_Patriotism in Poetry and Prose._ Being Selected Passages from
Lectures and Patriotic Readings. By JAMES E. MURDOCH.
Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott & Co. 12mo.
This volume, published in aid of the funds of the Sanitary Commission,
is one of the indications of the patriotism of the time. Mr. Murdoch, an
eminent and estimable actor and elocutionist, has been engaged, ever
since the war began, in doing his part towards rousing and sustaining
the enthusiasm of the people, by scattering the burning words of
patriotic poets in our Western camps and towns. The volume contains
specimens of lyric poetry which have stood the test of actual delivery
before soldiers who were facing the grim realities of war. Sometimes the
elocutionist has been so near the enemy as to have a shell come into
whizzing or screaming competition with the clear and ringing tones of
his voice; at other times, he has cheered with "The American Flag," "Old
Ironsides," or "The Union," audiences shivering with cold and famishing
on a short allowance of hard-tack. He has seen the American soldier
under all circumstances, and practically understands all the avenues to
his heart and brain. Many of the poems in the volume which have obtained
a national popularity were originally written at his suggestion. This is
especially true of the sounding lyrics of Boker, Read, and Janvier. His
own hearty and well-considered words, so full of manly feeling and
genuine patriotism, are none the worse for catching a little of that
inflation which the sights of the hospital and the battle-field, and a
sympathy with the average sentiment of sensitive crowds, are so sure to
provoke in an earnest and ardent mind. The poets who are represented in
this volume have cause for gratification in the assurance that they have
been more generally read than any of their American contemporaries. It
is estimated that Mr. Murdoch has recited their pieces to a quarter of
million of people during the last four years. In the hospital, in the
camp, before the lyceum audience, they have been made to do their good
work of comforting, rousing, or inflaming their auditors. They have sent
many a volunteer to the front, and nerved him afterwards at the moment
of danger. And certainly the friends of the soldiers will desire to read
what soldiers have so heartily applauded, especially as the money they
give for the book goes to sustain the most popular and beneficent of all
charities.
_Philosophy as Absolute Science, founded in the Universal Laws
of Being, and including Ontology, Theology, and Psychology made
one, as Spirit, Soul, and Body._ By E. L. and A. L.
FROTHINGHAM. Volume I. Boston: Walker, Wise, & Co.
We must go back to the time when a certain father and son of Crete
stretched their waxen wings and soared boldly into space, to discover
any "external representation" of the sublime attempt of the authors of
this volume. Yet it may reasonably be objected that in the Dædalian
legend we can detect but a partial and deceptive correspondence; for,
whereas we read that one of the ancient voyagers, having ventured too
near the sun, met his end by a distressing casualty, it is certain,
that, when the reader loses sight of this modern family-excursion in the
metaphysical ether, both parties are pushing vigorously on, wings in
capital condition, wind never better, and the grand tour of the universe
in process of most happy accomplishment. And let it here be mentioned
that the senior of the gentlemen whose names are given upon the
title-page is understood to resemble the classical artificer in being
inventor and manufacturer of pinions for the two. Mr. E. L. Frothingham
is to be regarded as substantially the author of the volume before us.
And so Philosophy is not dead, after all! Mr. Lewes's rather handsome
resolutions, of which copies have been forwarded to the friends of the
supposed deceased, turn out to be premature; Dr. Mansel's pious obituary
is an impertinence; Comte and Buckle, Mill and Spencer, are not the
spendthrift heirs of her homestead estate in Dreamland. The Positive
Mrs. Gamp may continue to assure us that the bantling "never breathed to
speak on in this wale," but the perennial showman persists in depicting
it "quite contrairy in a livin' state, and performing beautiful upon the
'arp." We play with metaphors, hesitating to characterize this latest
Minerva-birth. For it is either that "new sensation" demanded by the Sir
Charles Coldstream who has used up all religions and all philosophies,
or, being a _reductio ad absurdum_ of speculative pretension, it fulfils
the promise of a recent quack advertisement, and is in very truth "The
Metaphysical Cure."
Perhaps it were better to cancel the preceding paragraphs. Is not any
savor of banter out of place in the reception we are bound to accord to
an alleged solution of the unthinkable problem which underlies creation
and man's position therein? If the impulse which first controlled us is
not denied expression, it is because it implies at once the worst that
can be said of a very extraordinary performance. Let this worst be
written roughly, and in a single sentence. To the vast majority of
upright and thoughtful men who are at present living and laboring in the
world, Mr. Frothingham's "Philosophy as Absolute Science" can be saved
from being infinitely repulsive only by being infinitely ridiculous. But
to stop with this assertion would give no adequate impression of an
earnest and most conscientious work. A remarkable mind, even if a
misdirected one, has mounted upon the battlements of its system, and
proclaimed victory over all things. Of all tellers of marvels,
Swedenborg alone is so absolutely free from a vulgar fanaticism, and so
innocent of any appeal to passion, prejudice, or taste. With an
equipoise of disposition which is almost provoking, Mr. Frothingham
announces as dogmas speculations from whose sweep and immensity the
human mind recoils. Having posited his principles, he confidently
proceeds to deduce a system which shall include every spiritual and
material fact of which man can take cognizance. And he is too genuine a
philosopher to be troubled at the practical application of his
discoveries. He repudiates with contempt whatever expression has been
found for the energy of the purest and noblest leaders of modern
society. Esculapius is not accommodated with the sacrifice of so much as
a February chicken. The manly works of Wilberforce and Garrison, the
gracious influence of Channing, the stalwart conviction of Parker, the
deep perception of Emerson,--all these must be beaten down under our
feet as the incarnate Satan of the Litany. But if this is rather rough
treatment for the advance-guard of civilization, the brethren in the
rear rank are prevented from taking the comfort to which they seem to be
justly entitled. For we are utterly unable to understand what a recent
reviewer means in commending this work to conservatives as a noble
text-book and grand summary of arguments in favor of their positions.
The truth is, that no conservative can possibly accept the system. For
it is constantly shown that what may be called a progressive
_bouleversement_ is to every individual a necessary advance, securing to
him experiences which are essential to the realization of that spiritual
consciousness which is alone capable of receiving the Absolute
Philosophy. The editor of the "Richmond Examiner" must become as he of
the "Liberator," and the Bishop of Vermont must meditate a John Brown
raid, before either of them can receive the ultimate redemption now
published to the world.
From what Mr. Frothingham calls "an internal-natural point of
observation," which we understand to be that of a great majority of the
most intelligent and gifted people at present on the earth, the results
of this scheme appear so false and contradictory as to furnish its very
adequate refutation. Nevertheless, there doubtless exists a class of
spiritually minded, cultivated, unsatisfied men and women who will feel
that the sober sincerity of this voice crying in the commercial
wilderness must challenge a respectful hearing. Such persons will find
no difficulty in accepting the statement, that a system of Absolute
Truth must be "contrary to the natural conceptions of the mind, to the
facts of the natural consciousness, and to the inclinations of the
natural heart." Their past experiences have told them that no precision
of human speech can reveal a spiritual condition, or even render
intelligible the highest mental operations. Instead of the
"this-will-never-do" dictum of superficial and carnal criticism, they
will offer patient study, and be content that much shall appear foolish
and meaningless until a change in the interior being can interpret it
aright. It is just to mention that a very few persons of the character
described have already received Mr. Frothingham's philosophy, and
profess to find it full of instruction and delight. And let it not be
concealed that no one who did not possess the very abundant leisure
necessary for investigation and meditation, and had not passed through
mental states represented by Romanism, Protestantism, Unitarianism, and
Transcendentalism, could be accepted by the veriest neophyte as a
competent reviewer. We attempt nothing more than a very humble notice
which may bring the existence of this latest salvation before some of
the scattered fellowship who are ready for it. We despair of making any
statement concerning it which believers would not consider ludicrously
inadequate or absolutely false. All and singular are accordingly warned
that what is here printed comes from a mental point of view totally
opposed to the alleged Truth, as well as from that limited amount of
application which a regular calling in the week and customary
church-going on Sunday has left at our disposal.
Mr. Frothingham claims to have obtained cognizance of certain laws which
govern the relations of the Universe. He maintains that the natural
understanding of man is led through various educative processes to that
vague and variously interpreted condition known as Transcendentalism.
This final manifestation, although no other than Antichrist and the Man
of Sin in person, is a necessary forerunner of our possible redemption
through acceptance of the ultimate Gospel. For external philosophy has
here reached its lowest form, which is necessarily self-destructive; and
so ends what may be called the natural development of the human
consciousness. The personal principle has achieved its utmost might of
self-assertion against that which is universal. Selfishness now appears
in its most destructive form, demanding the liberty instead of the
subjection of men. Sympathy usurps the seat of Justice, the individual
is cruel under pretence of being kind, and fanaticism and mischief are
baptized as Duty. The divinely ordained institutions of society are
sacrificed, and ruin and chaos inevitably result. Having shown that
Philosophy, developed in its natural form, can produce nothing better
than Pantheism, Atheism, Anthropomorphism, and Skepticism, there arises
an inquiry for the causes which have produced these seemingly unhappy
results. And now it appears "that the Consciousness must be developed in
its natural form from a natural point of view before its spiritual form
can be developed; and therefore that Philosophy must be developed as a
natural production in three spheres before it can be realized as a
Universal Spiritual Science." Again, the Cause of All has hitherto been
conceived from a pagan, Unitarian, and naturalistic point of view. For,
if we understand Mr. Frothingham, the Pope is not a whit sounder than M.
Renan,--the Head of the Church being unable to "consciously appropriate"
his own theological formularies, until, governed by a Unitarian and
naturalistic law, they are contradicted in being incarnated. Philosophy,
then, hitherto demanding that everything should be realized from one
Universal Cause or Substance, "has failed to explain the nature of God
and the nature of man from any rational point of view." It has been
obliged to "recognize necessity as the universal law of life, and to
conceive the production of the phenomenal from the absolute,--therefore
of man from God; and also the production of the finite from the
infinite,--therefore of diversity from unity, of evil from good, and of
death from life; which is the greatest violation of rationality that can
possibly be supposed." But it is now time to state, or rather faintly to
adumbrate, the grand assumption of this singular work. There are held to
be two Spiritual Causes, whose union is the condition of all existence.
Each of these Causes, represented under the terms of Infinite and Finite
Law, are conceived to be threefold principles which act and operate
together as Death and Life. Neither the Infinite nor the Finite
Principle can obtain definite manifestation without the aid of the
other; but there is a capacity in the latter for becoming receptive and
productive from the former. And from this august union come all the
works of creation, where death is still made productive from life, evil
from good, the natural from the spiritual,--this last happy
productiveness never taking place by any development of the natural, but
only by means of a spiritual conception and birth. Every individual must
commence his existence as a dualistic substance necessarily discordant
and unreal. Through various appearances, representing an experience of
opposing spiritual laws, he reaches a position where true spiritual life
becomes possible through presentation to the consciousness of the
opposing Spiritual Laws already noticed. The solemn moment of choice,
when for the first and only time man can be said to be a free agent, has
now arrived. Affinities for the Laws of Death and Life are felt within
him. He may become productive from the Infinite for universal ends, or
from the Finite for those which are personal. He is saved or lost at his
own election.
Within the limits to which we are restricted, it is impossible to give
any account of the multiplex and abstruse details into which the system
is carried. The present volume contains an ontology constructed upon the
new basis. It shows varied study, and abounds in ponderous quotations
and laborious analyses. It will be profoundly interesting to the few who
are able to accept as axioms the teacher's assumptions, and to trace a
vigorous deduction in the changes which are rung upon a small set of
words. By a legitimate course of reasoning from his primal conception,
Mr. Frothingham claims to have demonstrated the fact of Tripersonality
in the Deity. He finds the universal law of spiritual life through
Marriage or the union of opposites through voluntary sacrifice. It is
likewise maintained that all the important statements of Absolute
Science are represented in Philosophy, the Scriptures, and the
Church,--each abounding in poetic symbols of absolute facts now for the
first time revealed. The Bible is held to be of supernatural origin and
universal application,--though of course its real significance has
hitherto been hidden from men. An exgesis of the Book of Job is given in
the appendix as a specimen of what may be disclosed in the sacred
records from this ultimate position of belief.
Mr. Frothingham's claims are in some measure those of a seer. His
immense show of philosophical apparatus, his prodigality of logical
balance-wheels and escapements, resemble the superfluous clock-work of
the "automaton" which plays its game as the gentleman concealed inside
shall judge expedient. It is of course impossible to probe the Two
Absolutes, or the wonderful marriage which takes place between them. Mr.
Frothingham _sees_ that so it is. Men of aspirations as high, and of
intellect as cultivated, will think that they have no difficulty in
seeing quite as distinctly that so it is not. Others, lovers of Truth,
zealous for human welfare, may look up a moment from their patient study
of phenomena in their coexistences and successions, and humbly confess
their inability to see into the matter at all. But it is to be observed
that the most distinguished representatives of the two classes of the
world's instructors have at present come to nearly identical conclusions
as to what should be the aims of human society. Mr. Henry James and Mr.
Herbert Spencer, Mr. Emerson and Dr. Draper, would find little
difficulty in working together in a state cabinet or on a legislative
committee. Without discussing the breadth or character of their several
knowledges or intuitions, they would probably approve the same measures,
and agree in the routine which, under existing circumstances, it was
best to pursue. But unless Mr. Frothingham should be wrecked upon a
desolate island, and there be visited by picnics of Transcendentalists
from whom he might occasionally reclaim a Caucasian Man Friday, we
cannot see what practical parturition can come of his mighty labor. He
offers nothing which is capable of becoming incorporated with the
existing intelligence of the age. He furnishes no acceptable basis for
the caution of maturity or the generous vision of youth. Charles Lamb's
recipe for witnessing with any quietude of conscience the artificial
comedy of the last century was, to regard the whole as a passing
pageant, and to accept with cheerful unconcern its issues for life and
death. Some such state of mind must be commended to the student of this
Philosophy. Let him be indifferent to that great act of political
justice which Abraham Lincoln was constrained to do. Let him have no
glow of satisfaction in the improved condition of woman, allowed to own
herself and to hold the property which her labor accumulates. Let him
not remember how she has repaid every effort made in her behalf by
marking the gauge upon the thermometer of civilization, and by raising
man as he raises her. In short, let him provisionally stand upon such a
platform as might be constructed by a committee of which Legree was
chairman and Bluebeard the rest of it, and if he does not accept
"Absolute Science," he will at least be patient in reading what may be
said in its behalf. But if, in justice to ourselves, we present the
obvious objections of the general reader, in justice to Mr. Frothingham,
we are bound to confess that they shrivel in the blaze of special
illumination with which he has been favored. He grants the value of
effort as it appears in the accepted channels of the day, but contends
that its value is confined to the development and growth of the
individual who exercises it. It furnishes a groundwork which at the
right time shall provide the material suggestive of supernatural
thought. It prepares the sacrifice that will be necessary in view of the
new order of spiritual experiences now presented for the first time to
the consciousness of man.
It scarcely need be said that Mr. Frothingham does not expect to make
many proselytes. He is well aware that his stupendous gift of a supreme
and ultimate Philosophy will produce no perceptible effect upon the
public. A complaint of taxes and a gossip of stocks continue audible;
but no neighbor drops in to tell us that the Mystery of Mysteries has
received elucidation, and that a man may know even as he is known. It is
fortunate that the lofty aim of a sincere and earnest thinker is its own
sufficient recompense. The quality of mind which struggles out of the
easy-going electicism which at present contents the majority of
cultivated men, and achieves a position where our poor half-truths
combine in a grand organic whole, is beyond the reach of human
congratulation. And the results of such conscientious and arduous
striving we are bound to receive with respect. To the disciples of Mr.
Frothingham we shall doubtless seem to have uttered some superficial
commonplaces about his creed, and have displayed our total inability to
penetrate to its true profundities. They will probably say that his
theory can tolerate no partial statement, and that the attempts of the
uninitiated can compass nothing but caricature and burlesque. We
cordially give them the advantage of this supposed stricture, and as
cordially refer all earnest inquirers to this first instalment of the
heroic work. We say _heroic_, and would abate the adjective of no jot of
meaning. It requires the stuff of which heroes are made to promulgate a
religious idea so unadapted to the conscious demands of any order or
condition of men. A few persons of redundant leisure, touched with the
restlessness in belief which is characteristic of the time, may thread
the mazes of "Absolute Science" until they awaken the desirable
perception of it coherency and strength. We know that there is
somewhere a flock awaiting the leadership of any vigorous mind which
does not doubt its mission, and mocks at all question and compromise.
Especially is it the duty of those who feel that they have attained the
necessary condition of "transcendental imbecility" to test the enormous
pretension of a doctrine of whose reception they alone are capable.
Whether Mr. Frothingham's book is wise and satisfying, they only can
tell us. It is our humbler duty to declare that we have found it
decidedly interesting, and perfectly harmless. The old charge of
corrupting youth cannot be preferred against this newest of
philosophers. For as error is dangerous only in proportion to its
plausibility, the risk encountered by the reader is infinitesimal.
_Looking toward Sunset._ By L. MARIA CHILD. Boston: Ticknor &
Fields.
For forty years it has been the good fortune of Mrs. Child to achieve a
series of separate literary successes, whose accumulated value justly
gives her a high claim to gratitude. Every one of her chief works has
been a separate venture in some new field, always daring, always
successful, always valuable. Her "Juvenile Miscellany" was the delight
of all American childhood, when childish books were few. Her "Hobomok"
was one of the very first attempts to make this country the scene of
historical fiction. In the freshness of literary success, she did not
hesitate to sacrifice all her newly won popularity, for years, by the
publication of her remarkable "Appeal for the Class of Americans called
Africans," a book unsurpassed in ability and comprehensiveness by any of
the innumerable later works on the same subject,--works which would not
even now supersede it, except that its facts and statistics have become
obsolete. Time and the progress of the community at length did her
justice once more, and her charming "Letters from New York" brought all
her popularity back. Turning away, however, from fame won by such light
labors, she devoted years of her life to the compilation of her great
work on the "Progress of Religious Ideas," a book unequalled in the
English language as a magazine of the religious aspirations of the race.
And now, still longing to look in some new direction, she finds that
direction in "Sunset,"--the only region towards which her name and her
nature have alike excused her from turning her gaze before.
This volume is a collection of essays and poems, old and new, original
and selected, but all bearing on the theme of old age. Her authors range
from Cicero to Dickens, from Mrs. Barbauld to Theodore Parker. The book
includes that unequalled essay by Jean Paul, "Recollections of the Best
Hours of Life for the Hour of Death"; and then makes easily the
transition to that delicious scene of humor and pathos from "Cranford,"
where dear Miss Matty meets again the lover of her youth. Some trifling
errors might be noticed here and there, such as occur even in books
looking this side of "Sunset": as when Burns's line, "But now your brow
is beld, John," is needlessly translated into "But now your head's
turned bald, John,"--where the version is balder than the head. It is
singular, too, how long it takes to convince the community that Milton
did not write the verses, "I am old and blind," and that Mrs. Howell of
Philadelphia did. Mrs. Child discreetly cites for them no author at all,
and thus escapes better than the editor of the new series of "Hymns for
the Ages," who boldly appends to the poem, "Milton, 1608-1674." Yet Mrs.
Child's early ventures in the way of writing speeches for James Otis and
sermons for Whitefield should have made her a sharper detective of the
ingenuity of others. Those successful imitations, published originally
in her novel of "The Rebels," have hardly yet ceased to pass current in
the school elocution-books.
Nothing occurs to us as being omitted from this collection, which justly
belongs there, unless she could have rescued from the manuscript that
charming essay, read by President Quincy at a certain Cambridge dinner,
wherein that beloved veteran--_Roscius sua arte_--taught his academic
children to grow old.
_The Autobiography of a New England Farm-House._ A Book. By N.
H. CHAMBERLAIN. New York: Carleton.
We have read this little book with some tenderness, and have been
interested in its calm, homelike pictures. The author appears to have
been drawn by a sincere affinity towards the poet to whom he does
himself the honor to dedicate his story in words of simple and sincere
appreciation.
There is a pellucid stillness, like that of a summer lake, over the
pages wherein the story lies reflected. And this perhaps we may consider
to be the charm and value of the book. But the author does not remember
that only those things are read which _must be said_; therefore the
simple incidents of his narrative are forced into a growth of many
instead of few chapters, and the long-drawn cord becomes weak, and will
not easily lead us to the end. He also betrays his lack of art by
printing verses which stick like deep sea-shells far below the
high-water mark of poetry. Nevertheless, there is a fine New England
color and flavor in the book which attract us, and a gentle, high-minded
peace reigns throughout the volume.
Is the author young? we are tempted to ask. Then let him turn priest
straightway, and enter the temple of Art, and let him weave his pictures
sacredly of the pure gold fibres of inspiration and thought.
_Lowell Lectures. The Problem of Human Destiny; or, The End of
Providence in the World and Man._ By ORVILLE DEWEY, D.D. New
York: James Miller.
The publication of a second edition of this thoughtful, genial, and
eloquent volume enables us to correct the omission of not noticing it on
its first appearance a few months ago. Originally prepared as a course
of lectures for the Lowell Institute, and repeated with marked success
in various cities of the Union, the mode of treatment is of course
popular rather than scientific. The subject is necessarily complicated
with the problem of evil; but the design is not so much to attempt a new
solution of the problem as to present, in a vivid and impressive form,
certain invigorating and consoling truths which relieve the weight of
its burden. The most comprehensive definition of evil, to all minds
which are forced, by the contradiction involved in the affirmation of
two Infinites, to deny its essential existence, is that which declares
it to be imperfect good. But as this definition implies that evil
characterizes all grades of created being, and includes the saint
singing in heaven as well as the savage prowling in the woods, it
carries with it little help or satisfaction to the practical will and
conscience. Dr. Dewey takes up the problem at one or two removes from
its purely abstract essence, and fastens on its concrete manifestations,
and the compensations for its existence in the system of the world. The
leading ideas he aims to inculcate are these: that the system of the
moral world is a system of spontaneous development, having for its
object human culture; that man, being free, must do, within the sphere
of his permitted activity, what he will, and therefore is free to do
what is wrong; that, in order that his growth may be free and rational,
the system of treatment under which he lives must be one of general
laws, and not of capricious expedients; and that there are two
restraints on his wild or pernicious activity,--one inward, from his
moral nature, the other outward, from material Nature. After
illustrating these at considerable, though by no means tedious length,
Dr. Dewey proceeds to exhibit the adaptation of the material world to
human culture,--the physical and moral constitution of man, and the
complexity of his being,--the mental and moral activity elicited by his
connection with Nature and life,--the problems of pain, hereditary evil,
and death, which affect his individual existence,--the problems of bad
or defective institutions and usages, religious, political, and warlike,
which affect his social existence,--and the testimony of history to
human progress, and to the principles of human spontaneity and divine
control which underlie it.
But this bare enumeration conveys no impression of the richness of the
author's matter or the fineness of his spirit. The volume is full of
interesting facts, gathered from a wide range of thoughtful reading,
literary, historical, theological, and scientific, and of facts, too,
which are associated with thoughts and related to a plan. The judgments
expressed on all the vital questions which come up in the discussion of
the theme bear the impress of genuine convictions. They are not merely
the assent of the understanding to propositions, but of the soul to
truths; and many must have been subjected to the test of personal
experience as well as mental scrutiny. The first requisite of a work on
the problem of human destiny is, that it should kindle the reader into
sympathy with human nature, and lodge in his mind an abiding conviction
of the reality of human progress; and this requisite Dr. Dewey's volume
satisfies better than many treatises of more scientific exactness and
more ambitious pretensions.