COMMENCEMENT OF THE MOST VALUABLE FRIENDSHIP OF MY LIFE. MY
FATHER'S DEATH. WRITINGS AND OTHER PROCEEDINGS UP TO 1840.
It was the period of my mental progress which I have now reached that I
formed the friendship which has been the honour and chief blessing of my
existence, as well as the source of a great part of all that I have
attempted to do, or hope to effect hereafter, for human improvement. My
first introduction to the lady who, after a friendship of twenty years,
consented to become my wife, was in 1830, when I was in my twenty-fifth
and she in her twenty-third year. With her husband's family it was the
renewal of an old acquaintanceship. His grandfather lived in the next
house to my father's in Newington Green, and I had sometimes when a boy
been invited to play in the old gentleman's garden. He was a fine
specimen of the old Scotch puritan; stern, severe, and powerful, but
very kind to children, on whom such men make a lasting impression.
Although it was years after my introduction to Mrs. Taylor before my
acquaintance with her became at all intimate or confidential, I very
soon felt her to be the most admirable person I had ever known. It is
not to be supposed that she was, or that any one, at the age at which I
first saw her, could be, all that she afterwards became. Least of all
could this be true of her, with whom self-improvement, progress in the
highest and in all senses, was a law of her nature; a necessity equally
from the ardour with which she sought it, and from the spontaneous
tendency of faculties which could not receive an impression or an
experience without making it the source or the occasion of an accession
of wisdom. Up to the time when I first saw her, her rich and powerful
nature had chiefly unfolded itself according to the received type of
feminine genius. To her outer circle she was a beauty and a wit, with an
air of natural distinction, felt by all who approached her: to the
inner, a woman of deep and strong feeling, of penetrating and intuitive
intelligence, and of an eminently meditative and poetic nature. Married
at an early age to a most upright, brave, and honourable man, of liberal
opinions and good education, but without the intellectual or artistic
tastes which would have made him a companion for her, though a steady
and affectionate friend, for whom she had true esteem and the strongest
affection through life, and whom she most deeply lamented when dead;
shut out by the social disabilities of women from any adequate exercise
of her highest faculties in action on the world without; her life was
one of inward meditation, varied by familiar intercourse with a small
circle of friends, of whom one only (long since deceased) was a person
of genius, or of capacities of feeling or intellect kindred with her
own, but all had more or less of alliance with her in sentiments and
opinions. Into this circle I had the good fortune to be admitted, and I
soon perceived that she possessed in combination, the qualities which in
all other persons whom I had known I had been only too happy to find
singly. In her, complete emancipation from every kind of superstition
(including that which attributes a pretended perfection to the order of
nature and the universe), and an earnest protest against many things
which are still part of the established constitution of society,
resulted not from the hard intellect, but from strength of noble and
elevated feeling, and co-existed with a highly reverential nature. In
general spiritual characteristics, as well as in temperament and
organisation, I have often compared her, as she was at this time, to
Shelley: but in thought and intellect, Shelley, so far as his powers
were developed in his short life, was but a child compared with what she
ultimately became. Alike in the highest regions of speculation and in
the smaller practical concerns of daily life, her mind was the same
perfect instrument, piercing to the very heart and marrow of the matter;
always seizing the essential idea or principle. The same exactness and
rapidity of operation, pervading as it did her sensitive as well as her
mental faculties, would, with her gifts of feeling and imagination, have
fitted her to be a consummate artist, as her fiery and tender soul and
her vigorous eloquence would certainly have made her a great orator, and
her profound knowledge of human nature and discernment and sagacity in
practical life, would, in the times when such a _carrière_ was open to
women, have made her eminent among the rulers of mankind. Her
intellectual gifts did but minister to a moral character at once the
noblest and the best balanced which I have ever met with in life. Her
unselfishness was not that of a taught system of duties, but of a heart
which thoroughly identified itself with the feelings of others, and
often went to excess in consideration for them by imaginatively
investing their feelings with the intensity of its own. The passion of
justice might have been thought to be her strongest feeling, but for her
boundless generosity, and a lovingness ever ready to pour itself forth
upon any or all human beings who were capable of giving the smallest
feeling in return. The rest of her moral characteristics were such as
naturally accompany these qualities of mind and heart: the most genuine
modesty combined with the loftiest pride; a simplicity and sincerity
which were absolute, towards all who were fit to receive them; the
utmost scorn of whatever was mean and cowardly, and a burning
indignation at everything brutal or tyrannical, faithless or
dishonourable in conduct and character, while making the broadest
distinction between _mala in se_ and mere _mala prohibita_--between acts
giving evidence of intrinsic badness in feeling and character, and those
which are only violations of conventions either good or bad, violations
which, whether in themselves right or wrong, are capable of being
committed by persons in every other respect lovable or admirable.
To be admitted into any degree of mental intercourse with a being of
these qualities, could not but have a most beneficial influence on my
development; though the effect was only gradual, and many years elapsed
before her mental progress and mine went forward in the complete
companionship they at last attained. The benefit I received was far
greater than any which I could hope to give; though to her, who had at
first reached her opinions by the moral intuition of a character of
strong feeling, there was doubtless help as well as encouragement to be
derived from one who had arrived at many of the same results by study
and reasoning: and in the rapidity of her intellectual growth, her
mental activity, which converted everything into knowledge, doubtless
drew from me, as it did from other sources, many of its materials. What
I owe, even intellectually, to her, is in its detail, almost infinite;
of its general character a few words will give some, though a very
imperfect, idea.
With those who, like all the best and wisest of mankind, are
dissatisfied with human life as it is, and whose feelings are wholly
identified with its radical amendment, there are two main regions of
thought. One is the region of ultimate aims; the constituent elements of
the highest realizable ideal of human life. The other is that of the
immediately useful and practically attainable. In both these departments,
I have acquired more from her teaching, than from all other sources
taken together. And, to say truth, it is in these two extremes
principally, that real certainty lies. My own strength lay wholly in the
uncertain and slippery intermediate region, that of theory, or moral and
political science: respecting the conclusions of which, in any of the
forms in which I have received or originated them, whether as political
economy, analytic psychology, logic, philosophy of history, or anything
else, it is not the least of my intellectual obligations to her that I
have derived from her a wise scepticism, which, while it has not
hindered me from following out the honest exercise of my thinking
faculties to whatever conclusions might result from it, has put me on my
guard against holding or announcing these conclusions with a degree of
confidence which the nature of such speculations does not warrant, and
has kept my mind not only open to admit, but prompt to welcome and eager
to seek, even on the questions on which I have most meditated, any
prospect of clearer perceptions and better evidence. I have often
received praise, which in my own right I only partially deserve, for the
greater practicality which is supposed to be found in my writings,
compared with those of most thinkers who have been equally addicted to
large generalizations. The writings in which this quality has been
observed, were not the work of one mind, but of the fusion of two, one
of them as pre-eminently practical in its judgments and perceptions of
things present, as it was high and bold in its anticipations for a
remote futurity. At the present period, however, this influence was only
one among many which were helping to shape the character of my future
development: and even after it became, I may truly say, the presiding
principle of my mental progress, it did not alter the path, but only
made me move forward more boldly, and, at the same time, more
cautiously, in the same course. The only actual revolution which has
ever taken place in my modes of thinking, was already complete. My new
tendencies had to be confirmed in some respects, moderated in others:
but the only substantial changes of opinion that were yet to come,
related to politics, and consisted, on one hand, in a greater
approximation, so far as regards the ultimate prospects of humanity, to
a qualified Socialism, and on the other, a shifting of my political
ideal from pure democracy, as commonly understood by its partisans, to
the modified form of it, which is set forth in my _Considerations on
Representative Government_.
This last change, which took place very gradually, dates its
commencement from my reading, or rather study, of M. de Tocqueville's
_Democracy in America_, which fell into my hands immediately after its
first appearance. In that remarkable work, the excellences of democracy
were pointed out in a more conclusive, because a more specific manner
than I had ever known them to be, even by the most enthusiastic
democrats; while the specific dangers which beset democracy, considered
as the government of the numerical majority, were brought into equally
strong light, and subjected to a masterly analysis, not as reasons for
resisting what the author considered as an inevitable result of human
progress, but as indications of the weak points of popular government,
the defences by which it needs to be guarded, and the correctives which
must be added to it in order that while full play is given to its
beneficial tendencies, those which are of a different nature may be
neutralized or mitigated. I was now well prepared for speculations of
this character, and from this time onward my own thoughts moved more and
more in the same channel, though the consequent modifications in my
practical political creed were spread over many years, as would be shown
by comparing my first review of _Democracy in America_, written and
published in 1835, with the one in 1840 (reprinted in the _Dissertations_),
and this last, with the _Considerations on Representative Government_.
A collateral subject on which also I derived great benefit from the
study of Tocqueville, was the fundamental question of centralization.
The powerful philosophic analysis which he applied to American and to
French experience, led him to attach the utmost importance to the
performance of as much of the collective business of society, as can
safely be so performed, by the people themselves, without any
intervention of the executive government, either to supersede their
agency, or to dictate the manner of its exercise. He viewed this
practical political activity of the individual citizen, not only as one
of the most effectual means of training the social feelings and
practical intelligence of the people, so important in themselves and so
indispensable to good government, but also as the specific counteractive
to some of the characteristic infirmities of democracy, and a necessary
protection against its degenerating into the only despotism of which, in
the modern world, there is real danger--the absolute rule of the head
of the executive over a congregation of isolated individuals, all equals
but all slaves. There was, indeed, no immediate peril from this source
on the British side of the channel, where nine-tenths of the internal
business which elsewhere devolves on the government, was transacted by
agencies independent of it; where centralization was, and is, the
subject not only of rational disapprobation, but of unreasoning
prejudice; where jealousy of Government interference was a blind feeling
preventing or resisting even the most beneficial exertion of legislative
authority to correct the abuses of what pretends to be local
self-government, but is, too often, selfish mismanagement of local
interests, by a jobbing and _borné_ local oligarchy. But the more
certain the public were to go wrong on the side opposed to
centralization, the greater danger was there lest philosophic reformers
should fall into the contrary error, and overlook the mischiefs of which
they had been spared the painful experience. I was myself, at this very
time, actively engaged in defending important measures, such as the
great Poor Law Reform of 1834, against an irrational clamour grounded on
the anti-centralization prejudice: and had it not been for the lessons
of Tocqueville, I do not know that I might not, like many reformers
before me, have been hurried into the excess opposite to that, which,
being the one prevalent in my own country, it was generally my business
to combat. As it is, I have steered carefully between the two errors,
and whether I have or have not drawn the line between them exactly in
the right place, I have at least insisted with equal emphasis upon the
evils on both sides, and have made the means of reconciling the
advantages of both, a subject of serious study.
In the meanwhile had taken place the election of the first Reformed
Parliament, which included several of the most notable of my Radical
friends and acquaintances--Grote, Roebuck, Buller, Sir William
Molesworth, John and Edward Romilly, and several more; besides
Warburton, Strutt, and others, who were in parliament already. Those who
thought themselves, and were called by their friends, the philosophic
Radicals, had now, it seemed, a fair opportunity, in a more advantageous
position than they had ever before occupied, for showing what was in
them; and I, as well as my father, founded great hopes on them. These
hopes were destined to be disappointed. The men were honest, and
faithful to their opinions, as far as votes were concerned; often in
spite of much discouragement. When measures were proposed, flagrantly at
variance with their principles, such as the Irish Coercion Bill, or the
Canada Coercion in 1837, they came forward manfully, and braved any
amount of hostility and prejudice rather than desert the right. But on
the whole they did very little to promote any opinions; they had little
enterprise, little activity: they left the lead of the Radical portion
of the House to the old hands, to Hume and O'Connell. A partial
exception must be made in favour of one or two of the younger men; and
in the case of Roebuck, it is his title to permanent remembrance, that
in the very first year during which he sat in Parliament, he originated
(or re-originated after the unsuccessful attempt of Mr. Brougham) the
parliamentary movement for National Education; and that he was the first
to commence, and for years carried on almost alone, the contest for the
self-government of the Colonies. Nothing, on the whole equal to these
two things, was done by any other individual, even of those from whom
most was expected. And now, on a calm retrospect, I can perceive that
the men were less in fault than we supposed, and that we had expected
too much from them. They were in unfavourable circumstances. Their lot
was cast in the ten years of inevitable reaction, when, the Reform
excitement being over, and the few legislative improvements which the
public really called for having been rapidly effected, power gravitated
back in its natural direction, to those who were for keeping things as
they were; when the public mind desired rest, and was less disposed than
at any other period since the Peace, to let itself be moved by attempts
to work up the Reform feeling into fresh activity in favour of new
things. It would have required a great political leader, which no one is
to be blamed for not being, to have effected really great things by
parliamentary discussion when the nation was in this mood. My father and
I had hoped that some competent leader might arise; some man of
philosophic attainments and popular talents, who could have put heart
into the many younger or less distinguished men that would have been
ready to join him--could have made them available, to the extent of
their talents, in bringing advanced ideas before the public--could
have used the House of Commons as a rostra or a teacher's chair for
instructing and impelling the public mind; and would either have forced
the Whigs to receive their measures from him, or have taken the lead of
the Reform party out of their hands. Such a leader there would have
been, if my father had been in Parliament. For want of such a man, the
instructed Radicals sank into a mere _Côté Gauche_ of the Whig party.
With a keen, and as I now think, an exaggerated sense of the
possibilities which were open to the Radicals if they made even ordinary
exertion for their opinions, I laboured from this time till 1839, both
by personal influence with some of them, and by writings, to put ideas
into their heads, and purpose into their hearts. I did some good with
Charles Buller, and some with Sir William Molesworth; both of whom did
valuable service, but were unhappily cut off almost in the beginning of
their usefulness. On the whole, however, my attempt was vain. To have
had a chance of succeeding in it, required a different position from
mine. It was a task only for one who, being himself in Parliament, could
have mixed with the Radical members in daily consultation, could himself
have taken the initiative, and instead of urging others to lead, could
have summoned them to follow.
What I could do by writing, I did. During the year 1833 I continued
working in the _Examiner_ with Fonblanque who at that time was zealous
in keeping up the fight for Radicalism against the Whig ministry. During
the session of 1834 I wrote comments on passing events, of the nature of
newspaper articles (under the title "Notes on the Newspapers"), in the
_Monthly Repository_, a magazine conducted by Mr. Fox, well known as a
preacher and political orator, and subsequently as member of parliament
for Oldham; with whom I had lately become acquainted, and for whose sake
chiefly I wrote in his magazine. I contributed several other articles
to this periodical, the most considerable of which (on the theory of
Poetry), is reprinted in the "Dissertations." Altogether, the writings
(independently of those in newspapers) which I published from 1832 to
1834, amount to a large volume. This, however, includes abstracts of
several of Plato's Dialogues, with introductory remarks, which, though
not published until 1834, had been written several years earlier; and
which I afterwards, on various occasions, found to have been read, and
their authorship known, by more people than were aware of anything else
which I had written, up to that time. To complete the tale of my
writings at this period, I may add that in 1833, at the request of
Bulwer, who was just then completing his _England and the English_ (a
work, at that time, greatly in advance of the public mind), I wrote for
him a critical account of Bentham's philosophy, a small part of which
he incorporated in his text, and printed the rest (with an honourable
acknowledgment), as an appendix. In this, along with the favourable,
a part also of the unfavourable side of my estimation of Bentham's
doctrines, considered as a complete philosophy, was for the first time
put into print.
But an opportunity soon offered, by which, as it seemed, I might have it
in my power to give more effectual aid, and at the same time, stimulus,
to the "philosophic Radical" party, than I had done hitherto. One of the
projects occasionally talked of between my father and me, and some of
the parliamentary and other Radicals who frequented his house, was the
foundation of a periodical organ of philosophic radicalism, to take the
place which the _Westminster Review_ had been intended to fill: and the
scheme had gone so far as to bring under discussion the pecuniary
contributions which could be looked for, and the choice of an editor.
Nothing, however, came of it for some time: but in the summer of 1834
Sir William Molesworth, himself a laborious student, and a precise and
metaphysical thinker, capable of aiding the cause by his pen as well as
by his purse, spontaneously proposed to establish a Review, provided I
would consent to be the real, if I could not be the ostensible, editor.
Such a proposal was not to be refused; and the Review was founded, at
first under the title of the _London Review_, and afterwards under that
of the _London and Westminster_, Molesworth having bought the
_Westminster_ from its proprietor, General Thompson, and merged the two
into one. In the years between 1834 and 1840 the conduct of this Review
occupied the greater part of my spare time. In the beginning, it did
not, as a whole, by any means represent my opinions. I was under the
necessity of conceding much to my inevitable associates. The _Review_
was established to be the representative of the "philosophic Radicals,"
with most of whom I was now at issue on many essential points, and among
whom I could not even claim to be the most important individual. My
father's co-operation as a writer we all deemed indispensable, and he
wrote largely in it until prevented by his last illness. The subjects of
his articles, and the strength and decision with which his opinions were
expressed in them, made the _Review_ at first derive its tone and
colouring from him much more than from any of the other writers. I could
not exercise editorial control over his articles, and I was sometimes
obliged to sacrifice to him portions of my own. The old _Westminster
Review_ doctrines, but little modified, thus formed the staple of the
_Review_; but I hoped by the side of these, to introduce other ideas and
another tone, and to obtain for my own shade of opinion a fair
representation, along with those of other members of the party. With
this end chiefly in view, I made it one of the peculiarities of the work
that every article should bear an initial, or some other signature, and
be held to express the opinions solely of the individual writer; the
editor being only responsible for its being worth publishing and not in
conflict with the objects for which the _Review_ was set on foot. I had
an opportunity of putting in practice my scheme of conciliation between
the old and the new "philosophic radicalism," by the choice of a subject
for my own first contribution. Professor Sedgwick, a man of eminence in
a particular walk of natural science, but who should not have trespassed
into philosophy, had lately published his _Discourse on the Studies of
Cambridge_, which had as its most prominent feature an intemperate
assault on analytic psychology and utilitarian ethics, in the form of an
attack on Locke and Paley. This had excited great indignation in my
father and others, which I thought it fully deserved. And here, I
imagined, was an opportunity of at the same time repelling an unjust
attack, and inserting into my defence of Hartleianism and Utilitarianism
a number of the opinions which constituted my view of those subjects, as
distinguished from that of my old associates. In this I partially
succeeded, though my relation to my father would have made it painful to
me in any case, and impossible in a Review for which he wrote, to speak
out my whole mind on the subject at this time.
I am, however, inclined to think that my father was not so much opposed
as he seemed, to the modes of thought in which I believed myself to
differ from him; that he did injustice to his own opinions by the
unconscious exaggerations of an intellect emphatically polemical; and
that when thinking without an adversary in view, he was willing to make
room for a great portion of the truths he seemed to deny. I have
frequently observed that he made large allowance in practice for
considerations which seemed to have no place in his theory. His
_Fragment on Mackintosh_, which he wrote and published about this time,
although I greatly admired some parts of it, I read as a whole with more
pain than pleasure; yet on reading it again, long after, I found little
in the opinions it contains, but what I think in the main just; and I
can even sympathize in his disgust at the _verbiage_ of Mackintosh,
though his asperity towards it went not only beyond what was judicious,
but beyond what was even fair. One thing, which I thought, at the time,
of good augury, was the very favourable reception he gave to
Tocqueville's _Democracy in America_. It is true, he said and thought
much more about what Tocqueville said in favour of democracy, than about
what he said of its disadvantages. Still, his high appreciation of a
book which was at any rate an example of a mode of treating the question
of government almost the reverse of his--wholly inductive and analytical,
instead of purely ratiocinative--gave me great encouragement. He also
approved of an article which I published in the first number following
the junction of the two reviews, the essay reprinted in the _Dissertations_,
under the title "Civilization"; into which I threw many of my new opinions,
and criticised rather emphatically the mental and moral tendencies of the
time, on grounds and in a manner which I certainly had not learnt from him.
All speculation, however, on the possible future developments of my
father's opinions, and on the probabilities of permanent co-operation
between him and me in the promulgation of our thoughts, was doomed to be
cut short. During the whole of 1835 his health had been declining: his
symptoms became unequivocally those of pulmonary consumption, and after
lingering to the last stage of debility, he died on the 23rd of June,
1836. Until the last few days of his life there was no apparent
abatement of intellectual vigour; his interest in all things and persons
that had interested him through life was undiminished, nor did the
approach of death cause the smallest wavering (as in so strong and firm
a mind it was impossible that it should) in his convictions on the
subject of religion. His principal satisfaction, after he knew that his
end was near, seemed to be the thought of what he had done to make the
world better than he found it; and his chief regret in not living
longer, that he had not had time to do more.
His place is an eminent one in the literary, and even in the political
history of his country; and it is far from honourable to the generation
which has benefited by his worth, that he is so seldom mentioned, and,
compared with men far his inferiors, so little remembered. This is
probably to be ascribed mainly to two causes. In the first place, the
thought of him merges too much in the deservedly superior fame of
Bentham. Yet he was anything but Bentham's mere follower or disciple.
Precisely because he was himself one of the most original thinkers of
his time, he was one of the earliest to appreciate and adopt the most
important mass of original thought which had been produced by the
generation preceding him. His mind and Bentham's were essentially of
different construction. He had not all Bentham's high qualities, but
neither had Bentham all his. It would, indeed, be ridiculous to claim
for him the praise of having accomplished for mankind such splendid
services as Bentham's. He did not revolutionize, or rather create, one
of the great departments of human thought. But, leaving out of the
reckoning all that portion of his labours in which he benefited by what
Bentham had done, and counting only what he achieved in a province in
which Bentham had done nothing, that of analytic psychology, he will be
known to posterity as one of the greatest names in that most important
branch of speculation, on which all the moral and political sciences
ultimately rest, and will mark one of the essential stages in its
progress. The other reason which has made his fame less than he
deserved, is that notwithstanding the great number of his opinions
which, partly through his own efforts, have now been generally adopted,
there was, on the whole, a marked opposition between his spirit and that
of the present time. As Brutus was called the last of the Romans, so was
he the last of the eighteenth century: he continued its tone of thought
and sentiment into the nineteenth (though not unmodified nor
unimproved), partaking neither in the good nor in the bad influences of
the reaction against the eighteenth century, which was the great
characteristic of the first half of the nineteenth. The eighteenth
century was a great age, an age of strong and brave men, and he was a
fit companion for its strongest and bravest. By his writings and his
personal influence he was a great centre of light to his generation.
During his later years he was quite as much the head and leader of the
intellectual radicals in England, as Voltaire was of the _philosophes_
of France. It is only one of his minor merits, that he was the
originator of all sound statesmanship in regard to the subject of his
largest work, India. He wrote on no subject which he did not enrich with
valuable thought, and excepting the _Elements of Political Economy_, a
very useful book when first written, but which has now for some time
finished its work, it will be long before any of his books will be
wholly superseded, or will cease to be instructive reading to students
of their subjects. In the power of influencing by mere force of mind and
character, the convictions and purposes of others, and in the strenuous
exertion of that power to promote freedom and progress, he left, as far
as my knowledge extends, no equal among men and but one among women.
Though acutely sensible of my own inferiority in the qualities by which
he acquired his personal ascendancy, I had now to try what it might be
possible for me to accomplish without him: and the _Review_ was the
instrument on which I built my chief hopes of establishing a useful
influence over the liberal and democratic section of the public mind.
Deprived of my father's aid, I was also exempted from the restraints and
reticences by which that aid had been purchased. I did not feel that
there was any other radical writer or politician to whom I was bound to
defer, further than consisted with my own opinions: and having the
complete confidence of Molesworth, I resolved henceforth to give full
scope to my own opinions and modes of thought, and to open the _Review_
widely to all writers who were in sympathy with Progress as I understood
it, even though I should lose by it the support of my former associates.
Carlyle, consequently became from this time a frequent writer in the
_Review_; Sterling, soon after, an occasional one; and though each
individual article continued to be the expression of the private
sentiments of its writer, the general tone conformed in some tolerable
degree to my opinions. For the conduct of the _Review_, under, and in
conjunction with me, I associated with myself a young Scotchman of the
name of Robertson, who had some ability and information, much industry,
and an active scheming head, full of devices for making the _Review_
more saleable, and on whose capacities in that direction I founded a
good deal of hope: insomuch, that when Molesworth, in the beginning of
1837, became tired of carrying on the _Review_ at a loss, and desirous
of getting rid of it (he had done his part honourably, and at no small
pecuniary cost,) I, very imprudently for my own pecuniary interest, and
very much from reliance on Robertson's devices, determined to continue
it at my own risk, until his plans should have had a fair trial. The
devices were good, and I never had any reason to change my opinion of
them. But I do not believe that any devices would have made a radical
and democratic review defray its expenses, including a paid editor or
sub-editor, and a liberal payment to writers. I myself and several
frequent contributors gave our labour gratuitously, as we had done for
Molesworth; but the paid contributors continued to be remunerated on the
usual scale of the _Edinburgh_ and _Quarterly Reviews_; and this could
not be done from the proceeds of the sale.
In the same year, 1837, and in the midst of these occupations, I resumed
the _Logic_. I had not touched my pen on the subject for five years,
having been stopped and brought to a halt on the threshold of Induction.
I had gradually discovered that what was mainly wanting, to overcome the
difficulties of that branch of the subject, was a comprehensive, and, at
the same time, accurate view of the whole circle of physical science,
which I feared it would take me a long course of study to acquire; since
I knew not of any book, or other guide, that would spread out before me
the generalities and processes of the sciences, and I apprehended that I
should have no choice but to extract them for myself, as I best could,
from the details. Happily for me, Dr. Whewell, early in this year,
published his _History of the Inductive Sciences_. I read it with
eagerness, and found in it a considerable approximation to what I
wanted. Much, if not most, of the philosophy of the work appeared open
to objection; but the materials were there, for my own thoughts to work
upon: and the author had given to those materials that first degree of
elaboration, which so greatly facilitates and abridges the subsequent
labour. I had now obtained what I had been waiting for. Under the
impulse given me by the thoughts excited by Dr. Whewell, I read again
Sir J. Herschel's _Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy_: and I
was able to measure the progress my mind had made, by the great help I
now found in this work--though I had read and even reviewed it several
years before with little profit. I now set myself vigorously to work out
the subject in thought and in writing. The time I bestowed on this had
to be stolen from occupations more urgent. I had just two months to
spare, at this period, in the intervals of writing for the _Review_. In
these two months I completed the first draft of about a third, the most
difficult third, of the book. What I had before written, I estimate at
another third, so that one-third remained. What I wrote at this time
consisted of the remainder of the doctrine of Reasoning (the theory of
Trains of Reasoning, and Demonstrative Science), and the greater part of
the Book on Induction. When this was done, I had, as it seemed to me,
untied all the really hard knots, and the completion of the book had
become only a question of time. Having got thus far, I had to leave off
in order to write two articles for the next number of the _Review_. When
these were written, I returned to the subject, and now for the first
time fell in with Comte's _Cours de Philosophie Positive_, or rather
with the two volumes of it which were all that had at that time been
published. My theory of Induction was substantially completed before I
knew of Comte's book; and it is perhaps well that I came to it by a
different road from his, since the consequence has been that my treatise
contains, what his certainly does not, a reduction of the inductive
process to strict rules and to a scientific test, such as the syllogism
is for ratiocination. Comte is always precise and profound on the method
of investigation, but he does not even attempt any exact definition of
the conditions of proof: and his writings show that he never attained a
just conception of them. This, however, was specifically the problem,
which, in treating of Induction, I had proposed to myself. Nevertheless,
I gained much from Comte, with which to enrich my chapters in the
subsequent rewriting: and his book was of essential service to me in
some of the parts which still remained to be thought out. As his
subsequent volumes successively made their appearance, I read them with
avidity, but, when he reached the subject of Social Science, with
varying feelings. The fourth volume disappointed me: it contained those
of his opinions on social subjects with which I most disagree. But the
fifth, containing the connected view of history, rekindled all my
enthusiasm; which the sixth (or concluding) volume did not materially
abate. In a merely logical point of view, the only leading conception
for which I am indebted to him is that of the Inverse Deductive Method,
as the one chiefly applicable to the complicated subjects of History and
Statistics: a process differing from the more common form of the
deductive method in this--that instead of arriving at its conclusions
by general reasoning, and verifying them by specific experience (as is
the natural order in the deductive branches of physical science), it
obtains its generalizations by a collation of specific experience, and
verifies them by ascertaining whether they are such as would follow from
known general principles. This was an idea entirely new to me when I
found it in Comte: and but for him I might not soon (if ever) have
arrived at it.
I had been long an ardent admirer of Comte's writings before I had any
communication with himself; nor did I ever, to the last, see him in the
body. But for some years we were frequent correspondents, until our
correspondence became controversial, and our zeal cooled. I was the
first to slacken correspondence; he was the first to drop it. I found,
and he probably found likewise, that I could do no good to his mind, and
that all the good he could do to mine, he did by his books. This would
never have led to discontinuance of intercourse, if the differences
between us had been on matters of simple doctrine. But they were chiefly
on those points of opinion which blended in both of us with our
strongest feelings, and determined the entire direction of our
aspirations. I had fully agreed with him when he maintained that the
mass of mankind, including even their rulers in all the practical
departments of life, must, from the necessity of the case, accept most
of their opinions on political and social matters, as they do on
physical, from the authority of those who have bestowed more study on
those subjects than they generally have it in their power to do. This
lesson had been strongly impressed on me by the early work of Comte, to
which I have adverted. And there was nothing in his great Treatise which
I admired more than his remarkable exposition of the benefits which the
nations of modern Europe have historically derived from the separation,
during the Middle Ages, of temporal and spiritual power, and the
distinct organization of the latter. I agreed with him that the moral
and intellectual ascendancy, once exercised by priests, must in time
pass into the hands of philosophers, and will naturally do so when they
become sufficiently unanimous, and in other respects worthy to possess
it. But when he exaggerated this line of thought into a practical
system, in which philosophers were to be organized into a kind of
corporate hierarchy, invested with almost the same spiritual supremacy
(though without any secular power) once possessed by the Catholic
Church; when I found him relying on this spiritual authority as the only
security for good government, the sole bulwark against practical
oppression, and expecting that by it a system of despotism in the state
and despotism in the family would be rendered innocuous and beneficial;
it is not surprising, that while as logicians we were nearly at one, as
sociologists we could travel together no further. M. Comte lived to
carry out these doctrines to their extremest consequences, by planning,
in his last work, the _Système de Politique Positive_, the completest
system of spiritual and temporal despotism which ever yet emanated from
a human brain, unless possibly that of Ignatius Loyola: a system by
which the yoke of general opinion, wielded by an organized body of
spiritual teachers and rulers, would be made supreme over every action,
and as far as is in human possibility, every thought, of every member of
the community, as well in the things which regard only himself, as in
those which concern the interests of others. It is but just to say that
this work is a considerable improvement, in many points of feeling, over
Comte's previous writings on the same subjects: but as an accession to
social philosophy, the only value it seems to me to possess, consists in
putting an end to the notion that no effectual moral authority can be
maintained over society without the aid of religious belief; for Comte's
work recognises no religion except that of Humanity, yet it leaves an
irresistible conviction that any moral beliefs concurred in by the
community generally may be brought to bear upon the whole conduct and
lives of its individual members, with an energy and potency truly
alarming to think of. The book stands a monumental warning to thinkers
on society and politics, of what happens when once men lose sight, in
their speculations, of the value of Liberty and of Individuality.
To return to myself. The _Review_ engrossed, for some time longer,
nearly all the time I could devote to authorship, or to thinking with
authorship in view. The articles from the _London and Westminster
Review_ which are reprinted in the _Dissertations_, are scarcely a
fourth part of those I wrote. In the conduct of the _Review_ I had two
principal objects. One was to free philosophic radicalism from the
reproach of sectarian Benthamism. I desired, while retaining the
precision of expression, the definiteness of meaning, the contempt of
declamatory phrases and vague generalities, which were so honourably
characteristic both of Bentham and of my father, to give a wider basis
and a more free and genial character to Radical speculations; to show
that there was a Radical philosophy, better and more complete than
Bentham's, while recognizing and incorporating all of Bentham's which is
permanently valuable. In this first object I, to a certain extent,
succeeded. The other thing I attempted, was to stir up the educated
Radicals, in and out of Parliament, to exertion, and induce them to make
themselves, what I thought by using the proper means they might become
--a powerful party capable of taking the government of the country, or
at least of dictating the terms on which they should share it with the
Whigs. This attempt was from the first chimerical: partly because the
time was unpropitious, the Reform fervour being in its period of ebb,
and the Tory influences powerfully rallying; but still more, because, as
Austin so truly said, "the country did not contain the men." Among the
Radicals in Parliament there were several qualified to be useful members
of an enlightened Radical party, but none capable of forming and leading
such a party. The exhortations I addressed to them found no response.
One occasion did present itself when there seemed to be room for a bold
and successful stroke for Radicalism. Lord Durham had left the ministry,
by reason, as was thought, of their not being sufficiently Liberal; he
afterwards accepted from them the task of ascertaining and removing the
causes of the Canadian rebellion; he had shown a disposition to surround
himself at the outset with Radical advisers; one of his earliest
measures, a good measure both in intention and in effect, having been
disapproved and reversed by the Government at home, he had resigned his
post, and placed himself openly in a position of quarrel with the
Ministers. Here was a possible chief for a Radical party in the person
of a man of importance, who was hated by the Tories and had just been
injured by the Whigs. Any one who had the most elementary notions of
party tactics, must have attempted to make something of such an
opportunity. Lord Durham was bitterly attacked from all sides, inveighed
against by enemies, given up by timid friends; while those who would
willingly have defended him did not know what to say. He appeared to be
returning a defeated and discredited man. I had followed the Canadian
events from the beginning; I had been one of the prompters of his
prompters; his policy was almost exactly what mine would have been, and
I was in a position to defend it. I wrote and published a manifesto in
the _Review_, in which I took the very highest ground in his behalf,
claiming for him not mere acquittal, but praise and honour. Instantly a
number of other writers took up the tone: I believe there was a portion
of truth in what Lord Durham, soon after, with polite exaggeration, said
to me--that to this article might be ascribed the almost triumphal
reception which he met with on his arrival in England. I believe it to
have been the word in season, which, at a critical moment, does much to
decide the result; the touch which determines whether a stone, set in
motion at the top of an eminence, shall roll down on one side or on the
other. All hopes connected with Lord Durham as a politician soon
vanished; but with regard to Canadian, and generally to colonial policy,
the cause was gained: Lord Durham's report, written by Charles Buller,
partly under the inspiration of Wakefield, began a new era; its
recommendations, extending to complete internal self-government, were in
full operation in Canada within two or three years, and have been since
extended to nearly all the other colonies, of European race, which have
any claim to the character of important communities. And I may say that
in successfully upholding the reputation of Lord Durham and his advisers
at the most important moment, I contributed materially to this result.
One other case occurred during my conduct of the _Review_, which
similarly illustrated the effect of taking a prompt initiative. I
believe that the early success and reputation of Carlyle's _French
Revolution_, were considerably accelerated by what I wrote about it in
the _Review_. Immediately on its publication, and before the commonplace
critics, all whose rules and modes of judgment it set at defiance, had
time to pre-occupy the public with their disapproval of it, I wrote and
published a review of the book, hailing it as one of those productions
of genius which are above all rules, and are a law to themselves.
Neither in this case nor in that of Lord Durham do I ascribe the
impression, which I think was produced by what I wrote, to any
particular merit of execution: indeed, in at least one of the cases (the
article on Carlyle) I do not think the execution was good. And in both
instances, I am persuaded that anybody, in a position to be read, who
had expressed the same opinion at the same precise time, and had made
any tolerable statement of the just grounds for it, would have produced
the same effect. But, after the complete failure of my hopes of putting
a new life into Radical politics by means of the _Review_, I am glad to
look back on these two instances of success in an honest attempt to do
mediate service to things and persons that deserved it. After the last
hope of the formation of a Radical party had disappeared, it was time
for me to stop the heavy expenditure of time and money which the
_Review_ cost me. It had to some extent answered my personal purpose as
a vehicle for my opinions. It had enabled me to express in print much of
my altered mode of thought, and to separate myself in a marked manner
from the narrower Benthamism of my early writings. This was done by the
general tone of all I wrote, including various purely literary articles,
but especially by the two papers (reprinted in the _Dissertations_)
which attempted a philosophical estimate of Bentham and of Coleridge. In
the first of these, while doing full justice to the merits of Bentham, I
pointed out what I thought the errors and deficiencies of his
philosophy. The substance of this criticism _I_ still think perfectly
just; but I have sometimes doubted whether it was right to publish it at
that time. I have often felt that Bentham's philosophy, as an instrument
of progress, has been to some extent discredited before it had done its
work, and that to lend a hand towards lowering its reputation was doing
more harm than service to improvement. Now, however, when a
counter-reaction appears to be setting in towards what is good in
Benthamism, I can look with more satisfaction on this criticism of its
defects, especially as I have myself balanced it by vindications of the
fundamental principles of Bentham's philosophy, which are reprinted
along with it in the same collection. In the essay on Coleridge I
attempted to characterize the European reaction against the negative
philosophy of the eighteenth century: and here, if the effect only of
this one paper were to be considered, I might be thought to have erred
by giving undue prominence to the favourable side, as I had done in the
case of Bentham to the unfavourable. In both cases, the impetus with
which I had detached myself from what was untenable in the doctrines of
Bentham and of the eighteenth century, may have carried me, though in
appearance rather than in reality, too far on the contrary side. But as
far as relates to the article on Coleridge, my defence is, that I was
writing for Radicals and Liberals, and it was my business to dwell most
on that, in writers of a different school, from the knowledge of which
they might derive most improvement.
The number of the _Review_ which contained the paper on Coleridge, was
the last which was published during my proprietorship. In the spring of
1840 I made over the _Review_ to Mr. Hickson, who had been a frequent
and very useful unpaid contributor under my management: only stipulating
that the change should be marked by a resumption of the old name, that
of _Westminster Review_. Under that name Mr. Hickson conducted it for
ten years, on the plan of dividing among contributors only the net
proceeds of the _Review_ giving his own labour as writer and editor
gratuitously. Under the difficulty in obtaining writers, which arose
from this low scale of payment, it is highly creditable to him that he
was able to maintain, in some tolerable degree, the character of the
_Review_ as an organ of radicalism and progress. I did not cease
altogether to write for the _Review_, but continued to send it
occasional contributions, not, however, exclusively; for the greater
circulation of the _Edinburgh Review_ induced me from this time to offer
articles to it also when I had anything to say for which it appeared to
be a suitable vehicle. And the concluding volumes of _Democracy in
America_, having just then come out, I inaugurated myself as a
contributor to the _Edinburgh_, by the article on that work, which heads
the second volume of the _Dissertations_.