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- • At™ 9, 1856.1 T HE LEADER. 761
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ON FOOT THROUGH TYROL. On Foot Throvijlt...
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France Before The Revolution. On The Sta...
calls their habitual merriment artificial and fallacious . The French of the efghteenth century , he says , were inordinately addicted to joy and pleasure -far more addicted to pleasure and joy than their posterity , but to be weary without amusement , dull without excitement and sad in the absence of festivity , is indicative less of lig ht-heartedness than of the monotony of mind which seeks continual distraction . Contrasting the character of the nation in the last and in the present century , M . de Tocqueville has this remarkable passage : — . The baseness of mankind is not to be estimated by the degree of their subserviency to a sovereign power : that standard would be an incorrect one However submissive the French mav have been before the Revolution to the will of the king , one sort of obedience was altogether unknown to them : they knew not what it was to bow before an illegitimate and contested power-a power but little honoured frequently despised , but which is willingly endured because it may be serviceable or because i ^^ ay hurt To this degrading form of servitude they were ever strangers . The king inspired them with feelings which none of the most absolute princes who have since appeared in the world have been able to call forth , and which are become incomprehensible to the present generation , so entirely has the Revolution extirpated them from the hearts of the nation . They loved him with the affection due to a father ; they revered him with the respect due to God . In submitting to the most arbitrary of his commands they yielded less to compulsion than to loyalty , and thus they frequently preserved great freedom of mind even in the most complete dependence . To them the greatest evil of obedience was compulsion ; to us it is the least : the worst is m that servile sentiment which leads men to obey . We have no right to despise our forefathers . Would to God that we could recover , with their prejudices and their faults , something of their greatness ! How , then , did the French people learn to Jiate royalty , aristocracy , priestly power ? M . de Tocqueville has written this book in reply , lo say that his exposition leaves the Revolution partly unintelligible , or intelligible only from a consideration of the peculiar character of the French , is , it seems to us , to ignore a large part of his argument , as well as to disparage the importance of that which is an essential object of investigation —the connexion of national character with historical events . Even omitting , however , M . de Tocqueville ' s estimate of his countrymen— a mere variation of Strabo ' s character of the Gauls—his plea of reasons suffices to establish the necessity of a Revolution in the last century to change the state of France . It was a mighty protest against the doctrine of human inequality , which had nowhere become so oppressive or so repulsive . It was nowhere so oppressive , because in no other country had feudalism asserted privileges so inconsistent with the general growth of ideas and manners , and it was nowhere so repulsive , because the peasantry , instead of being mediaeval serfs , were possessed of intelligence and spirit . The people improved and the government deteriorated . The government at length yielded to the popular impulse , but the nobles and clergy first resisted the government and then seduced it . A great nation hastening to reform was abruptly and treasonably repulsed , and the collision ensued which left monarchy and aristocracy ruined : — Picture to yourself a French peasant of the eighteenth century , or , I might rather say , the peasant now before your eyes , for the man is the same ; his condition is altered , but not his character . * Take him as he is described in the documents I have quoted—so passionately enamoured of the soil , that he will spend all his savings to purchase it , and to purchase it at any price . To complete this purchase he must first pay a tax , not to the government , but to other landowners of the neighbourhood , as unconnected as himself with the administration of public affairs , and hardly more influential than he is . He possesses it at last ; his heart is buried in it with the seed he sows . This little nook of ground , which is his own in this vast universe , fills"him with pride and independence . But again these neighbours call him from his furrow , and compel him to come to work for them without wages . He tries to defend his young crops from their game ; again they prevent him . As he crosses the river they wait for his passage to levy a toll . He finds them at the market , where they sell him the right of selling his own produce ; and when , on liis return home , he wants to use the remainder of his wheat for his own sustenance—of that wheat which wa 3 planted by his hands , and has grown under his eyes—he cannot touch it till he has ground it at the mill and baked it at the bakehouse of these same men . A portion of the income of his little property is paid away in quit-rents to them also , and these dues can neither be extinguished nor redeemed . Whatever he does , these troublesome neighbours are everywhere on his path , to disturb'his happiness , to interfere with his labour , to consume his profits ; and when these are dismissed , others in the black garb of the Church present themselves to carry off the clearest profit of his harvest . Picture to yourself the condition , the wants , the character , the passions of this man , and compute , if you arc able , the stores of hatred and of envy which are accumulated in his heart . Apply this description to the majority of a numerous people—docs i * supply slight or powerful reasons for disaffection and resistance ? M . do Tocquevillo , however , rests his theory on no exceptional or isolated circumstances . Every class of the population , every institution , old or new , changed or unchanged , every privilege and every concession , contribute to loosen the ties of the state and of society . The Church was attacked , because it was a political power , and because " France had been the prey of religious wars . The state was attacked , because under it hud grown up a system which reversed the natural condition of society . A vast scheme of centralization had lodged enormous power in tho hands of the king and his councillors , the thirty masters of requests who governed France . Municipal rights had been abolished , and the principles of the common law had been denounced as inapplicable to the proceedings of government . The court even endeavoured to create for itself a monopoly of journalism , and starting an official gazette , appointed sub-delegates as correspondents in all the provinces . ' Hereupon tho sub-delegiiteH undertuke tho task . One of them reported that « smuggler of suit had been hung , and had dinplnyod great courage ; another that a woman in his district had been delivered of three girls ut a birth ; a third that a dreadful storm had occurred , though without doing any mischief . One of them declared that in apito of all Iuh oflortH he had been unable to ( Uncover anything worth recording , but that ho will subscribe himself to so useful a journal , and will exhort nil respectable poinona to follow hia example . The paper failed , and was as inefficacious as the malignant laws against a free press and free diaeuHHion . But tho attempts of tho clergy and of the nobles to exempt themselves , in an ago of new enlightenment , from their
share in the burdens of the state , would alone have sufficed to justify the Revolution . The petition of the noble who wrote , " Your feeling heart will never consent to see the father of a family of my rank , strictly taxed by 1 twentieths like a father of the lower classes , " is scarcely surpassed , for impotence by the assurance of the hig h-bred lady who said the Divinity would think twice before He condemned a woman of quality . Meanwhile , to the extinction of local liberties , the promotion of the capital , the smoothi ng of the nation to an even surface—the establishment of equality withoutireedom , which is the most subtle art of despotism , was added that administrative corruption which led Burke , in his better days , to prophesy a vast convulsion in France : — It has been reckoned that between the year 3 1693 and 1790 alone , forty thousand places were created , almost all within the reach of the lower middle class . I have counted that , in 1750 , in a provincial town of moderate size , no less than one hundred and nine persons were engaged in the administration of justice , and one hundred and twenty-six in the execution of the judgments delivered by them—all inhabitants of the town . Of course , every place was sold . A . sort of bastard official class was thu 3 created , despised by the nobles , and hated by the people : — Government having , in its eagerness to turn everything into money , put up to sale most of the public offices , had thus deprived itself of the power of giviDg or withdrawing those offices at pleasure . Thus one of its passions had considerably impaired the success of another : its rapacity had balanced its ambition . The State was therefore incessantly reduced to act through instruments which it had not forged , and which it could not break . The consequence was that its most absolute will was frequentlyparalyzed in the execution of it- This strange and vicious constitution of the public offices thus stood instead of a sort of political guarantee against the omnipotence of the central power . Thus , the source of all corruption was not the source of all authority , and while the people lost their rights the crown lost its power , and France was given over to a privileged Church—a nobility fed upon exemption , and an . official caste intent only upon salaries and bribes . Nevertheless , as M . de Tocqueville proves , with emphatic elaboration , the people were not helpless ; they had grown too strong lor slavery , as well as too intelligent : — The spirit of the age had begun to penetrate by many ways into these untutored minds ; it penetrated by irregular and hidden channels , and assumed the strangest shapes in their narrow and obscure capacities . M . de Tocqueville arranges the departments of his subject in orderly and . connected succession , treating of the position of literary men in this age of isolated classes , and of their authority in politics and relig ion ; of the early development of reform , separated , unhappily , from the idea of liberty ; of economical doctrines sought to be imposed without political franchises being conferred ; of the exciting character of the remedies adopted by the court ; of all the movements , social , ecclesiastical , moral , which preceded the great explosion , and rendered it inevitable . * ± u An exposition so wide , so luminous , and so calm , is seldom given from the pen of any writer , however unprejudiced , however largely informed . M . de Tocqueville is not a pedant ; but he is a rare historical scholar , and illustrates every aspect of his subject by the aid of regular and well applied research . Unlike many writers , besides knowing where to find his materials , he knows how to use them . Any bibliographist is competent to dig up forgotten authorities ; but if he would be more than an amasser of evidence , he must be , as M . de Tocqueville is , a philosopher . Some interesting points have not been noticed by M . de Tocqueville . VVe mean the attempt of the Duke of Orleans , after the death of Louis XIV ., to establish seven reigning councils of state ; the ravages of the plague , in 1720 , from Marseilles to Montpellier , which lon <* left an indelible impress on the state of the peasantry ; the insurrection of the Beauvoisis , which is barely glanced at ; the stupendous public debt contracted by Louis XIV . ; the demoralization of the court , which cannot have been without its effect ; the age of poison ; the Parc-aux Cerfs and the Petit Trianon ; the Spintrian mysteries of Louis XV . ; the prodigality of his successor , b y which even Colbert was terrified ; the confusion of finances ; the propagation of strange and destructive ideas , which worked into the popular mind , and prepared it for the teachings of D'Alembert , Diderot , and Helvetius . But M . de Tocqueville ' s argument , though fragmentary—necessarily so because the subject is illimitable—is of noble proportions , and is itself sufficient to explain the French Revolution . We could not recommend it more earnestly , as a treatise to be studied by every serious reader , than by saying that an attentive perusal of M . de Tocqueville ' s book will in future form a necessary clement of political education .
- • At™ 9, 1856.1 T He Leader. 761
- At ™ 9 , 1856 . 1 T HE LEADER . 761
On Foot Through Tyrol. On Foot Throvijlt...
ON FOOT THROUGH TYROL . On Foot Throvijlt Tyrol , in the Summer of 1855 . By Walter White , Author of " A Londoner's Walk to tho Land ' s End . " Chapman and Hull . " On Foot Through Tyrol , \\\ Jitlg , 1855 , " would have been the accurate title to this book , since Mr . White was only there during the month of July , in which time , as he informs us , ho had " travelled more than two thousand miles , of which four hundred and twenty on foot , at a cost , including everything , of less than fourteen pounds . " We arc particular in stating the time occupied , because it limits the expectations of the reader . No one will demand , from so rapid a visit , anything beyond the most superficial account of the places and people . There is a certain freshness in Mr . White ' s book , lie is not the regular tourist , nor the regular tour-writer . He goes modestly on foot , and his style also goes on foot ; he avoids expensive hotels , everything like display ; and in writii % he avoids expansive rhetoric , or philosophic disquisition . It is evident that he greatly enjoyed his walk ; and wo fancy most readers will gnllop through his volume without fatigue . It is very slight , sketchy , mere rapid notes such as are jotted down in a journal , full of the trivialities of tho day , which seem not trivial when they occur . There are-some graphic pages on llofor and the Tyrolese insurrections ; but
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 9, 1856, page 17, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_09081856/page/17/
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