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Atw. 10, I860.] ®&* *****«? ^_
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allingham's poems. Poems. By William All...
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STELLA AND VANESSA. Stella anil Vanessa....
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Mackay' S Progress Of The Intellect. The...
might ( and the murder of those five sons of Saul was to all intents and purposes a hideous Moloch sacrifice ) , yet we seem to see a softening rather than a savage spirit in the story of Abraham , and wo must protest against a cannibal conclusion out of mere metaphors , such as " drinking the blood of the slain , " or the promise that the anakim " should be as bread to the people . " Mr . Mackay thinks that great legend of the sun standing still in the Valley of Ajalon to point to a great Baal sacrifice offered there by Joshua . We
rather agree with Spinoza in regarding it as a grand old poetical mythm , in which Jehovah ' s superiority to the sun-god of the Canaanites was attested before earth and Heaven , and the lord of the sky was forced to stand still and witness and assist the slaughter of his own worshippers . It was in the strength of a rather purer faith that the Jews became what they were , and , like the Mahometans afterwards , they preached it with their swords . Mr . Mackay ' s estimate of the Hebrew character—of what it was in itself , and of what the religion was—is doubtless far nearer the truth than the ordinary orthodox one , yet
he has given orthodoxy an advantage over him in these chapters of which it will not fail to avail itself . It will point to his overstrained metaphors , which it will parallel with his treatment of Homer , and for a time it will be able to set aside and ignore the real massive value of his book . Permanently to injure it will be beyond the power of orthodoxy or of anything else . However , in a second edition Mr . ' Mackay may reconsider himself ; and , in the mean time , at his weakest he is no slight adversary , and where we differ from him he has given us abundance of serious matter , which we feel we have not fairly considered . If for a time the old Hebrews have to endure a harder
judgment than they earned by their actions , no more than they have brought upon themselves by their arrogance , and for a time , perhaps , it is as well they should endure it . The truth lies probably between themselves and Mr . Mackay . It is no answer to point to a few really great and noble men among them whoso minds were lifted out beyond their age . Men of that kind there have been at all times , and among all peoples : — " Who shall say , " says Mr . Mackay , " how soon the human intellect first began to feel rightly about God ? " Fragments of Greek , thoughts of
great men , we find incorporated in every theologic system ; rising out like the moon ' s mountains into the sun , and shining like light islands out of the dead level of the gloom around them . What wo really most want ( Mr . Mackay makes us feel it more than ever ) , is a good edition of the Bible . Noble as our translation is , it was made by divines who read it all with the shadows inverted—by the theories of later ages . We must have a new translation made by scholars whose only purpose shall be to find out , not what the words may moan , but what the waiters meant . Who they were ; how they lived ; what they made of the world
about them ; what belief , what knowledge , what moral habits of thought and action they brought with them into their writings ; so and so only wo may expect a safe deliverance out of our Egypt . Where are the men who will do this for us ? Who s there with heart pure enough and head strong enouah to undertake such a work as this in the face of what the English world will give him for his pains ? Till we read Mr . Mackay ' s book we despaired . 13 ut if this was possible , more may be possible . Let us keep heart and pray for the good time , and work for it as God has given us gifts to work for it ; above all , let us be faithful to ourselves , nd not be ashamed of confessing to the truth .
We mu"t leave Mr . Mackay ' s excellent chapters on the rise of Philosophy and on the curious parallel of its history with that of Theology . Wo can only recommend them to careful perusal as by far the ablest summary which we have ever read . As a specimen of his stylo and of his conclusions , we will take an extract from the close of the second volume : — " If in moral Inequalities them bo anything which can rsaily disturb the serenity of the Divine Mind , tasking it
not merely to forbear but f . o forgive , the forgiveness ( of course not to be expected from a lower sourue ) is surely a ( Vco gift to the repentant— unpurchaseable by bloodshed—uninfluenced by magical exorcism ; and if human waywardness had deliberately proposed to cast a slnr on the sublime act of self-devotion which closed the career of Jesus , the object could scarcely have been more ellvctually attained than by construing it as an enchantment or spell , through which the real mental change , he died to promote might be superseded by a mere profession of paradoxical" belief . The expressive sign or
symbol of ' atonement' recommended itself to the imagination , supplanting one trick of fancy * by another , and giving a seemingly substantial basis for hope . This hope , of which , in St . Paul , grace is the object , and faith the inward assurance or means , is the mental realization of a new golden age or spiritual union with God . But , apart from a firm trust in the general beneficence of the Creator , which needs not to be restored , since it never was withdrawn , can this transcendental presumption which arrogantly anticipates the distant goal of existence be a safe creed for an imperfect progressive being ? A large mass of error is easily embalmed and perpetuated by a little truth . If the symbol of Christ ' s death were only an eminent example of self-devotion through which his spirit could for ever dwell with us , or if it were taken only as a final cancelling of those subjective fancies which made God appear as a tyrant , and raised an imaginary barrier between Him and His creatures , its effect would be healthful . Unfortunately it has been used for the very opposite purpose of perpetuating those ancient superstitions in their most frightful form , and practically giving to Christianity a character , which , though it have an ill sound , it would be vain as well as dishonest to dissemble , that of a religion of Moloch . Alas ! it is even so . We might have hoped that when the superstitions of the old nature worship had evaporated in the schools of the Greek philosophy , theology had finished its course , and that the era of the soul ' s calm possession of herself might have commenced ; but the yet undisciplined character of humanity was not so easily to pass , into the promised land of . its maturity . The intellect , before it would set itself to study patiently in the outer and inner world the real revelation which God had offered it , must first run again the old course of the imagination ; and after ridding itself of the Gods of Olympus , fell to constructing idols of its own as unreal , if not as absurd . Confounding thought with perception the inheritors of the wisdom of Plato and of Aristotle assumed that to every act of the mind there must be some external corresponding i object . Imperfect notional generalizations , under the modest name of ideas , claimed an objective existence —from objective they soon became divine , and the first effort of philosophy ended at the Gnostic Pleroma ! in the creation of a second Pantheon . There was no food there for the soul of man , and once again the I full cycle had painfully to be completed before a J second emancipation was possible . " Philosophy in j despair reverted to her superannuated parent , and I appealing to eastern mysticism sank back into the \ arms of faith . " So far more fortunate than under the earlier system ; instead of adoring a dim impersonation of the physical forces men now adored the noblest of themselves ; but it was the old superstition after all to which they were delivered over ; and Historic Christianity has too painfully asserted the demoniac elements which linger in its nature , in the hatred , the bitterness , the bloodshed which have accompanied its evolution .
Mackay' S Progress Of The Intellect. The...
? The Fall .
Atw. 10, I860.] ®&* *****«? ^_
Atw . 10 , I 860 . ] ®&* *****«? ^_
Allingham's Poems. Poems. By William All...
allingham ' s poems . Poems . By William Allingham . Chapman and Mall . A pleasant volume of poems , modestly prefaced , I and published rather with a view of ascertaining the | real position which the author has at present reached | in poetic development , than with any idea of the poems being adequate expressions of the power from which they proceed . Mr . Allingham is an apprentice to the divine art of Poesy , and does not give himself airs of having passed into mastership . There ; is strength implied in this modesty . Conscious of I his unfulfilled powers , he is more likely to reach the heights of his ambition , than if , with ludicrous yet , not uncommon vanity , he imagined the height was cleaTed because he made a spring at it . Mr . Allingham has poetical feeling , and a delicate eye for nature which occasionally recals Tennyson , whom , indeed , he unconsciously imitates in many places . Here is a littlo poem that might have been written by a younger brother of Tennyson : — " KVKNINO . " Star-shadows dot our tiny lake , Ami , sparkling ju betwctMi 'J" J j • dusky friiigt ; tins larches make , Soft slurs themselves an ; sucii ; Our boat and wt ! , not half awake ? , ( Jo ilriisiminiT down the pond , "While slowly o . 'iIIk th « Hail , ' Crake-crake , * From int'ii ' dow-fliils buyout * . ' Tim happy , circling , bounded view KmbracsuH us with homo ; J 5 ut up , through lioav « n ' H star-budding blue , Our kouIs are frei : to roam ; Whence for this veil of scouted dew That makes the earth so tnveet , A touch of astral brightness too , — A peace that is complete . " And the eamo may be said of The Pilot's Daughter , \ especially these two stanzas : —
" Were it my lot , there peeped a wish , To hand a pilot ' s oar and sail , Or haul the dripping moonlight mean , Spangled with herring-scale ; By dying stars , how sweet't would be . And dawn-blow freshening the sea , With weary , cheery pull to shore . To gain my cottasre home once more , And meet , before 1 reached the door . My darling Pilot ' s Daughter ! ' This element beside my feet Looks like a tepid wine of gold : One touch , one taste , dispels the cheat , 'Tis salt and bitter cold : A fi 3 her ' s hut , the scene perforce Of narrow thoughts and manners coarse , Coarse as the curtains that beseem With net-festoons the smoky beam , Would no-way lodge my favourite dream , E ' en with my Pilot ' s Daughter . " There are many poems printed in this collection which it may have been well to write as exercises , but not so well to have preserved . " The art to blot" is only one half of the poet ' s business—the other half is the courage to destroy . The great defect of the volume , however , is that which distinguishes volumes of verse from poetry , viz ., the absence of real feeling . They are fancy pictures , not the melodious utterances of joys and sorrows which in times gone by have laid their delicious burden on his soul , and now break forth in music . This , probably , is owing to the writer's youth ; for mastery over actual emotions is the last stage in an artist ' s apprenticeship—a stage few reach . But we will not too minutely criticise ; let us , rather , quote the plain counsel he gives his countrymen who shout " Justice for Ireland ! "' Justice for Ireland ! if ye can , O host , of writers broguish ; Nor paint each fellow-countryman As blundering or roguish . Think less of oddities and rags , And more of human nature ; And , ' stead of party-words and flags , March under something greater . " Justice for Ireland ! O ye priests , jUoth Protestant and lloman ; Let each observe his fasts and feasts , But try to anger no man . Religion ' s rind is little worth , The milk is in the kernel ; All love is of celestial birth . All hatred , of infernal . " Justice for Ireland ! echoing band Of empty agitators ; Who scorn each noiseless busy hand , And canonise the praters . Well may shrewd foes in secret scoff , Nor think your mouths of corking- ; While so much steam is blowing off . There ' s little left for working . ' Justice for Ireland / brothers all , Of every creed and station ; And other counsel if ye call , For saving of the nation—Ti'is maxim in the meantime prize . Nor think its plainness humbling , Let every one bbwark of libs , And laziness , and cthumbling . " As we are upon Ireland , let us note a pretty conceit of his , in calling her the Cinderella of the sister kingdoms . 44 Ireland , the Cinderella of the three Called Sister Kingdoms , darkened with the staina Of long and sore maltreatment though she be . Amidst her ashes a sweet voice retains : And our old village was as deep imbued With music as a . mavis-peopled wood . " Lady Morgan recently called Ireland " The Magdalen of Nations "—an imitation of " The Niobe of Nations" ; but this of Cinderella seems to us a happier phrase , though not very complimentary to England and Scotland .
Stella And Vanessa. Stella Anil Vanessa....
STELLA AND VANESSA . Stella anil Vanessa . A Romance from the French . By Lady Dull' Gordon . Bentley . There are two aspects in which this novel may be regarded ; the one as a picture of Swift ' s life , more particularly with reference to those two unhappy women whose hearts he broke ; the other as a mere novel , representing a possible instead of an . actual history , and ranging under the same head as " novels of the season . " As a novel it is in many ways remarkable . Being the work of a Frenchman , one may look upon its accuracy of fact , names , tone , and
manners as almost marvellous . We find here none of that daring grace of blundering , that steady bias to go wrong which characterizes Frdnch treatment of English matters . The book might have been written by a cultivated Englishman so far as accuracy is concerned . In another respect , also , it is singular : although the subject in its actual history , and especially in the inferences ono is , forced to draw , borders upon the revolting , and leads ono into physiological considerations which a Balzac would have pounced upon with the avidity of a crow upon carrion , yet the author has not only kept clear of all offence , he has so constructed his story that the offensive ideas never
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 10, 1850, page 17, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_10081850/page/17/
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