Chapter VI: Part 6

Des Erreurs et de la Verite, ou les hommes rappeles au principe
universel de la science; ouvrage dans lequel, en faisant remarquer aux
observateurs l'incertitude de leurs recherches, et leurs meprises
continuelles, on leur indique la route qu'ils auroient du suivre, pour
acquerir l'evidence physique sur l'origine du bien et du mal, sur
l'homme, sur la nature materielle, et la nature sacree; sur la base des
gouvernements {168} politiques, sur l'autorite des souverains, sur la
justice civile et criminelle, sur les sciences, les langues, et les
arts. Par un Ph.... Inc.... A Edimbourg. 1782.[369] Two vols. 8vo.

This is the famous work of Louis Claude de Saint-Martin[370] (1743-1803), for whose other works, vagaries included, the reader must look elsewhere: among other things, he was a translator of Jacob Behmen.[371] The title promises much, and the writer has smart thoughts now and then; but the whole is the wearisome omniscience of the author's day and country, which no reader of our time can tolerate. Not that we dislike omniscience; but we have it of our own country, both home-made and imported; and fashions vary. But surely there can be but one omniscience? Must a man have but one wife? Nay, may not a man have a new wife while the old one is living? There was a famous instrumental professor forty years ago, who presented a friend to Madame ----. The friend started, and looked surprised; for, not many weeks before, he had been presented to another lady, with the same title, at Paris. The musician observed his surprise, and quietly said, "Celle-ci est Madame ---- de Londres." In like manner we have a London omniscience now current, which would make any one start who only knew the old French article.

The book was printed at Lyons, but it was a trick of French authors to pretend to be afraid of prosecution: it {169} made a book look wicked-like to have a feigned place of printing, and stimulated readers. A Government which had undergone Voltaire would never have drawn its sword upon quiet Saint-Martin. To make himself look still worse, he was only ph[ilosophe] Inc...., which is generally read _Inconnu_[372] but sometimes _Incredule_; [373] most likely the ambiguity was intended. There is an awful paradox about the book, which explains, in part, its leaden sameness. It is all about _l'homme_, _l'homme_, _l'homme_,[374] except as much as treats of _les hommes_, _les hommes_, _les hommes_;[375] but not one single man is mentioned by name in its 500 pages. It reminds one of

"Water, water everywhere,
And not a drop to drink."

Not one opinion of any other man is referred to, in the way of agreement or of opposition. Not even a town is mentioned: there is nothing which brings a capital letter into the middle of a sentence, except, by the rarest accident, such a personification as _Justice_. A likely book to want an _Edimbourg_ godfather!

Saint-Martin is great in mathematics. The number _four_ essentially belongs to straight lines, and _nine_ to curves. The object of a straight line is to perpetuate _ad infinitum_ the production of a point from which it emanates. A circle [circle] bounds the production of all its radii, tends to destroy them, and is in some sort their enemy. How is it possible that things so distinct should not be distinguished in their _number_ as well as in their action? If this important observation had been made earlier, immense trouble would have been saved to the mathematicians, who would have been prevented from searching for a common measure to lines which have nothing in common. But, though all straight lines have the number _four_, it must not be supposed that they are all equal, for a line is the result of its law and {170} its number; but though both are the same for all lines of a sort, they act differently, as to force, energy, and duration, in different individuals; which explains all differences of length, etc. I congratulate the reader who understands this; and I do not pity the one who does not.

Saint-Martin and his works are now as completely forgotten as if they had never been born, except so far as this, that some one may take up one of the works as of heretical character, and lay it down in disappointment, with the reflection that it is as dull as orthodoxy. For a person who was once in some vogue, it would be difficult to pick out a more fossil writer, from Aa to Zypoeus, except,--though it is unusual for (,--) to represent an interval of more than a year--his unknown opponent. This opponent, in the very year of the _Des Erreurs_ ... published a book in two parts with the same fictitious place of printing;

Tableau Naturel des Rapports qui existent entre Dieu, l'Homme, et
l'Univers. A Edimbourg, 1782, 8vo.[376]

There is a motto from the _Des Erreurs_ itself, "Expliquer les choses par l'homme, et non l'homme par les choses. _Des Erreurs et de la Verite_, par un PH.... INC...., p. 9."[377] This work is set down in various catalogues and biographies as written by the PH.... INC.... himself. But it is not usual for a writer to publish two works in the same year, one of which takes a motto from the other. And the second work is profuse in capitals and italics, and uses Hebrew learning: its style differs much from the first work. The first work sets out from man, and has nothing to do with God: the second is religious and raps the knuckles of the first as follows: "Si nous voulons nous preserver de toutes {171} les illusions, et surtout des amorces de l'orgueil par lesquelles l'homme est si souvent seduit, ne prenons jamais les hommes, mais toujours _Dieu_ pour notre terme de comparaison."[378] The first uses _four_ and _nine_ in various ways, of which I have quoted one: the second says, "Et ici se trouve deja une explication des nombres _quatre_ et _neuf_, qui ont peu embarrasse dans l'ouvrage deja cite. L'homme s'est egare en allant de _quatre_ a _neuf_...."[379] The work cited is the _Erreurs_, etc., and the citation is in the motto, which is the text of the opposition sermon.

A FORERUNNER OF THE METRIC SYSTEM.

Method to discover the difference of the earth's diameters; proving its
true ratio to be not less variable than as 45 is to 46, and shortest in
its pole's axis 174 miles.... likewise a method for fixing an universal
standard for weights and measures. By Thomas Williams.[380] London,
1788, 8vo.

Mr. Williams was a paradoxer in his day, and proposed what was, no doubt, laughed at by some. He proposed the sort of plan which the French--independently of course--carried into effect a few years after. He would have the 52d degree of latitude divided into 100,000 parts and each part a geographical yard. The geographical ton was to be the cube of a geographical yard filled with sea-water taken some leagues from land. All multiples and sub-divisions were to be decimal.

I was beginning to look up those who had made similar proposals, when a learned article on the proposal of a {172} metrical system came under my eye in the _Times_ of Sept. 15, 1863. The author cites Mouton,[381] who would have the minute of a degree divided into 10,000 _virgulae_; James Cassini,[382] whose foot was to be six thousandths of a minute; and Paucton,[383] whose foot was the 400,000th of a degree. I have verified the first and third statements; surely the second ought to be the _six-thousandth_.

An inquiry into the Copernican system ... wherein it is proved, in the
clearest manner, that the earth has only her diurnal motion ... with an
attempt to point out the only true way whereby mankind can receive any
real benefit from the study of the heavenly bodies. By John
Cunningham.[384] London, 1789, 8vo.

The "true way" appears to be the treatment of heaven and earth as emblematical of the Trinity.

Cosmology. An inquiry into the cause of what is called gravitation or
attraction, in which the motions of the heavenly bodies, and the
preservation and operations of all nature, are deduced from an
universal principle of efflux and reflux. By T. Vivian,[385] vicar of
Cornwood, Devon. Bath, 1792, 12mo.

{173}

Attraction, an influx of matter to the sun; centrifugal force, the solar rays; cohesion, the pressure of the atmosphere. The confusion about centrifugal _force_, so called, as demanding an external agent, is very common.

THOMAS PAINE'S RIGHTS OF MAN.

The rights of MAN, being an answer to Mr. Burke's attack on the French
Revolution.[386] By Thomas Paine.[387] In two parts. 1791-1792. 8vo.
(Various editions.)[388]

A vindication of the rights of WOMAN, with strictures on political and
moral subjects. By Mary Wollstonecraft.[389] 1792. 8vo.

A sketch of the rights of BOYS and GIRLS. By Launcelot Light, of
Westminster School; and Laetitia Lookabout, of Queen's Square,
Bloomsbury. [By the Rev. Samuel Parr,[390] LL.D.] 1792. 8vo. (pp.64).

When did we three meet before? The first work has sunk into oblivion: had it merited its title, it might have {174} lived. It is what the French call a _piece de circonstance_; it belongs in time to the French Revolution, and in matter to Burke's opinion of that movement. Those who only know its name think it was really an attempt to write a philosophical treatise on what we now call socialism. Silly government prosecutions gave it what it never could have got for itself.

Mary Wollstonecraft seldom has her name spelled right. I suppose the O! O! character she got made her W_oo_lstonecraft. Watt gives double insinuation, for his cross-reference sends us to G_oo_dwin.[391] No doubt the title of the book was an act of discipleship to Paine's _Rights of Man_; but this title is very badly chosen. The book was marred by it, especially when the authoress and her husband assumed the right of dispensing with legal sanction until the approach of offspring brought them to a sense of their child's interest.[392] Not a hint of such a claim is found in the book, which is mostly about female education. The right claimed for woman is to have the education of a rational human being, and not to be considered as nothing but woman throughout youthful training. The maxims of Mary Wollstonecraft are now, though not derived from her, largely followed in the education of girls, especially in home education: just as many of the political principles of Tom Paine, again not derived from him, are the guides of our actual legislation. I remember, forty years ago, an old lady used to declare that she disliked girls from the age of sixteen to five-and-twenty. "They are full," said she, "of _femalities_." She spoke of their behavior to women as well as to men. She {175} would have been shocked to know that she was a follower of Mary Wollstonecraft, and had packed half her book into one sentence.

The third work is a satirical attack on Mary Wollstonecraft and Tom Paine. The details of the attack would convince any one that neither has anything which would now excite reprobation. It is utterly unworthy of Dr. Parr, and has quite disappeared from lists of his works, if it were ever there. That it was written by him I take to be evident, as follows. Nichols,[393] who could not fail to know, says (_Anecd._, vol. ix, p. 120): "This is a playful essay by a first-rate scholar, who is elsewhere noticed in this volume, but whose name I shall not bring forward on so trifling an occasion." Who the scholar was is made obvious by Master Launcelot being made to talk of Bellendenus.[394] Further, the same boy is made to say, "Let Dr. Parr lay his hand upon his heart, if his conscience will let him, and ask himself how many thousands of wagon-loads of this article [birch] he has cruelly misapplied." How could this apply to Parr, with his handful of private pupils,[395] and no reputation for severity? Any one except himself would have called on the head-master of Westminster or Eton. I doubt whether the name of Parr could be connected with the rod by anything in print, except the above and an anecdote of his pupil, Tom Sheridan.[396] The Doctor had dressed for a dinner visit, and {176} was ready a quarter of an hour too soon to set off. "Tom," said he, "I think I had better whip you now; you are sure to do something while I am out."--"I wish you would, sir!" said the boy; "it would be a letter of licence for the whole evening." The Doctor saw the force of the retort: my two tutelaries will see it by this time. They paid in advance; and I have given liberal interpretation to the order.

The following story of Dr. Parr was told me and others, about 1829, by the late Leonard Horner,[397] who knew him intimately. Parr was staying in a house full of company, I think in the north of England. Some gentlemen from America were among the guests, and after dinner they disputed some of Parr's assertions or arguments. So the Doctor broke out with "Do you know what country you come from? You come from the place to which we used to send our thieves!" This made the host angry, and he gave Parr such a severe rebuke as sent him from the room in ill-humor. The rest walked on the lawn, amusing the Americans with sketches of the Doctor. There was a dark cloud overhead, and from that cloud presently came a voice which called _Tham_ (Parr-lisp for _Sam_). The company were astonished for a moment, but thought the Doctor was calling his servant in the house, and that the apparent direction was an illusion arising out of inattention. But presently the sound was repeated, certainly from the cloud,

"And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before."

There was now a little alarm: where could the Doctor have got to? They ran to his bedroom, and there they discovered a sufficient rather than satisfactory explanation. The Doctor had taken his pipe into his bedroom, and had seated himself, in sulky mood, upon the higher bar of a large and deep old-fashioned grate with a high mantelshelf. Here he had {177} tumbled backwards, and doubled himself up between the bars and the back of the grate. He was fixed tight, and when he called for help, he could only throw his voice up the chimney. The echo from the cloud was the warning which brought his friends to the rescue.

ATTACKS ON RELIGIOUS CUSTOMS.

Days of political paradox were coming, at which we now stare. Cobbett[398] said, about 1830, in earnest, that in the country every man who did not take off his hat to the clergyman was suspected, and ran a fair chance of having something brought against him. I heard this assertion canvassed, when it was made, in a party of elderly persons. The Radicals backed it, the old Tories rather denied it, but in a way which satisfied me they ought to have denied it less if they could not deny it more. But it must be said that the Governments stopped far short of what their partisans would have had them do. All who know Robert Robinson's[399] very quiet assault on church-made festivals in his _History and Mystery of Good Friday_ (1777)[400] will hear or remember with surprise that the _British Critic_ pronounced it a direct, unprovoked, and malicious libel on the most {178} sacred institutions of the national Church. It was reprinted again and again: in 1811 it was in a cheap form at 6s. 6d. a hundred. When the Jacobin day came, the State was really in a fright: people thought twice before they published what would now be quite disregarded. I examined a quantity of letters addressed to George Dyer[401] (Charles Lamb's G.D.) and what between the autographs of Thelwall, Hardy, Horne Tooke, and all the rebels,[402] put together a packet which produced five guineas, or thereabouts, for the widow. Among them were the following verses, sent by the author--who would not put his name, even in a private letter, for fear of accidents--for consultation whether they could safely be sent to an editor: and they were _not_ sent. The occasion was the public thanksgiving at St. Paul's for the naval victories, December 19, 1797.

"God bless me! what a thing!
Have you heard that the King
Goes to St. Paul's?
{179}
Good Lord! and when he's there,
He'll roll his eyes in prayer,
To make poor Johnny stare
At this fine thing.

"No doubt the plan is wise
To blind poor Johnny's eyes
By this grand show;
For should he once suppose
That he's led by the nose,
Down the whole fabric goes,
Church, lords, and king.

"As he shouts Duncan's[403] praise,
Mind how supplies they'll raise
In wondrous haste.
For while upon the sea
We gain one victory,
John still a dupe will be
And taxes pay.

"Till from his little store
Three-fourths or even more
Goes to the Crown.
Ah, John! you little think
How fast we downward sink
And touch the fatal brink
At which we're slaves."

I would have indicted the author for not making his thirds and sevenths rhyme. As to the rhythm, it is not much better than what the French sang in the Calais theater when the Duke of Clarence[404] took over Louis XVIII in 1814.

"God save noble Clarence,
Who brings our king to France;
God save Clarence!
He maintains the glory
Of the British navy,
etc., etc."

{180} Perhaps had this been published, the Government would have assailed it as a libel on the church service. They got into the way of defending themselves by making libels on the Church, of what were libels, if on anything, on the rulers of the State; until the celebrated trials of Hone settled the point for ever, and established that juries will not convict for one offence, even though it have been committed, when they know the prosecution is directed at another offence and another intent.

HONE'S FAMOUS TRIALS.

The results of Hone's trials (William Hone, 1779-1842) are among the important constitutional victories of our century. He published parodies on the Creeds, the Lord's Prayer, the Catechism, etc., with intent to bring the Ministry into contempt: everybody knew that was his _purpose_. The Government indicted him for impious, profane, blasphemous intent, but not for seditious intent. They hoped to wear him out by proceeding day by day. December 18, 1817, they hid themselves under the Lord's Prayer, the Creed, and the Commandments; December 19, under the Litany; December 20, under the Athanasian Creed, an odd place for shelter when they could not find it in the previous places. Hone defended himself for six, seven, and eight hours on the several days: and the jury acquitted him in 15, 105, and 20 minutes. In the second trial the offense was laid both as profanity and as sedition, which seems to have made the jury hesitate. And they probably came to think that the second count was false pretence: but the length of their deliberation is a satisfactory addition to the value of the whole. In the first trial the Attorney-General (Shepherd) had the impudence to say that the libel had nothing of a political tendency about it, but was _avowedly_ set off against the religion and worship of the Church of England. The whole {181} is political in every sentence; neither more nor less political than the following, which is part of the parody on the Catechism: "What is thy duty towards the Minister? My duty towards the Minister is, to trust him as much as I can; to honor him with all my words, with all my bows, with all my scrapes, and with all my cringes; to flatter him; to give him thanks; to give up my whole soul to him; to idolize his name, and obey his word, and serve him blindly all the days of his political life." And the parody on the Creed begins, "I believe in George, the Regent almighty, maker of new streets and Knights of the Bath." This is what the Attorney-General said had nothing of a political tendency about it. But this was _on the first trial_: Hone was not known. The first day's trial was under Justice Abbott (afterwards C. J. Tenterden).[405] It was perfectly understood, when Chief Justice Ellenborough[406] appeared in Court on the second day, that he was very angry at the first result, and put his junior aside to try his own rougher dealing. But Hone tamed the lion. An eye-witness told me that when he implored of Hone not to detail his own father Bishop Law's[407] views on the Athanasian Creed, which humble petition Hone kindly granted, he held by the desk for support. And the same when--which is not reported--the Attorney-General appealed to the Court for protection against a {182} stinging attack which Hone made on the Bar: he _held on_, and said, "Mr. Attorney, what _can_ I do!" I was a boy of twelve years old, but so strong was the feeling of exultation at the verdicts that boys at school were not prohibited from seeing the parodies, which would have been held at any other time quite unfit to meet their eyes. I was not able to comprehend all about the Lord Chief Justice until I read and heard again in after years. In the meantime, Joe Miller had given me the story of the leopard which was sent home on board a ship of war, and was in two days made as docile as a cat by the sailors.[408] "You have got that fellow well under," said an officer. "Lord bless your Honor!" said Jack, "if the Emperor of Marocky would send us a cock rhinoceros, we'd bring him to his bearings in no time!" When I came to the subject again, it pleased me to entertain the question whether, if the Emperor had sent a cock rhinoceros to preside on the third day in the King's Bench, Hone would have mastered _him_: I forget how I settled it. There grew up a story that Hone caused Lord Ellenborough's death, but this could not have been true. Lord Ellenborough resigned his seat in a few months, and died just a year after the trials; but sixty-eight years may have had more to do with it than his defeat.

A large subscription was raised for Hone, headed by the Duke of Bedford[409] for L105. Many of the leading anti-ministerialists joined: but there were many of the other side who avowed their disapprobation of the false pretense. Many could not venture their names. In the list I find: {183} A member of the House of Lords, an enemy to persecution, and especially to religious persecution employed for political purposes--No parodist, but an enemy to persecution--A juryman on the third day's trial--Ellen Borough--My name would ruin me--Oh! minions of Pitt--Oil for the Hone--The Ghosts of Jeffries[410] and Sir William Roy [Ghosts of Jeffries in abundance]--A conscientious Jury and a conscientious Attorney, L1 6s. 8d.--To Mr. Hone, for defending in his own person the freedom of the press, attacked for a political object, under the old pretense of supporting Religion--A cut at corruption--An Earldom for myself and a translation for my brother--One who disapproves of parodies, but abhors persecution--From a schoolboy who wishes Mr. Hone to have a very grand subscription--"For delicacy's sake forbear," and "Felix trembled"--"I will go myself to-morrow"--Judge Jeffries' works rebound in calf by Law--Keep us from Law, and from the Shepherd's paw--I must not give you my name, but God bless you!--As much like Judge Jeffries as the present times will permit--May Jeffries' fame and Jeffries' fate on every modern Jeffries wait--No parodist, but an admirer of the man who has proved the fallacy of the Lawyer's Law, that when a man is his own advocate he has a fool for his client--A Mussulman who thinks it would not be an impious libel to parody the Koran--May the suspenders of the Habeas Corpus Act be speedily suspended--Three times twelve for thrice-tried Hone, who cleared the cases himself alone, and won three heats by twelve to one, L1 16s.--A conscientious attorney, L1 6s. 8d.--Rev. T. B. Morris, rector of Shelfanger, who disapproves of the parodies, but abhors the making an affected zeal for religion the pretext for political persecution--A Lawyer opposed in principle to {184} Law--For the Hone that set the razor that shaved the rats--Rev. Dr. Samuel Parr, who most seriously disapproves of all parodies upon the hallowed language of Scripture and the contents of the Prayer-book, but acquits Mr. Hone of intentional impiety, admires his talents and fortitude, and applauds the good sense and integrity of his juries--Religion without hypocrisy, and Law without impartiality--O Law! O Law! O Law!

These are specimens of a great many allusive mottoes. The subscription was very large, and would have bought a handsome annuity, but Hone employed it in the bookselling trade, and did not thrive. His _Everyday Book_[411] and his _Apocryphal New Testament_,[412] are useful books. On an annuity he would have thriven as an antiquarian writer and collector. It is well that the attack upon the right to ridicule Ministers roused a dormant power which was equal to the occasion. Hone declared, on his honor, that he had never addressed a meeting in his life, nor spoken a word before more than twelve persons. Had he--which however could not then be done--employed counsel and had a _guilty defense_ made for him, he would very likely have been convicted, and the work would have been left to be done by another. No question that the parodies disgusted all who reverenced Christianity, and who could not separate the serious and the ludicrous, and prevent their existence in combination.

My extracts, etc., are from the nineteenth, seventeenth, and sixteenth editions of the three trials, which seem to have been contemporaneous (all in 1818) as they are made up into one book, with additional title over all, and the motto "Thrice the brindled cat hath mew'd." They are published by Hone himself, who I should have said was a publisher {185} as well as was to be. And though the trials only ended Dec. 20, 1817, the preface attached to this common title is dated Jan. 23, 1818.[413]

The spirit which was roused against the false dealing of the Government, i.e., the pretense of prosecuting for impiety when all the world knew the real offense was, if anything, sedition--was not got up at the moment: there had been previous exhibitions of it. For example, in the spring of 1818 Mr. Russell, a little printer in Birmingham, was indicted for publishing the Political Litany[414] on which Hone was afterwards tried. He took his witnesses to the summer Warwick assizes, and was told that the indictment had been removed by certiorari into the King's Bench. He had notice of trial for the spring assizes at Warwick: he took his witnesses there, and the trial was postponed by the Crown. He then had notice for the summer assizes at Warwick; and so on. The policy seems to have been to wear out the obnoxious parties, either by delays or by heaping on trials. The Government was odious, and knew it could _not_ get verdicts against ridicule, and _could_ get verdicts against impiety. No difficulty was found in convicting the sellers of Paine's works, and the like. When Hone was held to bail it was seen that a crisis was at hand. All parties in politics furnished him with parodies in proof of religious persons having made instruments of them. The parodies by Addison and Luther were contributed by a Tory lawyer, who was afterwards a judge.

Hone had published, in 1817, tracts of purely political ridicule: _Official Account of the Noble Lord's Bite,_[415] _Trial of the Dog for Biting the Noble Lord_, etc. These were not touched. After the trials, it is manifest that Hone was {186} to be unassailed, do what he might. _The Political House that Jack built_, in 1819; _The Man in the Moon_, 1820; _The Queen's Matrimonial Ladder_, _Non mi ricordo_, _The R--l Fowls_, 1820; _The Political Showman at Home_, with plates by G. Cruickshank,[416] 1821 [he did all the plates]; _The Spirit of Despotism_, 1821--would have been legitimate marks for prosecution in previous years. The biting caricature of several of these works are remembered to this day. _The Spirit of Despotism_ was a tract of 1795, of which a few copies had been privately circulated with great secrecy. Hone reprinted it, and prefixed the following address to "Robert Stewart, _alias_ Lord Castlereagh"[417]: "It appears to me that if, unhappily, your counsels are allowed much longer to prevail in the Brunswick Cabinet, they will bring on a crisis, in which the king may be dethroned or the people enslaved. Experience has shown that the people will not be enslaved--the alternative is the affair of your employers." Hone might say this without notice.

In 1819 Mr. Murray[418] published Lord Byron's _Don Juan_,[419] and Hone followed it with _Don John, or Don Juan Unmasked_, a little account of what the publisher to the Admiralty was allowed to issue without prosecution. The parody on the Commandments was a case very much in point: and Hone makes a stinging allusion to the use of the "_unutterable Name_, with a profane levity unsurpassed by {187} any other two lines in the English language." The lines are

"'Tis strange--the Hebrew noun which means 'I am,'
The English always use to govern d----n."

Hone ends with: "Lord Byron's dedication of 'Don Juan' to Lord Castlereagh was suppressed by Mr. Murray from delicacy to Ministers. Q. Why did not Mr. Murray suppress Lord Byron's _parody_ on the Ten Commandments? _A._ Because it contains nothing in ridicule of Ministers, and therefore nothing that _they_ could suppose would lead to the displeasure of Almighty God."

The little matters on which I have dwelt will never appear in history from their political importance, except in a few words of result. As a mode of thought, silly evasions of all kinds belong to such a work as the present. Ignorance, which seats itself in the chair of knowledge, is a mother of revolutions in politics, and of unread pamphlets in circle-squaring. From 1815 to 1830 the question of revolution or no revolution lurked in all our English discussions. The high classes must govern; the high classes shall not govern; and thereupon issue was to be joined. In 1828-33 the question came to issue; and it was, Revolution with or without civil war; choose. The choice was wisely made; and the Reform Bill started a new system so well dovetailed into the old that the joinings are hardly visible. And now, in 1867, the thing is repeated with a marked subsidence of symptoms; and the party which has taken the place of the extinct Tories is carrying through Parliament a wider extension of the franchise than their opponents would have ventured. Napoleon used to say that a decided nose was a sign of power: on which it has been remarked that he had good reason to say so before the play was done. And so had our country; it was saved from a religious war, and from a civil war, by the power of that nose over its colleagues. {188}

THOMAS TAYLOR, THE PLATONIST.

The Commentaries of Proclus.[420] Translated by Thomas Taylor.[421]
London, 1792, 2 vols. 4to.[422]

The reputation of "the Platonist" begins to grow, and will continue to grow. The most authentic account is in the _Penny Cyclopaedia_, written by one of the few persons who knew him well, and one of the fewer who possess all his works. At page lvi of the Introduction is Taylor's notion of the way to find the circumference. It is not geometrical, for it proceeds on the motion of a point: the words "on account of the simplicity of the impulsive motion, such a line must be either straight or circular" will suffice to show how Platonic it is. Taylor certainly professed a kind of heathenism. D'lsraeli said, "Mr. T. Taylor, the Platonic philosopher and the modern Plethon,[423] consonant to that philosophy, professes polytheism." Taylor printed this in large type, in a page by itself after the dedication, without any disavowal. I have seen the following, Greek and translation both, in his handwriting: "[Greek: Pas agathos hei agathos ethnikos; kai pas christianos hei christianos kakos.] Every good man, so far as he is a good man, is a heathen; and every Christian, so far as he is a Christian, is a bad man." Whether Taylor had in his head the Christian of the New Testament, or whether he drew from those members of the "religious world" who make manifest the religious flesh and the religious devil, {189} cannot be decided by us, and perhaps was not known to himself. If a heathen, he was a virtuous one.

A NEW ERA IN FICTION.

(1795.) This is the date of a very remarkable paradox. The religious world--to use a name claimed by a doctrinal sect--had long set its face against amusing literature, and all works of imagination. Bunyan, Milton, and a few others were irresistible; but a long face was pulled at every attempt to produce something readable for poor people and _poor children_. In 1795, a benevolent association began to circulate the works of a lady who had been herself a dramatist, and had nourished a pleasant vein of satire in the society of Garrick and his friends; all which is carefully suppressed in some biographies. Hannah More's[424] _Cheap Repository Tracts_,[425] which were bought by millions of copies, destroyed the vicious publications with which the hawkers deluged the country, by the simple process of furnishing the hawkers with something more saleable.

_Dramatic fiction_, in which the _characters_ are drawn by themselves, was, at the middle of the last century, the monopoly of writers who required indecorum, such as Fielding and Smollett. All, or nearly all, which could be permitted to the young, was dry narrative, written by people who could not make their personages _talk character_; they all spoke {190} alike. The author of the _Rambler_[426] is ridiculed, because his young ladies talk Johnsonese; but the satirists forget that all the presentable novel-writers were equally incompetent; even the author of _Zeluco_ (1789)[427] is the strongest possible case in point.

Dr. Moore,[428] the father of the hero of Corunna,[429] with good narrative power, some sly humor, and much observation of character, would have been, in our day, a writer of the _Peacock_[430] family. Nevertheless, to one who is accustomed to our style of things, it is comic to read the dialogue of a jealous husband, a suspected wife, a faithless maid-servant, a tool of a nurse, a wrong-headed pomposity of a priest, and a sensible physician, all talking Dr. Moore through their masks. Certainly an Irish soldier does say "by Jasus," and a cockney footman "this here" and "that there"; and this and the like is all the painting of characters which is effected out of the mouths of the bearers by a narrator of great power. I suspect that some novelists repressed their power under a rule that a narrative should narrate, and that the dramatic should be confined to the drama.

I make no exception in favor of Miss Burney;[431] though she was the forerunner of a new era. Suppose a country {191} in which dress is always of one color; suppose an importer who brings in cargoes of blue stuff, red stuff, green stuff, etc., and exhibits dresses of these several colors, that person is the similitude of Miss Burney. It would be a delightful change from a universal dull brown, to see one person all red, another all blue, etc.; but the real inventor of pleasant dress would be the one who could mix his colors and keep down the bright and gaudy. Miss Burney's introduction was so charming, by contrast, that she nailed such men as Johnson, Burke, Garrick, etc., to her books. But when a person who has read them with keen pleasure in boyhood, as I did, comes back to them after a long period, during which he has made acquaintance with the great novelists of our century, three-quarters of the pleasure is replaced by wonder that he had not seen he was at a puppet-show, not at a drama. Take some _labeled_ characters out of our humorists, let them be put together into one piece, to speak only as labeled: let there be a Dominie with nothing but "Prodigious!" a Dick Swiveller with nothing but adapted quotations; a Dr. Folliott with nothing but sneers at Lord Brougham;[432] and the whole will pack up into one of Miss Burney's novels.

Maria Edgeworth,[433] Sydney Owenson (Lady Morgan),[434] Jane Austen,[435] Walter Scott,[436] etc., are all of our century; as {192} are, I believe, all the Minerva Press novels, as they were called, which show some of the power in question. Perhaps dramatic talent found its best encouragement in the drama itself. But I cannot ascertain that any such power was directed at the multitude, whether educated or uneducated, with natural mixture of character, under the restraints of decorum, until the use of it by two religious writers of the school called "evangelical," Hannah More and Rowland Hill.[437] The _Village Dialogues_, though not equal to the _Repository Tracts_, are in many parts an approach, and perhaps a copy; there is frequently humorous satire, in that most effective form, self-display. They were published in 1800, and, partly at least, by the Religious Tract Society, the lineal successor of the _Repository_ association, though knowing nothing about its predecessor. I think it right to add that Rowland Hill here mentioned is not the regenerator of the Post Office.[438] Some do not distinguish accurately; I have heard of more than one who took me to have had a logical controversy with a diplomatist who died some years before I was born.

THE RELIGIOUS TRACT SOCIETY.

A few years ago, an attempt was made by myself and others to collect some information about the _Cheap Repository_ (see _Notes and Queries_, 3d Series, vi. 241, 290, 353; _Christian Observer_, Dec. 1864, pp. 944-49). It appeared that after the Religious Tract Society had existed more than fifty years, a friend presented it with a copy of the original prospectus of the _Repository_, a thing the existence of which was not known. In this prospectus it is announced that from the plan "will be carefully excluded whatever is enthusiastic, absurd, or superstitious." The "evangelical" {193} party had, from the foundation of the Religious Tract Society, regretted that the _Repository Tracts_ "did not contain a fuller statement of the great evangelical principles"; while in the prospectus it is also stated that "no cause of any particular party is intended to be served by it, but general Christianity will be promoted upon practical principles." This explains what has often been noticed, that the tracts contain a mild form of "evangelical" doctrine, free from that more fervid dogmatism which appears in the _Village Dialogues_; and such as H. More's friend, Bishop Porteus[439]--a great promoter of the scheme--might approve. The Religious Tract Society (in 1863) republished some of H. More's tracts, with alterations, additions, and omissions _ad libitum_. This is an improper way of dealing with the works of the dead; especially when the reprints are of popular works. A small type addition to the preface contains: "Some alterations and abridgements have been made to adapt them to the present times and the aim of the Religious Tract Society." I think every publicity ought to be given to the existence of such a practice; and I reprint what I said on the subject in _Notes and Queries_.

Alterations in works which the Society republishes are a necessary part of their plan, though such notes as they should judge to be corrective would be the best way of proceeding. But the fact of alteration should be very distinctly announced on the title of the work itself, not left to a little bit of small type at the end of the preface, in the place where trade advertisements, or directions to the binder, are often found. And the places in which alteration has been made should be pointed out, either by marks of omission, when omission is the alteration, or by putting the altered sentences in brackets, when change has been made. May any one alter the works of the dead at his own discretion? {194} We all know that readers in general will take each sentence to be that of the author whose name is on the title; so that a correcting republisher _makes use of his author's name to teach his own variation_. The tortuous logic of "the trade," which is content when "the world" is satisfied, is not easily answered, any more than an eel is easily caught; but the Religious Tract Society may be _convinced_ [in the old sense] in a sentence. On which course would they feel most safe in giving their account to the God of truth? "In your own conscience, now?"

I have tracked out a good many of the variations made by the Religious Tract Society in the recently published volume of _Repository Tracts_. Most of them are doctrinal insertions or amplifications, to the matter of which Hannah More would not have objected--all that can be brought against them is the want of notice. But I have found two which the respect I have for the Religious Tract Society, in spite of much difference on various points, must not prevent my designating as paltry. In the story of Mary Wood, a kind-hearted clergyman converses with the poor girl who has ruined herself by lying. In the original, he "assisted her in the great work of repentance;" in the reprint it is to be shown in some detail how he did this. He is to begin by pointing out that "the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked." Now the clergyman's name is _Heartwell_: so to prevent his name from contradicting his doctrine, he is actually cut down to _Harwell_. Hannah Moore meant this good man for one of those described in Acts xv. 8, 9, and his name was appropriate.

Again, Mr. Flatterwell, in persuasion of Parley the porter to let him into the castle, declares that the worst he will do is to "play an innocent game of cards just to keep you awake, or sing a cheerful song with the maids." Oh fie! Miss Hannah More! and you a single lady too, and a contemporary of the virtuous Bowdler![440] Though Flatterwell be an {195} allegory of the devil, this is really too indecorous, even for him. Out with the three last words! and out it is.

The Society cuts a poor figure before a literary tribunal. Nothing was wanted except an admission that the remarks made by me were unanswerable, and this was immediately furnished by the Secretary (_N. and Q._, 3d S., vi. 290). In a reply of which six parts out of seven are a very amplified statement that the Society did not intend to reprint _all_ Hannah More's tracts, the remaining seventh is as follows:

"I am not careful [perhaps this should be _careful not_] to notice Professor De Morgan's objections to the changes in 'Mary Wood' or 'Parley the Porter,' but would merely reiterate that the tracts were neither designed nor announced to be 'reprints' of the originals [design is only known to the designers; as to announcement, the title is ''Tis all for the best, The Shepherd of Salisbury Plain, and other narratives by Hannah More']; and much less [this must be _careful not_; further removed from answer than _not careful_] can I occupy your space by a treatise on the Professor's question: 'May any one alter the works of the dead at his own discretion?'"

To which I say: Thanks for help!

I predict that Hannah More's _Cheap Repository Tracts_ will somewhat resemble the _Pilgrim's Progress_ in their fate. Written for the cottage, and long remaining in their original position, they will become classical works of their kind. Most assuredly this will happen if my assertion cannot be upset, namely, that they contain the first specimens of fiction addressed to the world at large, and widely circulated, in which dramatic--as distinguished from puppet--power is shown, and without indecorum.

{196}

According to some statements I have seen, but which I have not verified, other publishing bodies, such as the Christian Knowledge Society, have taken the same liberty with the names of the dead as the Religious Tract Society. If it be so, the impropriety is the work of the smaller spirits who have not been sufficiently overlooked. There must be an overwhelming majority in the higher councils to feel that, whenever _altered_ works are published, _the fact of alteration should be made as prominent as the name of the author_. Everything short of this is suppression of truth, and will ultimately destroy the credit of the Society. Equally necessary is it that the alterations should be noted. When it comes to be known that the author before him is altered, he knows not where nor how nor by whom, the lowest reader will lose his interest.

A TRIBUTE TO WILLIAM FREND.

The principles of Algebra. By William Frend.[441] London, 1796, 8vo.
Second Part, 1799.

This Algebra, says Dr. Peacock,[442] shows "great distrust {197} of the results of algebraical science which were in existence at the time when it was written." Truly it does; for, as Dr. Peacock had shown by full citation, it makes war of extermination upon all that distinguishes algebra from arithmetic. Robert Simson[443] and Baron Maseres[444] were Mr. Frend's predecessors in this opinion.

The genuine respect which I entertained for my father-in-law did not prevent my canvassing with perfect freedom his anti-algebraical and anti-Newtonian opinions, in a long obituary memoir read at the Astronomical Society in February 1842, which was written by me. It was copied into the _Athenaeum_ of March 19. It must be said that if the manner in which algebra _was_ presented to the learner had been true algebra, he would have been right: and if he had confined himself to protesting against the imposition of attraction as a fundamental part of the existence of matter, he would have been in unity with a great many, including Newton himself. I wish he had preferred amendment to rejection when he was a college tutor: he wrote and spoke English with a clearness which is seldom equaled.

His anti-Newtonian discussions are confined to the preliminary chapters of his _Evening Amusements_,[445] a series of astronomical lessons in nineteen volumes, following the moon through a period of the golden numbers.

There is a mistake about him which can never be destroyed. It is constantly said that, at his celebrated trial in 1792, for sedition and opposition to the Liturgy, etc., he was _expelled_ from the University. He was _banished_. People cannot see the difference; but it made all the difference to {198} Mr. Frend. He held his fellowship and its profits till his marriage in 1808, and was a member of the University and of its Senate till his death in 1841, as any Cambridge Calendar up to 1841 will show. That they would have expelled him if they could, is perfectly true; and there is a funny story--also perfectly true--about their first proceedings being under a statute which would have given the power, had it not been discovered during the proceedings that the statute did not exist. It had come so near to existence as to be entered into the Vice-Chancellor's book for his signature, which it wanted, as was not seen till Mr. Frend exposed it: in fact, the statute had never actually passed.

There is an absurd mistake in Gunning's[446] _Reminiscences of Cambridge_. In quoting a passage of Mr. Frend's pamphlet, which was very obnoxious to the existing Government, it is printed that the poor market-women complained that they were to be _scotched_ a quarter of their wages by taxation; and attention is called to the word by its being three times printed in italics. In the pamphlet it is "sconced"; that very common old word for fined or mulcted.

Lord Lyndhurst,[447] who has [1863] just passed away under a load of years and honors, was Mr. Frend's private pupil at Cambridge. At the time of the celebrated trial, he and two others amused themselves, and vented the feeling which was very strong among the undergraduates, by chalking the walls of Cambridge with "Frend for ever!" While thus engaged in what, using the term legally, we are probably to call his first publication, he and his friends were surprised by the proctors. Flight and chase followed of course: Copley and one of the others, Serjeant Rough,[448] escaped: the {199} third, whose name I forget, but who afterwards, I have been told was a bishop,[449] being lame, was captured and impositioned. Looking at the Cambridge Calendar to verify the fact that Copley was an undergraduate at the time, I find that there are but two other men in the list of honors of his year whose names are now widely remembered. And they were both celebrated schoolmasters; Butler[450] of Harrow, and Tate[451] of Richmond.

But Mr. Frend had another noted pupil. I once had a conversation with a very remarkable man, who was generally called "Place,[452] the tailor," but who was politician, political economist, etc., etc. He sat in the room above his shop--he was then a thriving master tailor at Charing Cross--surrounded by books enough for nine, to shame a proverb. The blue books alone, cut up into strips, would have measured Great Britain for oh-no-we-never-mention-'ems, the Highlands included. I cannot find a biography of this worthy and able man. I happened to mention William Frend, and he said, "Ah! my old master, as I always call him. Many and many a time, and year after year, did he come in every {200} now and then to give me instruction, while I was sitting on the board, working for my living, you know."

Place, who really was a sound economist, is joined with Cobbett, because they were together at one time, and because he was, in 1800, etc., a great Radical. But for Cobbett he had a great contempt. He told me the following story. He and others were advising with Cobbett about the defense he was to make on a trial for seditious libel which was coming on. Said Place, "You must put in the letters you have received from Ministers, members of the Commons from the Speaker downwards, etc., about your Register, and their wish to have subjects noted. You must then ask the jury whether a person so addressed must be considered as a common sower of sedition, etc. You will be acquitted; nay, if your intention should get about, very likely they will manage to stop proceedings." Cobbett was too much disturbed to listen; he walked about the room ejaculating "D---- the prison!" and the like. He had not the sense to follow the advice, and was convicted.

Cobbett, to go on with the chain, was a political acrobat, ready for any kind of posture. A friend of mine gave me several times an account of a mission to him. A Tory member--those who know the old Tory world may look for his initials in initials of two consecutive words of "Pay his money with interest"--who was, of course, a political opponent, thought Cobbett had been hardly used, and determined to subscribe handsomely towards the expenses he was incurring as a candidate. My friend was commissioned to hand over the money--a bag of sovereigns, that notes might not be traced. He went into Cobbett's committee-room, told the patriot his errand, and put the money on the table. "And to whom, sir, am I indebted?" said Cobbett. "The donor," was the answer, "is Mr. Andrew Theophilus Smith," or some such unlikely pair of baptismals. "Ah!" said Cobbett, "I have known Mr. A. T. S. a long time! he was always a true friend of his country!" {201}

To return to Place. He is a noted instance of the advantage of our jury system, which never asks a man's politics, etc. The late King of Hanover, when Duke of Cumberland, being unpopular, was brought under unjust suspicions by the suicide of his valet: he must have seduced the wife and murdered the husband. The charges were as absurd as those brought against the Englishman in the Frenchman's attempt at satirical verses upon him:

"The Englishman is a very bad man;
He drink the beer and he steal the can:
He kiss the wife and he beat the man;
And the Englishman is a very G---- d----."

The charges were revived in a much later day, and the defense might have given some trouble. But Place, who had been the foreman at the inquest, came forward, and settled the question in a few lines. Every one knew that the old Radical was quite free of all disposition to suppress truth from wish to curry favor with royalty.

John Speed,[453] the author of the _English History_,[454] (1632) which Bishop Nicolson[455] calls the best chronicle extant, was a man, like Place, of no education, but what he gave himself. The bishop says he would have done better if he had a better training: but what, he adds, could have been expected from a tailor! This Speed was, as well as Place. But he was {202} released from manual labor by Sir Fulk Grevil,[456] who enabled him to study.

A STORY ON SIMSON.