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SUBSISTENCE AND LAND. Monday, April 8, 1...
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Critics are not the legislators, but the...
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The action of Literature upon Society ha...
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Carlyle slill pursues his politinil Imit...
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Odious as all attempts are to degrade a ...
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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.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Sunday Labour At The Post-Office. Maccle...
the Post-office , and urge as one reason for doing so that we are a Christian people , and consequently ought to keep the first day holy . Now , sir , I consider it highly desirable that Sunday labour should be diminished as much as possible , not only in the Post-office , but every other department , both public and private—in short , I look upon the Sabbath as intended to be a day of rest and recreation . But if it is really a fact that we are a Christian people , surely there can be no necessity for asking Parliament to make a law compelling us to do what ought to be looked upon as a Christian duty , to be performed by the people themselves voluntarily . Surely a Christian nation could withhold its letters from the Post-office for one day , if the delivery of them on the Sabbath is contrary to the spirit of its religion .
I make it a principle to post no letters ( except in cases of absolute necessity ) so that they will be in the hands of the post-office authorities on the Sunday . It is not because I belong to the " rigidly righteous " that I act thus , but because I think we ought , as far as we conveniently can , to compress the labour of the week into six days . There are , doubtless , many instances in which it would be cruel to delay the delivery of a letter for twenty-four hours , and for this reason it appears to me desirable that the whole matter should rest on the public spirit of the nation at large . It is in the power of those who write letters to diminish Sunday deliveries by at least nine tenths , by simply posting none but those of absolute necessity on or for that day .
A few weeks ago there were petitions lying at all the churches in this town against Sunday post-office labour ; these petitions were signed by considerable numbers of the various congregations , yet the very persons who signed them were on the same day ( and the day was not different from other Sundays in this respect ) the cause of adding an hour or two to the labour of the letter-carriers . It is a well-known fact that the delivery on Sunday morning takes longer than on any other morning in the week ; and this is owing chiefly to tradesmen—the signers of anti-Sabbath-labour petitions—keeping the postman waiting at their doors to deliver their letters , which , on other mornings , are laid on their counters in an
instant . Anxious at nil times to give every one credit for good motives , I cannot believe that people can be truly and earnestly sincere who make a great fuss ubout the desecration of the Sabbath , and petition Parliament for its protection ; while at the same time they are the principal cause of the very evil they so loudly reprobate . II . It .
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Subsistence And Land. Monday, April 8, 1...
SUBSISTENCE AND LAND . Monday , April 8 , 187 ) 0 . Sir , —The fallacy of the " ltight " of every one to subsistence from the soil , it seems to mo , may easily be shown thus : — A certain number of persons take possession of an uninhabited island . The land is equally divided amongst the individuals . The population increasethe land is subdivided till it can be divided no longer , so as to furnish suhsistence to each possessor . Manufactures , trade , and commerce are introduced—those who have no land are supported by these means . Have they any " reason " or " right " to complain of not being in the possession of land when they are supported from other sources ?
Again : some of those who possess the equal divisions of land are idle , ignorant , or improvident . Their land is not sufficiently productive . They sell their land to others more industrious , enlightened , and prudent , and are content to work for the purchasers for wages . It is a common fact that there are men who can work better for others than for themselves . This is found to he the case with the Irish . In this case have they who have no land any right" to complain that they are not landed proprietors ?—or they who have a small portion of land
any right to complain of those who have thus obtained lnrgor possessions ? In either case I can see no " right" to complain . The doctrine that " society " or Government " ought to support or find labour for each individual scorns to me most pernicious , as interfering with that individual industry , prudence , nnd Re . lf-depcndence , which are the only legitimate and wholesome sources of subsisteneo and greatness of character . In proportion as men depend more upon others than upon themselves , they become feeble , inactive , and degraded .
Instead of telling the ignorant , the imprudent , the idle , the vicious , the generally intvipable , to look to assistance from " society" or 4 < Government , " far better surely would it ho to direct their attention to the numerous instances , which continually occur , of men rising by their own unassisted exertions from poverty and obscurity to competence , or wealth and honourable- reputation , and to bid them obtain knowledge , and exercise prudence and industry , if they desire to bo similarly distinguished . Kemember , if wo endeavour to take all demerit from poverty and ill success , we at the samo time destroy all the merit ( and thereby the most potent stimulus ) in the successful exertions of independent prudence and industry . F . B . Bartox .
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Critics Are Not The Legislators, But The...
Critics are not the legislators , but the judges and police of literature . They do not make laws—they interpret and . try to enforce them .. — Edinburgh Review .
The Action Of Literature Upon Society Ha...
The action of Literature upon Society has very much changed of late years , with the changes which Literature itself has undergone . The enormous extension of the public press—extension in quality , no less than quantity—has stultified individual influence . Within the memory of even young men there lived writers each of whose individuality seemed , so to speak , a centre and culmination of the national thought and feeling : poets , novelists , philosophers , and critics , each standing on a pedestal of his own . A new poem by Byron
or Coleridge , a new novel by Scott or Bulwbb , a new treatise by Bentham or Mill , a new article by Wilson or Jeffrey , excited a degree of expectation and enthusiasm which no man now has the power of exciting , and which , if appearing to-morrow , would be received with extreme calmness . The reason is , that the level of our Literature has been greatly raised . Let any man look at the writing in the Times , the Chronicle , Blackwood , or Fraser , of even ten years ago , and compare it with
the current numbers , and , with all allowance made for exceptional papers , he will be astonished at the progress . There is more power , picturesqueness , sound knowledge , and novel thought in the fugitive articles of the present day than in the more ambitious but scarcely less fugitive books of that day . In Literature , our age begins to refuse to deify pigmies . To make a great name demands great powers . It was not so a few years hence . , as may be seen in the amiable but extremely feeble poet , Bowles , whose recent decease has led us into this strain of
reflection . Bowles was a giant in his day : even Coleridge , and Soutiiky , and Lamjj , and Byron treated him as such . Had he died thirty years ago what a " sensation" would have been made ! what articles written about him ! what biographical sketches and familiar letters printed Yes : thirty years ago is about the period when it would have answered his purpose to die—had he
been living for that ! Had his famous edition of Pope appeared in our day , instead of exciting the contest which brought Campbell , Byron , and others into the field , it would have been quietly " settled " by the Atheneeumj had the " Sonnets " once so prized appeared last month , the Alhenccum would have placed them in its notices of " Poetry of the Million . " What does this mean ? It means
that the general intelligence of the nation is such that no man of ordinary thews and sinews can be mistaken for a hero ; the democracy of Literature like the democracy of Society , though it in nowise prevents Great Men , renders the Throne and Sceptre less easy of attainment . Poets who feel themselves equal if not superior to those who formerly were hailed with acclamations , and disgusted at receiving no ovations themselves , declare the age is unpoetical .
It is only enlightened . Let a Poet arise who surpasses his contemporaries as Byron and Shelley surpassed theirs , and the nation will accept him . Has it not accepted Tennyson ? The cry of the neglected Poets is echoed by the neglected Novelists . There , too , we see a public not prone to make idols of such clay as formerly sufficed . But , let a Vanity Fair or a Jane JZyre makes its appearance , and how the world thousand-voiced proclaims the advent of a new power !
This reminds us that another edition of Jane Eyre—a pocket volume for six shillings—is about to be given to the public ; so that , instead of borrowing it from the library , we may all place it on our shelves . True it is that we shall thereby be deprived of the marginal annotations , and the bold fresco-paintings of " observing thumbs" which enrich library copies ; but for those whose studies i \ o not by preference lie amidst manuscripts , the loss will be inconsiderable .
Carlyle Slill Pursues His Politinil Imit...
Carlyle slill pursues his politinil Imitations in the Latter-tiny Pamphlets . The current , number , on The New JJoivitiny-sfreef , is a supplement to the last . To get at that desideratum , an effective new Government , he argues , wo must overcome one or other of " two great fundamental short coinings "—we either lack intellect in this respectable Nineteenth century , or Governments have an imperfect method of supplying themselves with the same . We must have out the " Kings , " the real rulers of the country , and set them over the departments at homo and abroad ; and then we may commence upon some real Government . The
corner where we are to begin is the enormous increasing pauperism ; to be conquered by an organization of labour . But to make any progress at all , the Englishman must learn not only to think the truth , but to speak it . In short , you cannot get at the matter of truth , reality , without the spirit of truth . So writes Carlyle . He is making men cry out against him , but verily he is making them think .
Odious As All Attempts Are To Degrade A ...
Odious as all attempts are to degrade a Great Man to the vulgar level , by proving that accompanying his greatness there were some vulgar weaknesses—repugnant to our best instincts , as the valet de chambre estimation of heroism always will be—it is pleasant to see an iconoclast smiting false images with a daring hand , and reconciling our aversions with our reason . Such an iconoclast is Granier de Cassagnac . In his Histoire des Causes de la Revolution Frangaise , has smitten the hideous image of Marat , whom those
Republicans who , thinking only of their cause , and careless as to the moral worth of its soldiers , have erected into a hero and a martyr . Our satisfaction is inexpressible at finding the new historian able to prove by facts that Marat never was a Republican , that he repudiated the idea of any government except that of a dictatorship , and , moreover , that his supposed austere poverty was—like his dirt and vehemence—a trick to captivate the
confidence of the populace . M . Cassagnac shows very clearly that , although he was extravagant and improvident , he had abundance of money , and never stinted himself in his enjoyments . We always felt a deep repugnance against Marat from the first inspection of his Ami du Peuple ; and now we are delighted to find that repugnance justified on other grounds . The Journal des Debuts has printed the chapter on Marat , and thereby excited attention to the subject .
So Eugene Sue is to be the Socialist candidate after all ! When we last week stigmatized his claims—intellectual and Socialistic—we had little expectation of seeing him gain such a victory ; but we anticipated the moral by pointing to the anarchical condition which could produce such a leader . If wise men and honest men will not become the leaders of the people , charlatans must be chosen , for leaders—demagogues—the people will have , and naturally prefer those who sympathize with them . The action of Literature upon Society has sometimes been denied , and the " amusement of a leisure hour" has been the
only object accorded to it . Eugene Sue is an answer to that . The amount of " amusement " derivable from his Mysteries of the People is infinitely small ; the amount of " influence , " however , threatens to become terrible . Amidst the tumult of politics the voice of poetry seems to have suddenly resounded with unwonted energy . At the theatre of the Porte St . Martin ( classical in crime—the boards of which have trembled beneath so much of the agony of " le drame" ) has made a great experiment , which a great name
has changed into success . We refer to Lamartine ' s new play of Toussaint Louverture , in which Frederic represented the black Napoleon to an audience more capable of relishing mere poetry on the stage , and more pleased with the higher qualities of a drama than any audience since the days of Pericles . Accordingly , in spite of the disagreeable effect to the eye of a drama in which the actors are all Black , in spite of the stress upon the attention where the drama is almost all dialogue and monologue , and not flashing out in broad masses of incident and situation , the beauty of the
language , and the grandiose turn of the sentiments delighted Paris and made " a sensation . " It forms a topic of discussion in every salon j casting into the shade its modest rival Vivia , by the charming poet , Rehoul , baker at Nismes , who has given a llacinian form to the subject so beautifully treated by a late poetess of our own ( Mrs . Adams—see her Vivia Pernetua ) , but who has
failed to produce any powerful impression upon his public , though Jules Janjn satirizes the public for its bad taste . Poor M . Reijoul ! what chance had his quiet Muse beside the Muse of Lain artine—unt ! yrande dame with all her at ours j or the Muse of Alexandria Dumas—a Lorette with brilliant eyes ( rouge aiding !) dishevelled tresses , naked bosom , and the voice of an orgie ? Here is Dumas with his dramc of Urbain
Grandier , which for five mortal hours keeps an audience palpitating ; forty actors of both sexes people the stage in brilliant and varied costumes , while as for the crimes , terrors , effects , situations , & c ., which crowd pell-mell upon the scene , imagine what
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), April 20, 1850, page 14, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_20041850/page/14/
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