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reviewer ; wfco itas the happy *** of popularizing : iiis subject without w * lldkg down to ' the ignorance of unscientific readers . - IMir ' ¦¦ 3 . % ' - -3 hunrm ? s Suggestions on the Best Means of Teaching English History cfealifenge the respect due to the writer of those briUiatit historical fragments familiar to the readcws of the new Series of the Westminster Review . Butwe cannot conceal ourTegaret and disappointmentat the tone and £ he tendency of these * suggestions . "' » fr . Fbotti > e may fee right in suggesting &e Statutes at large -as a text-book for historical students , though the bare idea of such a task is enough to daunt the railway readers of this rapid age . Mr . JPbotwe may "be Tight in regarding all extant English histories ( with the single exception of Hume ) as perniciously unsound , superficial , inexact .
and contradictory , aa so many pitfals for the inge nuous British mnd , contrived by-viewy Aeorists and partisans ; but we doubt the efficacy of his anfidote f&riihis pseudo-hfetorical virus , and we shall be content to wait for iheTesult of Mr . PaotroB ' s own researches into the Public Acts . Unhapp il y Mr . Fkottde appearsto be in a transitional state of mind not entirely favourjtble to historical investigations . Arsenthuental faith in retrogress , Mr 3 E % otrDB will pardon -as ibr Baying , is almost as unsound as that " faitfc in a mysterious entity-wnich Obey call progress , " at whichMr . Pwdtob sneers w ^ h « 31 tfie * asperity of remorse ; In the same eqaable spirit Mr . Frowde ^ mio ^ rnx ^ 1 ; W « dTO » ticnmlBystem of uniformed Oxford " singularly sound
« h& simple ; ** tradnis scorn -for ^ Gower-street" is measureless . Oxford , if ireare totrustMr . Tbottke , * ntra thought it sufficient if she can bringlier pupils to understand something of man by studying his actions in tsTose and mintrte detail . " Kow , w « cannot « ay that we should have been disposed to point to Oxford as ifie best -school for the study of man , unless , indeed , the jrtudy of ^ nis actions in close and minute detail" refer to tne study of Aw » - ^ oti ^ s Efhtcs , -die only text-book far the study of man's " actions imxjlbse itnd nrarate-detaiT * Tecogmsed at Oxford . Mt . Tbotidb is eloquent upon what Oxford has not done , and there would be no difficulty i n enlarging
iipon fhat ample topic ; but wiien he teHs us that " she has done wett what « ne nas done" ^—• ' ¦ And fiftB'UH ^ appejfl'pnfnflly an * justly to -fite « xperience of Iilte to bear-witness Tot 4 ter . When the men whom she and Cambridge hava « kic * te < i pass out Into the arena -of the -world , in spite of all that lias been said , they maintain there -an easy supremacy . They have gained at the universities not , ^ perhaps , information , but vrhat Ties at the ibottom-of jail pwwwrto ^ ain , information fbrany useful purpose : —apow * r o /* tic * we in-4 &ht into . « ommo » things , which the more ahowy cnncation of rival systems is something less successful in conferring —• . We are really tempted to ask Mr . Fboij » e to what audience b . e is addressang tiiese pMsposterous phrases . They may be a harmless flattery to Oxford , iriit to ' the" poor unlettered public they are almost an insolence . Mr . Fboudbj would have us to believe that the " easy supremacy" has nothing
whatever to do with class prestige . Not perhaps information is a naif . avowal , bnt this ib the first time we nave heard " an active insight into ¦ common things" ascribed to a system made up , like a mummy , of dead languages and obsolete ** science . " After such a bundle of paradoxes , we Are not surprised to find Mr . Fbottoe , who considers belief in . the law of eternal progress a vulgar error , referring us back with fond bitterness to the age " of therTtTDOKSf asan age inwhich-everything was-for the-best , in- the best possible of worlds , at least in England . All these disastrous fallacies would be unworthy of correction if they proceeded from an ordinary writer . l $ ut "Mr . Fbottdb invests them with so subtle and . dangerous a charm of jbrm and colour , that we are almost persuaded to accept his pictures for realities . And with all that is wild and false , there is so much that is sound
. and sensible , dexterously mixed , so . much of fine feeling , just observation , and noble impulse , tfhe eifect upon incautious readers is doubly dangerous , « hd deserves a double reprobation . We have already glanced at the article on Alfred de Musset . We must add , that it is , from first to last , so far as we have been able to decipher it , a mistake . To readers familiar with tlie literature and society of modern France * it is even ludicrous in its appreciations . And what shall be said of a critic wlio seeks the life of the poet in the disgraceful pages of M . Jacquot , a 4 JOrt of literary bandit , who , under the disguise of " De MrnECOuRT , " defames contemporary celebrities who decline to pay him to be silent , and -caricntnrea with odious inventions the victims of his praise . The feeTmg of this article n kindly , and that is all that can be said in its excuse .
On tile wfioTe , we are unable unreservedly to congratulate Mr . Pakkbe -on his first volume of Oxford Essays . We think he might have inaugurated bo -excellent a scheme with a stronger selection of writers and of topics . Where are the names of Jowjett , Stanley , Gohdwik Smith , Congkkvh P—conspicuously absent from the present . volume . We trust we may meet them in succeeding -numbers of a series which deserves to be successful , la the mean time we hail with pleasure the forthcoming companion refame of Cambridge Essays . Oxford has a " bad tart . ''
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THE GOVERNING CLASSES . Vh » " GopamifV flfcraw" of Great Britain . By JSdward JM . Wittty . ' TrUbner and Co . 1854 , ^ jrcmvetxvm « nd intelligent readers , who Lave thought our journal worth ^ uttityr on the file , will have recognized an expression in the Times of late , iot onlyslgnincant ia itself , but in the time and manner of its reappear-« cb . We Bay ^ reappaaranoe * ' advisedly , for the Times has only now
consented to bestow all the weight of its immense publicity upon a formula whichi the Leader , ^^ more humble , but not less constant and sincere a minister of opinion , created two years since . In August , 1853 , at a time when the moderate party included all parties , we were enabled to offer the hospitality of our columns to an esteemed fellow-worker , who without en < ra < nrig too directly the . responsibility of the journal , did us the honour to consider the Leader the fittest , the freest , the most historical depository of his intimate political convictions . Under the signature ^ of " Itfon- Elector , " itself a striking commentary upon our constitutional fictions , and under the equally striking title , " The Governing Glasses , " he contributed from week to week to our pages a series of political portraits representative of our hereditary caste of statesmen . The times were quiet thenj ruffled only by a somewhat parochial tempest of indignation against a Prince who was sinot bis
gularly supposed to have a voice m the foreign policy adopted country . There was no strain upon our constitutional machinery ; all went smoothly enough with the time-honoured compromises and the traditional servilities of an en li ghtened people . Still , eyen in England , as we know , these political sketches excited some curiosity : the persona of the sketches were highly diverted—at each other ' s expense . In France , " The Governing Glasses" have been partially reproduced ; in Germany , many of the sketches were translated into a journal at Berlin , and the Allgemeine Zeitung devoted a searching and eulogistic criticism to their sense and spirit . In America and Australia , we need not say , they were read and reprinted . _ But few at that moment imagined , certainly not the writer , how soon a time of trial would test their sincerity and attest their truth . Their republication in a that
coHeeted form was excused by the writer on the plea ' * they were written -with a consistent political purpose , and that thetopic is a permanent topic , viz ., the governmental system of Great Britain . Thus each separate sketch is the attempted portrait of an individual representing a class within the governing class . " ... * ..-Had our friend waited onl y a year he would have needed no justification . Less than one year of wary with its strain" upon our governmental system , has stamped his wild words with the authority of oracles . It were no doubt beneath the dignity , we do not say the magnanimity , of the Times to recognise the initiative of a contemporary only five years old , young enough , alas ! to be honest , rash enough to confront the perils , and to assume the responsibilities of a difficult name and a dangerous cause . Par from us to indulge in querulous and idle lamentations , to the tune of Sic vos non vobis .
We are too proud to find the bread we cast upon the waters ^ coming back to us after many days , to cayil at the instrument of so national a benefit . Let . us be ignored , and let our doctrines prevail , must be the watchword of tiiose who aspire to lead the mardi of opinion . - JFortonately , however , if the great journal at home assimilates without acknowledgment the ideas of its lesser brethren ^ there are journals abroad , with a ^ circulation not inferior to the Times itself which can afford to Tio justice where justice is due . Our great Frericb contemporary , La Presse , noticing the impatience of opinion in England at the incompetency of our aristocratic administrators , expresses itself as follows >— " Even the Times , - ever prudent , with all its haugjhty petulance , bat ever « arefui to catchl the wind of opinion , has published , day after day , articles complaining severely of what it calls the Governing Classes . That is the expression , but it was not invented by the Times : it was pronounced two years ago , by a writer of infinite esprit , Mr . Edward Whitty . lJnfortunately , ' Mr . Whitty has one disadvantage ; he belongs to no coterie , and teHs the truth equally to all , and in no xsountry do tihese men get on . Theyare tn ^ oys ^ who commit-the unpardonable fault ef-being in the right too soon , and of calling things by their right names . ' Not for any purpose of idle self-glorification do we reproduce this emphatic , this European recognition of our contributor . But it is a duty we owe to those of our readers who have honoured us with their steadfast confidence to support it by independent and disinterested testimonials . No journal , let us observe , represents the opinion of its toimders , or of its writers only ; it represents , and can only exist by representing faithfully , the feeling of the community , or at least of some section of the community . We say then : Yes ; it is our danger , our difficulty , and out g * ory to tell the truth too soon , and to call things by their right names . What , if not this , does our very name import 9 And the despised democracy , the " negroes of the constitution" at home ( as General Thompson with all his picturesque energy has expressed it ) , the unnamed heroes who die unmurmuring victims of insolent incapacity abroad , may depend upon it , we shall persevere . The times are full of difficulty , but to -sincerity of purpose difficulty is an encouragement .
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LADY BLESSINGTON . The Literary L \ fe and Correspondence of the Countata of Blessington . By R . B . Madden , &c , &c . 8 vola . Newby . 1865 . Lax > t BjLKflstNQTow was the last of a long and brilliant series of reines de salon , and when rigid law , that honours not the Muses wlrcn the < Dastalian debts are not duly paid , laid its rude hand on Gore House and despoiled the shrine ait whteh she had so long been Priestess , English society saw the last of a system of grave faults onriod under exquisite refinements , noting rery strongly on the literary character for good and for evil , but chiefly , as we conceive , for evil . Gore House was for mnny years the last existing step in the slow progress of literature towards its final goal—perfect and unfettered freedom of writing and publishing without external impediment or aid , with the ^ reat reading public as solo arbiters of success . Everyone knows haw , m the healthy Elizabethan days , literature flourished under the manly patronage of individuals of rank and fortune , success apart from these being unsought flw and impossible ; how that patronage grew so mdbcrimNMKteon the one hand , so hallow and insincere on the other , until , in tb « middle of last century , great Johnson blew it to the winds by his famous letter to Iiord Chesterfield . But literature either wns not able to walk alone , or thought it was not , and authorcraft sank into a pitiable plight -until a new form of patronage arose , without the direct degradation of dedications and fees , though with hardly less radical evils , however
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tH / ¦ - gyjP- ^ E ^ g -ffiiBL . ¦ T ; : [ SaaramA ^ ^
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 17, 1855, page 162, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2078/page/18/
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