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788 imm 1 3L1: A Pilfer ' - [Saturday,
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FAITH AND NEGATION. Miracles and Science...
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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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Fashion And Famine. ¦Fastiionandifamine ...
nobleman or two from England—a German countess—^ the greatest and most popular statesmen of oar own land , had flung a daezling splendour over these places . * " During the whole of that season the United States Hotel had been feept in a state of delightful commotion by the rivalry of two leaders in the fashionable world , who had taken np their head-qnarters in" that "noble establishment . . " Never was a warfare carried on with snch amiable bitterness , such caressing homethrasts . Everything was done regally , and with that sublime politeness which duellists practise when most determined to exterminate each other . Of coarse , « ach lady . had- her position and her followers , and no military chieftains ever managed their respective forces more adroitly . " Mrs . Nash was certainly the oldest incumbent , and had a sort of preemption right as a fashionable leader . She had won her place exactly as her husband had obtained his wealth , first plodding his way from the workshop to the connting-room , thence into the stock- ' market , where , by two or three dashing speculations worthy of the- gambling-table , and entered upon in the same spirit , he became a millionaire . - ^ Exactly by the same method Mrs . Nash worked her way upward as a leader of ton .
Originally uneducated and assuming , she had . exercised unbounded sway over her husband ' s work-people , patronising their wives , and practising diligently the airs that were to be transferred with her husband ' s advancement into higher circles . ¦•' * 'through the Tapid gradations of her husband ' s fortune , she held her own In the race , and grew important , dressy , and presuming , but not awbit better informed or more refined . "When her husband became a millionaire , she made one audacious leap into the midst of the upper ten thousand , hustled her way upward , and facing suddenly about , proclaimed herself a leader in the fashionable world . : - " People looked pni complacently . Some smiled in derision ; some sneered with scorn ; others , too indolent or gentle for dispute , quietly admitted her charms ; while to that portion of society worth knowing , sheretainea her original character—that of a vulgar , fussy , ignorant woman , from whom persons of refinement shrank instinctively . Thus , through tne forbearance of some > the sneers of others , sa ' nd the carelessness of all , she fought ier -way teatkisition which soon became legitimate arid acknowledged . ¦
" But this year Mrs ; Nash met with a ; Very formidable rival , who disputed the ground sheVhad usurped 5 ncn by inch . If Mrs , N ^ sh was -insolent ,: Mrs . iSykes was sly anf fascinating . ARfitn tsct that was more than a inatch for any amount of arrogant presumption , and education wbic ^ grained character that distinguislied Mrs . Nash ^ She was well calculated to make a contest for fashionable superiority ' excitingandpiquant . . -t' Women of Vt ' rtie- refinement never entet into these liiiserable rivalries for notoriety , but they sometimes look on amused . In this c '& se the ladieswere beautifully rriatched . T ^ he audacity of one was met with the artf j iil sw power and the prestige of estabnshedauthorityV Mrs . Sykes opposed ^ nqyeltjj unmatched art , and a . species or serpent-like fascination difficult to cope with ; and ninch to her astonishment , th formerlady found her laurels dropping awayleaf byleafbefore she begani to feel them wither . / : / - ' ,: ¦ .. ¦ ¦;¦ '¦ ' ¦• . ¦ " . - . - ¦ ' r " .. ' , ¦¦ . ¦¦ : ¦ :. ;¦ . ¦ ¦¦ ¦ .. '" ¦ ' :: ¦ ¦ ¦ ' ' : ¦¦¦ ¦ '¦¦¦¦ : < i ; - ' - - ¦¦•'• . \ V- ' . '¦¦ ¦ ¦ . ¦ ' ¦ ' ¦ . . . "¦'
"But a few days before tee fancy ball , a hew fly was cast mtd the fashionable current , that quite eclipsed anything that had appeared before . An English earl ^ fresh fro m the Continent , came ap to Saratoga one day , in : '¦«' trainfrom New York , and would be present at the fancy ball . - ¦¦ ¦ ••'¦ ¦/¦ . : ¦ ¦ - /¦ : -V : ¦ : ¦ ¦ :. '¦ '¦ ' . . . - .: " ' . ¦¦ " ' ¦ ¦ - . ¦ : ¦ ¦"¦ ¦;¦ . ¦'¦ [ : ¦¦¦" ¦¦ ¦¦¦ ¦ ... ¦ ' ¦ : ¦¦ : ¦ ' ¦ ¦'¦ , . ' ¦ ' ¦¦ ¦ . ^ JSere was , new cause for strife -between the Nashes and the Sykeses . Which of these ladies should-secure the nobleman for the fancy ball ? True , the earlwas very young ,: awkwa ^ a ' as-the school-boy he was , and really : looked more like a juvenile . horse-jockey than a civilised gentleman . Bat he was an' earl ; would assuredly haye a seat in the House of Lords , it ever he became old enough ; besides , he had already lost thirty thousand dollars ! at the gamblipg-table , and bore it like aprince . * . v . " , ? JHer < s was an . object worthcontending for . What American : lady would be immortalised bygleaning upon thearm / of an . earl as ; sha entered the assembly . rooin . ? . No minor claims could be put in liere . The « arl undoubtedly : belonged io Mrs . Nash or Mrs . Sykes-- ' whicli should it be ? ^ . This | was the Question that agitated : all fashionable life at the Springs to its centre ; Partisans .. were brought into active operation . Private ambassadors went and came
from , the gambling saloons to - the drawing-rooms , looking more porteBtous than any messenger ever sent from the allied powers to the Czar . " The innocent young lord , who had escaped from Iris tutor for a lark at the Springs , was terriblyi embarrassed by so many attentions . Too yonrtg for any knowledge of society in his own land , he made desperate ' efforts to appear a man of the world , and feel himaelf at home in a _ country where men are set aside , while society is conyerked into a , paradise for boys . It is rumoured that some professional gentlemen took advantage of this confusion in the young lordling ' s ideasj and his losses at the gambling-table grew , more and more princely . . ' , "But the important night arrived . Tlie mysterious operations of many a private dressing-room became visible . A hundred bright and fantastic forms trod their way to music along the open colonnade of the hotel toward the assembly-room .. The brilliant procession entered the ; folding-doors , and swept down the room—two rivers of human life , flowing on , whirling and retiring , beneath a shower of radiance cast from the wall , and the chandeliers that seemed literally raining light . In her toilet , the American lady is not a shade behind our neighbours of Paris ; and , no saloon in . the world ever surpassed this in picturesque effect and richness of costume . Diamonds were plentiful as dew-drops on a rose thicket . Pearls , embedded in lace that Queen Elizabeth would , have monopolised for her own toilet .
gleamed and fluttered around those republican fajtrios , a decided contrast to the checked Handkerchief that Ben . Franklin used at the European court , or tlio bare feet with which our revolutionary fathers trod the way to our freedom through the winter snows . After the jga ' y crowd had circulated around the room awhile , there was a pause in the music , a breaking up of the characters into groups ; then glances were cast toward tho door , and murmurs ran from Hp to lip . Neither Mrs . Nash nor her rival had yet appeared ; as usual , their entrance , was arranged to make a sensation , How Dodsworlh's leader knew the exact time of this fashionable ' s advent , I do not pretend to say . Certain it is , just as the band struck np an exhilarating march , Mrs . Z . Btaih entered the room with erect front and pompous triumph , holding the English earl resolutely by the arm . Mrs . Theodore Sykes came in a good deal subdued and crestfallen , after the dancing commenced . She was escorted by one of tho most illustrious of our American statesmen , which somewhat diminished tho bitterness of her defeat- Her fancy dress was one blase " of diamond * , and wiieri Mm . Nash sailed by , holding the young earl triumphantly by tho arm , she seemed oblivious of the noble presence , but was smiling up into tho byes of her august companion as if an American utatea-XtvkxK reall y wor <> some small consolation for tho loss of a . schoolboy nobleman , who looked as if ho would givo his right arm , which , however , belonged to Mrs . NftBh just then , to bo safe at home , even with his tutor . "
788 Imm 1 3l1: A Pilfer ' - [Saturday,
788 imm 3 L 1 : A Pilfer ' - [ Saturday ,
Faith And Negation. Miracles And Science...
FAITH AND NEGATION . Miracles and Science . By Edward Straolioy . Longmans What is Truthf John Chapman " We believe the vulgar lamentation over the spread of unbelief to bo one of the many orthodox deceptions . Whatever may be the atrophy of churches , or the decay of dogmatic systems , tho religious spirit ia not waning , but increasing in strength , purity , and intensity . The race of believers is not oahuw his aitcction
yot , nor wm » o so long as man gives nostagoa or to death , and sweeps tho horizon of his earthly hones with an unresting nspiration after tho beyond . . But this religious spirit is the offspring , not the enemy , of inquiry : the child of anguish and of doubt . In Franco an awakening of thia religious spirit ( which has nothing in common with a Staterevival ot ecolesiastioism ) has been observed of late : perhaps as a xefugo from political discontent : perhaps the herald of a simpler and severer ago of liberty to come—who knows P , in England tho same phenomenon is to bo noted . Within tho pale of
orthodoxy a broader doctrine has sprung up , while infidelity itself has abjured scoffing , and discusses reverently the faith it combats and the doctrine it repudiates . Here are two remarkable examples of this double tendency ; two little books , distinguished equally for the unflinching thoroughness of their sincerity , for their bold grappling with the most momentous doubts , for the deeply religious and reverent spirit that lends di gnity and a certain sadne ss * to the impetuous antagonism of the one , confidence and . calmness to the fearless investigations of the other . In both we recognise the true "enius of Protestant inquiry , the true exercise of liberty of conscience ; and in both we discern the gleams of a dawning faith , more expansive and more humane than church or sect has yet conceived . There is a-wide difference , however , between the two books ; and we can suppose the clearheaded and
bravesouled thiuker who seeks to conciliate faith with science a little startled at his association vrith the uncompromising and unconciliating avenger of " natural religioa against conventional usurpation . " The intellectual position of the , two combatants is in fact essentially different : the one has built up stronger bulwarks for the ancient faith to which , he clings with generous and trustful devotedness , by the very aid of the most destructiye engines of modern hetorodoxy ; the clear keen air of free inquiry has braced up his thought , arid strengthened the vitality of his belief ; while the other , like a prispiter escaped , spurns every sign and vestige of his thraldom ., and , in his impatience of authoritative religions , seems almost to confouad the dogma and the instinct , the systena and the spirit , the doctrine and the corruption , in one sweeping denunciation . But the courage and the energy of the trutb } -seeker ate in themselves virtues too rare and too emphatic to be passed oyer . without aheatrty greeting . It is paly the covrardly , the insincere , and
the indifferent , who yml resent the : outspeaking qf a mind that has fought its way but of an indolent and dishonest acquiescence into the lonely freedom of tr ^ e belief approved by th £ conscience and ratified by the life-: -The writer of these letters in reply to the upon another of the Christiian temple ;^^ he rests not ruitil he has created for himselif ^^ a hew ^ heaven ^ and : a new eartA ; until he can kneet down a solitary worshipper at the shrine of Justice , which is his ; highest conception of : the duty of man ^ d of the perfect providence of God * . His letters are addressed to certain orthodosc friends- ^ to a lady w ^ hose religioit is a sentiment ; to a IJoctor of Divinity whose religion is art .- ' * establishnient » " and ! " to a sympathjetic ; though perh ^ The writer thinks decisively and writes ; vigorously ; and if lie is provoked into an pecasiohat wildness of manner and inteniperance of Expletives , courtesy arid good feeling never quite desert him , and in such discussions even rudeness is better than reticence . ; i
We ^ ^ would especially recommend these letters to the more calm and nbt less convinced author of" Miracles and Science , " as they contain the strottgest and most' searching objections to which the orthodox scheme is exposed , and which have not yet been deajt with even by so ppwerful and intrepid a pea as his . Our readers will at once appreciate the excepitipnal position dccia ^ ied by Mr . Strachey among belieyersj when we tell them that his trea'tise aix Miracles , is prefaced by an introductory dialogue in which he insists that . *•* ¦ Christianity and thes Bible ought to be invesri g * M ^ > * ^ * Wr truth tested b y the same methods of positive science aai we enaploy in astro- ^ homy or chemistry . '' And in another place he professes unfeigned respect
for the geniusi of Augxiste Comte . There are many noble isayings in these few pages for which we should be glad to find space . Here is one : " God's name is Truth . If truth "bids you follow to the bottomless pit , go t you wili find Gqd there . If the . most orthodox tradition offers to lead you to heaven , refuse ; for you will not find him by that path . " There is one pas ^ - sage , however , on ^' Scepticism" to which we entirely demur , and which appears to us singularly inconsistent with the whole tone of the writer's mind , and the whole force of his position . After insisting on the necessity of testing the truth of religion by positive scientific methods , after admirably reproving the intellectual cowardice of false belief , and vindicating the right and the duty of free inquiry , Mr . Strachey suggests in the following passage that scepticism is itself a disease : —
Though I grant , nay protest , that tho more honest course for tho man who has doubts is to face them , 1 would beg the reader to consider well whether what is honest for him or for pie is therefore of necossity good in itself ? Is ' not scepticism , curable or incurable , a curable or incurable disease of tho mind , and to be treated accordingly ? It may have been no merit to our fathers that they did not feel our dqubts , —nay , it may bo true that our doulits are but tho inheritance of their over-confidence , as the hard-drinking fox-hunter may transmit to Ilia son tho consumption which never touched himself ; it may be that the practical man' of our own dny is not only grossly credulous , but tho cause , through reaction , of scepticism in others : but lot us look at the facts , not at tho moral merits , and then say whether scopticism is in itself a more manly and honlthy state ot mind than credulity . Scepticism enables us to see several sides of a matter where ' practical men' see only one , to bo eclectics where they are partisans , and tq look down on their attacks and dofunces of what we discern to bo . one object , with tho calmness of Epicurean godsj but it gives us this knowledge only hi paralysing at least our practical powers of duty , and often our vnoral sonso too . "
3 STow , using wordsin thoir strict sense , as we are persuaded so exact and scientific a thinker asMr . Strachey would demand , we may be permitted to rewind him that scepticism means nothing more than inquiry ' -, tho sceptic is simply the •' inquirer . " How sceptic * in the course of time and the corruption of language came to signify unbelief in a particular set of dogmas we do not stop to _ examine ; nor do we understand in what sense Protestantism , which is nothing moro _ nor leaa than the right of free inquiry can stigmatise scepticism ( i . e . inquiry ) as a disease . If it bo a disease , Popery is the euro—an alternative which we are certain so masterly a vindicator of private judgment as Mr . Strachey will bo as little disposed to accept as we can bo . Desiring to talc © leave of Mr . Straohey with a sonso of unimpaired admiration , wo conoludo with this eloquent and pioreiug condemnation of
OVV . RIBTIOMNT OKTHOPOXY . " Our faith is indeed weak and tottering enough : no thoughtful mnu can look into his own heart , or into what may lie plainly discerned of tho hoirta of his neighbours , mid not bo tw « ro that under the thin crust of our reticent orthodojey volcanic ilroa are Bluinborinij . The men who have gone out from among us openly deol « rlng that honoat invostlimtiou of roceived opinions about Ohristlunity baa compoflod them to ubnndon it for pure Uicibiti or else that a still severer logic hits shown thorn that not thoiam but nthoiont * must bo their end if tlioy do not take rofugo in tho infallible authority of Korne—these aro but the roprosontntirea of an ovor-increauing numbor who « ro uilently yielding themselvoa to the prospect of
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 19, 1854, page 20, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_19081854/page/20/
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