
without even a glance at them, large domains of thought that lie within
his pages. We are glad to believe, that, through the excellent edition
before us, his Lives will be more widely read than ever. In this
country, where the tendency of things is to the limited, but equal
development of each individual in social and political life, and hence
to the production of a uniform mediocrity of character and of action,
these biographies are of special value, as exhibiting men developed
under circumstances widely contrasted with our own, and who may serve
as standards by which to measure some of our own deficiencies or
advantages. Here were the men who stood head and shoulders above the
others of their times; we see them now, "foreshortened in the tract of
time,"--not as they appeared to their contemporaries, but in something
like their real proportions. But the greatness of those proportions for
the most part remains unchanged. How will it be with our great men two
thousand years hence? Will the numerous "most distinguished men of
America" appear as large then as they do now? Will the speeches of our
popular orators be read then? Will the most famous of our senators be
famous then? Will the ablest of our generals still be gathering laurels?
There is a story told by the learned Andrew Thevet, chief cosmographer
to Henry III., King of France and Poland, to the effect that one
Triumpho of Camarino did most fantastically imagine and persuade himself
that really and truly one day "he was assembled in company with the
Pope, the Emperor, and the several Kings and Princes of Christendom,
(although all that while he was alone in his own chamber by himself,)
where he entered upon, debated, and resolved all the states' affairs of
Christendom; and he verily believed that he was the wisest man of
them all; and so he well might be, of the company." The fantastical
imagination of this Triumpho furnishes a good illustration of the
reality of companionship which one who possesses Plutarch may have in
his own chamber with the greatest and most interesting men of ancient
times. If he be worthy, he may make the best of them his intimates. He
may live with them as his counsellors and his friends. Whether he will
believe that he is "the wisest man of them all" is doubtful; but,
however this may be, he will find himself in their company growing
wiser, stronger, tenderer, and truer.
It has been well said, that "Plutarch's Lives is the book for those who
can nobly think and dare and do."
_The Lost and Found; or Life among the Poor._ By SAMUEL B. HALLIDAY. New
York: Blakeman & Mason. 1859.
It has been asserted--most emphatically by those who have most fairly
tried it--that no house was ever built large enough for two families to
live in decently and comfortably. Yet in this present year of grace,
1859, half a million of men and women--two-thirds of the population of
New York--are compelled, by reason of their own poverty and the avarice
of certain capitalists, to live in what are technically known as
"tenement-houses," or, more pertinently, "barracks,"--hulks of brick,
put up by Shylocks anxious for twenty per cent., and lived in--God knows
how--by from four to ninety-four families each. Of 115,986 families
residing in the city of New York, only 15,990 are able to enjoy the
luxury of an independent home; 14,362 other families live in comparative
comfort, two in a house; 4,416 buildings contain three families each,
and yet do not come under the head of tenements; and the 11,965
dwelling-houses which remain are the homes of 72,386 _families_, being
an average of seven families, or thirty-five souls to each house!
But this is only an average. In the eleventh ward, 113 _rear_ houses
(houses built on the backs of deep lots, and separated only by a narrow
and necessarily dark and filthy court from the front houses, which are
also "barracks,") contain 1,653 families, or nearly 15 families or 70
souls each; 24 others contain 407 families, being an average of 80 souls
to each; and in another ward, 72 such houses contain no less than 19
families or 95 souls each!
This seems shocking. But this is by no means the worst! There are 580
tenement-houses in New York which contain, by actual count, 10,933
families, or about 85 persons each; 193 others, which accommodate 111
persons each; 71 others, which cover 140 each; and, finally, 29--these
must be the most profitable!--which have a total population of no less
than 5,449 souls, or 187 to each house!
That part of Fifth Avenue which holds the chief part of the wealth and
fashion of New York has an extent of about two miles, or, counting both
sides of the street, four miles. These four miles of stately palaces
are occupied by four hundred families; while a single block of
tenement-houses, not two hundred yards out of Fifth Avenue, contains no
less than seven hundred families, or 3,500 souls! Seven such blocks, Mr.
Halliday pertinently remarks, would contain more people than the city of
Hartford, which covers an area of several miles square.
Such astounding facts as these the industrious Buckle of the year 3000,
intent upon a history of our American civilization, will quote to the
croakers of that day as samples of our nineteenth-century barbarism.
"But," some one may object, "if the houses were comfortably arranged,
and land was really scarce, after all, these people were not so badly
off."
The "tenement-house," which is now one of the "institutions" of New
York, stands usually upon a lot 25 by 100 feet, is from four to six
stories high, and is so divided internally as to contain four families
on each floor,--each family eating, drinking, sleeping, cooking,
washing, and fighting in a room eight feet by ten and a bed-room six
feet by ten; unless, indeed,--_which very frequently happens,_ says Mr.
Halliday,--the family renting these two rooms _takes in another family
to board,_ or _sub-lets_ one room to one _or even two_ other families!
But the modern improvements?
One of the largest and most recently built of the New York "barracks"
has apartments for 126 famines. It was built especially for this use.
It stands on a lot 50 by 250 feet, is entered at the sides from alleys
eight feet wide, and, by reason of the vicinity of another barrack of
equal height, the rooms are so darkened that on a cloudy day it is
impossible to read or sew in them without artificial light. It has not
one room which can in any way be thoroughly ventilated. The vaults and
sewers which are to carry off the filth of the 126 families have grated
openings in the alleys, and door-ways in the cellars, through which the
noisome and deadly miasmata penetrate and poison the dank air of the
house and the courts. The water-closets for the whole vast establishment
are a range of stalls without doors, and accessible not only from the
building, but even from the street. Comfort is here out of the
question; common decency has been rendered impossible; and the horrible
brutalities of the passenger-ship are day after day repeated,--but on a
larger scale. And yet this is a fair specimen. And for such hideous and
necessarily demoralizing habitations,--for two rooms, stench,
indecency, and gloom, the poor family pays--and the rich builder
receives--_"thirty-five per cent, annually on the cost of the
apartments!"_
When a city has half a million of inhabitants who _must_ content
themselves with such quarters as these, which, even the beasts of the
field would perish in, does any man wonder that 18,000 women were
arrested in the last year? that in the three months ending January
31st, 1859, 13,765 arrests were made by the city police, of which over
one-third were females, one in six under twenty years of age, and more
than one-half under thirty? that in 1855 there was one death in every
26-1/3 of the population? that in 1858 the five city dispensaries were
called on to treat (gratuitously) 65,442 infant patients? that, in 1855,
1,938 infants were stillborn, and 6,390, or 1 in 99 of the population,
did not live the first year out? while, at the present time, 20,000
children roam the streets, and never enter a schoolroom? With such
homes, is there cause for surprise that husbands murder their wives?
that mothers abuse their children,--and would kill them, too, were they
not profitable little slaves, as Mr. Halliday shows? that men and women
live in drunken stupor upon the spoils of young children,--often not
their own,--sent out to beg, to steal, or do worse yet? that even the
very fag-end of humanity, the sentiment of "honor among thieves,"
perishes here?
For twenty years, Mr. Halliday has labored among these poor creatures,
as the "agent" or missionary of the "American Female Guardian Society
and Home for the Friendless," an association of noble-minded and
unusually practical men and women. If any of our readers fear lest the
fountain of benevolence may dry up within him, we commend Mr. Halliday's
book to his perusal. He will find there some little stories which have a
pathos beyond tears; some facts--happening, mayhap, within ten minutes'
walk of his own fireside--quite as strange as the strangest fiction of
Mr. Cobb or Mr. Emerson Bennett. We have not space left for any account
of Mr. Halliday's labors. His Society provides not only boys and girls,
but even men and women under certain circumstances, with present
assistance and shelter, and afterwards a home and work in the country,
at a distance from the temptations and miseries of the city. It is
curious to read that Mr. Halliday receives frequent orders from various
States--even the most distant West--for "a baby," "a boy," "a little
girl." It is good to know that in that way many bright young souls are
saved from the horrors of "tenement" life, and placed in kind hands;
and it is touching to read, that, while many of these little ones are
remarkable for good looks and bright spirits, all are reported as
singularly quiet, sedate, and submissive. We are glad to know that the
types of the paper published by the Society are set up by the women who
have a refuge in its Home; and we were sorry to read of one boy, who
always ran away from everybody and every place, being at last secured
in the House of Refuge, where, being now nearly eleven years old, the
monster! "he seems dejected, and I have never seen him smile," says Mr.
Halliday. This boy--and a good many others who like the streets and the
free air better than the black-hole of a tenement--should go to sea.
The sea is an honorable trade, (it _used_ to be a profession,) and the
merchants of New York could not do a wiser or a better thing than in
providing a school-ship where such lads could be taught the rudiments
of seamanship and navigation, or, in default of that, sending them as
apprentices in their vessels.
We have two complaints to enter against Mr. Halliday: first, that he
has given his book a title which will deter most sensible people
from opening it; and, second, that in his valuable report on the
tenement-houses, he does not give the names of those enterprising
personages who make thirty-five per cent, at the expense, not only of
their poor tenants, but of every tax-payer in New York.
_The New American Cyclopaedia: a Popular Dictionary of General
Knowledge._ Edited by GEORGE RIPLEY and CHARLES A. DANA. Vol. VI.
Cough--Education. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 8vo. pp. 772.
More than one-third of the task assumed by the editors of this work is
now completed; and the best testimony in its favor is, that, although it
has been freely criticized, sometimes with closeness and severity, and
sometimes with studied harshness and evident malice, its reputation has
risen among candid and competent readers with the appearance of each
volume. Faults, negative and positive, may undoubtedly be discovered in
it; but the same is true, in a greater or less degree, of every other
production of human labor; and the eyes neither of malice nor of
hypercriticism have been able to find any sufficient reason why this
Cyclopaedia should not be accepted as the beat popular dictionary of
general knowledge in the English language. As the work advances, the
comprehensiveness of its plan, the honesty of its purpose, and the truly
catholic and liberal spirit which animates it, become more and more
apparent; and the names of the authors of the articles (a list of which
is to be published, we believe, with the last volume) sufficiently show
the determination of the editors to secure the cooperation of the first
talent in the country. Among the contributors to the present volume are
the Rev. Dr. Bellows, Edmund Blunt, Dion Bourcicault, Professor Dana
of Yale College, Edward Everett, Professor Felton of Cambridge, Parke
Godwin, Richard Hildreth, George S. Hillard, William Henry Hurlbut, and
Professors Lowell and Parsons of Cambridge.
Of the articles, we especially notice _Cranmer_, remarkable for the
candor and the coolness of perception with which the character of its
benevolent and gifted, but inconsistent and vacillating subject, is
discussed:--_Cromwell_, which gives a completer, more authentic, and
less prejudiced account of the eventful life of the great Puritan leader
than is to be found in any other publication known to us:--_Crusades_,
a complete picture in little of those great fitful blazes of religious
enthusiasm by which it flickered into its final extinction; (for,
afterward, only a semblance of it was made a stalking-horse by
politicians;) and this article is quite a model of epitome:--_Cuneiform
Inscriptions_, in which the writer has presented concisely and clearly
the fruits of a careful examination of all the many theories that have
been broached with regard to these important and puzzling records of the
ancient world, without revealing a preference, if he have one, for
any; a wise course, where, in a case of such consequence, the views
of learned men are so conflicting, but one not always easily
followed:--_Damascus Blades_, a very interesting, and, for general
purposes, a very full description of the peculiarities of those famous,
and, it appears, not too much lauded weapons:--_Deaf and Dumb_, a very
copious article of eleven pages, rich in historical and biographical
detail, and giving full accounts of the various methods of instruction
adopted for this class of persons in all times and countries, with a
large body of statistical information upon the subject; an article of
great interest, but perhaps undue length:--_Death_, which conveys much
information on a subject as to which the grossest and most deplorable
misconceptions prevail; an article equally remarkable for its careful
and minute presentation of the phenomena of death and for the placid and
philosophical spirit in which it is written:--_Deluge_, in which, with
the ingenuity before shown in the treatment of similar subjects, the
various accounts of that event, and the facts and theories relating to
it, are laid before the reader in a manner to which no one, of whatever
creed, can object, and a new and very ingenious and rational mode of
accounting for the phenomenon in question is proposed;--_Dog_, the
fulness of which makes it acceptable to the lover of natural history,
the sporting man, and the general reader:--and the last article,
_Education_, one of great value, which describes the systems of
instruction pursued in all ages and countries, and which, without
entering upon the support of any one of them, presents to the reader
such an impartial and detailed summary of the distinguishing features of
them all, that he can form an intelligent opinion upon them for himself.
The volume is so meritorious, that we have not looked for faults; but,
as we turned the leaves, we noticed a few such as the following:--that
the river Dove, in England, should be mentioned as "noted for its
picturesque scenery," and yet its association with Izaak Walton and
Charles Cotton, its chief glory, be passed unnoticed; and that Discord
should be defined as, "_in music_, a combination of sounds inharmonious
and unpleasing to the ear"; whereas, although, out of music, discord
means a sound inharmonious and displeasing to the ear, in music discord
is the golden bond of harmony, the life and soul of expression, that for
which the ear yearns with a yearning that is inexpressible, and enjoys
with poignancy of pleasure. We asked, too, if Thomas Dowse should be
honored with a page and a half, in which his fall from a tree, his
rheumatic fever, and the head winds which prevented him from visiting
Europe are chronicled,--while the eminent French painter, Couture, whose
use of the pallet is marked by such striking originality, that it has
produced an impression upon the works of a generation of painters,
has twelve lines! And we can hardly be accused of hypercriticism, in
directing the attention of the editors to a sentence like the following,
in the article _Diptera_, p. 498, 2d col.:--"Though _this order_
contains the bloodthirsty mosquito, the disgusting flesh-fly, and many
insects depositing their eggs in the bodies of living animals, _it_ is a
most useful one, supplying food to insectivorous birds, and _themselves_
[who? what?] consuming decomposing animal and vegetable substances,"
etc. But these are instances of oversight in not very important matters,
or of inaccuracy of expression, or of difference of judgment between
the editors and ourselves as to plan, which even in our judgment do not
affect the value of the work in which they occur. Graver errors could be
found in almost every work of great scope that ever came from the
press. We indicate them that we may afford some help toward a nearer
approximation to that perfection which is unattainable.
_Tom Brown at Oxford: a Sequel to School-Days at Rugby._ By THOMAS
HUGHES, etc. Part I. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 1859.
Many men write successful books; but very few have the power of making
a book succeed by naturalness, simplicity, and quiet strength, as Mr.
Hughes found the secret of doing in his "School-Days at Rugby." It is so
easy to be eloquent,--scarce a modern French novelist but has the gift
of it by the ream; so easy to be philosophical,--one has only to begin
a few substantives with capitals; and withal it is so hard to be genial
and agreeable. Since Goldsmith's day, perhaps only Irving and Thackeray
had achieved it, till Mr. Hughes made himself the third. It is no
easy thing to write a book that shall seem so easy,--to describe your
school-days with such instinctive rejection of the unessential, that
whoever has been a boy feels as if he were reading the history of his
own, and that your volume shall be no more exotic in America than in
England. Yet this Mr. Hughes accomplished; and it was in a great measure
due to the fact, that beneath the charm of style the reader felt a real
basis of manliness and sincerity.
His second book, "The Scouring of the White Horse," was less
successful,--in part from the narrower range of its interest, and
still more, perhaps, because it lacked the spontaneousness of the
"School-Days." In his first book there was no suggestion of authorship;
it seemed an inadvertence, something which came of itself;--but the
second was _made_, and the kind fairy that stood godmother to its elder
brother had been sent for and accordingly would not come.
In this first number of his new story Mr. Hughes seems to have found his
good genius again, or his good genius to have found him. We meet our old
friend Tom Brown once more, and commit ourselves trustingly to the same
easy current of narrative and incident which was so delightful in
the story of his Rugby adventures. We have no doubt the book will be
instructive as well as entertaining; for we believe the author has had
some practical experience as teacher in "The Working-Men's College,"--an
excellent institution, in which instruction is given to the poor after
work-hours, and which, beside Mr. Hughes, has had another man of genius,
Mr. Ruskin, among its unpaid professors. The work is to be published
simultaneously in this country and in England.
_Avolio; a Legend of the Inland of Cos, with other Poems, Lyrical,
Miscellaneous, and Dramatic._ By PAUL H. HAYNE. Boston: Ticknor &
Fields. 1859. pp. 244.
There is a great deal of real poetic feeling and expression in this
volume, and, we think, the hope of better things to come. The author has
not yet learned, and we could not expect it, that writers of verse tell
us all they can think of, and writers of poetry only what they cannot
help telling. The volume would have gained in quality by losing in
quantity, but to give too much is the mistake of all young writers, and
it is, perhaps, only by making it once for themselves that they can
learn to sift. It is so hard at first, when all the sand seems golden!
Of old the Muses were three, each of whom must reject something from the
poem, but when verse-writing became easier and more traditional, their
number was raised to nine, that they might be the harder to please. And
what a difficult jury they are! and how long they stay out over their
verdict!
But, after all, it seems to us that Mr. Hayne has the root of the matter
in him; and we shall look to meet him again, bringing a thinner, yet
a fuller book. The present volume shows thoughtfulness, culture,
sensibility to natural beauty, and great refinement of feeling. We like
the first poem, which is also the longest, best of all. The subject is
an imaginative one,--and the choice of a subject is one great test of
genuine aptitude and ability. In this poem, and in some of the sonnets,
(which are good both in matter and construction,) Mr. Hayne shows a
genuine vigor of expression and maturity of purpose. There is a tone of
sadness in the volume, as if the author were surrounded by an atmosphere
uncongenial to letters. The reader cannot fail to be struck with this,
and also with the oddity of two or three political sonnets, in which Mr.
Hayne calls on his fellow-citizens to rally for the defence of slavery
in the name of freedom. The book is dedicated, in a very graceful
and cordial sonnet, to Mr. E.P. Whipple; and it is seldom that South
Carolina sends so pleasant a message to Massachusetts. Mr. Hayne need
only persevere in self-culture to be able to produce poems that shall
win for him a national reputation.
_Fairy Dreams; or Wanderings in Elfland._ By JANE G. AUSTIN. With
Illustrations by Hammatt Billings. Boston: J.E. Tilton & Co. 1859.
This is a pretty book for children, written with no little feeling and
fancy, and in a graceful style. The chimney-corner has been abolished
by the economical furnace-register, and Santa Claus, if he come at all,
must do it like an imp of the pit. The volumes for children to pore
over, as they bake by the stove, or stew over the black hole in the
floor, have also suffered an economic and practical change. No more
fires, no more pretty fancies, seems to have been the doom. Parents who
think, as we do, that children inhale practicality with our American
atmosphere, and that a little encouragement of the imaginative side of
their nature is not amiss, will be glad to drop Mrs. Austin's book into
the proper stocking. The stories are well told; that, especially, of
the Gray Cat is full of fanciful invention. The book is very prettily
manufactured also, though we think publishers are carrying their
fondness for tinted paper too far. Salmon-color is too much; the deepest
tint allowable is that of cream from a cow that has grazed among
buttercups.
_Twelve Years of a Soldier's Life in India:_ Being Extracts from
the Letters of the late Major W.S.R. HODSON, B.A., Trinity College,
Cambridge; First Bengal European Fusileers, Commandant of Hodson's
Horse. Including a Personal Narrative of the Siege of Delhi and Capture
of the King and Princes. Edited by his Brother, the Rev. GEORGE H.
HODSON, M.A., Senior Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. From the
Third and Enlarged English Edition. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 1860.
16mo. pp. 444.
This book should be widely read; or we might better say, this book _will
be_ widely read,--so widely, indeed, that there is no need for us to
repeat its story here, or to give an abstract of its contents. Hodson
was a man worth knowing, and his letters show him to us as he was.
The special qualities of which Englishmen are proud, as the traits
of national character, belonged in an uncommon degree to him. He was
eminently truthful, staunch, and brave; he had a clear eye, a strong and
ready hand, cool judgment, stern decision, and a tender heart. He might
have borne the old Douglas motto on his shield.
He was trained under as good teachers as a young man ever had. At Rugby,
under Dr. Arnold; then, for a year or two, living among the ennobling
associations of Trinity College; then at Guernsey, as a young soldier,
under Sir William Napier; then in India, with James Thomason,
Lieutenant-Governor of the Northwest Provinces, one of the best rulers
that India ever knew, "_facile princeps_ of the whole Indian service";
and finally passing from him to serve under Sir Henry Lawrence, the
noblest soldier of India, a man for whom common words of praise are
insufficient,--Hodson had an unrivalled set of masters, and his life
proves him to have been worthy of them.
The British rule in India is of such sort as to test the qualities of
its officers to the last point. If they have anything good in them, it
is sure to be brought into full action. Such responsibilities are thrown
on them as at once to stimulate them to exertion of their best powers.
Men who in the ordinary fields of work might remain all their lives mere
commonplace mediocrities, under the discipline of Indian service, find
out and show their real value. The Indian mutiny exhibited how common
the rare qualities of foresight, energy, and enduring courage, and the
still higher qualities of submission, patience, and faith, had become
among those against whom the natives rose like a flood to overwhelm them
in destruction. The little bands of English at Cawnpore, at Lucknow, and
at many a less famous station, stood like rocks against the dashing of
the storm. The qualities that enabled them to win the admiration even
of their enemies, and to call forth the respect and the sorrow of the
world, were the result, not of sudden stress, but of long and habitual
training. The reader of Hodson's memoir will gain a knowledge of the
processes by which such characters are developed.
The letters which make up the larger part of this book are written
with animation and simplicity, and are full of spirited accounts of
adventure, of rough and various service. The narrative which they afford
of the siege of Delhi is of absorbing interest. The picture of the
little army of besiegers, wasted by continual disease and exposure to
the heats of an Indian summer,--worn by the constant sallies and attacks
of a host of enemies trained in arms,--saddened by the receipt of evil
tidings from all quarters,--feeling that upon their final success rested
not only the hope of the continuance of British supremacy in India, but
the very lives of those dear to them,--and, worst of all, compelled
to submit to a succession of incompetent generals, whose timidity and
irresolution baffled the best designs of officers and the dashing
bravery of the troops;--the pictures which Hodson gives of this little
army, of its unflagging spirit and resolution, and its valorous deeds,
are drawn with such truth as to bring the successive scenes vividly
before the imagination. Hodson himself was one of the best and most
useful of a noble corps of officers. His modesty does not hide the
grounds of the enthusiasm which was felt for him by his men,--of the
admiration that he excited among his fellows. The story of the capture
of the King and Princes, after the fall of Delhi, is one of the most
interesting stories of daring ever told. You hold your breath as you
read it. It was a gallant deed, done in the most gallant way.
Altogether, the book is one of thoroughly manly tone and temper,--a book
to make those who read it manlier, to put to shame the cowardice of easy
life, to make men more honest, more enduring, more energetic, by the
example which it sets before them. Hodson's life was short, but its
result will last. There was no sham about it, no meanness,--nothing but
what was large, true, and generous. As one turns the last page, it is
with no regret that such a man should have died in the fight, for he
was a Christian soldier. He was the _preux chevalier_ of our times. The
words in which Sir Ector mourns for his brother, Sir Lancelot, are fit
for his epitaph. "'Ah, Sir Lancelot,' said hee, 'thou were head of
all christen knights! An now I dare say,' said Sir Ector, 'that, Sir
Lancelot, there thou liest, thou were never matched of none earthly
knight's hands; and thou were the curtiest knight that ever bare shield;
and thou were the truest friend to thy lover that ever bestrood horse;
and thou were the truest lover of a sinful man that ever loved woman;
and thou were the kindest man that ever strook with sword; and thou were
the goodliest person that ever came among presse of knights; and thou
were the meekest man and the gentlest that ever eate in hall among
ladies; and thou were the sternest knight to thy mortall foe that ever
put speare in the rest.'"
_Friends in Council_. A Series of Readings and Discourse thereon. A New
Series. 2 vols. Boston: James Munroe & Co. 1860.
The best class of readers in England and America are sure to give a
cordial welcome to a new book by Mr. Helps. Nothing better need be said
of this second series of "Friends in Council" than that it is a worthy
sequel of the first. It is the work of a man of large experience and
wide culture,--of one who is at the same time a student and a man of
the world, versed in history and practically acquainted with affairs.
Refined thoughtfulness and common sense combine to give value to all
that Mr. Helps writes, and he is master of a style at once manly and
elegant, quiet and strong. Two famous lines, which occur in a passage
quoted in these volumes, serve well to characterize their merits:--
"Though deep, yet clear,--though gentle, yet not dull,--
Strong without rage,--without o'erflowing, full."
Such books have a special worth in these days of hasty writing. They
admit one to the companionship of thoughtful, well-mannered gentlemen.
One feels that he has been in good company, after reading them; and,
whatever he may have gained of wisdom from the friends he has met in
council, he is also improved in temper and in manners by their society.
The conversations which form the setting of the essays in these volumes
enable Mr. Helps to present in an easy and effective way various sides
of the important questions that he discusses. Completeness of statement
is rarely to be obtained upon any of the deeper topics of life. If the
golden side be displayed, the silver side is likely to be hidden. The
same man holds various, though not irreconcilable opinions upon the same
subject, according to the different lights in which he views it or the
different phases it presents. The most honest man must sometimes
appear inconsistent for the sake of truth; and the clearer a man's own
convictions, the wider will be his charity for those of others. Mr.
Helps exhibits admirably this natural and necessary diversity of
thought, existing even where there is a coincidence of principle and of
aim.
The essays upon War and Despotism are, perhaps, the ablest in these
volumes, and deserve to be seriously viewed in the light of passing
events. They are distinguished by freedom from exaggeration and by their
moderation of statement. As in so many of the productions of the best
English writers at the present day, something of despondency in regard
to the condition of the world is to be traced in them. And truly, to one
who looks at the state of Europe and of our own country, there is more
need for faith than ground of hope.
But at this Christmas season, this season of peace and good-will, let
all our readers read the essay on Pleasantness. And if they will but
take its teachings to heart, we can wish them, with the certainty of the
fulfilment of our wish, a merry Christmas and a happy New Year.
_The Marvellous Adventures and Rare Conceits of Master Tyll Owlglass._
Newly collected, etc., by KENNETH R.H. MACKENZIE. With Illustrations by
Crowquill. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 1860. pp. xxxix., 255.
This is a very beautiful edition of a very amusing book. The preface and
notes of Mr. Mackenzie will commend it to scholars, while the stories
themselves will divert both young and old. A book of this kind, which
can keep life in itself for more than three hundred years, must have
some real humor and force at bottom. It is as good a specimen of
mediaeval fun as could anywhere be found. With nothing like the satiric
humor of the "Epistolae Obscurorum Virorum," it appeals to a much larger
circle of readers. We are very glad to meet it again in so handsome a
dress, and with such really clever illustrations. It is just the book
for a Christmas gift.
_Reynard the Fox, after the German Version of Goethe._ By THOMAS
JAMES ARNOLD, Esq. With Illustrations from the Designs of Wilhelm von
Kaulbach. New York: D. Appleton & Co., 346 and 348 Broadway. 1860. pp.
226.
It is very well that Mr. Arnold should tell us on the title-page that
his version is _after_ that of Goethe. Nothing could be truer,--and it
is a very long way after, too. By substituting the slow and verbose
pentameter of what is called the classic school of English poetry for
the remarkably forth-right and simple eight-syllabic measure of the
original, the translator has contrived to lose almost wholly that homely
flavor of the old poet, which Goethe carefully preserved. We do not mean
to say that this is altogether a bad version, as such things go; on the
contrary, it has a great deal of spirit, as it could hardly fail to
have, unless it belied its model altogether;--but it is as far as
possible from giving any notion of the characteristic qualities of
"Reinaert de Vos." If Mr. Arnold must change the measure, Chaucer's
"Nonnes Preestes Tale" would have been a safer guide to follow.
The book, in spite of its American title-page, is wholly of English
manufacture. It is a very handsome volume, and Kaulbach's illustrations
are copied with tolerable success, though with inevitable inferiority to
the German originals. Kaulbach is hardly so happy an animal-painter as
Grandville, but he has at least given his subjects in this case a more
human expression than in his monstrous caricatures of Shakspeare.
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