readers does it no more than justice when he declares it to be the work of
a highly gifted mind, containing many beautiful philosophical views of the
relation which woman sustains in society, abounding in the results of
careful observation, and characterized by a pervading religious spirit. It
is adapted to accomplish great good, and its circulation would do much to
aid those who have the care of youthful females, and who desire that they
should fill the place in society for which they were designed. There is no
work in our language which occupies the place that this is intended to
fill; nor which presents so interesting a view of the organization of
society by its great AUTHOR, and of the situation appropriated to _woman_
in that organization. The book has reference more particularly to the
elevated circles of society; to those who have advantages for education;
who have leisure for the cultivation of the intellect and the heart after
the usual course of education is completed, and who have opportunities of
doing good to others. 'It will supply a place which is not filled now, and
would be eminently useful to that increasing number of individuals in our
country. It is much to be regretted that not a few when they leave school
seem to contemplate little farther advancement in the studies in which
they have been engaged. A just view of the place which woman is designed
to occupy in society, as presented in this volume, would do much to
correct this error. We should regard it as an auspicious omen, if this
work should have an extensive circulation in this country, and believe
that wherever it is perused it will contribute to the elevation of the
sex; to promote large views of the benevolence and wisdom of the Creator
in regard to the human family, and to advance the interests of true
religion.'
THE AMERICAN REVIEW, AND METROPOLITAN MAGAZINE. Numbers five and six.
pp. 588. New-York: SAXTON AND MILES, Broadway.
The number of this publication for the December quarter is a very good
one. We were especially interested in the 'Michael Agonistes' of Mr. J. W.
BROWN, which is, in parts, both powerful and harmonious, and in a
dissertation upon 'WEIR'S National Painting.' The writer is of opinion
that our eminent artist has made a sad mistake in the conception of his
striking group, although he awards warm praise to certain portions of the
picture. Still he says: 'It argues slight knowledge of human nature to
suppose that melancholy resignation characterized those who at Delft-Haven
embarked for a land of civil and religious liberty; wild and inhospitable,
to be sure, but still a land of Freedom. There were other thoughts in the
hearts of that noble band than those of sorrow. Even had they been leaving
the country of their birth, they would not have sorrowed; but as it was,
bidding farewell to a land of foreigners, almost as hostile to freedom as
their own, they felt not otherwise than joyful, and their bosoms were full
of thoughtful, reasoning gladness. The parting kiss of that young wife
must have tried, somewhat, the firmness of her husband, yet not enough to
cloud his bright anticipations of the future. A different mood than that
imagined by Mr. WEIR should have pervaded the group, if we are not widely
in error. 'With all its faults,' adds our critic, however, 'The
Embarkation of the Pilgrims,' although not indicative of great genius, yet
regarded as to execution, does honor to Mr. WEIR. We should do injustice
to the central group, did we omit to confess that the devotional grandeur
of the face of the minister, raised to heaven in prayer, struck us with a
feeling of awe, such as we had perhaps never before experienced.' This
especial tribute we have heard paid to this picture by every person whom
we have heard refer to it.
EDITOR'S TABLE.
AMERICAN MANNERS AND AMERICAN LITERATURE.--We ask the attention of every
right-minded American to the following remarks, which we take the liberty
of transcribing from a welcome epistle to the Editor, from one of our most
esteemed and popular contributors. The follies which it exposes and the
evils which it laments have heretofore formed the themes of papers in this
Magazine from the pens of able correspondents, as well as of occasional
comment in our own departments; but we do not remember to have seen the
subject more felicitously handled than by our friend: 'The crying vice of
the nation, and the one which of all others most fastens the charge of
inconsistency on our character and professions, is that apish spirit with
which we admire and copy every thing of European growth. While we exalt
our institutions, character and condition over those of all other nations,
and give ourselves 'a name above every name,' is it not supremely absurd
for city to vie with city and family with family in adopting the latest
fashions in dress and opinions originating in nations which have grown old
in profligacy, and abound in the worthless excrescences of society? We
profess to be perfectly independent of all control in our thoughts and
actions: '_Nullius addicti jurare in verba magistri_.' Yet who more
readily than we shout in chorus to the newest modes of thinking ushered
into ephemeral life by philosophers across the water? Who adopt so early
or carry so far the most outre and preposterous styles of dress invented
in Paris, as our American belles and dandies? The newest cut in garments
which was hatched in Paris beneath the crescent-moon, her waning rays see
carried to its utmost verge in our bustling marts. We follow the
revolutions in the configuration of coats, from square to round, and from
round to angular, with as scrupulous and painful a precision as if our
national honor depended on the issue. Nay, we are usually a little _too_
faithful, and fairly 'out-Herod Herod.' Does the cockney of the 'world's
metropolis' compress his toes in boots tapering at an angle of forty
degrees? The republican fop promenades Broadway with _his_ pedal
extremities squeezed into an angle of thirty; and the corns ensuing he
bears with christian fortitude; for does he not find his 'exceeding great
reward' in being more fashionable than the Londoner himself? Has the fat
of the Siberian bear, or 'thine incomparable oil, Macassar' called forth a
thicket of hair on the cheek of the Frenchman, reaching from the cerebral
pulse to the submaxillary bone? Instantly the pews of our churches, the
boxes of our theatres, and the seats of our legislative halls, are
thronged with whey-faced apes, the moisture of whose brains has exuded in
nourishing a frowning hedge, of which the dark luxuriance encircles the
whole face, resembling the old pictures of the saints wherewith our
childhood was amused, encompassed with a glory! When the whiskered
'petit-mâitres' of Hyde-Park shall begin to transport their adorable
persons to this new world on a summer's trip, they will be astonished not
a little to be stared at on landing through opera-glasses by counterparts
of themselves; exact to the last hair of the moustache. 'Werily,' will be
their ejaculation, 'hit his wery great presumption in these wulgar
democrats to himitate us Henglish in this way-ah!' Every easterly wind
blows in a fleet laden with cargoes of folly, and every outward-bound
vessel bears an order for fresh importations of absurdity, of which
milliners and tailors are the shippers, and flirts and fops the
consignees. So far has this mimicking spirit proceeded, that we regard
neither climate nor season. Were some accident to delay for a few months
our advices from Europe, I question not but our fashionable ladies would
adopt in mid-winter the same form and materials for their dresses which
the Parisian damsels sported on the Boulevards beneath the scorching
dog-star. The changeful and chilly atmosphere of our sea-board differs
widely from the genial airs of 'La belle France,' and to adopt their
fashions in detail is about as wise and tasteful in us as it would be for
the negro panting beneath the line to wrap himself in the furs of Siberia,
and substitute for his refreshing palm-juice the usquebaugh of the
Highlands. Who would not laugh himself into a pleurisy to see the dandies
of Timbuctoo stalking along in solemn gravity beneath their torrid sun,
encumbered with a Russian fur-cloak, or a Lapland 'whip' on a snow-sledge,
driving his canine four-in-hand, with a Turkish turban and Grecian robe
folded carelessly around him? Yet wherein do we greatly differ in _our_
absurdities! Again: we profess to have lopped from our democratic tree the
old-world customs of hereditary title and patrimonial honor. _We_ are no
respecters of persons. _We_ have no reverence for ancestral virtues, and
the lustre that shines only by reflection has no charms for _us_. _We_
respect no grandees but 'nature's noblemen.' _We_ look through the
glittering atmosphere of place, and title, and factitious distinction, at
the man himself. The artificer of his own fortunes we hail as a brother.
He who possesses superior abilities or unblemished integrity, _we_ honor,
though his hands be on the plough; and he who is imbecile or dishonest,
_we_ despise, though his brow be encircled by a coronet. All noble,
consistent, rational, and right. But how is this? 'Lo! a foreigner has
landed on our shores.' Well; what then? We also should be foreigners in
Europe. 'Yes; but he bears the honorable appendage of Lord, or Sir, or De,
or Di, or Von, or Don.' Happy, meanwhile, thrice happy the youth whom his
titleship will allow to treat him; blessed, triumphantly blessed, the Miss
whose charms have warmed into life the cold gaze of my Lord Highbred, or
Monsieur De Nonchalance. And oh! beatified beyond all rapture the doting
mother, who in her ripened and expanded miniature begins to realize her
dreams of 'young romance,' and to hope by connection with a family more
lineally descended from Adam than her own, to obtain a rank
'Whose glory with a lingering trace,
Shines through and deifies her race!'
Truth, every word truth--satire most justly bestowed; and before
relinquishing this general theme, let us ask the reader to admire with us
the cognate remarks of a writer in the last number of the 'North-American
Review' upon the importance of a _Literature_ which shall be distinctive
and national in its character, and not a _rifacamento_ of the varying
literatures of various nations: 'The man whose heart is capable of any
patriotic emotion, who feels his pulse quicken when the idea of his
country is brought home to him, must desire that country to possess a
voice more majestic than the roar of party, and more potent than the whine
of sects; a voice which should breathe energy and awaken hope where-ever
its kindling tones are heard. The life of our native land; the inner
spirit which animates its institutions; the new ideas and principles, of
which it is the representative; these every patriot must wish to behold
reflected from the broad mirror of a comprehensive and soul-animating
literature. The true vitality of a nation is not seen in the triumphs of
its industry, the extent of its conquests, or the reach of its empire; but
in its intellectual dominion. Posterity passes over statistical tables of
trade and population, to search for the records of the mind and heart. It
is of little moment how many millions of men were included at any time
under the name of one people, if they have left no intellectual
testimonials of their mode and manner of existence, no 'foot-prints on the
sands of time.' The heart refuses to glow at the most astounding array of
figures. A nation lives only through its literature, and its mental life
is immortal. And if we have a literature, it should be a _national_
literature; no feeble or sonorous echo of Germany or England, but
essentially American in its tone and object. No matter how meritorious a
composition may be, as long as any foreign nation can say that it has done
the same thing better, so long shall we be spoken of with contempt, or in
a spirit of benevolent patronage. We begin to sicken of the custom, now so
common, of presenting even our best poems to the attention of foreigners,
with a deprecating, apologetic air; as if their acceptance of the
offering, with a few soft and silky compliments, would be an act of
kindness demanding our warmest acknowledgments. If the Quarterly Review or
Blackwood's Magazine speaks well of an American production, we think that
we can praise it ourselves, without incurring the reproach of bad taste.
The folly we yearly practise, of flying into passion with some inferior
English writer, who caricatures our faults, and tells dull jokes about his
tour through the land, has only the effect to exalt an insignificant
scribbler into notoriety, and give a nominal value to his recorded
impertinence. If the mind and heart of the country had its due expression,
if its life had taken form in a literature worthy of itself, we should pay
little regard to the childish tattling of a pert coxcomb who was
discontented with our taverns, or the execrations of some bluff
sea-captain who was shocked with our manners. The uneasy sense we have of
something in our national existence which has not yet been fitly
expressed, gives poignancy to the least ridicule launched at faults and
follies which lie on the superficies of our life. Every person feels, that
a book which condemns the country for its peculiarities of manners and
customs, does not pierce into the heart of the matter, and is essentially
worthless. If Bishop BERKELEY, when he visited MALEBRANCHE, had paid
exclusive attention to the habitation, raiment, and manners of the man,
and neglected the conversation of the metaphysician, and, when he returned
to England, had entertained POPE, SWIFT, GAY, and ARBUTHNOT with satirical
descriptions of the 'compliment extern' of his eccentric host, he would
have acted just as wisely as many an English tourist, with whose malicious
pleasantry on our habits of chewing, spitting, and eating, we are silly
enough to quarrel. To the United States in reference to the pop-gun shots
of foreign tourists, might be addressed the warning which Peter Plymley
thundered against BONAPARTE, in reference to the Anti-Jacobin jests of
CANNING: Tremble, oh! thou land of many spitters and voters, 'for a
_pleasant_ man has come out against thee, and thou shalt be laid low by a
joker of jokes, and he shall talk his pleasant talk to thee, and thou
shalt be no more!' In order that America may take its due rank in the
commonwealth of nations, a literature is needed which shall be the
exponent of its higher life. We live in times of turbulence and change.
There is a general dissatisfaction, manifesting itself often in rude
contests and ruder speech, with the gulf which separates principles from
actions. Men are struggling to realize dim ideals of right and truth, and
each failure adds to the desperate earnestness of their efforts. Beneath
all the shrewdness and selfishness of the American character, there is a
smouldering enthusiasm which flames out at the first touch of fire;
sometimes at the hot and hasty words of party, and sometimes at the
bidding of great thoughts and unselfish principles. The heart of the
nation is easily stirred to its depths; but those who rouse its fiery
impulses into action are often men compounded of ignorance and wickedness,
and wholly unfitted to guide the passions which they are able to excite.
We want a poetry which shall speak in clear, loud tones to the people; a
poetry which shall make us more in love with our native land, by
converting its ennobling scenery into the images of lofty thoughts; which
shall give visible form and life to the abstract ideas of our written
constitutions; which shall confer upon virtue all the strength of
principle and all the energy of passion; which shall disentangle freedom
from cant and senseless hyperbole, and render it a thing of such
loveliness and grandeur as to justify all self-sacrifice; which shall make
us love man by the new consecrations it sheds on his life and destiny;
which shall force through the thin partitions of conventialism and
expediency; vindicate the majesty of reason; give new power to the voice
of conscience, and new vitality to human affection; soften and elevate
passion; guide enthusiasm in a right direction; and speak out in the high
language of men to a nation of men.'
THE NORTH-AMERICAN REVIEW for the January quarter is one of the best
issues of that 'ancient and honorable' Quarterly which we have encountered
for many months. It contains eight extended reviews, five brief 'Critical
Notices,' and the usual quarterly list of new publications. The first
article is upon the '_Poets and Poetry of America_,' a work 'which has
travelled through many States and four editions,' and for the production
of which Mr. GRISWOLD is justly commended. In the progress of this paper,
the writer indulges in a sort of running commentary upon the more
conspicuous poets included in the compiler's collection, as BRYANT,
HALLECK, SPRAGUE, DANA, PERCIVAL, LONGFELLOW, WILLIS GAYLORD CLARK,
HOLMES, WHITTIER, etc., etc. Of BRYANT the reviewer among other things
remarks:
'MR. GRISWOLD says finely of BRYANT, that 'he is the translator of
the silent language of nature to the world.' The serene beauty and
thoughtful tenderness, which characterize his descriptions, or
rather interpretations of outward objects, are paralleled only in
WORDSWORTH. His poems are almost perfect of their kind. The fruits
of meditation, rather than of passion or imagination, and rarely
startling with an unexpected image or sudden outbreak of feeling,
they are admirable specimens of what may be called the philosophy
of the soul. They address the finer instincts of our nature with a
voice so winning and gentle; they search out with such subtle
power all in the heart which is true and good; that their
influence, though quiet, is resistless. They have consecrated to
many minds things which before it was painful to contemplate. Who
can say that his feelings and fears respecting death have not
received an insensible change, since reading the 'Thanatopsis?'
Indeed, we think that BRYANT'S poems are valuable, not only for
their intrinsic excellence, but for the vast influence their wide
circulation is calculated to exercise on national feelings and
manners. It is impossible to read them without being morally
benefitted. They purify as well as please. They develope or
encourage all the elevated and thoughtful tendencies of the mind.'
We are glad to see the reproof which the reviewer bestows upon those
critics of LONGFELLOW'S poetry, who to escape the trouble of analysis,
offer some smooth eulogium upon his 'taste,' or some lip-homage to his
'artistical ability,' instead of noting the tendency of his writings to
touch the heroic strings in our nature, to breathe energy into the heart,
to sustain our lagging purposes, and fix our thoughts on what is stable
and eternal. The following is eminently just:
'The great characteristic of LONGFELLOW, that of addressing the
moral nature through the imagination, of linking moral truth to
intellectual beauty, is a far greater excellence. His artistical
ability is admirable, because it is not seen. It is rather mental
than mechanical. The best artist is he who accommodates his
diction to his subject. In this sense, LONGFELLOW is an artist. By
learning 'to labor and to wait,' by steadily brooding over the
chaos in which thought and emotion first appear to the mind, and
giving shape and life to both, before uttering them in words, he
has obtained a singular mastery over expression. By this we do not
mean that he has a large command of language. No fallacy is
greater than that which confounds fluency with expression.
Washerwomen, and boys at debating clubs, often display more
fluency than WEBSTER; but his words are to theirs, as the roll of
thunder to the patter of rain. Language often receives its
significance and power from the person who uses it. Unless
permeated by the higher faculties of the mind, unless it be not
the clothing, but the 'incarnation of thought,' it is quite an
humble power. There are some writers who repose undoubting
confidence in words. If their minds be filled with the epithets of
poetry, they fondly deem that they have clutched its essence. In a
piece of inferior verse, we often observe a great array of
expressions which have been employed with great effect by genius,
but which seem to burn the fingers and disconcert the equanimity
of the aspiring word-catcher who presses them into his service.
Felicity, not fluency, of language is a merit.'
Exactly; yet these same 'fluent' versifiers are the persons who talk with
elaborate flippancy of the 'simple common-places' of this noble poet! The
reviewer adds: 'LONGFELLOW has a perfect command of that expression which
results from restraining rather than cultivating fluency; and his manner
is adapted to his theme. He rarely, if ever, mistakes 'emotions for
conceptions.' His words are often pictures of his thought. He selects with
great delicacy and precision the exact phrase which best expresses or
suggests his idea. He colors his style with the skill of a painter. The
warm flush and bright tints, as well as the most evanescent hues of
language, he uses with admirable discretion. In that higher department of
his art, that of so combining his words and images that they make music to
the soul as well as to the ear, and convey not only his feelings and
thoughts, but also the very tone and condition of the soul in which they
have being, he likewise excels.' The reviewer illustrates these remarks,
by citing the 'Psalms of Life,' the 'Saga of the Skeleton in Armor,' 'The
Village Blacksmith,' etc., which were written by Mr. LONGFELLOW for the
pages of this Magazine, and adds, that our poet indulges in no 'wild
struggles after an ineffable Something, for which earth can afford but
imperfect symbols. He appears perfectly satisfied with his work. Like his
own 'Village Blacksmith,' he retires every night with the feeling that
something has been attempted, and something _done_.' There is a subtle
analysis of the style of that first of comic poets, HOLMES, for which we
shall endeavor to find space hereafter. Of the writings of the late
lamented WILLIS GAYLORD CLARK, the reviewer remarks, that they 'are all
distinguished for a graceful and elegant diction, thoughts morally and
poetically beautiful, and chaste and appropriate imagery. They exhibit
much purity and strength of feeling, are replete with fancy and sentiment,
and have often a searching pathos and a mournful beauty, which find their
way quietly to the heart.' The poetry of our friend and correspondent
WHITTIER is warmly commended: 'A common thought comes from his pen 'rammed
with life.' He seems in some of his lyrics to pour out his blood with his
lines. There is a rush of passion in his verse, which sweeps every thing
along with it.' The remaining references are to the lady-poets, Mesdames
BROOKS, CHILD, SIGOURNEY, SMITH, WELBY, HALL, ELLET, DINNIE, EMBURY,
HOOPER, the DAVIDSONS, etc. The whole article is well considered; and we
cordially commend it to the attention of our readers. The remaining papers
are upon PALFREY'S admirable 'Lectures on the Evidences of Christianity,'
'Trade with the Hanse-Towns, the German Tariff-League;' 'GERVINUS'S
History of German Poetry;' 'Debts of the States,' an excellent and most
timely article;' 'PRESCOTT'S History of Mexico;' 'SAM SLICK in England;'
and a valuable dissertation on Libraries, based upon the catalogue of the
library of Brown University.