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that when the conditions chemical forces...
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~yi ^U^Iltttt£« .
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Critics are not the legislators, but the...
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" Shakspeabx in France," as we have noti...
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We promised to return to the Edinburgh E...
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THE NEW EDITION OF BACON. The Works of F...
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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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That When The Conditions Chemical Forces...
208 THE IiEADEB . [ No , 362 , Saturday , - ¦ „ . . ,-.. i ™ . ¦¦¦ j i .. ^^^^_^ - ^^ - ^^ -- ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ MMa | iM ^ B ^ ww >^ BBPM ^ W ^ W
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Critics Are Not The Legislators, But The...
Critics are not the legislators , but the judges and police of liter atuxe JJ ^ flJ-0 not make laws—they interpret and try to enforce them . — Edinburgh Keview . . ¦ . ? ¦ . .
" Shakspeabx In France," As We Have Noti...
" Shakspeabx in France , " as we have noticed on more than one occasion is becoming a significant phenomenon . While a Ponsabd mates himselt the laughing-stocit of France , as of England , by uttering nonsense ^ about the " divine Wiluams , " and a Dumas adds a new and improved fifth act to Samhf in a few hours de ce travail rapide etfoudroyant which his admirers marvel at , other and more serious minds are giving patient devotion and clear ht to
sagacity to the reverential study of our great poet , from whom ougwe expect such noble labour more than from a sou of Victor Hugo ? That son , Francois , has just published a volume containing a complete translation of the sonnets into prose , with a very interesting Introduction ; and as the volume appears in the ' Collection Xevy , ' price only one franc , our readers should not hesitate to possess themselves of it . The translation is admirably executed , although , of course , for an ^ Eng lishman it can only have the interest of curiosity . The Introduction , on the other hand , has the interest of literary discussion . Headers will see with pleasure the careful study this Introduction
exhibits ; and perhaps will agree with the views it sets forth . Very ingenious , and we believe novel , is the rapprochement M . Feancois Hugo makes of Sidney ' s Defense of Poesy , and Siiakspeare ' s answer thereto in the prologue to the fourth act of the Winter ' s Tale , where Time is made to justify every departure from the -unities . More questionable to us is the hypothesis , not novel , although M . Hugo supposes it to be so , which makes the sonnets tell a distinct story . Mr . Ar . mita . ge Brown has already done this , in a volume which Shakspearean students well know ; Professor Masson has also done it , in a volume still inedited ; others
have had a similar conception of the sonnets ; but for our own parts we can only regard the conception , as one of the many ingenious plausibilities of literature , not tenable in the presence of rigorous criticism . By rearranging the sonnets according to his own fancy , and by including among them a poem from , the Passionate Pilgrim , which is ? iot Shakspeare's , M . Hugo does give n , certain unity to these various poems , and that unity may increase their interest ; as a matter of criticism , however , the grounds on which this arrangement is made , must , we think , be regarded as mere shifting sandbanks of plausibility in the face of the fact that the sonnets were not at all thus arranged in Shakspeare ' s lifetime , and the fact that poets avail them selves of the sonnet expressly for occasional poems . It is a debatable question , and will continue to be debated ; critic opposes critic ; commentator scorns commentator ; everybody differs from everybody ; as Euripides says in the Cyclops , " no one will listen to any one or anything , "—
aKOvet . 8 ovSev ovBfls ovSevos —and M . Fbancois Hugo is as welL entitled to a hearing as another . He has earned a right to be heard ; let our readers judge for themselves ; they will listen , at any rate , with interest , and that interest will not be diminished by their recognition of certain accents which the celebrated preface to Cromwell have made familiar .
We Promised To Return To The Edinburgh E...
We promised to return to the Edinburgh Essays for the purpose of considering Dr . George Wilson's admirable essay on Chemical Final Causes . We cannot afford room for the many suggestive passages we had marked , and must content ourselves with referring the reader to the essay , which is not only full of fine thoughts , but contains little which those who repudiate sueh inquiries will object to . The bearing , indeed , of the whole argument , namely , why do certain chemical elements rather than others cuter into the composition of plants and animals ? we consider a purely otiose inquiry ; as well ask , why does an acid combine with a base to form a salt ? why are chemical combinations definite P But although the question raised is essentially
unanswerable , the facts elicited aro of very great interest ; and no one better than Dr . George Wilsom knows how to treat science so as to be intelligible to general readers : with felicitous illustrations , scientific and poetical , he brings the most abstruse questions into the clearness of day . There is a passage towards the clcso of his paper which , however , we not only think unacceptable as philosophy , hut which we are persuaded he will , on reconsideration , acknowledge to bo so . I aak for an indulgent estimate of a method of research in which I have scarcely a predecessor ; but I submit to criticism examples of the method , because I believe it to bo logically free from objection . It only assumes that whatever properties a chemical element possesses before its cntranco into an organism , it retains after its entranceThusif i
. , ron be crystallisnblo , magnetisuble , clectrifinblo , oxi < lnblo in various dogreeB , arid ready to unite -with organic matters out of the body , I assume that it will continue to exhibit those properties within it , whatever may bo tho additional properties which it manifests in -virtue of its being placed in such ' new conditions as can bo realised only in a living organism . When wo examine substances in a perrcctiy dark apartment , we discern no colour in them , but when wo carry them with , us into a lighted room , and perceive the tints which they then display , we do not doubt that thoy retain all the properties which they oxhibited in darkness ; and that these rnoreovorare closely connected with their assumption of colour when light falls upon £ !! ; 1 J ° * fi * u 8 im lar but not loaB lcfiitimato assumption , when wo take for S ? l « it ¦ i P > ortie !» which exist in an clement whoa part of a dead mass , remain in U when part of a living one . Either we have altogether mistaken him , or this clcur-siglitod ehomlst has been guilty of a strange oversight , One of tho first principles of philosophy is ,
that when the conditions axe changed , chemical forces manifest themselves differently ; and this out of the organism no less than within it . Chlorine and hydrogen , for example , have a powerful affinity for each other ; but Dr "Wilson knows as well as any man that these gases may be mixed together in the dark -without ever uniting ; the change of condition from light to darkness is sufficient to prevent these gases from manifesting their affinity . Again a certain degree of cold prevents many chemical combinations wlich take place at the ordinary temperature of the atmosphere . Such changes of condition ..
are slight compared with the changes which bodies undergo in passing into the organism ; so that instead of our being able to say that the properties manifested , by a "body when out of the organism will continue to be manifested ~ b y it when , in the organism , we are never entitled to assume this a priori Indeed , it is owing to this very fact that the absurd idea of a " vital force controlling or suspending chemical force" has gained such general currency Were Dr . Wixson ' s assumption granted , we should fee able to explain all physiological phenomena deductively , from the known properties of chemical elements ; which is not the case . We propound our objections with some misgiving , for we naturally enough suspect that Dr . _ WiLSON must have meant something different from , what he says .
The New Edition Of Bacon. The Works Of F...
THE NEW EDITION OF BACON . The Works of Francis Bacon . Collected and Edited by James Spedding-, Robert Leslie Ellis , and Douglas Devon Heath ,. "Vols- I . and II . Longman and Co . At length an edition of Bacon , worthy-of hira and of English scholarship , begins to issue from the press . It is somewhat humiliating to our national pride that this our grandest name in philosophy , a name fox ever on our lips , an influence for ever directing our minds , should hitherto have inspired neither of our universities nor one of our scientific bodies with the desire to do it such justice as could be done by setting forth the Opera Omnia in all the advantage of careful and competent editing . Corporate bodies have
declined the task . Commercial speculation has declined it , not feelinor sufficient confidence in public sympathy . Three private students—aft honour to them !—have taken , it upon themselves ; and , to judge from the two volumes now before us , they have executed the task with a fulness , sagacity , and loving care which will leave little for successors to improve . We use a hackneyed phrase when we say no English gentleman ' s library should "be without this edition of Bacon ; but we use the phrase with precise earnestness of meaning , for the edition is in all respects so admirable that we have only one regret , namely , the impossibility of the edition not findingits place on the shelves of every thinking man , owing to the inevitable cost of such a work .
We have gone through the two volumes pencil in hand , and possessed ourselves of all the editorial matter in the shape of prefaces and notes . Having done so , we cannot restrain the expression of our surprise that critics should have thought proper to put forward trifling objections to points of quite minor detail , instead of bestowing all their space in explaining the merits of this edition . Not that assent to every opinion , or approval of every detail , could be expected . When -we have more than a thousand notes on various topics , it is natural that many of these notes will seem questionable ; when we have a new arrangement of materials , it is natural that some differences of opinion will be called forth . But in . presence of so great a work , executed with such rai e ability and care , the obtrusion of critical objections on minor points seems to us a deviation from the true office of the public press .
The present edition arranges Bacon ' s various works under three general divisions . First—the philosophical literai'y works addressed to mankind at largo , and iatelligible to all cultivated readers ; secondly—the professional works , addressed more exclusively to legal readers ; thirdly—the occasional works , such as letters , speeches , charges , tracts , state-papers , and other writings of business . The advantage of this classification is not onl y obvious in its convenience to the reader , it admits of a corresponding division of editorial labours . For the idea of any one man editing Bacon is preposterous ; and when that one man is a Birch or a Montagu , it becomes simply ludicrous . Three editors , at the very least , are requisite . Three editors have co-operated in this edition . Mr . Spedding , who is editor-in-chief , undertakes the literary and occasionnl works ; Mr . Ellis the philosophical works ( aided by Mr . Spedding ); and Mr . Heath the professional works .
The two volumes already issued contain the " Novum Orgnnum , " the " Parascevo ad Historiam Naturalem , " the " De Augmentis , " the " Novus Orbis Scientiarum , " the u Historia Ventoruin , " the u tlistoria Vitse et Mortis / ' the " Historia Densi et ltari , " the " Inquisitio de Magneto , " the " Topica inquisitiones de Luce et Luminc , " the " Sylv ; i Sylvarum , " the " Scala Intcllectus , " and the Protlxomi . " All these works have their prefaces , explaining their relations chronological imd philosophical , and arc liberally annotated throughout . Iiawley ' s Life , with notes by Mr . Spedding , is prefixed ; and Mr . Ellis furnishes a General preface to the philosophical
works ,- in which he expounds and criticises Bacon ' s Method and historical position . All who can make their way through Latin prose , will prefer reading the Latin versions rather than the translations which in iuturc volumes will be given to render the edition available even to English readers ; and , if the suggestion come not too late , we should urge on Mr . Spedding the desirability of reprinting at least the bulk of the notes in their respective places with the translations ; the increase of printing will bo more than compensated by the advantage to the English reader . The printing and paper an £ excellen . t , and the whole aspect of the edition is one winch charms the eye .
Descending from generals to particulars , wo have to notice in the prefaces and notes such copiousness and variety of erudition at the service oj such desire for precision , as makes this edition stand conspicuous among aw works executed by Englishinon . Mr . Ellis displays an extent of accurate knowledge- which is truly remarkable . Not only does lie correct the "very frequent misquotations from nnd references to ancient authors , and furiusn pnrnllel pu . s 3 ag 0 . -j or ourious rajwoclteiiu'itts ., which rtlono would require con-
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 28, 1857, page 16, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_28021857/page/16/
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