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    LITERATURE, SCIENCE, ART, &e.

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    The Garrick Jubilee went not without its historian , neither shall the Burns' Centenary celebration . A contemporary " frae north o' Tweed" informs us that Mr . James Ballantine , of Edinburgh , is hard at work upon the task of chronicling the deeds that wpre done and the speeches that were spoken on

    the 25 th ultimo : how Willie brewed that particular " peck o ' mautj" and what Rab and Allan said when they " cam' to pree . " We trust that he will not forget t o animadvert upon the evasion of the truth which they were guilty of when they claimed to have only "just a wee drappie in" their " e ' e . " In sober prose , the volume is to be published by Messrs . A . Fullarton and Co ., and will contain an account of the Bums' Centenary Festivals all over the world , as far as they can be gathered .

    The reassembling of Parliament has had a great effect in stimulating the agitators for the repeal of the paper duty to fresh exertions . A meeting was held at Exeter Hall , on Wednesday last , Mr , Milner Gibson presiding , to give . an opportunity of a repetition of the old arguments , and a refutation of the old fallacies . But for the appearance of Mr . Nichol , a printer in Chandos-street , the proceedings would have been quite unanimous . This gentleman appears to be quite as inimical to the repeal of the dut y as Mr . Bolm is , though the object of his taking that view is not quite so

    appatent as in the case of the latter . As the season seems fitting , it may be as well to drop a Lint to our contemporarieSi that to all but one or two papers in the country , the ; question of the repeal of this duty will shortly be , without any hyperbole * vital . With the penny press the repeal is simply a matter of life and death , and some of the ; dear daily papers know this " so well that , although they dare not throw in the weight of their opinions openly , they never miss an opportunity of throwing cold water upon it when the time arrives . The cant that the

    consumer will not profit by the repeal , because" you cannot reduce the price of a newspaper by the fraction of a farthing , may be very special , but it is also very false , and cannot be too loudly exposed . The principles of trade have long since demonstrated that , wherever a duty is removed , competition compels that the consumer , and not the seller , gets the benefit of it . Nor will this principle be falsified in this instance . Wherever the price can be lowered pro rata with the duty it will be so ; but when that is impossible , the aggregate sum paid yearly will be spent in improving the value of the article in other respects . Suppose , for example ,

    that the proprietors of the daily penny papers are relieved from the burden of some five thousand pounds , hitherto paid in duty , what are they to do with it P Enoh man would of course prefer to put it into his own pocket ; but competition steps in and compels him to spend it in trying to excel his neighbours , In every sense , therefore , the public must be gainers by the repeal of a tax which has been very fitly termed " a tax upon knowledge . " I ? ot many remarkable books have issued from the press this week : that by Lord Campbell upon the legal acquirements of Shakspearo is perhaps the most remarkablethough that is but an

    incon-, clusive attempt to prove that the immortal bard was once an attorney ' s hack clerk . Captain May no Reid ' s new novel , Owen Meredith ' s now poem , and the Rov . Alfred H . New ' s glorification of Sclina , Countess of Huntingdon , uncW the eccentrio title of " The Coronet and the Cross , "—and what more remains to bo recorded P We arc glad to perceive that the shade of do \ ibt which rested upon Mrs . Elliott ' s journal has been removed by Mr . Bentloy ' s explanation that lie purchased the mnnusorint of Miss Bcntinok . tho

    erranddaughter of Mrs . Miott . This , of oourso , explains tuo whole mystery ; but the noxt question is whether tho young lady was awavo of tho contents of tlw paokot before sue consented to mako a market ot her grondafn ' s character . Aatnotio Hungarians may bewail tho ' death of * u « ig » nan nationality and tho oppression of tho houbo of Hapsburg , but scholars will bo glad to $ * * " *© onco fftm ° » 8 Magyar Tudomanyos -anaemia , or Hungarian National Academy , is

    once more constituted , and Englishmen will be proud to hear that among the distinguished foreigners elected as members of the body are that eminent philologist and linguist Mr . Thomas Watts , of the British Museum library ; Sir . John Bowriug Sir Henry Rawlinspn , Lord Macaulay * Babbage , Herschel , and Faraday . Another stray item of foreign gossip is that the Count de Montalembert has caused two silver statuettes of Cicero and Demosthenes to be made for the purpose of presenting them to the advocates who defended him . Both in conception and execution this idea is thoroughly . French . Our Paris intelligence does not bring us news of any important work having appeared during the week . ¦ ' . '' .-.

    The obituary includes the name of Charles Phillips , the late Commissioner of the Insolvent Court , who died in the seventy-second year of his age . He was the friend and biographer of Gurran , and did good service to literature by treasuring up and recordine many a bright and wise saying that fell from the lips of the brilliant Irishman . Phillips was to some extent an unfortunate man—for his opening prospects at the bar were bright , and yet he died a Commissioner in Portugal-street . His practice was mainly at the criminal bar , and he had the misfortune to awaken public indignation by his conduct at the trial of Courvoisier , when he endeavoured to save his client by insinuating the guilt upon another person , a dodge held to be quite permissible among the members of the profession .

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    MAN AND HIS DWELLING-PLACE . Man and his Dwelling-Place . An Essay towards the Interpretation of Nature . J . W . Parker and Son . Hypotheses have been rightly esteemed the halfway houses on the road to truth . During the earlier stages of pur scientific progress , we for a while rest at them , but still leave them behind us as we pursue our journey . One of the first of these in which we are fain to rest while in our philosophical novitiate is , that the world and the things in it are what they appear . This is an opinion which even the present age will not willingly quit ; a prejudice which but few will permit to be eradicated . It

    lias , served its turn , however , and must depart . Scientific intelligence will no longer admit its validity . Our anonymous essayist , therefore , elects to maintain briefly a certain position as proper to the present stage of our progress—namely , that "the study of Nature leads to the conchision that there is a effectiveness in man which modifies his perception ' , " and " that the universe is not truly corre ^ spondent to his impressions , but is of a far more perfect and higher kind . " The author proceods to illustrate this position , by showing that , though Nature is apparently inert , she is not aotually so . The history of science is ,

    accordingly , an attempt to understand the universe on the supposition that the inertness ( or defect ) exists in Nature ; but the . attempt leads to the result of transferring the defect from Nature to human perception . Man , in his present condition , wants life . The trno life of man is of another kind —it corresponds to true absolute being , his true relations to which have to be restored . Nature , theroforo , in herself is not inert , or physioal , but spiritual . " In other words , there is not a physical worjd and a spiritual world besides , but tho spiritual world which alone is , is physical to man ; the physical being tho mode in wlnoh man by his doi ' cotivonoss , porcoives tho spiritual . " Wo deal with the phenomena , not with tho fact of being ; wo appear at rest in relation to the

    objocts around us , but wo , like them , are reall y in motion . Honco illusion , error , and false conclusion . Soionoe has boon lately occupied in dispersing thoso consoquonces by exposing thoir onuses . II ; has been devofod to physioul roscarch . Soiontifio men have " stretched forth thoir hands unto tho Infinite . " Tho truths of modern soionoo will not readily blond with tho cqnoeptions previously formed of future . Freedom is demanded instead of that nooessity by which Nafiuro has boon supposod to bo governed . What says Humboldt in his Cosmos ? ** Nature is tho domain of liberty , " To whioh our author adds , that " the discordance of our state with tho

    aspirations and unquenchable assertions of our soul is felt but not understood . It is want of life in man under Which we labour that makes the universe physical to us , and subjects us to the tyranny of inert necessities . For Nature is not as we feel it . Thus do we perceive and feel another different fact , thus to feel it not for ever . Life is to be given to man , a life whereby , being more , he shall feel more truly . The instincts " whieh assert for man a truer , worthier being , may assume a loftier tone . Science is their friend and servant , not their enemy ; revealing deadness in respect to man , it explains the mystery of his present state , adds emphasis to the prophecy

    of a different future . Man shall be made alive ; altered not in circumstances , but in himself . The physical testifies of the spiritual ; the dead , defective world , of which we are conscious , tells us . of man , of his deadness , of his need to be made more . " We have thus thoroughly expounded the theory of this anonymous author , and in this manner , have done more real service than if we had opposed , instead of explaining , his notion . It is enough that the reader is enabled to do this for himself . The object of books like the present is that , proceeding from thinking men , they cause the reader to think also ; whether differently or not is a matter of less

    moment . .. : . . That , in the physical , we are in communion witji a spiritual world which it symbolises , is in accordance with the dynamic doctrines that now prevail . According to them , we are related to living forces . The universe is full of glory and beauty , full of activities , full of influences , with which we naturally sympathise . Affection and imagination are onee more united to scientific experiment . The product , too , has an objective value ; ¦ " the tenderness and awe which move" , are not merely " subjective enchantments . " . . And what is there needed in us in order perfectly to understand such truths as those which our author would teach ? The power of abstraction . He has , with a curious felicity , illustrated it by a reference

    to the stereoscope : — - If when we look through a stereoscope , it is said to U 3 that the object is double , we might reply in the same ways " How can that which I see be said to be double P It is single . " True ; it is not that which is consciously present to our perception that is spoken of , but . the object which causes us to have such perception , and to think aright of which we must remember the subjective laws of vision . We correct our perception , as it were , by withdrawing ( ox abstracting ) our eye from the Btereoscope . So we must mentally withdraw ( or abstract ) our eye to judge of the true reality of Nature . Not of that

    which is consciously present to our perception , but of that which truly is , we want to learn . Considering the subtle reasoning involved in tho argument of the present essay , the , style is singularly clear , neat , and intelligible . A child may understand it , though only the metaphysical man can appreciate it . The author has had the advantage of the labours of others , and p laced on their elevation sees further than many of his predeocssors . Hence the noveUy and originality of many of his views . His philosophy , however , is of a cheerful school , and breathes of human kindness .

    Our author dcyotes an entire chapter to an astronomical illustration of tho theory , We now believe , he tells us , that the starry universe is infinite , or at least inconceivably vast in its extent in space . We reject with scorn the idea that it is confinod within a petty sphero round tho earth . Yet the ^ y iscst of men boforo Copernicus could not have believed tho universe to bo as wo now know it ; to bo . It would have seemed as absurd to thorn to bo told , that tho univorse is influito , as it is to us to bo told

    that it is spiritual . And Why P Simply because they asoribou to the stnrry hcavons a condition which belonged not to it , but to themselves , On tho sooro of their own feeling's and perceptions , they boliovcd 1 hat tho heavens were moving round the earth , and woro forced thoroforo to conceive of them as they aro not . Moreover , " men admitted so long that tho motion was hi tho heavens , because it was tacitly assumed ; attention was not dirooted to that question . Whon tho inquiry was Onco distinctly raised , it could bo decided only in one way . So havo wo admit-tod so long the inortnoss wo cor * , tainly fool , to bo in nature , only booauso it has been taoilly assumed to bo so . " Tho question has not

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    LITERARY CHRONICLE OF THE WEEK .

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    m 463 , -Fe ^ rttary 5 , 1859 . ] THE L B A D E B . 171

    Literature, Science, Art, &E.

    LITERATURE , SCIENCE , ART , &e .

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 5, 1859, page 171, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2280/page/11/