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776 ®!)£ HeairtftY [Saturday,
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MEMORANDUM. Contrasts are freely drawn j...
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THE COUN-rACTORS OUTWITTED BY THEMSELVES...
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t li r. 11 o u a k o v v, i: i> tf o it ...
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Critics are not the legislators, but the...
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"Arms give place to the toga"; the battl...
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Pope, recalling the fate of the social f...
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Mr. Ri/skin has put forth his Pree-Rnp h...
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The " Monks of old " have much unconscio...
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Transcript
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Jfnui.Isu Kkkmno On Thk Oovkrnmknt Itali...
have polluted , in no form whatever can you expect good government . ' These are bold expressions ; but they strike home . The sentiment that tyrants ought to be called to account by the nations whom they misgovern will , we believe , find an echo among the countrymen of Hampden and Cromwell . King Ferdinand of , Naples , brought before a court of law , tried openly by a Neapolitan jury , and , if found guilty , punished by the penalty for the gravest crimes , would be a spectacle of justice . He might , in a highly enlightened court , get off on the plea that the prisoner , like his family , had been weak in mind . For a Jury mighT . be a protection to those tyrants who repudiate every responsibility , save that which is enforced by the arm of the assassin .
776 ®!)£ Heairtfty [Saturday,
776 ®!) £ HeairtftY [ Saturday ,
Memorandum. Contrasts Are Freely Drawn J...
MEMORANDUM . Contrasts are freely drawn just now between the conduct of the Governments in Rome and Naples , both of which refuse permission to . the Protestant residents for fitting places of worship , and the tolerance shown in our own country to Roman Catholics . But the contrast is idle . In one sense it is what logicians call an identical proposition : you are contrasting what we have always boasted to be tolerance with what we have always known to be intolerance , only changing the general names into particular names . And so much force as may be in that old contrast is diminished by so much force as there may be in the Anti-Papal Bill—whatever that may be .
To make the contrast available you should make the things compared equal in other respects . If Rome were under a popular constitution you could contrast it with England : but there was no charge of sectarian intolerance against the Republican Government of Home . The persons aggrieved in Rome and Naples are aliens : those whom intolerance would aggrieve here are our own fellow-countrymen . The case reminds us how difficult of application is the lex talionis : how much easiest and safest the law of dealing with all according to our own honour and dignity , as kindly and generously as possible .
The Coun-Ractors Outwitted By Themselves...
THE COUN-rACTORS OUTWITTED BY THEMSELVES . A Dismal practical joke have the corn-factors passed upon themselves . They encouraged as much as they could the admission of Continental flour , expecting to make their profit out of the " free " trade . If the millers were to suffer , was it not good for the consumers ? If , indeed , the millers themselves were to be consumed , so much the better . Cornfactors have their way , and are all delight . Trade accrues ; but lo ! the French and Germans plant in London their own factors ! Do not the
factors now , admitting the beauties of frec-tr . tde as applied to wheat and to flour , think that ihcre ought to be a duty on foreign factors ? Worse and worse : mere circulars , exclaim the appalled factors , are current about London market , on Wednesdays and Friday !? , in French or German than in English . But worse yet—the foreign factors propose to sell by auction 1 We may expect to see Beveral gentlemen appearing at thu " legitimate theatres this winter , in " lirst tragedy , " from the Theatre Uoyul , Mark Lane . "
T Li R. 11 O U A K O V V, I: I> Tf O It ...
t li r . 11 o u a k o v v , i : i > tf o it n . Tub nolc surviving AVhig of the London pi « : ss claims br a merit of Lord JoIiii ' h policy , that wheicax Sir Robert Peel has been vigorous , sudiUn , thorough , and tHfdive in his reforms , the other has betn slow , and has bo contrived ns to reconcile opponents to hit measures . The journalist puts it excellentl y when he says— "If ) ou cannot uleep , the housemaid who made your bid may be in HOinc d « Lrr « e retipoiiHible . Now , Loid John Russell
made a very diflorrnt bed for the Conservatives from any that Sir Robert Peel offered to his victims . " The Protectionists see the idol torn out of their hands , gone altogether ; wherefore , they are ai : jfry , and want to net it back . 15 ul the bed of Reform wan so made by John Kuahell—so softened with rutcpuying clauscM , ChandoH claustH , nnd so forth , that the hottest old Tory could lie down upon it . J . It . is the only genuine Betty to mnke m > beds at the Reform inn , —the Bedford Anns , Iiuukc-Ol-call for every elaub of bagman political .
But the friendly critic is wrong . Theie -irm : people most anxious to get into the place t . moolhcd by « ir Robert Peel , to go to bed ; mid most soundly have thene Hume people been Bleeping there ever ( since . Nothing could diNturb them but their own bad dicmi—the antipupul nig him are . Thvy were content enough to K < -t into that bed , till of them , liom RubAcll to IIawes , and to lie there too . On tin ; other hand , you can Hcareely find men who like to get into it next after them . . Stanley and others declined poiutblank : they Naid that the bed wau tumbled dirty , and not at all inviting . The contemptuous burden of their noiig wan— "See-Haw , Margery Daw . " "Good beds" are placarded at the Old Ori ginal Reform Inn ; but the pliice in lowing its ciiHtom ; it in not ho clean aw it wuh ; and people do not , quite like the character of the house .
Bed-making , according to the iilobc , is Lord John ' u forte ; uud Jum Reform Bill in the example cited , llehan had twenty yeafa' experience , and is now manufacturing another ; ho that his next Reform Bill ia to excel the lant in aoftiu-HB and iepoac— to be u more j . huu fcuthcr-beda Reform bed .
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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 lievicw .
"Arms Give Place To The Toga"; The Battl...
"Arms give place to the toga "; the battleaxe rusts against the wall , and knightly valour . —manhood , virtus—seeks eminence in the contests of intellect . Captain Pen has a higher office than Captain Sword . The age of military ascendancy has so completely passed away , that practical statesmen , m 6 n without enough imagination to become dreamers , are active at the Peace Congress
—a scheme which , fifty years ago , would have surpassed in buffoonery the most extravagant conceptions of Rabelais or Swift . Such being the march of history , it is clear that , if the aristocracy do not distinguish itself in Politics , Philosophy , and Literature , it must soon pass away . If Dukes do not lead us , wherefore should we accept of Dukes ?
The young Duke of Argyll has evidently the serious and lofty ambition of becoming ducal . He has distinguished abilities to warrant that ambition . Were he Jones , he would make himself remarkable ; being a Duke , all he does is remarked . This week he has issued a pamphlet on the Twofold Protest , in the shape of a letter to the Bishop of Oxford , the effect of which we are certain will be very considerable , since it not only shatters the preposterous Anglican claims set up by Samuel of Oxford ; but it dives deep into the heart of this vexed question , and exposes the parent source of all the much-lamented secessions from " Oxford to
Rome . " That exaltation of the Priesthood as a Divine Commission representing the Apostles by " direct unbroken succession , " which is the animating principle of Puseyism , and is in open defiance of Protestantism , the Duke of Argyll has no difficulty in proving to be the bridge over which men pass to Rome : — " Ask some of tho » e to whom I allude , " he say ? , " how they have overcome all those objections to the Romish worship and teaching which vou have often heard them express so strongly ? Ask them how
they could acquiesce in practices which they used to call , as you now call them , * idolatrous' ? You will always <^ et one answer—' the authority ot" the Church . ' And when you come to analyse this idea , so powerful to bend the strong and to prostrate weaker minds , you iind that in reality it is not one principle but a compound of two ; one respecting the nature of ' the Church' as regards its government , and another respecting its authority . The lirst is
that ' the Church' is governed by an Order of Priesthood , j-ernctuatt . d as sin h by a spiritual hereditary descent overspreading the whole Christian "world , and repies 'ining by ' diiect unbroken succession' the Holy Apostles . The second is that the authority of the l'liesthood is exclusive of every other , and ao extensive that the widest differences of doctrinal belief cannot justify separation from it , or the intrusion of any other Christian minibtry . "
And these principles are held by the High Anglican Church . To them the Duke , as a true Protestant , would oppose the " good old Protestant weaponsappeal to the authority of Scripture against the authority of the priesthood . " But as he is an advocate for thoroughness , and demands that premises be pushed to their conclusions with unswerving rigour , we would call hi . s attention to the principle underl ying Protestantism , deeper and wider than that of a mere appeal to Scri pture against Priesthood , viz ., tin ; absolute , right of private judgment—in other words , of free thought . The contest is not simply between Anglican and CalvinisL it is
the contest between Dogma and Convictionbetween the objective and the subjective Churches . The right which Ldtiikh claimed to inl . erprel . lhe Scripture in his way , we also claim to interpret it in ours , i . e . to reject it ; and our right is equall y valid with his own . I ' roni the moment , you abolish the distinction between Priest and Layman- Lutiikii did no when he insisted that Chiunt was present in every faithful soul , as a temper of the mind , an inward fact , not in the Church as an outward factyou break down all authority except that of Conscience ; and upon the broad ground of Conscience
although we may , oppose tha claims of the Anglicans , we equally oppose the claims of the Calvinists . There is one sentence in the Duke's pamphlet which we read with pain . The opinion it expresses is common enough , but we looked for higher views and sterner adherence to Truth from one so earnest and so bold . This it is : — " And here allow me say that it is only by pushing such principles to their last logical results that their truth and safety can be tested . They are not like political maxims which maybe consistently modified —in part allowed to guide and in part left to sleep . In respect to principles of religious truth , there can . be no such dealing . "
Here Compromise and half truth are openlyavowed as admissible in Politics , though in Religion they justly seem dangerous ! It is , as we said , a common error , a deplorable error . Theologians , indeed , are in the habit of calling religious truth " sacred truth , " until they learn to think it more sacred than other truth . But the Duke of Argyll will , we are persuaded , admit on reflection , that in no case is evasion of principles to be justified before Truth , and that whatever is " abstractedly " false , can never become u concretely" true . If " expediency" be admissible in Political affairs , wherefore is it inadmissible in Ecclesiastical affairs which are but the politics of the Church ?
Pope, Recalling The Fate Of The Social F...
Pope , recalling the fate of the social favourite Gay , says or sings : — " Gay dies unpension'd , with a hundred friends !" Gay would be luckier now ; in the caprices of the Pension List , favouritism ha 3 ample sway ; otherwise , we might ask with astonishment , upon what principle the favoured objects are often selected ? This week we learn , that Mr . J . Silk Buckingham and Colonel Torrens have each been awarded £ 200 per annum , in consideration of their services to literature . Far be it from us to grudge them this reward ; but we cannot help calling attention to the anomalous nature of the
Pension List . While the most paltry sums are set apart for the reward of Literature , Science , and Art ( the nation is magnificent to Captains , Generals , Field Marshals , and all the heroes fighting under Captain Sword ) , it is not proper that these sums should be withheld from the most deserving and the most needing . Whatever may be the claims of Mr . Buckingham for literary services , it is clear that he stood in no pressing need of the pension , since he had just been pensioned by the East India
Company ; and Colonel Torrens , as a Colonel , cannot , we suppose , be in want . Of course no man , at least no literary man , is so rich as not to he glad of an extra £ 200 a year ; and were funds plentiful , we should make ho comment on the pitsent cases ; but when we think of the men in absolute need , men in failing health and waning years , men to whom the pension would not he an extra , but a necessity , we cannot forbear pointing out the impropriety of giving pensions to those who need them less .
Mr. Ri/Skin Has Put Forth His Pree-Rnp H...
Mr . Ri / skin has put forth his Pree-Rnp htt eMism ; but he writes " about and about" the subject , instead of giving an elaborate statement of the aims and claims of the New School . The Pamp hlet is w ell worth reading for thesake of several pages in it apropos to Art in general , and to Turner in particular ; but it will disappoint those who seek for « : ntici « iri or defence of the P . R . li . ' s . Before Hai'IIAB' - had dazzled the worldPainters went dm ** l 0
, Nature ; since the splendid achievements of If ** i'iiaki , they have been servile to certain tech » i u " rules , " and have forgotten Nature in copy " !? Art . That is the gist of what Mr . Rijhkin Hays 'lH with great eloquence , and great arrogance , < usual : and his manifesto turns out to be , on
whole , a world-old truiHin , dressed up with excellent advice We shall return to the Pamp We next week .
The " Monks Of Old " Have Much Unconscio...
The " Monks of old " have much unconscio ^ villainy to answer for I They piously "" "K " . ^ they were doing good service by ell ' acing tho ti of Creek and Roman Literature from l "
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 16, 1851, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_16081851/page/12/
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