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    Untitled Article

    W . H . Charming is reported to have said of his uncle , the celebrated Doctor Channing , that he was a Pot-Plato—not the original attic marble , but a copy in pot . One may forgive the nepotial irreverence for the sake of the wit ; and , plagiarising W . H . Channing , we may say that Samuel Warren is a Pot-Alison . The two Hercules Pillars of Blackwood are wonderfully alike ; but Alison is on a larger and grander scale than Warren , and is fully entitled to precedence as the original of their peculiar order of excellence . Each has the same wordy style . Each alike mistakes bombast for eloquence . Each lias the same steadfast faith in the miraculous power of a ! to metamorphose a dull sentence into a galaxy of wit . Each is a little suspicious of anything with real stalwart life in it ; and each , to borrow Disraeli's admirable sareasm , constantly writes to show that Providence is ever on the side of the Tories . Carlyle is stated to have said of Maeaulay , that his idea of God is as of a kind of higher Whig government ; and in like manner , one might much more justly say of Warren , that his idea of Grod 1 was a sublime Pitt ; and of the Day of Judgment , a judgment scene in the High . Court of Chancery , with everybody in full wies and robes , nlus

    wings . Ihe very lowest phase of human enthusiasm is when admiration is excited by clothes—and in this stage Warren is hopelessly fixed . The aspect of the Monmouth Assize is " a solemn scene ;"—and why ? Simply because three judges sit in " imposing scarlet and ermine . " The scene at a condemned sermon is " striking , " because the Rev . Dr . Cotton is picturesquely venerable" " in full canonicals . " At the trial of Lord Cardigan the " scene" is " imposing" because the Lords wear " their full robes , and the Knights the collars of thei ? respective orders . " And when the ladies fill the Peeresses' Gallery the " scene" becomes one " of great solemnity and magnificence . " Most impetuous youths of eighteen have this clothes-worship , but it usually leaves them by twenty-one . But to the soul of Warren the moment never appears to have come when the eye sees through all outer adornment , sheer to the essence of things , and men appear not what they are dressed in , but what they really are .

    Literature may he roughly divided into two great divisions—that which nierely attempts to amuse , and that which attempts to teach . There is no doubt that Mr . Warren intends these volumes to come under the latter head , and in . that case this clothes-worshi p is a fatal sin . Consider for a moment how many aspects has blindness for the substance of things . ^ What is conventional morality- ^ the morality that satisfies society , and which is pure in daylight , and sins only in the dark—hut the mere outward clothes of morality ? the show , not the reality . And yet beyond this conventional morality , Mr . Warren , appears to have no idea . We see this in the manner he handles the celebrated case of the barrister Phillips , in his defence of Courvoisier ( to which we shall allude more fully ere leaving the subject }; in that case a precedent was established , emperilling human morality and the foundations of civilised society at their very basesand

    ; Mr . Warren is blind to this , and when he has shown that Phillips was professionally correct , and his conduct was approved by Baron Parke , he thinks hhnself justified in acquitting Phillips of all blame , and charging the Examiner with a breach of the ninth commandment . We see it in his cure for duelling , viz ., hanging the conqueror , never seeing that we have duels , or should have them if the law did not already punish the dueller , simply because there is inadequate moral law in England , and because there is no justice for a man who has his wife corrupted , his sister seduced , his mother insulted , or his honour wronged , unless he can prove a monetary loss , and has a fair amount of money to spare . And beyond a conventional religion there is no trace here

    of Mr . Warren having even a glimpse . We do not say that J . W . Smith , Sir W . Pollett , the Duke of Marlborough , &c , were not religious , but we do say that Mr . Warren's evidence to that effect is inconclusive , and that it proves nothing beyond that they attended church , or had an admiration for Palev , or took the sacrament before a battle , or when dying . But the conventionality of Mr . Warren is most apparent in his Essay on the Plurality of Worlds . A more lame or incompetent handling of this question in its religious aspects it is impossible to conceive . Mere twaddle and empty reasaertion of orthodox doctrines he regards as irrefutable logic ; and when a real strong argument appears , he seems to conceive he has sufficiently disproved it by calling in the wrath of outi'agcd conventionality against the honest thinker .

    _ The assertion by Thomas Paine , that the plurality of loorlds to his mind _ demolishes Christianity , Warren simply dismisses , by calling it " impious drivel . " Now , Paine ' s writing is anything but drivel , and no one should dare to call a sincere doubt impiety , especially when its logical value is not quite nothing . Again , he calls the Vestiges "« wild work of an injiihl tendency . " Now , it would be as absurd to call some of Mr . Warren ' s most stilted fustian " eloquence , " as it is to call the Vestujes " wild . " If ever there was a calm , clear , subdued book , the Vestiges is it ; and as to its infidelity , may we ask Mr . Warren , infidelity to w / iat ? To this doxy or that doxy , porhaps , but not to the honest conviction of the author , and to the God who gave him that conviction . Perhaps this form of infidelity

    never struck Mr . Warren . We don't profess to endorse the Vestiges , but may be excused suggesting , that it may not bo an infidel work to marshal facts in support of a theory which , it true , would simply show that God , being really omnipotent and omniscient , did actually make the world on a system so grandly comprehensive , that it will last for ever without repairs , instead of having auido it on a principle that requires his constant attention and perpetual alteration and interference . We might quarrel with Mr . Warren ' s intolerance and discourtesy in these matters—let that pass ; but wo rnuat say that so utter an absence of nn eyo to soo and a brain to grasp the fundamental csseuco of subjects like these , degrades these volumes into a very lov rank .

    The first of these volumes contains a Talc , Papers on Follett , J . W . Smith , Unck Tom's Cabin , and Filcaim ' s Island , all sufficiently respectable to bo worth n printer ' s while when the subjects were now , but containing no intrinsic merit to warrant their ropubliuntion . A paper called " Who is the Murderer ? " wo commend to Mr . Warren ' s udmiroi-H , asking them to compare it with the account of tho Murs' murders by De Quinccy . They will there see true genius and pot-genius in the same Held , and bo not a little Btartled with tho difference , wo fancy . Tho article on tho Duke of

    Marlborough is chiefly remarkable for its consummate toadyin « of Alison and its naif mistaking of platitudes for thought . " ' How do the events of real life outstrip all that romance has figured or would venture to portrav ?' observes Mr . Alison . " Really does he ? Well , here is an original mind if you like . Yet we think we have met with the same thought before more tersely and better expressed . In reading this article one cannot help asking if all this of Alison , what could we say of Gibbon , of Hume , of Hallam of Macaulay ? One is also in difficulty to tell whether Alison or Marlboromrh be the greater . " Illustrious , " " brilliant , " " blazing , " « radiant " " resplendent , " " dazzling , " and such adjectives , are shower « d with lavish impartiality alike on the words of one and the actions of the other The entire paper is a wonderful instance of culinary utensils setting at denance the adage , —the . pot elaborately brightening the kettle .

    Before closing , in justice to our contemporary the Examiner , we feel bound to notice Mr . Warren ' s dealin g with the Philli ps-Courvoisier case . Mr . Warren evidently fancies his conclusion final , but it is not so . Our readers will recollect that Phillips was employed to defend Courvoisier , and did so to a certain stage , firmly believing his innocence ; but in the middle of the trial Courvoisier confessed to his counsel that he really was the murderer . Mr . Phillips , however , continued the defence , did his best to get an acquittal , and went the length of saying that " the omniscient God alone knew who had committed the murder . " The Examiner , in common with all good men , not being lawyers , was outraged at this novel scene , calculated to emperil the very foundations of social life ; and protested against this new view of , a counsel ' s duty , and in so doing attacked Mr . Phillips . This was in 1840 , and in 1849 the controversy was renewed . On this latter occasion Mr . Warren took up Mr . Phillips ' s case , and imagines that he vindicates Mr . Phillips personally , as well as proves the new precedent aright one .

    In conclusion we may say that , although these volumes are not worthy the author of the Diary and of Ten Thousand a Year , they are eminently worthy the author of the Lily and the Bee , and the Oration on the Queen ' s visit to Hull ; and in closing them for ever , we cannot refrain from uttering this remark ( quite as original as Alison ' s , quoted' above ) : when a man has nothing to say , how delightful were it if he held his peace .

    Untitled Article

    LIFE OF NICHOLAS I . . Life of Nicholas L By F . Mayne . Longman and Co . Nicholas of Russia is undoubtedly the man of the age , whether he be regarded in the fee-faw-fum aspect , or in that of the great worker of the great problem of the century . So , of course , one hears a good deal about him , as indeed one does of any sort of celebrity , of any calibre , from the Imperial measure to the Barniim . Last year the booksellers' shops abounded in . Eastern romance , wherein every kind of entirely different opinion upon the Sultan , both as to moral or physique was promulgated . This year it is his Imperial antagonist ' s turn , and the European bete noire is " sat upon " by the literary jurors , and a diversity of verdicts is the result . The personal character ' and actual history of Nicholas of Russia have less place in Mr . Mayne ' s book than , from its title and preface , we were prepared

    to find them occupy . The big man , with big moustaches and big boots , the popular idea of Nicholas entertained by John Bull , would appear to be a very adequate idea , fully corroborated by facts , to judge by the following description : — " The Czar is now fifty-seven years of age , in person tall and commanding , being about six feet two inches in height , stout , and well made , but rather inclined to corpulency . As yet , however , this is kept within due bounds by tight lacing , said to be very injurious to his personal health . His shoulders and chest are broad and full , his limbs clean and well-made , and his hands and feet small and finely formed . " Mr . Mayne does not appear to have any personal knowledgo of his subject , which he treats rather loosely , and the volume may be said to be made up of a collection of extracts from well-known works , principally from that of the Marquis de Custine . The conventional notion of the Czar , with which one begins to read anything about him , is totally undisturbed by the perusal of this book .

    " Other writers beside De Custino speak of the Czar very much like the French marquis , describing him as not a man , but an autoorat , —not as a monarch , but as a despot , as living ever in public to eye and overawe his people and his servants , and ever under a mask to conceal the terrible vindictiveness with which tlie slightest fault discoverable towards himself , Russia , and his ideas of what is due to both , is ruthlessly punished . For even while his admirers tell of his determination to punish peculation , and other faults of the same nature , yet in the true spirit of tho tyrant he punishes to revenge himself on tho offender , not to avenge the majesty of the law , or to hinder from future iniquities of the kind . . . . The one overwhelming feature of tho Czar ' s character is ambition . To be a great Russian Emperor , and to make Russia tho chief empire in the world , seems to have been his aim from tho moment he

    mounted tho throne , even if it was not the dream of his life from an earlier period . Tho partition of Poland with others , his amenities to Austria , tho assistance he rendered tliat state during tho civil war in Hungary , were all ho many present aelfdonials to smooth tho way for tho future conquest , of the land on which ho had set his heart—Turkey . For long years , as witnessed by tho diplomatic correspondence lately published , has he determined on possessing himself of tho keys of tho East , which he thinks , and probably truly , added to his mighty northern possessions , would give him supremo dominion throughout tho world . Very crafty , deop-laid , and sagacious have been his plans ; but tho Uritish feeling of protecting the weak , and tho far-seeing policy of the Emperor of tho French , have unexpectedly come in his way . "

    In similar platitudes the book abounds . When the authors composition ia succeeded by extracts from ooinowhat moro readable books , and towards the conclusion , by selections from the Times correspondence , it increases in interest . The following is a curious specimen of the mode of intellectual training to which Young Russia is suhjoctod under the Czar ' s paternal rule . It is an extract from the Catechism taught in nil Russian schools : — Q . How is tho authority of the Emperor to bo considered In reference to the Spirit of Christianity ? A . A » proceeding immediately from God . Q . What duties does religion touch us , tho humble subjects of Iris Majesty tho Emperor of Russia , to practice towards him V

    Untitled Article

    December 30 , 1854 . ] THE LEADER , 1241

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Dec. 30, 1854, page 1241, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2071/page/17/