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*p • * i jLlttTDIttTf ?
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We Ws to correct a mistake into wh , ich we were led last weeTc respecting the authorship of the article on the Essay on the Plurality o Worlds , in the North British Review . It is not by Professor Nicitoi ., but by Sir Datid BaBwsras , who , as he himself informs us , has copied sentences , and even , paragraphs from the Review into his own hook ; and this would make him appear a plagiarist were the article attributed to another . Sir David ' s work is mu <* h talked of , and espousing the more popular side of the argunaent to which it gives scientiHc sanction , it is likely to be read with eagerness * Men are so happy to seem to know anything about the other ¦ W * ld » .
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It ia acutely remarked by Leopabdi , in ODe of his detached aphorisms , that thfe best way to conceal the limits of your knowledge is no * to overstep ' them . II pB certo modo di celare agli altri i confini del proprio sapere , e di nan trapassarli . But the difficulty is to ascertain those limits , -to know what you know , and to recognise" the limits of the kaowable . The ambition of human intellect is insatiable , illimitable , and it always flies at the unattainable , like Virgii / s archer shooting at the stars by way of trying its strength . ^ las * , before wii have in any way arrived at clear conceptions of Life on this J > lanet , we are busy framing theories of the Life which is developing iteett on Jupiter , Saturn , Mercury , and the rest , M In caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sat . "
WflffwEix ( if he be the author of the Essay on the Plurality of Worlds ) Is quite sure that Mercury , for instance , boasts no Cambridge lion with intellect magnificent and a Scheme of Salvation especially arranged for him r is sure that Jupiter is deficient in the race of Jokes , and that Saturn knows not Sinutbl ! On the other hand , Sir Davh > Bruwstbb is quite sure that JtWfxs and $ * rf * tt , ander mightier avatars , flourish there as here , and that an infinite futurity awaits astronomers for the carrying on of their
speculations among an infinity of worlds . Meanwhile , neither has any knowledge on the subject ; yet both at © tampered by that rein menschliche standpunktthat purely human standard we spoke of last week , unable to conceive any Life but tfee human . Not oniy they , but all men are so hampered . Sometimes this is seen , in quite ludicrous aspects , as where men put into words their conception of heaven . Thus , in the Oxford Collection <* f Hymns , the devout mind is promised an abode of bliss ,
11 Where Congregations ne ' er break up And Sabbaths have no end ' . " ( We are quoting literally . ) Remembering what Hie Sabbath is , in most English and Scotch families , and remembering also the general constitution of ** congregations , " this does not accurately represent our idea of Heaven ! Yet if infinity be desired as the Hunting Grounds of the Intellect , the microscope affords rfc . There need be no fear of exhausting that source . To confine our attention for one moment to one small branch of natural
investigation , what a gigantic study is that of Entozoa . It is only of late years that the intestinal worms have been investigated ; Goezb in 1793 , and Rddolphi in 1808 , may be considered the originators . Since then Bremseb , B'OJANtTS , NORDMAUN , OWEST , DujARlHIf , Van BeNBDEN , and Bl ^ ASfCHAKD , have by Jiheir labours raised it to the dignity of a special section of inquiry . How laborious these preliminary steps have been may be estimated by the fact that Rudolphi , who devoted a life to the subject , only had the opportunity of observing 350 species of the 1000 mentioned by him . To make the Vienna collection of intestinal worms , which numbers 368 species , fifteen years , and the dissection of 45 , 000 vertebrate animals , have been requisite 1 For his Histoire JS ~ < iturelle des Helminthes . Dtjjaodin has in the course of
twenty years opened 300 invertebrate and 2400 vertebrate animals . Nor is this all . To understand these worms you must understand their embryogony . They pass through metamorphoses as numerous and as important as those of insects ; and the investigator , after noting the development of these warms in one organ of one animal , has to find the second stage of development in worms inhabiting some other animal or some other organ ; thus the infancy of the " individual alluded to " may be passed in the stomach of a rat ; but if you wish to know him as a boy , you must seek him in his playground ; elsewhere , say in the cat's liver ; to recover him in matured respectability , iji tlie brain of an ox ! There is a subject for an ingenious writer : The Wanderings of a Tcenia - a Romance of Natural History !
The reader -who ia at all interested in this subject of Helmvnthology ( science of intestinal worms ) will find a very valuable report to the Academic des Science . ! , made by M . Quatbefaoks , on the MS \ noxres of Van Bbneden and Kuchitjmeistrr , in the last number of the Annales des Sciences Naturelks . We tulce this opportunity of informing our scientific readers that a new series is commenced of the Annales with the number just cited , affording them a good occusion for subscribiiiff .
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Doos Vice wear an attractive Moiak ? Wulkjub Collins answers that
question m * n eatoaet to be found elsewhere in these coUmv ; btsfc while lie says , and trtrty says , that Vice has no need of any extrmsie fclhiretoeftts , fee wil 3 also admit that the cause of poor Virtue wift irot be grentfy advanced by her rival being supposed to Tbe more attractive , STow moralists of the sermonising tendency are somewhat too uactuoos in th * ir descriptions © f what to avoid . They paint the devil with such gusto that one thinks he cant be so very diabolical after all . Tbm * w < s read lately in * ato * y , tneant to be very moral , Iiow an unhappy father on life death-feed 4 s&wmk his
children that their mother had . shamelessly deserted lum eighteen yeetrs before . By way of heightening the horror of her comfcict h * « dds , « Yet « he st 31 lives , n * y chilcfeeQ . Would that I could even tell you she has * epextfed her crime * snrd acknowledged her sin before @ < h » and Mao- ! Bwt aba i no . She riots in luxury with Tier paramour in Paris So this four . * TDhis is v « ry common language ; yet it would seem as if eighteen years of hixery m Paris , «* rioting -with her paramour , " vrerfe not a very fftvful consequence , but rather a temptation . It is all very -well for moralists to declaim against " rioting in luxury , " but men and women of less stoical material Are x&t
terrified at luxury , do not shudder at Paris , and on . jthe whole would he apt to prefer that kind of life to one where the congregation * never thought © f breaking up . If hymns and stories really did shape onr Hv « s , j » d g * what tfte result Would be from two such specimens ss those we have &&m 4
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HTDE AND SEEK . Bide and Seek . By W . Wilkie Collins , Author of " Antonina , " " Basil , " &c . 3 vol * . 3 e&efey . W » had many and Serious objections to raise against Wilkie Collins's former novel , " Basil * " in Ixtiaaee o £ * rot praise ; en itmneh ^ we hwve v 5 w ; y tasafcty plmidits to bestow on this we , wit * amly jjut eaougV criticism to aerve as ballast and to " trim tfcs fcoat . " I » the nwt place , % ece isfm ^ e loud enough aiisd rare enough m tke fi ^ ct Ikl ^ we r « ttd 7 tbe ; ihrde vo )« We » ib ^ olu ^ i page by page , hurr ied on by the story , yet never " -skipping , " rearfjwg tbe book , and not running as we read . There are few novels which can hope for such a complimsent . " Hide and Seek" deserves it , fcecause the author bas done his work in a worknxaftJike manner , cftYef « iliy , conBideratelyy without " scumbling . " There are no lofty coHv * watio « s twellSag o « t the voltimes-while the Author takes breAth and thinks of h < rW to p ^ eptire the next incident . Tnere are no redundant piatitades lera ^ rling wvet the fatigued pages . Tkere are no How etban do we finds /^ no ^ So true it is that man ; & c . No sermons . The dialogue ifr dr * na * tic—pttfc there either
to carry on the story or fetch out the trait * of chwfttctef . The yrtiting is bright , clear , nervotis , often felicitous , occasiotrafly extravagant , but never slip-slop . JChen the story without being , new either in stfeif or in the tewling incidents , has a certain complicated clearness , with enough of myster ? and eatpectation to keep attention alive , although it vrant « cnmaXy and le « vefl an indefinite , unsatrefied feeling remaining 1 in the reader * * mrnA In fact , theite seems to lave been another volume requisite toworifc out &tt the dvamft suggested here . la bis preface , the author «» y » tl * th « lias endeavoured . it > combine interest off story and development oE * ch * l * etes 0 in ftetrl ^ eqjitid proportions—a good endeavour , but one in which Im has not fl * ute suoceeded ; find the reason of that non-success we take to he his suDStitatiifrr portrait-pfcinting for development . The characters in this book are WeS conceived , well drawn , but they are described i th « y do not move through the story , revealing themselves in it . Mr . Thorpe is a most ^ aitfied portrait : heTe it te : —*
" His one worldly ambition Was to preserve intact the eharacterof &respeotalble mail . Hi » one moral 'weakness was the eonstant dread of accidentally compromising tfai » character , if he deviated in the Bmaklest degree from the established routine of his chosen opinions , employments , society , and daily Eabits . His standard of respectabflty Wat unlimited and uncompromising . I lmfc -widely-wormhipped axiom of our « ommerciiil morality which asserts that any man ( or rascal ) is respectable who cwn ' pay hia way , * wa » an axiom at which Mr . Thorpe shuddered . His vigorous respectability—both in theory and practice ^—ascended incomparably higher and descended ineffably lower than the weakly raftpeotsMltiw of toost of his neighbours . It rose to the climax of the most Puritanical virtue and the most impossible mortal perfection : it sank to the most humble and familiar of the manners and customs of everyday life . It embraced at once the strictest watchfftlnttrit in * renserving the
proprieties of tempo * and Die proprieties of dress . It was equally \ igHatit in regulating th& flow of his language and the length of his-nailB . It 'began With bis Behaviour at church : it ended " with his behaviour at tea . "If he worshipped respectability devouily , ne also worshipped It Binceteiy . If Ba anxiously washed the outside of the cup and platter , he did not forget to wash- the inside clean too . He wa 9 not more virtuous in fhe broad glare of nootoffay than he was under cover of tlie darkest night , fife waa ho such , time-server , money-server , or raillMWrver with high moral principles , as may he seen among us everjr day . He was vt > liyjwciite wno > secretly pitted the sins that allured him and openly castigated the sins that Were not tohia taste . In grim , ancompromising , very truth , he was what he assumed to- be ; what ho gloried in being ; wh-afc he dreaded as the direst of degradations not to be—a respectable man . All the secret pulses of his moral and « mental life hung together on the same thread ( it i * never more than a thread , in this world ) , which elevuted his character above th « roach ot calumnies of every kind , great and small . As credit is prized by a merchant : as circulation ia prized l > y an author : as reputation \ s prized by a vronnan—so was reapeptablHty prized by
Mr . Thorpe . " If he had not had any children , or , having them , if they had been daughters—or , to to take tlie case as it really stood—if his sou had happoned to bo of a quiet , passive , and cold-bloo < led nature , the various peculiarities which altogether composed Mr . Thorpe'a character would never have reached that disastrous prominence , as domestio agents , into which circumstances had forced them , now and for some time pirst . Having , however , a son who -was neither quiet , passive , nor cool-blooded ; who seemed incornprelvetisibly to have inherited a . disposition from his mother's family inutead of his father's loins ; whose exuberant , energies , wild iluw of spiritu , and restless oravins after excitement , dissipation ^ and change , would have tried the endurance of the most indulgent parental rule—having , » u short , such a son ua Zuclc , every one of Mr . Thorpe ' s favourite prejudices , principles , and opiniont acquired a fatal importance , merely from the direct influence which they inyolunturj exercised , not only in aggravating the filial irregularities , but also evon in producing those viM-y olfeiiccB which ho was most vigilantly anxious to restrain . "
This is an original portrait . " Respectable" men ate alwiya rascals ft no vela . Mr . Thorpe is of the kind we may meet aay Week . But alt W < know of Mr . Thorpe we know through that extract—the story doea no
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Ju » b 24 , 1854 . ] THE LEADER , jjjjj
*P • * I Jlltttditttf ?
ICiferatttTf .
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CtatLcs are not tha legislators , but the judges and polios of literature . They do not make laws—they interpret and try to enforce them . — Edtnburah ILeoievi .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), June 24, 1854, page 591, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2044/page/15/
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