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J^ly21,X855] THE LEADER. imo
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THE MORALITY OF WILHELM MEISTER. l/ultn ...
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TWENTY YEAKS CONFLICT IN THE CHURCH. The...
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THE CUSTOM OF DUNMOW. fialtads: lionuiut...
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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.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
The Spanish Conquest In America. The Spa...
sn in the dark and dismal charnel-houses of Huitzilopoclitli and Tezcatlipuk must lV 6 seemed , to the Spaniards an ill-omeaed dream . Years would pass away , and by would become veterans , covered with wounds and with renown , before they would iye time to think over and to realise to themselves the full horror of the accursed iogs which they had looked upon that day . The length to which these extracts have extended prevent our drawing ore froni these volumes , but the reader will have seen enough to stimulate 3 curiosity for the whole . There were several points upon which we should tidly have enlarged were greater space at disposal ; but the foregoing rewks indicate in a general way our opinion of the book , and the extracts dicnte its style , so that between tlie two our office of " Taster" to the iblic has been fulfilled . We must add , however , that the book is profusely astratcd with maps let into the text , and repeated from time to time , so as save the reader the trouble of seeking them ; these maps , mostly newide , greatly facilitate our comprehension of the narrative , and are Valuable cuments .
J^Ly21,X855] The Leader. Imo
J ^ ly 21 , X 855 ] THE LEADER . imo
The Morality Of Wilhelm Meister. L/Ultn ...
THE MORALITY OF WILHELM MEISTER . l / ultn Affitter's Apprenticeship . From tlu > German of Goethe . Translated by R . Dillon Boylan , Esq . ( Holm ' s Standard library . ) II . G . Bohn . BUAP 8 Mr- Lewes ' s Life of Goethe , which we now sec advertised , may ow some new light on the structure and purpose of the much-debated rel—WiViclm Meistcr ' s Apjtrenticeship . In the meantime , we are tempted the appearance of a new truuslation to give the opinion which our pret knowledge enables us to form on one or two aspects of this many-sided rk . Isk nineteen out of twenty moderately educated persons what they think WUhelm Meistcr , and the answer will probably be— "I think it an aoral book : and besides , it is awfully dull : I was not able to read it . "
latever truth there may be in the first half of this judgment , the second "is' a sufficient guarantee that the book is not likely to do any extensive iry in English society . Parents may let it lie on the drawing-room table jout scruple , in the " confidence that for youthful minds of the ordinary . it will have no attractions , and that the exceptional youthful mind ch is strongly arrested by it is of too powerful and peculiar a character ? e trained according to educational dogmas . iut ts WUhelm Meister an immoral book ? We think not : on the cony , ire think that it appears immoral to some minds because its morality a grander orbit than any which can be measured by the calculations of pulpit and of ordinary literature . Goethe , it is sometimes said , seems iis book to be almost ' destituteof moral bias : he shows no hatred of bad ans , no warm sympathy with good ones ; he writes like a passionless inour , to whom ' all human things are interesting only as objects of
intelual contemplation . But we question whether the direct exhibition of a al bias in the writer will make a book really moral in its influence . Try on the first child that asks you to tell it a story . As long as you keep n apparently impartial narrative of facts you will have earnest eyes fixed you in rapt attention , but no sooner do you begin to betray symptoms si intention to mor : dise , or to turn the current of facts towards a peril application , than the interest of your hearer will slacken , his eyes will der , and the moral dose will be doubly distasteful from the very sweett iu -which you have attempted to insinuate it . One grand reason of is , that the child is aware you arc talking for it instead of from yourself , hat instead of carrying it along in a stream of sympathy with your own rest in the story , you give it the impression of contriving coldly and ing artificially . Now , the moralising novelist produces the same effect iiis mature readers ; an effect often heightened by the perception that
moralising is rather intended to make his book eligible lor tamily Lin" than prompted by any profound conviction or enthusiasm . Just as from being really moral is the so-called moral denouement , m which ttrds and p unishments are distributed according to those notions of ice on which the novel-writer would have recommended that the world aid be governed if he had been consulted at the creation . The emotion rrtbfuction which a reader feels when the villain of the book dies of some sous disease , or is crushed by a railway train , ib no more essentially : al than the satWnoiion which used to be foil in whipping culprits at the L-tail So we dismiss the charge of immorality against Wilhahn Master these two counts—the absence ui' moral bias in the mode of narration , the comfortable issues allowed to questionable actions and questionable
rncters . . , . . . , , Iut there is another ground for the same accusation which involves deeper siderationa . It is said that some of the scenes and incidents are such as refined moral tustc of these days will not admit to be proper subjects for that to depict irregular relations in all the charms they really have for win nature , and to associate lovely qualities with vices which society tea a brand ofoutlawrv , implies a toleration which is ut once u sign and a rco of perverted moral sentiment . Wilhclm ' s relation to Mariana , and charm which the render is made to feel in the lawless Plnhnn , man }; incite that occur during Wilhelm ' slifc with the players , and the stones of imrio ' s loves in ; the present , preterite , and future , are shocking to the valcnt KmHiah . It Is no answer to this objection to say —what , is the truthfulthat the ot almost
i-that ( jS ethe ' s pictures are , career every ins man brimra him in contact with far moiv vitiating irregularities < han presented in the experience of Willu-lin Mei , U-r ; lor no one can maini that alli ' ACt is a fit subject for art . The »] . l > cro ot the artist has is it aomewherc , and the Aral question is , lias ( Jooiho oversteppo . this hunt , hm , the mere fact , of artititic rcprcbentutum is u mistake t I he second . iMabiects are within the legitimate limits ol art , is his mode ot treat-* SL a . to mak . hia pictures nemieioiw P Surely the sphere , ot art endrwhereyer there id beauty either in form , or thought , or ieelmg A . af « uai « ht falliu ff » u the dreariest sandbank will otten serve the painter CSS ^ tlfe tragedi an may t ake for his » u »? jeot the »<** ^ £ lowaif they servo as the background for some divmo deed of tenderness 1 - ^ , « Y £ IL noveiiat £ y place before u ., every aspect ^ bu »« a where there » « omc trait of love , or endurance , or hulnloamesa to cull
forth our best sympathies . Balzac , perhaps the mo 9 t wonderful writer of fiction the world has ever seen , has in many of his novels overstepp ed this limit . He drags us by his magic force through scene after scene of unmitigated vice , till the effect of walking among this human carrion is a moral nausea . But no one can say that Goethe has sinned in this way . Everywhere he brings us into the presence of living , generous humanitymixed and erring and self-deluding , but saved from utter corruption by the salt of some noble impulse , some disinterested effort , some beam of good nature , even though grotesque or homel y . And his mode of treatment seems to us precisely that which is reall y moral in its influence . It is without exaggeration ; he is m no haste to alarm readers into virtue by melodramatic consequences ; he quietly follows the stream of fact and of life : and waits patiently for the moral processes of nature as we all do for her material processes . The large tolerance of Groethe , which is markedly exhibited in WUhelm Meister , is precisely that to which we point as the element of
moral superiority . We all begin life by associating our passions with our moral prepossessions , by mistaking indignation for virtue , and many o-o through life without awaking from this illusion . These are the "insupportables justes , qui du haut de leurs chaises d ' or narguent lea miseres et les souffrances de 1 'humanite . " But a few are taught by their own falls and their own struggles , by their experience of sympathy , and help and goodness in the " publicans and sinners " of these modern days , that the line between the virtuous and vicious , so far from being a necessary safeguard to morality , is itself an immoral fiction . Those who have been already taught this lessen will at once recognise the true morality of Goethe ' s works . Like WUhelm Meister , they will be able to love the good in a Philina , and to reverence the far-seeing efforts of a Lothario .
Twenty Yeaks Conflict In The Church. The...
TWENTY YEAKS CONFLICT IN THE CHURCH . The Ticenty Years Conflict in the Church , and Its Remedy . John Chapman . The writer of this honest and well-meaning little Tract must be a fortunate man , for he tells us that " he has himself proposed reforms in religion equal in extent to the reforms effected by Lord Bacon in science , and in no case was he ever met by a reply , or involved in any controversy . " His present object is to heal the divisions in the Church of England , and avert that disruption which he justly conceives to be imminent between the Evangelical and Hig h Church ( and we should add the Latitudinarian ) parties . The mode iif which he proposes to carry out this object is certainly in the highest degree Baconian , or whatever else may designate philosophic comprehensiveness and simplicity . He would reconcile the two hostile parties by the effectual method of subtracting from the creed of each all the most vital
and characteristic doctrines — Apostolic Succession — the Supernatural Efficacy of the Sacraments—Justification by Faith—Original Sin—and Predestination . For these tenets he would substitute , by way of compensation , the Right of Private Judgment , or the Authority of Reason and Conscience —Free Will—Responsibility , and man ' s power to perform good as well as evil . These changes are to be embodied in a Reformed Liturgy ( of which an outline is given ) by a Reformed Convocation equally composed of Laity and Clergy . To an arrangement so manifestly tending to obviate the inconvenience of doctrinal discrepancies , the writer thinks all parties would readily accede . In what theological Paradise has he lived ? The writer ' s general view of parties is clear and sensible . In particular , he sees the service which the Hig h Church movement rendered to the cause of truth , by destroying the belief in the perfection of the Anglican Church . He is also ' quite correct in giving the same party credit for reasserting against the dominant Calvinism that doctrine of Free Will on . which morality depends ; though unhappily they asserted at the same time doctrines concerning the nature and effects of sin , of which it was justly said that , if they were true , it would be better to be a blade of grass than a man . We may add that some remarkable attacks on Bibiiolatry were made in the " Tracts for the Times , " the object of which was of course to exalt Church authority at the expense of the Bible , but which tended , in eflect , to assist the emancipation of reason and the development of a critical spirit . The Newmanites in truth are not a little answerable for the encouragement of that love of truth , which , when they see its legitimate consequences , they will persecute , and arc beginning to persecute already . We cannot encourage the author to hope that his remedy will be accepted , or evcu that the spirit of charity and benevolence in which he tenders it will meet with u response . We would recommend him ,, instead of trying to reconcile the irreconcilable , to eliminate the essential , and avert the inevitable , rather to labour for the independent establishment of pure religious and moral truth , and the preservation of our nioral and spiritual lite , as individuals ami us a nation , from that abyss of confusion into which ecclesiastical institutions and ecclesiastical creeds all over Christendom are too manifestly about to fall .
The Custom Of Dunmow. Fialtads: Lionuiut...
THE CUSTOM OF DUNMOW . fialtads : lionuiutic , Fantastical , ami // unioroim . By TV . Harrison Ainsworth . Routledge and Co , The Flitch if Uunmow . By " VV . Harrison Ainaworth . Routledge and Co Tin : collected versification of Mr . Harrison Ainsworth ' s novels , from JiooktrooU down to his latest work—the fine historical tiction referred to in . the title of the present notice—has furnished forth a book of ballads , classified as Legendary and Romantic , Fantastical , and Humorous . The romantic and fantastical disposition of Mr . Ainsworth seems always to have lea Jinn into slums and gaol-yards for a good deal of his legendary »» ote ™ % ll"a into Dryasdust remains of antiquated phraseology for all hia 1 "'" " « ened instead of supposing that Buch and such a thing could ^' .. ^^ X ut it Mr . AinsworAi wota that it scarce mote have been , and w Wjr « u 3 a ^ J B » . « . !« rl . twRv . Jixcentinc one or two of the songs hero brought together ,
and notably the one called « Marguerite do y ^ Zt Zr ^ o & Z b ^ i ^ tt ^
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), July 21, 1855, page 19, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_21071855/page/19/
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