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    1142 T H E L EADER. [Saturday,

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    THACKERAY IN AMERICA. (To the Editor of ...

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    MALMESBURY COMPENSATIONS. Loed Maimesbtj...

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    THE GOVERNING CLASSES. No. XI. THE EARL ...

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    and investing them with something more than that spiritual authority which , by the great condescension of the Church of England , Dissenters are allowed to exercise over their own flocks . High Churchmen are very careful lest they should be guilty of a like sin themselves , and an occasion has lately occurred for an expression of opinion on this question . Some years ago it was decided , by the united wisdom of the Courts of Great Britain and Prussia , to establish a Protestant Bishopric in Jerusalem . The plan was , that the two Courts should make the appointment

    in turn , the first choice being given , to England . The second bishop—Gobat by name—now overlooks the snug little flock of Jerusalem converts . They are not very numerous , and maybe easily folded by the most indifferent shepherd , but Ve suppose fervency of zeal makes up for the deficiency . of numbers . But this band of true believers is not too insignificant to incur the indignation of the High Church Party , who cannot abide the notion that a Bishop of the Anglican Church should interfere with the established rights of the Greek Patriarch . If the Jews are to be converted let them listen to the

    Church that has been planted among them . Lately , certain High Churchmen originated a protest to the Greek Patriarch , denouncing the unorthodox proceedings of the Courts of England and Prussia . The four archbishops sent out a counter protest , and there , for the present , the matter rests . But a further result has followed in Ireland . A curate , in the diocese of Dublin , signed the High Church protest , and we are informed that the archbishop has deprived him of his license , the effect of which is to prevent the curate from

    preaching or taking any clerical duty . We must wait for further intelligence before we can make any comment . At present it offers another illustration of the internal weakness of the Church , and the despotic power which resides in bishops . Also of ' their despotic impotence . The bishops declare that they cannot interfere with other parishes of the globe , or extend the limits of the Anglican Church . The truth is alone in the Church of England , but it would be impolite to

    press it beyond the boundaries authorized by lav . Episcopal succession belongs to our hierarchy alone , but it would be ungenerous to interfere with the superior inheritance of other churches . Salvation is secured through the authorized prayer-book alone , but how improper to enforce salvation upon the members of another church . It is no doubt most desirable to save the souls of those who go astray in the Church of Home or of Greece ; but how can an Anglican bishop tolerate the idea of introducing the soul to salvation through a breach of etiquette ?

    1142 T H E L Eader. [Saturday,

    1142 T H E L EADER . [ Saturday ,

    Thackeray In America. (To The Editor Of ...

    THACKERAY IN AMERICA . ( To the Editor of the Leader . ) London , Nov . 25 , 1853 . My dear Pktwnd , —I sco by the American papors , that Thackeray lias been subjected to rather a serious misinterpretation , for what I agree with him in thinking a Hentenoe unhappily constructed . To an . English reader acquainted with Thackeray ' s writing , the meaning of the fatal sentence is clear enough . The writer is throwing himself into the spirit of tho timo to

    which ho refers ; and without saying ho , by a very common figure of speech , ho speaks in tho conirnoiiplaeo language of that ; day . Just ho doctors call their patients " , " and apeak as ii ' thoy personally endured all tho ilia they correct . Just so a theoretical arguer , putting a c-n . se , " for tho sake of argument , " will Hay— " i am arulfiau ; I have murdered all my . family ; I . view everything virtuous vvifth deteHtiilioii , " and . so Jorlli . In like manner , a novellis !; whom the Americans

    cannot miHpect , repeatedly ealln the Americans " rebeLs" —putting the words into the months oj British o / Hcern . . If Cooper had nmde all his . "KngliHlunen of 177 (> , talk like Aiucrieans ol 1853 , his Sj )?/ would not have boon read Mi roughout . England and America .. It in true that , on ;» . hasty reading , Thackeray scant , < i lobe talking in hiH own pernon ; but his letter to the Whiles , which jh really in hi . s own per . son , explainw what his feelingH nra .

    Now , it will bo well if Americana understand how lif . Mo thin declaration , of Hentimont on Thaclreray ' . s part in wrung from him hy eeiiHure . I have no right to chiini more than a , Blight personal acquaintance with Thaekomy , from having met iii tiio oxcrc ' iao of our proleawioi ) , ami from

    possessing several common friends . In some parts of the Union , however , my name may be known , and where it is , certainly it will be known as that of a man who will not tolerate any language unworthy of a country which is half my own ; Now , I happen to have met Thackeray in a company where lie could speak with the most unqualified confidence , and where he must have conversed without study , and without thought of what would be repeated . In that free and friendly converse he poured forth all his thoughts upon America—not unmixed with touches of sly humour , such as would occur to him on visiting any

    community , whether in Belgravia or Broadway . I wish , what he then said could have been overheard by the whole Union ; because I never heard but one Englishman so heartily acknowledge the noble qualities , the worth , and the estimable traits of Americans generally ; that one Englishman being a relative of my own , formerly an officer of the Republic , and now a resident in the Union . Satirists have been to America , have accepted her hospitality , and have repaid it with satire . Thackeray is not one of that number . He is a satirist ; but he is a man with a keen sense and a large heart ; and he understands America , North and South .

    I heard him talk of giving his impressions of the Union publicly , and I joined others in urging him to do so . What was his objection ? That he would not make money hy his sense of the kindness which he had received ; and that if he did it without payment it might be misconstrued into an invidious contrast of his own better feeling as compared with that of others who had not so well understood the American people . I wish this over delicacy had not restrained him ; but it is impossible that Americans should harbour resentment at one misunderstood sentence in the

    writings of a man who puts so generous an _ appreciation on their personal qualities , their kindness to himself , and their national power . I am , my dear friend , yours ever affectionately , Thornton Hunt .

    Malmesbury Compensations. Loed Maimesbtj...

    MALMESBURY COMPENSATIONS . Loed Maimesbtjry seems always to advance a reason the opposite of that which is in point . Mr . Hamilton , a schoolmaster without property , is grossly injured by the Neapolitan Government , and while Lord Malmesbury obtains an abstract recognition of the right which a British subject has to educate British subjects in Naples , Mr .

    Hamilton very pertinently asks for compensation as the proper redress in his particular case . Oh ! no , answers Lord Malmesbury ; "it appears tome particularly desirable that British subjects , and still more a powerful country like England , should never have the appearance of obtaining a pecuniary profit from an injury inflicted . " We only see one way in which this representation can be rendered consistent with Lord

    Malmesbury s conduct in the Mather case . Young Mr . Mather underwent a personal assault hy an Austrian officer at Florence , and he demanded redress . Lord Malmesbury did not refuse to render it , but in this case he insisted on reducing it to a money compensation , in spite of Mr . Mather ' s declared unwillingness to accept a

    personal and pecuniary indemnity , as Rumcient atonement for a national outrage . When Mr . Mather presented himself at tho Eoroign Ofliee , Lord Mahueahury wished to know at how much he valued the injury to hia son ; and then he boasted , through Mr . Addington , that Mr . Scarlett "had . succeeded in obtaining practical atonement for tho unmerited and brutal treatment "

    received hy the son , in tho payment ol a . thousand franeeseoni . So that n , blow inflicted upon an Engliwh gentleman I ' ionl MalnieHbury regards an effectually redreaeedby apayuiont of irancetwoni ; hut ruin inflicted upon u poor Hehoolrnu . sl . er can only ho made the . subject ol an nhntniol , question <>! ' right i ' or u , grout country ! There in , we aay , hut one kind . of eona ' iHteney hero ; it ia the advancing always of p reeiaely the roaaon thai ; in not wanted . Our contemporary tho Prcs-x , whom we ahvaya read with pleamire—if Hometinien the plenHwre Iiuh a apico of malice in it—diHcoverH a . wonderful now principle in apology for the noble Lord . Aa wo had mentioned America , which ho powerfully protects il . H eitizena , the . / Vrvw hbch l . hollepublic , out in n novel manner . II' tho injury of Mr . Hamilton had boon indicted by America , nay a our contemporary , "Lord MiilineHbury wight have token Jhis » timcl on England ' s utmost rights

    as jealously as he didin the fishery"dispute ;" but as it was " the despicable Neapolitan police , " " the late [ Foreign Secretary could never stoop to bully the weak . " So that imnnmity is proclaimed for the despicable and weak , and British HamiJtons must he the martyrs in these exercises of British magnanimity .

    The Governing Classes. No. Xi. The Earl ...

    THE GOVERNING CLASSES . No . XI . THE EARL OF SHAFTESBT 7 E . Y . When Franklin first went to Paris he was feted , not by the people , but by the young nobles and the old women ; and he wrote to Boston that certainly France was the most enlightened country in the world , since , there , even the aristocracy was republican . Franklin lived to find that republicanism was only a fashion among the French nobles : Coblentz , some few years after , receiving the same young nobles and the same old women , no longer talking of Rousseau and Paine , but exclusively of the Duke of Brunswick and of Pitt . What the young nobles of France were saying and doing in 1770—1790 , the young nobles of England are pretty nearly saying and doing in 1840—1860 : shamming sympathies incompatible with their own existence . The boast of the repentant , but still gay Duchess , that she would bring virtue into fashion , waa a very good bravado ; better have virtue as a fashion than not have it at all . But the worst of affecting to be good is , that you are expected to be good ; and the tests occasionally applied to that fancy dress of politics worn by the noble school of Young England , have subjected the wearers to the inconvenience of anachronistic costume . When Cceur-de-Lion leaves St .

    Julliens' to smoke 4 * cigar in a beer-house , even cabmen are afflicted with a sense of contrast ; and when a naturally austere nobleman leaves a love and charity meeting to give an unreserved Tory vote in Parliament , he suggests the ridiculous , even to the well accustomed clerks at the table . Young England writes and talks fraternity all the morning , and goes down to the House to play the elder brother , all the evening . The Earl of Shaftesbury may be classed among Young England ; not that he ever formally entered

    their Church , or accepted their new testament drawn up by Mr . Disraeli ; but that his instincts led him contemporaneously with their analogous contortions to enact the part of the Christian peer , —a character for whom the precise historical parallel , aa before suggested , is in the Eousseau- raving French noble . And Lord Shaftesbury has survived the school , just as Col . Sibthorpo has survived Jus school , — because more earnest , more honest , and less sensitive than the rest , ho has never seen the anachronism . There is not a

    peer of the realm more devoted to hia order ; not a Protestant more zealous for Protestantism : not a sociologist more afraid of socialism ; yet the Earl of Sha-ftcsbury has done more harm to the pqorago , m mischief to the Church , and given a greater aid to socialism , than any man of his time . Ho has talked very democratic prose all hia life , without having had a suspicion of his tendencies : and when ho has accomplished hi . s mission he will recoil from the results with the most pious , yea ., the most prayerful , horror .

    Although this excellent nobleman takes from Jn « brethren the same title which he accords to his Maker , ho may bo referred to and Htudied as tho model of a Christian gentleman . And that is hia Hin to his order ; for if , : ih lie tells every public meeting , i « return for tho vote- of thanks given somewhat to tho saint , but ft lifcllu to the osirl , lie in only doing his duty , what must his father .-. nd his noblo frion < ln havo been doing , Jill their liven , and what are the spiritual peers dojng ? I ' in tlio foiling of thin country to disbelieve in publicly professed goodness : it is never calculated that a p ' " riMeo may occasionally be tho real thing ; and itm »« ' be confessed that Micro is enormous Hcoptioium m

    British society wil . h regard to Lord Shaftesbury . Thw arisen from so comparatively few of those- who talk »» this manner , ever having neon or watched l ; l >« » 1 JU 1 upon whom thoy pronounce wit-h mush dormivo omphn , Mis . A fixed impreysion in tlio British mind is tha tho Earl of Sliaffcesbury is a man who is nlwayH tilin g ing about tho Pope , who has a HinifHo in his noso ft" ^ a gmtt , surface of white in tho region of tlio « y « tho throat . And , no doubt , thin enlightened and religious country detests such n figure , , »» M '"" , ' would infinitely prefer tho whilom Marquis of ™ thUn . ford , in a ciuWm frock , fosteninfr <* publican * W 11

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 26, 1853, page 14, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_26111853/page/14/