Chapter L: The March on Vienna (3)

But we do not propose now to follow out this idea, interesting though it would be; we would deal with the matter of "accident" in another light--that of self-culture. When a man has risen from a humble to a lofty position in life, carved his name deep into the core of the world, or fallen upon some sudden discovery with which his name is identified in all time coming, his rise, his work, his discovery is very often attributed to "accident." The fall of the apple is often quoted as the accident by which Newton discovered the law of gravitation; and the convulsed frog's legs, first observed by Galvani, are in like manner quoted as an instance of accidental discovery. But nothing can be more unfounded; Newton had been studying in retirement the laws of matter and motion, and his head was full, and his brain beating with the toil of thinking on the subject, when the apple fell. The train was already laid long before, and the significance of the apple's fall was suddenly apprehended as only genius could apprehend it; and the discovery, which had long before been elaborating, suddenly burst on the philosopher's sight. So with Galvani, Jenner, Franklin, Watt, Davy, and all other philosophers; their discoveries were invariably the result of patient labor, of long study, and of earnest investigation. They worked their way by steps, feeling for the right road like the blind man, and always trying carefully the firmness of the new ground before venturing upon it.

Genius of the very highest kind never trusts to accident, but is indefatigable in labor. Buffon has said of genius, "It is patience." Some one else has called it "intense purpose;" and another, "hard work." Newton himself used to declare, that whatever service he had done to the public was not owing to extraordinary sagacity, but solely to industry and patient thought. Genius, however, turns to account all accidents--call them rather by their right name, opportunities. The history of successful men proves that it was the habit of cultivating opportunities--of taking advantage of opportunities--which helped them to success--which, indeed, secured success. Take the Crystal Palace as an instance; was it a sudden idea--an inspiration of genius--flashing upon one who, though no architect, must at least have been something of a poet? Not at all; its contriver was simply a man who cultivates opportunities--a laborious, pains-taking man, whose life has been a career of labor, of diligent self-improvement, of assiduous cultivation of knowledge. The idea of the Crystal Palace, as Mr. Paxton himself has shown, in a lecture before the Society of Arts, was slowly and patiently elaborated by experiments extending over many years; and the Exhibition of 1851 merely afforded him the opportunity of putting forward his idea--the right thing at the right time--and the result is what we have seen.

If opportunities do not fortuitously occur, then the man of earnest purpose proceeds to make them for himself. He looks for helps every where; there are many roads into Nature; and if determined to find a path, a man need not have to wait long. He turns all accidents to account, and makes them promote his purpose. Dr. Lee, professor of Hebrew at Cambridge, pursued his trade of a bricklayer up to twenty-eight years of age, and was first led to study Hebrew by becoming interested in a Hebrew Bible, which fell in his way when engaged in the repairs of a synagogue; but before this time he had been engaged in the culture of his intellect, devoting all his spare hours and much of his nights to the study of Latin and Greek. Ferguson, the astronomer, cultivated the opportunity afforded him by the nights occupied by him in watching the flocks on the Highland hills, of studying astronomy in the heavens; and the sheep-skin in which he wrapped himself, became him as well as the gown of the Oxford Professor. Osgood, the American painter, when a boy, was deprived by an austere relative, of the use of pencils and paper; but he set to work and practiced drawing on the sand of the river side. Gifford, late editor of the _Quarterly Review_, worked his first problems in mathematics, when a cobbler's apprentice, upon small scraps of leather, which he beat smooth for the purpose. Bloomfield, the author of the "Farmer's Boy," wrote his first poems on the same material with an awl. Bewick first practiced his genius on the cottage-walls of his native village, which he covered with his sketches in chalk. Rittenhouse, the astronomer, calculated eclipses on the plow-handle. Benjamin West, the painter, made his first brushes out of the cat's tail.

It is not accident, then, that helps a man on in the world, but purpose and persistent industry. These make a man sharp to discern opportunities, and to use them. To the sluggish and the purposeless, the happiest opportunities avail nothing--they pass them by with indifference, seeing no meaning in them. Successful men achieve and perform, because they have the purpose to do so. They "scorn delights, and live laborious days." They labor with hand and head. Difficulties serve only to draw forth the energies of their character, and often their highest pleasure is in grappling with and overcoming them. Difficulties are the tutors and monitors of men, placed in their path for their best discipline and development. Push through, then strength will grow with repeated effort.

Doubtless Professor Faraday had difficulties to encounter, in working his way up from the carpenter's bench to the highest rank as a scientific chemist and philosopher. And Dr. Kitto had his difficulties to overcome, in reaching his present lofty position as one of the best of our Biblical critics; deaf from a very early age, he was for some time indebted to the poor-rates for his subsistence, having composed his first essays "in a workhouse." And Hugh Miller, the author of "The Old Red Sandstone," had difficulties to grapple with, in the stone-quarry in Cromarty, out of which he raised himself to a position of eminent honor and usefulness. And George Stephenson too, who was a trapper-boy in a coal-pit, had difficulties to encounter, perhaps greater than them all; but, like a true and strong man, bravely surmounted and triumphed over them. "What!" said John Hunter, the first of English surgeons, originally a carpenter, "Is there a man whom difficulties dishearten, who bends to the storm? He will do little. Is there one who _will_ conquer? That kind of man _never_ fails."

Man must be his own helper. He must cultivate his own nature. No man can do this for him. No institution can do it. Possibly a man may get another to do his _work_ for him, but not to do his _thinking_ for him. A man's best help is in himself--in his own heart, his own soul, his own resolute purpose. The battle can not be fought by proxy. A man's mind may be roused by another, and his desire to improve and advance himself excited by another; but he must mould his own stuff, quarry his own nature, make his own character. What if a man fails in one effort? Let him try again! Let him try hard, try often, and he can not fail ultimately to succeed. No man can tell what he can do until he tries, and tries with resolution. Difficulties often fall away of themselves, before a determination to overcome them. "There is something in resolution," says Walker, in the _Original_, "which has an influence beyond itself, and it marches on like a mighty lord among its slaves. All is prostration where it appears. When bent on good, it is almost the noblest attribute of man; when on evil, the most dangerous. It is only by _habitual_ resolution, that men succeed to any great extent--mere impulses are not sufficient."

Some are scared from the diligent practice of self-culture and self-help, because they find their progress to be slow. They are in despair, because, having planted their acorn, they do not see it grow up into an oak at once. These must cultivate the virtue of patience--one of the quietest but most valuable of human virtues. They must be satisfied to do their true work, and wait the issues thereof. "How much," says Carlyle, "grows every where, if we do but wait! Through the swamps one will shape causeways, force purifying drains; we will learn to thread the rocky inaccessibilities, and beaten tracks, worn smooth by mere traveling human feet, will form themselves. Not a difficulty but can transfigure itself into a triumph; not even a deformity, but if our own soul have imprinted worth on it, will grow dear to us."

Let us have the honesty and the wisdom to do the duty that lies nearest us; and assuredly the first is the culture of ourselves. If we can not accomplish much, we can at least do our best. We can cultivate such powers as have been given to us. We may not have the ten talents, but if we have only the one, let us bring it out and use it, not go bury it in the earth like the unworthy man in the parable. "If there be one thing on earth," said Dr. Arnold, "which is truly admirable, it is to see God's wisdom blessing an inferiority of natural powers, when they have been honestly, truly, and zealously cultivated." Let us strike into the true path, and keep there, working on hopefully, patiently, and resolutely--not turned aside by temptation, nor putting off the work from day to day by vain resolutions to do things that are never done; but DO, with all our might, what the hand findeth to do; and we may safely leave the issues in the hands of Supreme Beneficence; for doubtless the rewards of well-doing will come in their due season.

THE BROTHERS.

One fine spring day in 1831, I was walking, accompanied by a physician, in the gardens belonging to the celebrated Lunatic Asylum near Paris, conducted by Dr. B----. At the turn of an alley I suddenly found myself close to an old man, on whose arm leaned a youth, apparently about twenty years of age. The countenance of the first wore an expression of profound sadness, while the young man's eye gleamed with the wild strange fire of madness.

The aged man saluted me with silent courtesy, but the younger ran to me, seized my hand, and exclaimed, "A glorious day, monsieur; the scaffold is ready on the Plaza Bemposta! Do you see the crowds assembled? And look! chained on yonder cart, that woman with the pale and savage face; that is Queen Carlotta, the wife of Juan VI., the mother of Don Miguel. 'Tis now thy turn to die, tigress! thy turn to bow beneath the ax, and redden the scaffold with thy blood! But adieu," he added, addressing me, "they are waiting for me--they call me! I am the queen's executioner!"

I turned toward the old man, but he only shook his head and sighed; then I questioned the physician who accompanied me.

"That young man," he said, "is one of the most interesting cases we have; his history is a strange one."

My curiosity was now excited, and I begged of my companion to satisfy it.

"May I, without indiscretion, listen also?" asked a tall man, with a sad and gloomy countenance, who now approached us, and who, as I learned afterward, was under Dr. B----'s care for a serious affection of the heart.

"You may, certainly," replied my friend, bowing, and then began: "In the year 1823, one of the first families in Portugal inhabited an old castle not far from Coimbra. The Marquis de San Payo, the head of this house had played an important part in the revolution which, for a short time, removed from the throne Juan VI. and his imperious queen, Carlotta. The attempt, however, having been finally frustrated, the men who had made it fell victims to their temerity, and the marquis, disgraced and distrusted by the reigning powers, was forced to live in his castle, as it were in exile. His wife and his two sons accompanied him thither; the eldest of these, named Manoel, was fifteen years of age, and of an ardent, excitable temperament; his brother, Jacinto, two years younger, was of a tender, melancholy, dreamy disposition. The minds of both were fully nurtured in the political views which had ruined their father's fortunes, both by his conversation and the instructions imparted to them at the college of Coimbra. That city had become the centre of the Cortes' revolutionary operations, and the University had not escaped the contagious excitement of the times. The students organized the plan of a new insurrection, and at their head was Manoel; the contest, however, proved an unequal one--a charge of cavalry, a few volleys of shot and shell, two hundred corpses on the field, and all was over. Manoel was taken, and thrown into the prison of Oporto. The rebels were divided into three classes; the first, and least guilty, were condemned to perpetual confinement, the second to transportation, and the third to death; among the latter was Manoel. No allowance was made for his youth and inexperience, for among his judges was the Duca d'Arenas, a former rival of the marquis, first in love and then in ambition, whose cowardly malicious spirit sought to strike the father through the son."

Here the stranger, who was listening attentively, gave a visible start.

"Imagine," resumed the doctor, "what must have been the anguish of the poor parents, and of Jacinto. The boy's energies were roused by his mighty grief; he hastened to the palace of Bemposta, and went straight to the hall, where the queen was giving audience to her favorite d'Arenas. When Jacinto crossed the threshold, he paused; a woman was before him--a cold and haughty woman. No trace of pity or of softness lingered on her features, or beamed in her piercing eyes; no, her heart was ice, her face iron.

"'Pardon, madam!' cried the boy, falling on his knees.

"'Child, we know of naught but justice; who art thou--what dost thou want?'

"'I am the son of the Marquis de San Payo, and I come to ask pardon for my brother.'

"The Duke d'Arenas looked up, and exchanged glances with the queen. 'Madam,' said he, 'the best clemency in political affairs is shown by the sword of the executioner!'

"'Manoel is but sixteen years old!' cried Jacinto, in a voice of agony.

"'So much the better,' replied Carlotta; '_he will go the more surely and speedily to heaven_!'[4]

[4] These words are matter of history.

"Next morning the condemned cart left the prison of Oporto; it contained the two brothers, for Donna Carlotta, with an incredible refinement of cruelty, had ordered that Jacinto should be present at the execution. I shall not try to describe the last scene of this fearful drama; when Manoel bowed his head, Jacinto started upright; and when the fatal blow had fallen, he crouched down on the scaffold; a smile parted his lips--he was struck with madness! Concealed among the crowd, the marquis had witnessed all, but no external emotion betrayed his inward agony; his tearless eyes were fixed on the ax which had hewn down the noblest branch of his house. As to the marchioness, her woe was also silent: eight days afterward, she was found dead, with her eyes fixed on Manoel's portrait. The marquis, after a time, went to England with Jacinto, where he was during a year and a half under medical treatment, but without benefit. Afterward, they went to Germany, and there, finding science equally powerless, the marquis at length resolved to place his son under the care of Dr. B----; he is now in a fair way to recover."

"Are you sure of that!" asked the stranger eagerly.

"I have every reason to believe it."

We walked toward the house, and again saw Jacinto; he was seated on a grass-plat, leaning forward, with his face buried in his hands. His father was near him, grave, silent, and anxious-looking as before. The stranger followed us, and, as he came near, the eyes of Jacinto were raised, and fixed on him with a wild bright look. Suddenly the youth started up, and shrieked, "the Duke d'Arenas!" Then he fell senseless on the ground.

At the unwonted sound the old man thought that intellect and memory had returned to his child, and, forgetting that his enemy, the murderer of his eldest son, stood before him, he exclaimed, "Oh! thank God he is saved!"

"He is _lost_," said the doctor, sadly.

A few moments of awful silence followed; all eyes were fixed on Jacinto, whose mouth was open, and whose eyes were fixed on vacancy. The sudden shock had rendered him a hopeless idiot.

The Duke d'Arenas looked at the marquis with an earnest supplicating expression; and then, falling on his knees before him, exclaimed, "Pardon me, I have suffered!"

"I curse thee! Duke d'Arenas."

"Behold me at thy feet, Marquis de San Payo!"

"Begone!" cried the old man, sternly; "there are between us the corpses of my wife and of my eldest son, besides this other ruin, whose destruction you have just achieved; I am now childless!"

The Duke d'Arenas fixed on the marquis a look so filled with sorrow and despair, that it might have sufficed to satisfy his vengeance.

"And I," he said, bending his head, "can never again know repose, except in the grave!"

SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF M. THIERS.

M. Thiers is one of the notable celebrities of our day. Though a Frenchman, his name is well known in England as the author of the famous History of the French Revolution. But in his own country, he is also known as a distinguished orator and statesman; indeed it is not too much to say, that Thiers is the _cleverest_ man in France.

You enter the Chamber of Deputies on some day of grand debate. A speaker has possession of the ear of the house. You see little more than his head above the marble of the tribune, but the head is a good one--large, well-formed, and intelligent. His eyes, the twinkle of which you can discern behind those huge spectacles he wears, are keen and piercing. His face is short, and rather disfigured by a grin, but when he speaks, it is lively, volatile, and expressive in a remarkable degree. His thin nervous lips, curled like Voltaire's, are characterized by a smile, by turns the most winning, sarcastic, and subtle, that can possibly be imagined.

Listen to him. He speaks with a nasal twang and a provincial accent. He has no melody in his voice. It is loud and ear-piercing--that of a vixen. Sometimes it rises to a screech, as that of Sheil's did. And yet all ears hang listening to that voice, which pours forth a succession of words embodying ideas as clear as crystal, copious almost to excess, but never tiresome. His exuberant thoughts flow from him without effort; he is perfectly easy, frank, familiar, and colloquial, in his style; his illustrations are most happy, often exceedingly brilliant. Be his theme ever so unpopular, he is invariably listened to with interest. His diminutive figure, his grim face, his screeching voice, are all forgotten in the brilliancy of his eloquence, and in the felicitous dexterity of his argument. That speaker is M. Thiers.

Such as his position is, he has made it himself. He has worked his way upward from obscure poverty. He owes nothing to birth, but every thing to labor. His father was a poor locksmith of Marseilles, where Adolphe was born in the year 1797. Through the interest of some of his mother's relations, the boy obtained admission to the free school of Marseilles, where he distinguished himself by his industry, and achieved considerable success. From thence, at eighteen, he went to study law at the town of Aix. Here it was that he formed his friendship with Mignet, afterward the distinguished historian. These two young men, in the intervals of their dry labors in the study of law, directed their attention to literary, historical, and political subjects. Thiers even led a political party of the students of Aix, and harangued them against the government of the restoration. He was practicing his eloquence for the tribune, though he then knew it not. He thus got into disgrace with the professors and the police, but the students were ardently devoted to him. He competed for a prize essay, and though his paper was the best, the professors refused to adjudge the prize to "the little Jacobin." The competition was adjourned till next year. Thiers sent in his paper again "next year," but meanwhile, a production arrived from Paris, which eclipsed all the others. To this the prize was speedily adjudged by the professors. But great was their dismay, when, on opening the sealed letter containing the name of the competitor, it was found to be no other than that of M. Thiers himself!

The young lawyer commenced practice in the town of Aix, but finding it up-hill work, and not at all productive, he determined to remove, in company with his friend Mignet, to seek his fortune in Paris. Full of talents, but light in pocket, the two friends entered the capital, and took lodgings in one of its obscurest and dirtiest quarters--a room on the fourth floor of a house in the dark Passage Montesquieu, of which a deal chest of drawers, a walnut-wood bedstead, two chairs, and a small black table somewhat rickety, constituted the furniture. There the two students lodged, working for the future. They did not wait with their hands folded. Thiers was only twenty-four, but he could already write with brilliancy and power, as his prize essay had proved. He obtained an introduction to Manuel, then a man of great influence in Paris, who introduced Thiers to Lafitte, the banker, and Lafitte got him admitted among the editors of the _Constitutionelle_, then the leading journal. It was the organ of _Les Epiciers_, or "grocers," in other words, of the rising middle classes of France. At the same time, Mignet obtained a similar engagement on the _Courrier_.

The position of Thiers was a good one to start from, and he did not fail to take advantage of it. He possessed a lively and brilliant style, admirably suited for polemical controversy; and he soon attracted notice by the boldness of his articles. He ventured to write on all subjects, and in course of time he learned something of them. Art, politics, literature, philosophy, religion, history, all came alike ready to his hand. In France, the literary man is a much greater person than he is in England. He is a veritable member of the fourth estate, which in France overshadows all others. Thiers became known, invited, courted, and was a frequenter of the most brilliant _salons_ of the opposition. But newspaper writing was not enough to satisfy the indefatigable industry of the man. He must write history too, and his theme was neither more nor less than the great French Revolution. Our readers must know the book well enough. It is remarkably rapid, brilliant, stylish--full of interest in its narrative, though not very scrupulous in its morality--decidedly fatalistic, recognizing heroism only in the conqueror, and unworthiness only in the vanquished--in short, the history of M. Thiers is a deification of _success_. But ordinary readers did not look much below the surface; the brilliant narrative, which ministered abundantly to the national appetite for "glory," fascinated all readers; and M. Thiers at once took his place among the most distinguished literary and political leaders of France.

He became a partner in the _Constitutionelle_; descended from his garret, turned dandy, and frequented Tortoni's. Nothing less than a handsome hotel could now contain him. Thiers has grown a successful man, and to such nothing is denied. Liberalism had thriven so well with him, that he must go a little further, he must be democratic; the drift of opinion was then in that direction, so he set on foot the _National_, the organ of the revolutionary party. The war which this paper waged against the government of Charles X. and the Polignac ministry, was of the most relentless kind. The _National_ it was, that stung the government into the famous _Ordonnances_, which issued in the "Three Days'" Revolution of 1830. Thiers was, throughout, the soul of this ardent, obstinate, brilliant struggle against the old Bourbon government.

The _National_ had only been seven months in existence, when the event referred to occurred. The _Ordonnances_ against the Press appeared on the morning of the 26th of July. In the course of the day, the leaders of the Opposition Press, and several members of the Chamber of Deputies, met at the office of the _National_. M. Thiers at once propounded the course that was to be adopted at this juncture.

"Well," said he, "what's to be done now, as to opposition in the journals--in our articles? Come! we must perform an act."

"And what mean you by an act?"

"A signal of disobedience to a law which is no law! A protest!"

"Well--do it then!" was the reply.

A committee was named, on the spur of the moment, composed of Thiers, Chatelain, and Cauchois-Lemaire. Thiers drew up the protest: he inserted the leading idea--"The writers of journals, called upon the first to obey, ought to give the first example of resistance." This was the signal of revolution! Some said, "Good! We shall insert the protest as a leading article in our journals." "Not only that," said Thiers, "we must put our names under it, and our heads under it." The protest was agreed to, after considerable discussion; it was published; and the people of Paris indorsed the protest in the streets of Paris the very next day. Thus Thiers performed the initial act, which led to the expulsion from France of the elder branch of the Bourbon family. But it ought to be added that, after having signed the protest, which was published next morning, Thiers returned to muse in the shades of Montmorency, and did not return to Paris until the 29th, after the decisive battle of the barricades had been fought.

Of course, Thiers was now a man of greater mark than ever. The new government of the Citizen King at once secured him; and the son of the Marseilles locksmith, the poor law student of Aix, the newspaper writer of the garret, was now appointed Counselor of State and Secretary-General of Finance. It is said that the Citizen King even offered him the Portfolio of Finance, which he declined on the ground of inexperience; but he afterward accepted the office of Under-Secretary of State, and mainly directed that important part of the administration through a crisis of great financial difficulty. He was sent into the Chamber of Deputies as member for Aix, at whose college he had studied.

Thiers was no favorite when he entered the Chamber; he was very generally disliked, and he did much to alarm the timid by his style of dressing a-la-Danton, as well as by his high-flown phrases in favor of democratizing Europe, saving Poland, delivering Belgium, and passing the Rhine. His eloquence was then bluster, but as he grew older, he became more polished, more cautious, and more politic. When the Lafitte ministry fell, of which he had been a member, Thiers at once deserted that party, and attached himself to the Casimir-Perier administration. He fell foul of his old comrades, who proclaimed him a renegade. Never mind! Thiers was a clever fellow, who knew what cards he was playing. He who was for passing the Rhine, was now all for repose and peace; he would have no more innovations, nor propagandism; before, the advocate of equality and democracy, he now became the defender of conservatism, the peerage, and the old institutions of France. He stood almost alone in defending the peerage, but it fell nevertheless, and the revolution went on.

On Marshal Soult assuming the direction of affairs in 1831, Thiers was appointed Minister of the Interior. La Vendee was in flames at the time, Belgium was menaced, and excitement generally prevailed. Thiers acted with great energy under the circumstances; by means of gold, a traitor was found who secured the arrest of the Duchess de Berri, and the rebellion in Vendee was extinguished. A French army was sent against Antwerp, the citadel was taken, and the independence of Belgium secured. In the Chambers, Thiers obtained a credit for a hundred millions of francs, for the completion of public works. The statue of Napoleon was replaced on the Place Vendome; public works were every where proceeded with; roads were formed; canals dug; and industry began generally to revive. The Minister of the Interior was successful.

But a storm was brewing. The republicans were yet a powerful party, and the government brought to bear upon them the terrors of the law. Secret associations were put down, and an explosion took place. Insurrections broke out at Paris and Lyons; Thiers went to the latter place, where he was less sparing of his person than he had been during the three days of Paris; for at Lyons two officers fell at his side, killed by musket-shots aimed at the minister himself. At length the insurrection was got under; dissensions occurred in the ministry; Thiers retired, but soon after took office under Marshal Mortier; the fetes of July, 1835, arrived; the Fieschi massacre took place, Thiers being by the king's side at the time of the explosion. Laws against the liberty of the Press followed this diabolic act, and now M. Thiers was found on the side of repression of free speech. The laws against the Press were enforced by him with rigor. He was now on the high road to power. He became President of the Council, and Minister of Foreign Affairs. But the Spanish intervention question occurred. Thiers was in favor of intervention, and the majority of the ministry were opposed to it. Thiers resigned office, and bided his time. He went to Rome and kissed the Pope's toe, bringing home with him leather trunks of the middle ages, Roman medals, and a store of new arguments against democracy.

A coalition ministry was formed in 1838, and Thiers, "the Mirabeau gadfly," as a pungent lady styled him about this time, became the leader of the party. Thiers failed in his assaults on the ministry; Mole reigned, then Guizot; and the brilliant Thiers was reduced to the position of a simple deputy on the seats of the opposition. But again did M. Thiers find himself in power, after the failure of the ministry on the Dotation Bill of the Duke of Nemours. The ministry of March 1st, 1840, was formed, and Thiers was the President of the Council. Louis Philippe confided all to him; but, though Louis trusted Thiers, and perhaps owed his crown to him, this statesman seemed really to be his evil genius. The Thiers ministry brought the government of France into imminent danger from foreign powers, and was replaced, as a matter of urgency, by that of Guizot, in October. Thiers again relapsed into violent opposition. Years passed, during which he proceeded with his completion of the History of the Consulate and the Empire, which brought him in large gains. The fatal year of 1848 arrived; and when Guizot was driven from power, Louis Philippe again, and for the last time, charged M. Thiers with the formation of a ministry. It did not last an hour. The revolution of 1848 was already consummated.

The career of Thiers since then is well known. For a time he disappeared from France; haunted Louis Philippe's foot-steps--still protesting undying love for that branch of the Bourbon family. He returned to the Chamber of Deputies, where he is again in opposition; though what he is, and what the principles he holds, it is difficult to say. Principles, indeed, seem to stick to Thiers but lightly. One day he is the bitter enemy of socialism, the next he is its defender. He is a Free-trader to-day, a Protectionist to-morrow. He is a liberal and a conservative by turns. In short, he is a man "too clever by half," and seems constantly tempted, like many skillful speakers, to show how much can be said on both sides of a question. He is greatest in an attack; he is a capital puller-down: when any thing is to be built up, you will not find Thiers among the constructors. He is a thoroughly dextrous man--sagacious, subtle, scheming, and indefatigable. Few trust him, and yet, see how he is praised! "Have you read Thiers' speech? Ah! there is a transcendent orator!" "Bah!" says another, "who believes in what Thiers says? The little stinging dwarf--he is only the _roue_ of the tribune!"

Thus, though Thiers has many admirers, he has few friends. His changes have been so sudden and unexpected on many occasions, that few care to trust him. He is not a man to be depended upon. He has been a republican and a monarchist by turns: who knows but to-morrow he may be a Red? It all depends on how the wind blows! This is what they say of M. Thiers. The nobles regard him as a _parvenu_; the republicans stigmatize him as a renegade. The monarchists think of him as a waiter on Providence.

M. Cormenin (Timon), in his _Livre des Orateurs_, has drawn a portrait of Thiers with a pencil of caustic. Perhaps it is too severe; but many say it is just. In that masterly sketch, Cormenin says--"Principles make revolutions and revolutionists. Principles found monarchies, aristocracies, republics, parliaments. Principles are morals and religion, peace and war. Principles govern the world. In truth, M. Thiers affirms that there are no principles, that is to say, M. Thiers has none. That is all."

LIFE AND DEATH.

BY REV. CHARLES KINGSLEY, AUTHOR OF "ALTON LOCKE," "YEAST," ETC.

God gives life, not only to us who have immortal souls, but to every thing on the face of the earth; for the psalm has been talking all through not only of men, but of beasts, fishes, trees, and rivers, and rocks, sun, and moon. Now, all these things have a life in them. Not a life like ours; but still you speak rightly and wisely when you say, "That tree is alive, and that tree is dead. That running water is live water; it is clear and fresh; but if it is kept standing it begins to putrefy; its life is gone from it, and a sort of death comes over it, and makes it foul, and unwholesome, and unfit to drink." This is a deep matter, this, how there is a sort of life in every thing, even to the stones under our feet. I do not mean, of course, that stones can think as our life makes us do, or feel as the beasts' life makes them do; or even grow as the trees' life makes them do; but I mean that their life keeps them as they are, without changing. You hear miners and quarrymen talk very truly of the live rock. That stone, they say, was cut out of the live rock, meaning the rock as it was under ground, sound and hard; as it would be, for aught we know, to the end of time, unless it was taken out of the ground, out of the place where God's Spirit meant it to be, and brought up to the open air and the rain, in which it is not its nature to be; and then you will see that the life of the stone begins to pass from it bit by bit, that it crumbles and peels away, and, in short, decays, and is turned again to its dust. Its organization, as it is called, or life, ends, and then--what? Does the stone lie forever useless? No. And there is the great, blessed mystery of how God's Spirit is always bringing life out of death. When the stone is decayed and crumbled down to dust and clay, it makes _soil_. This very soil here, which you plow, is the decayed ruins of ancient hills; the clay which you dig up in the fields was once part of some slate or granite mountains, which were worn away by weather and water, that they might become fruitful earth. Wonderful! But any one who has studied these things can tell you they are true. Any one who has ever lived in mountainous countries ought to have seen the thing happen--ought to know that the land in the mountain valleys is made at first, and kept rich year by year by the washings from the hills above; and this is the reason why land left dry by rivers and by the sea is generally so rich. Then what becomes of the soil? It begins a new life. The roots of the plants take it up; the salts which they find in it--the staple, as we call them--go to make leaves and seed; the very sand has its use; it feeds the stocks of corn and grass, and makes them stiff. The corn-stalks would never stand upright if they could not get sand from the soil. So what a thousand years ago made part of a mountain, now makes part of a wheat plant; and in a year more the wheat grain will have been eaten, and the wheat straw, perhaps, eaten too, and they will have _died_--decayed in the bodies of the animals who have eaten them, and then they will begin a third new life--they will be turned into parts of the animal's body--of a man's body. So what is now your bones and flesh may have been once a rock on some hill-side a hundred miles away.

A BLACK EAGLE IN A BAD WAY.

Austria, in this present year of grace, 1851, looks to me very much like a translated version of England under the Stuarts.

I am a resident at Vienna, and know Austria pretty well. I have seen many birds before now in a sickly state--have seen some absolutely rotting away--but I never saw one with such unpromising symptoms upon him as the Black Eagle of Austria.

The Court of Vienna is perhaps the most brilliant in Europe; the whole social system in Vienna is perhaps the most thoroughly unsound in Europe. Austria is weighed down by a numerous and impoverished nobility, by unjust taxes, and by a currency incredibly depreciated. Her commerce is hampered by all manner of monopolies, and is involved in such a complex network of restrictions, as only the industrious, gold-getting fingers of a few can unravel. Nearly the whole trade of Austria is in the hands of this busy, persevering few. Out of the immediate circle of the government, there is scarcely a satisfied man in the Austrian dominions. The nobles feel abridgment of their privileges, and decrease of profit by the abolition of their feudal rights, succeeding the late revolution. The merchants feel that in Austria they suffer more vexatious interference than it is in the nature of man to bear quietly. The people, a naturally good-humored race, have learned insensibly to clench their fists whenever they think of their absolute and paternal government.

The position of the nobles is ridiculous. They swarm over the land; increase and multiply, and starve. Not more than a few dozen of them can live honestly without employment; while not one of the noble millions may exercise a trade for bread; may practice law or medicine, or sink down into authorship. The Austrian patrician can not feed himself by marriage with a merchant's daughter; if he do, his household will not be acknowledged by his noble friends. The he-noble must marry the she-noble, and they must make a miserable, mean, hungry, noble pair.

A celebrated Viennese Professor dined one day in England with a learned lord. "Pray, how is Baron Dash?" inquired a guest--said Baron Dash being at that time an Austrian Minister.

"He is quite well," said the Professor.

"And his wife!" pursued the other. "I remember meeting her at Rome; they were just married, and she was a most delightful person. She created a sensation, no doubt, when she was received at your court?"

"She was not received at all," said the Professor.

"How was that?" asked many voices.

"Because she is not born."

"Not born" is the customary mode of ignoring (if I may use a slang word of this time) the existence of the vulgar, among the noble Viennese. At the present moment, the family of a Minister, or of any of the generals who have saved the throne, may be excluded from society on this pretense. Two recent exceptions have been made in favor of the wives of two of the most important people in the empire. They were invited to the court-balls; but were there treated so scurvily by the "born" ladies, that these unborn women visited them only once.

What is to be done by these poor nobles--shut out from commerce, law, and physic? Diplomacy is voted low; unless they get the great embassies. The church, as in all Catholic countries, is low; unless a nobleman should enter it with certain prospect of a cardinal's hat or a bishopric. The best bishoprics in the world (meaning, of course, the most luxurious) are Austrian. The revenues of the Primate of Hungary are said to be worth the comfortable trifle of sixty thousand pounds a year.

But there remains for these wretched nobles, one road to independence and distinction; and this is the army. To the army, it may be said, the whole body of the Austrian nobility belongs. The more fortunate, that is to say, the highest in rank, add to their commissions places about the court. Cherished titles are acquired in this way; and a lady may insist on being seriously addressed in polite Austrian society as--say for example, Frau-ober-consistorial-hof-Directorinn.

In the army, of course, under such a system, we see lieutenants with the hair gone from their heads, and generals with no hair come yet on their chins. A young man of family may get a captaincy in three months, which his neighbor without patronage, might not get if he lived forever. Commissions are not sold in Austria as they are in England, but the Ministry of War knows how to respond to proper influence. In an army of five hundred thousand, vacancies, it is needless to say constantly occur. The lad who is named cornet in Hungary, is presently lieutenant of a regiment in Italy, and by-and-by a captain in Croatia. After that, he may awake some morning, major, with the place of aid-de-camp to the Emperor; and to such a boy, with friends to back him, the army is decidedly a good profession. The inferior officers are miserably paid, an ensign having little more than thirty pounds a year. A captain, however, is well paid in allowances, if not in money; while a colonel has forage for twelve horses, and very good contingencies besides. Again, there are to be considered other very important differences between pay in the Austrian and pay in the English army. An Austrian can live upon his pay. His simple uniform is not costly; he is free from mess expenses, and may dine for six-pence at the tavern favored by his comrades. Not being allowed at any time to lay aside his uniform, he can not run up a long tailor's bill; and, being admitted to the best society, he need not spend much money on amusement. Besides, does not the state accord to him the privilege of going to the theatre for twopence?

The poorer officers in the Austrian service are so unreasonable and ill-conditioned, that they are not in general pleased by these advantages being given to men, who may possibly be well born, but who have certainly not been long born; and in many places combinations have been made to resist the unfair system of promotion. A young captain sent down to command gray-beards, with a lively sense of their own claims on the vacancy, is now and then required to fight, one after the other, the whole series of senior lieutenants. This causes a juvenile captain occasionally to shirk the visit to his regiment, and effect a prompt exchange.

Some part of the last-named difficulty is overcome by the existence of one or two corps of officers who have no regiment at all. Where there are no men to murmur, the business of promotion is carried on with perfect comfort.

In spite of all this, there is much to be said to the credit and honor of the innumerable throng of people forming the Austrian army. It is an excellently appointed and well-disciplined multitude. The gallantry of its soldiers, and the skill and experience of many of its highest officers, must be freely admitted. Then, too, the great number of nobles classed within it has at least had the good effect of creating a high standard of artificial honor. The fellow-feeling among Austrian soldiers is also great; those of the same rank accost each other with the "Du," the household word of German conversation; and the common word for an old companion in arms is "Duty-bruder."

Duels are frequent, but not often fatal, or even dangerous. To take the nib from an adversary's nose, or to pare a small rind from his ear, is ample vengeance even for the blood-thirsty.

An Austrian officer who has received a blow, though only in an accidental scuffle, is called upon to quit his regiment, unless he has slain upon the spot the owner of the sacrilegious hand that struck him. This he is authorized by law to do, if struck while wearing uniform. The effect of this savage custom has been to produce in Austrian officers a peculiar meekness and forbearance; to keep them always watchful against quarrels with civilians; and to make them socially the quietest gentlemen in the world.

Last winter a fast English gent left a masked ball at the Redoute, intoxicated. Disarming a sentry, he ensconced himself until morning in his box. The gent was then forwarded to the frontier, but the soldier was flogged for not having shot him.

Freedom from arrest for debt is an immunity enjoyed by Austrian officers; but those who indulge too freely in their exemption from responsibility, may want defenders powerful enough to prevent their summary dismissal from the service.

I have written thus much about the Austrian army, because, in fact, as the world here now stands, every third man is or has been a soldier; and one can not talk about society in this empire without beginning at once to talk about its military aspect.

Gay and trifling as the metropolis is, with its abundance of out-door amusement, Vienna must be put down in plain words as the most inhospitable capital in Europe. The Austrians themselves admit that they could not endure to be received abroad as they are in the habit of receiving strangers here. The greater Austrian nobles never receive a stranger to their intimacy.

A late French embassador, who conducted his establishment with splendor, and was at all times profusely hospitable, used to say that he was not once asked privately to dinner during the whole period of his residence in Vienna. The diplomatic corps do not succeed in forcing the close barriers of Austrian exclusiveness; and twenty years of residence will not entitle a stranger to feel that he has made himself familiarly the friend of a single Austrian. Any one who has lived among the higher classes in Vienna will confirm my statement, and will recall with astonishment the somewhat indignant testimony of the oldest and most respected members of the _corps diplomatique_ to the inhospitable way in which their friendly overtures have been received. Invitations to dinner are exceedingly rare; there are brilliant balls; but these do not satisfy an English longing for good-fellowship. Familiar visits and free social intercourse do not exist at all. Then there are the two great divisions of society--or the nobles and the merchant Jews; on one side poverty and pride; on the other, wealth and intellect. The ugliest and most illiterate of pauper-countesses would consider her glove soiled by contact with the rosy fingers of the fairest and most accomplished among bankers' wives. The nobles so intermarrying and so looking down contemptuously upon the brain and sinew of the land, have, as a matter of course, degenerated into colorless morsels of humanity. How long they can remain uppermost is for themselves to calculate, if they can; it is enough for us who see good wine at the bottom, and lees at the top, to know that there must be a settlement impending.

For the inhospitality of Viennese society there is one sufficient reason; it springs out of the dread of espionage. In this city of Vienna alone there are said to be four hundred police spies, varying in rank between an archduke and a waiter. Letters are not safe; writing-desks are not sacred. An office for opening letters exists in the post-office. Upon the slightest suspicion or curiosity, seals have impressions taken from them, the wax is melted over a jet of flame, the letters are read, and, if necessary, copied, re-sealed, and delivered. Wafers are of course moistened by steam. You can not prevent this espionage, but it can be detected (supposing that to be any consolation) if you seal with wax over a wafer. One consequence of the melting and steaming practices of the Austrian post-office is especially afflicting to merchants;--bills come sometimes to be presented, while the letters containing advice of them lie detained by the authorities; acceptance, in the absence of advice, being refused.

From the surveillance of the police officials, perhaps not a house in Vienna is free. The man whom you invited as a friend, and who is dancing with your wife, may be a spy. You can not tell; and for this reason people in Vienna--naturally warm and sociable--close their doors upon familiarity, and are made freezingly inhospitable. Yet this grand machine of espionage leaves crime at liberty. Although murder is rare, or at least rare of discovery (there is a Todschauer, or inspector of deaths, but no coroner's inquest), unpunished forgeries and robberies of the most shameless kind outrage society continually. Many of the more distant provinces are infested by gangs of organized banditti; who will ride, during broad daylight, into a country gentleman's courtyard; invite themselves to dinner, take away his property, and insist on a ransom for himself if he has no wish to see his house in flames. When met by troops these bands of thieves are often strong enough to offer battle.

But, although the Austrian police can not protect Austrian subjects, it can annoy not only them, but foreigners besides. The English are extremely liable to suffer. One Englishman, only the other day, was ordered to the frontier for a quarrel with his landlady; another, for keeping bad society; another, for hissing a piece of music; three, for being suspected of political intrigue; two for being newspaper reporters. The French have lately come in for their share of police attentions; and we have lost, from the same cause, the company of two Americans. Among the Austrians themselves, the very name of the police is a word of terror. By their hearths they dare barely whisper matter that would be harmless enough elsewhere, but dangerous here, if falling upon a policeman's ears.

Recently there was a poem published which professed to draw a parallel between a monarchy and a republic. Of course it was an orthodox and an almost rabid glorification of "sound" absolutist principles. The poet sent a copy to an Austrian noble; who, opening it carelessly, and immediately noticing the word "republic," handed the book back to a servant, with a shudder, and a note to the author acknowledging its receipt, and wondering that the poet "should have thought him (the noble) capable of encouraging republican principles!" This note scarified the feelings of the rhymer intensely. He hurried off to exculpate himself and explain the real aim of his book. He did this, and, of course, his book was bought.

This is the state of Austria in 1851. Men of all grades look anxiously to France; well knowing that the events in Paris next year, if they lead to outbreak, will be felt in Vienna instantly. Yet Strauss delights the dancers, and the military bands play their "Hoch Lebe" round the throne. The nobles scorn the merchants and the men of letters; who return the noble scorn with a contemptuous pity. The murmur of the populace is heard below; but still we have the gayest capital in all the world. We throng the places of amusement. Dissipation occupies our minds and shuts out graver thought. Verily, Charles Stuart might be reigning in this capital.

THE POTTER OF TOURS.

Among the choicest works of art contributed to the Great Industrial Exhibition by our French neighbors, were some enameled earthernware vases of remarkably fine workmanship, and particularly worthy of attention for their grotesque yet graceful decorations. These vases had, however, a still higher claim to distinction than that arising from their own intrinsic value, for they were the workmanship of one who may truly be ranked among "nature's nobles," although by birth and station owning no greater title than that of "Charles Avisseau, the potter of Tours."