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THE Ij E AD E R. [No- 451 » November 13,...
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Curiosities of Science Past and Present....
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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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Bacon's Histories And Essays. Tlie Works...
tribuunt , felicita & em . Deus . " About the whole there is an heroic tread and grandeur . Loyalty to the ruler and . lealness to the land are equally expressed . And all through the sentences are pervaded by a national anti-Armada and anti-Papal fervour . The great deeds recorded are near enough to the writer still to have left the inspiriting excitement of personal recollection ; and they are sufficiently mellowed by a distance which gives and gracefulness of outline to their recital . ¦¦ ¦—»¦ -
repose XUUUOb CU & Vi . ££ J . UUrVs *> **« . ** Vrfu » - » w » — — The theme of her unbroken felicity is never lost sight of ; and with a most anti-Baconian but pardonable blindness , he will not have it that the fate of her mother * the vicissitudes of her youth , or her childlessness , mar the picture . Only three sentences , but they are worthy ones , speciiy , as one item of her felicity , the greatness of her galaxyof ministers . " Addo et illud in fehcitatis ejus Cumulum insignem : quod lion tantum noimne nrnnrin . s « d in miuistrorum virtute , fehcissima iuit .
Tales enim viros nacta est , quales -fortasse haec insula antehnc ( for which we might safely substitute posthac ) noa peperit . Deus autem , regibus favens , etiam spiritus ministroruni excitat et ornat . Pour or five pages contain a statesmanlike and most Machiavellian " Imago Civilis Julii Csesaris . " Certain additions and corrections by Bacon ma copy of Camden ' s Amiales are given and explained . And so we are carried to the Essays , or Counsels , Civill and MoralL
Here we have the fullest amplitude and nicety of editorial care and commentatory vigilance . Of the Essavs there were three or four English editions published in the author ' s lifetime ; and . a Latin one , prepared with the care arising from the impression that Latin would continue to ' be in ages subsequent to Bacon the special lingua franca of philosophy . In the first English edition there were only twelve essays , increased in the second , of 1 C 3 2 ,, to thirtyeight , and in that of 1625 / to fifty -eight ; of these twenty were ner , and most of the rest altered and enlarged . Mr . Spedding has printed , as appendices to the last ample edition , which Le gives first , the two prior editions entire . In these the original spelling is preserved , as a matter of philological thatfro manuscript
interest . More than : m a in the British Museum evidence is given of another stage in the growth of the volume , intermediate between the editions of 1597 and 1612 . From an Italian translation , too , published in London in 1618 , with a dedicatory letter to Cosmo de Medici , cross lights of commentary are thrown . Anything more fall and satisfactory than this * editor could not have achieved . If we dwell upon these merits of painstaking editorial accuracy , it arises from the fact that in these days of impromptu and hasty book-weaving , the excellences are so rare as to be worthy of special remark , and of being held ¦ up to the world as exemplars , the more necessary of enforcement as the motives against imitation are so cogent and ever present .
To comment upon so old and popular a book as j & acon ' s Essays in a journal , one function of which is to record the progress of literature in our own days , from week to week , may seem , and is , for the most part , foreign to pur scope ; bat if the admixture of this retrospective element he but moderate and judicious , we clo devoutly believe that a higher dignity is lent to our labours by an occasional departure from the chronicling of the new , and reference to the old and established . But , after all , it would be difficult to say anything of the Essays that has not been said before . And this the more especially , that tho hook stands , with such classics as tho Pilffrim ' s Progress , as one of the few good old works which , with a certain capricious wantonness of choice , if
you have regard to the similar merits of other old English books forgotten and unread , still retain a place in tho shelves of the multitude . Nor ia this to be wondered at , Bacon had his Essays done into Latin that their form might make them live through futurity in the libraries of the learned . Perhaps ho had not tho same conviction as tho real perpetuity of their popularity has proved ho might nave had , of the merits of their matter , their universal applicability , and tho riponos ? of tho English soil for suoh seed . Tho Latin edition -has , doubtless , ' spread his fame wider . Tho English edition has sunk deop into tho mind of the English nation . How often , when ro-reading Young ' s Night Ttwyhts or Popo ' s Essay on Man , are you constrained to say , " Even if I had noVor opened this book , I should have known it all . 1 uould almost re-form tho book , by gathering
together the quotations from writers since this author who have taken severally every line of the poem . Every time you open Thucydides , you say , Mow like after all , are the new times to the old . Here I find the same questions of government economy and policy , as I read about in the Tithes this morning . And the arguments and illustrations are nearly as similar as the themes" In the reperusal of the Essays , to which welcome pleasure the cutting open of this volume has called us , at every page we have said to ourselves , " Here is a mine , blocks fronv which every dav we have been admiring in fabrics built by others . Yesterday that same happy turn gleamed upon us from Addison ; that well-balauecd antithesis of Macaulay ' s was culled from the garden in which he loitered so long , and from which he carried away many of its treasures and its choice
perfume ; and tnat sensing , ru-jcu , » U uu t u .. o ponse fired from the mouth of Professor Teufelsdrockh or Herr Sauerteig was forged at Gorhambury . " The De Sapientid Veterum completes the volume . It takes the fables of Greek mythology as means of philosophical and moral instruction . The intent of the work is at once apparent when you read the table of contents . Some of the titles , for example , are . —" Pan , siveNatura ; " "Cyclopes , sive Mimstn Terroris ; " " Actseon et Pentheus , sive Cunosus ;" " Proteus , sive Materia ; " " Dionysus , sive Cupiditas ; " " Sirenessive Voluptas . " In some
, cases the obvious and accepted significance of the fable is extracted and explained ; but in most , with allowable arbitrariness , the truth to . be taught has first occupied the mind of the teacher , and then chosen for itself a fable applicable and appropriate as its channel and clothing . The design and its working out are curious , as the precursor of the modern theory of myths , to which so much research and scholarship haVe been dedicated . There is ho disparagement implied in the statement _ that , as a mere * theory , Bacon ' s details and specialties will not stand the test of the tile results of the
thought and study brought to bear upon the conclusions of such late writers as Niebuhr and Max Midler . As a specimen of Bacon ' s plan , we may epitomise his last parable , " Sireues , sive Voluptas . " The Sirens , daughters of Terpsichore , originally had wings , but lost them in a contest witli the Muses , who bound them to their heads as trophies of their victory—all except Terpsichore , the mother of the rebels . They dwelt in certain pleasant islands . Thither they lured mariners by their songs , and then killed them . To each captive they sang jut the strain that best suited his taste . So destructive were they , that their shores were white with the bones of their victims . When Ulysses passed with his crew , he caused his sailors' cars to be stopped with wax . lie had himself bound to tho mast ,
for-SYLVAN HOLT'S DAUGHTER . Sylvan HoWs Daughter . 3 vols . By Holme Lee . Smith , Elder , and Co Makgak-et Holt is Sylvan Holt ' s daughter , " a fine , wellTgr . own girl of seventeen , strong and hardy from her free out-door life , but naturally graceful in person , and with a face whose pure , soft / healthy blush was beauty proof against the harsh mountain winds . She was never loud-voiced or boisterous indeed , unless there was something remarkable to excite animation , her manners were rather indolently calm than otherwise . " Brought up somewhat in __
hoydenish fashion , with a fine natural intelligence rather in the rough , " she knows all the nooks of Wildwood , the seat of her father ; can read , and loves reading when the volume suits her ; can write and spell tolerably ; can sing in a sweet untaught fashion ; can back any horse in her father's stables , and make flies for fishing . " This , is the catalogue raisonneoi the young lady and her accomp lishments , as inventoried by the author . Margaret ' s father is represented as mean , sarcastic , and even brutal in manner to people in general , but always loving and tender to his daughter . He had , however , sustained " one terrible cruel wrorj < r in life , " - which forms the
key to his brusque and repulsive behaviour . Martin Carew , a young neighbour—ncpiiew to Mrs . Joan ¦ Clcrvaux , who is in possession of Sylvan Holt ' s secret —fulls in love with Margaret , with the approbation of his aunt , but without the consent of the young lady herself . Affairs go on with tolerable smoothness for about half a volume , and then one . Colonel Fielding , a Scotchman , of wealthy and proud family , anxious to preserve the family lineage untainted , conies on the stage , and though double the ago of Svlvan Holt ' s dauirhtciy succeeds in winning her
heart . . Margaret . Holt , sees her mental deficiencies , determines to remedy them by hard si udy , and finally to give him her hand ,. after she lias been informed bv her father that she was a " welL-lochcr'd"'bride , with one little drawback , Iliat her mother had abandoned her in her infancy to elope with another man , and , after her fai her had killed-the seducer , had lost her reason and died unforgiven . The story of Margaret becomes known to her proud . Scotch relations ; by sonic it is-considered to be no reproach , by others ' a'different view -is taken ot tltf matter . This contradictory feeling irritates the proud and sensitive spirit of Margaret , who , bthe attec
however , is repaid and consoled y - tionand sympathy of her husband . Years before Colonel Fielding met with Margaret he had been affianced to Frances Sinclair , : v beautiful creature , who returned his love , but who , from prudential considerations , gave up her chance of happiness to wed a richer suitor . These circumstances become known to Margaret , but cause little or no jealousy , and Margaret , now Colonel Fielding s wile , ana Frances , now Mrs . Hamilton , meet , and soon fall into firm friendship . Mrs . Hamilton ' s inlirm and wealthy husband dies , leaving her a well-joint . urcd widow , with the seeds of iucinient consumption . Colonel Fielding having heard that Mrs . Hamilton is seriously ill at Nice , suddenly abandons home and wife in a fit of renewed love for . 1 ranee * , joins her at Nice , and remains there till she dies . Mai . ni . „ . ; , „„« , ! o » r 1 rlicfrii < ifr »< l at this COlKlUCt , tllOUffll
bidding any one to loose him at his peril , even if he requested it . Orpheus drowned their strains , by raising" his own voice , and singing the praises of the gods . Of this story Bacon , in an exact and most accu < rate parallelism , makes the following . Pleasures spring from abundance and exultation of mind . They carry away men at once , as if with wings . But doctrine and instruction strip pleasure of its gossamer pinions . This redounds to tho honour of philosophy , and it carries tho trophy of its gain . Only the mother of the Sirens , the lighter kinds of learning , still goes on foot , and cannot soar . Pleasure livos retired from the throngs of men .
still deeply attached to her husband , ma iranspoi of wifely indignation sends a message to him timr she never " desires to sec his face again . law olTonds the high-spirited colonel , and as he had not " sold out , " ho prepares to yield obedience to a ma - date from the War Office to join his regimen India . After a suitable period passed in mutual sulks , husband and wilb boing throughout ft' - ™** lovers at heart , Colonel Fielding writes a rcnon a letter , Margaret relents , and jortis her liuabam in India , whore sho goes about ciimpnifinnig with nun throughout all the horrors of the present 1 ml on mutiny . Aftor marrving oil " and otherwise disposing of tho subordinate bhavacters , the novel comes ion
Tho bones on the shores do not deter fresh victims . Examples of other men ' s calamities do not restrain men from the corruptions of pleasure For this mischief and seduction there arc three remediestwo from philosophy , one from religion . Tho first method is that proper to tho vulgar , and to them the safest—to avoid all ocoasions which may tempt the mind . Minds of a loftior ordor fortily themselves with tho oonstanoy of resolution , and can venture , olad with this harness , into tho midst of pleasuros ; but tliia only , if , like Ulysses , they romove tho ovil influonoo and counsols of nasociatos . But the best remedy is religion . Meditations on things divino oxcol tho pleasures of souse , not . only in power , but also in sweetness . _
Wo boliovo tho oritioism on this book moat honost to our readers is tho wish most favourable to its editors , that tho portion of tlio task yet remaining may be exorcised with tho sarrio warm and conscientious fidelity as has animated thorn in tho preparation of tho volumes wo havo alroady suocos 8 ively . noticed .
close . . It will bo scon thoro is very lil . tlo that is now oi extraordinary cither in olinrnctors or lnciiienia \ u this novel , and yot Ihcro is sufficient vniioty , sufflciont novelty of situation , Buflloienfc cleverness in tho conduct of tho p lot and tho conclusion , to inlorost warmly , and to tako it out ot tho lwt oi commonplace productions .
The Ij E Ad E R. [No- 451 » November 13,...
THE Ij E AD E R . [ No- 451 » November 13 , 1858 . \ . Ji £ \ J ^ ' ¦ ^ ^^ M ^ M ^^
Curiosities Of Science Past And Present....
Curiosities of Science Past and Present . ? f hn V ™ tJ F . S . A . ( Kent and Co . ) -A book admirably «< lapJJJ for a pro « ont . Wo are not , upon tJo whoJo , very friendly to abort cuts to knowledge , but tho we J bolow u 8 appears no well solootod , and < iflb « ta ao nuwh ioM Instruction , blended with entertainment , Hint wo uu »"" healtnto tp give it our cordial rocommondfltlon .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 13, 1858, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_13111858/page/12/
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