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Leader (1850-1860), 18th November 1854, Edition 2 of 2, Page 15, The recent reception at the Palais Mazau...

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      November 18, 1854.] The Leader. Io95

      November 18 , 1854 . ] THE LEADER . IO 95

      R&'I Cttemrart

      Ettotot

      Critics Are Not The Legislators, But The...

      Critics are not the legislators , but the judges and police of literature . They do not make laws —they interpret and try to enforce them . —Edinburgh Review .

      One Of Tie Best Illustrations Of The Man...

      One of tie best illustrations of the manner in -which the war is engulphing all other interests is the fact that day after day the daily dapers are devoting all their "leaders" to topics connected with the war , affording not one to other topics . "We are now , however , in the very thick of the crisis ; and the public will probably demand refreshment soon from these incessant " rumours of war . " . Meanwhile , as we have already said , the war is originating a -whole literature of its own . This literature divides itself into two kinds—tie descriptive literature of the war , and the speculative literature of the war .

      Of . the descriptive literature we have abundance and to spare . By far the most valuable part of it is the correspondence direct from the seat of the war . The correspondents of the different newspapers seem to be competing with each other in the vividness and accuracy of their battle-paintings and scene-paintings ; and in the mass of well-written letters from officers and privates which every post brings over , there are excellent minor touches of description , filling out the accounts received from the professional writers . After all , however , it is the most difficult thing iu the world to describe a battle . We have read very good accounts of sieges , and it is possible for a non-military reader to understand a siege if tolerably well described 5 but vre have never yet met with an account of a battle— -we mean a

      real pitched battle , and not a mere fight ox skirmish : —which flashed the scene before us so as to make it conceivable and intelligible . Napier ' s JPe ? iinsida War is universally admitted to be a book pre-eminently good in its descriptions of battles ; but we cannot say that even the pages of that -work , with the inserted plans of the battles , ever made the whole phenomenon of a battle quite comprehensible to us—while , on the contrary , we fancy we picked up the sieges pretty well from the pages of the same work . The newspaper correspondents are doing their best to teach us to conceive battles better . Seated on tops of eminences these

      gentlemen survey battles going on , and send them , home mapped and coloured-Some of them by this time must have over and over again gone through Goethe ' s celebrated experience of the bullet-fever . Anxious to know what the sensation of being in a battle really was , G-oethe , when he accompanied tke German army in its invasion , of France during the French revolution , took an opportunity to ride out in a skirmish when the bullets were whistling and men were dropping . His description of his sensation was , that everything about him seemed of a brown , colour 5 the brown air in which he moved seeming also to be hot , while his own body seemed also to have its temperature raised to that of the brown medium .

      We cannot say that the speculative literature of -the war keeps pace with the descriptivo literature . A . good exposition of those generalities , historical , social , and political , which are involved in . the present war , and give it its importance , are still much needed . For example : the Greek Church question , and its bearings on the war , has hai'dly yet beea stirred in any competent manner . A-gain : the whole doctrine of Panslavism , of which the present war is but an exemplification , and the right intelligence of which is necessary for a comprehension of the relations of Poland and other parts of Eastern

      Europe to Russia , is still caviare to most of us . The English are always slow in mastering generalities . With Anglo-Saxon stolidity they seize fast enough the plain fact that the tyrant Nicholas , a man with a big stomach compressed by a belt , wants to get what he ought not to have , and is having thousands butchered to get it ; but of Nicholas , in the grander historical aspect of him as a man in whoso pcrsoa large principles and tendencies are incarnate , and who believes he has a " mission , " they have no conception . The French are far before us in this respect ; and their spoculativo literature of the war is superior to ours .

      The Students Of Glasgow University Have ...

      The students of Glasgow University have elected the Duke of Akqyle to succeed Lor < l Egxington ag their Lord Rector—the Duke obtaining a large majority of votes over Mr . Disraicli . Mr . Cakj , t ( xk -was nominated , but ¦ was afterwards withdmwn . Front the circumstance that tho post has been occupied for a scries of past years by some of tho most notable men in the country , tho Roctorship of Glasgow University is considered one of the highest honorary distinctions in tho country . Tho students are the electors , and , generally , the young men make a political use of the occasion , and divide into two parties—the one-with a Whig , the other with a Conservative

      candidate . On one or two occasions—as when they elected Camvrkix , tho poet—they have had the sense to throw politics a » ido , and sulect a man purely on tlie ground of his intellectual fume . They have missed a splendid opportunity of so showing their sense on this occasion . Mr . Caklyjlu is a man whoso notions and phrases at thin moment visibly pervade our whole intellectual atmos phere ; and even many of thoso who delight in antagonising him , fi ^ ht him with i \ mild datrUun of his own principles and tmyiuga . It is , perhaps , a law of tho activity of such a man that bo shall stand aloof from the chance of honorary distinctions , such aa baronetcies , invitations to

      Windsor Castle , solicitations to stand for boroughs , and lord-rectorships of colleges . " He looks and laughs at a' that . " It is not the less to be objected to the students of Glasgow , that with the possibility of having such a man—a Scotchman , too—as their Lord Rector , they should have so much as named the Duke of Akoyie . The Duke of Abgtle is a meritorious young nobleman , with a cultivated mind and serious tastes—that is all ; his election is referable to local influence : and Glasgow University " returning" him displays the same faculties as Tavistock when Tavistock elects a Russeix .

      It Deserves To Be Noted, As A Fact Signa...

      It deserves to be noted , as a fact signally illustrative of the present intellectual condition of the world , that at the present moment a number of able and highly-educated men are assembled in Eome , devoting their best energies to the solution of a question which they entitle " The Immaculate Conception of the Virgin . " Besides the Pope himself and the resident Roman ecclesiastics , some thirty-five prelates from different parts of Italy * and from Germany , France , England , Ireland , and . America , are busy , laying their grey heads together in order to frame a final settlement of this question , -which has been left undecided until now . The result will be that before the end of the present year , the one thousand millions of human beings who inhabit our planet will be furnished with definite instructions as to what they are to believe respecting the conception of -the Yirgin . There will no longer be that agony of suspense which has everywhere so visibly prevailed on this important subject ! Strange !

      It Is Hinted That Cardinal Wisejian, -Wh...

      It is hinted that Cardinal Wisejian , -who is aow in . Rome , may be appointed Librarian of the Yatican in the room of-Cardinal Mai , deceasedthe English Cardinal having the reputation of being the most book-learned man among the Cardinals . In such a post the Cardinal would have an opportunity of carrying into effect some of his views as to what kind of literature should be preserved , and what suppressed . Most probably , however , the appointment will not take place , if it involves a residence away from England . —Mb . MAcREABr is coming forth iroin his retirement so far as to undertake a series of dramatic readings in . aid of local charities in Manchester and Birmingham . He is to read selections from the Ensrlish

      poets in Manchester on the 27 th , and in Birmingham on the 30 th . Some go so far as to hope that he may once again tread the stage ; but this is not likely . — -Ma . Dickens is to read his Christmas Carol at an educational meeting at Bradford on the 28 th of December—a , graceful mode of serving a good cause . Lokd Aberdeen is made a Governor of the Charter House— -a foundation in which there are many abuses to be reformed . —The announcement of Babwum's Autobiography , which we made last week , is , of course , creating a sensation .

      The Recent Reception At The Palais Mazau...

      The recent reception at the Palais Mazauin of the Bishop of 0 bleaN 8 was interesting and notable in many respects . The Bishop disappointed a few and conciliated many by tho generous elevation of thought with which > in the name of the Church , he affirmed the divine origin and the immortal destiny of Letters , and resumed with glowing and graceful eloquence the services rendered to civilisation by men of learning even in Pagan times-The Bishop declared himself a humble link in tlie chaia which was destined to unite Literature and the Church , the Episcopate and the Aeademy . There were passages in the Bishop ' s address of so large and liberal a tone , sofull of the spirit of charity and kindness , that the applause of that select audience could scarcely be restrained during their delivery . The

      composition of the address was m a style of scholarly seventy tempered with a most winning and persuasive sweetness : the unction of the priest merged in . tho sympathy of the man . Altogether , the Bishop ' s language was a surprise , a charm , a reconciliation . But it was all the more welcome and remarkable that it was a bishop of Ultramontane rather than of Gallican tendencies ( and who was on the eve of departui-o for Rome , to support with , the authority of hia learning and influence that dogma of the Immaculate Conception , which tho Gallican Church disavows ) who protested so -warmly aud so nobly in favour of the Pagan literature which a section of Ultriimontanista would fain banish from the education of the youth of the nineteenth century , to give placo to the Latin of tho schoolmen and a few scraps of Grook from the Fathers . By the side of the Bishop , who spoke of Plato and of VirgU aa of men in some sort inspired , sat Count Montawom » hk . t , and M . Victor Cousnsr , the

      deserter from philosophy into tho boudoirs of the seventeenth contuiy , was gaily rocanting his liberty of thought in tho midst of a group of discarded and fallen ministers of impossible monarchies , and political apostates of ofloto regimes . Count Sai . vanoy , ox-Grand Master of tho University and President of the Academy , replied to tho Bishop of Orleans . His reply would naturally , wo might suppose , be a dignifiud eulogy of tho now academician , and a layman ' s response to thu priest ' s vindication , of the human intellect . Little do they know of tho coterum that compose tho Forty of tho Palais Ma / . arin , who imagine such a ruply nis this from Count Sai . vanj >* , Tins speech of tho ox-Ministor of Public ; Instruction was a . tissue of feoblo and querulous recriminations againat tho Freauh Revolution , but for which , most assuredly , Count Salvanoy would never havo boon even an exminister . Count yAi « vAN » v iuaislod , by tho way , on tho necessity of looming

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 18, 1854, page 15, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_18111854/page/15/