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veals them . Thus it is that the broader and intenser the light of Reason brought to bear upon subjects which transcend it , the less clearly do we see . You will not suffer Reason to dictate your Poetry — why insist upon its dictating to you Religion ?
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SIR PHILIP HETHERINGTON . Sir Philip Hetherington . By the Author of " Olivia . " ( The Parlour Library . ) Simtns and M'Intyre . The publishers are bold speculators to produce original works of this class at a shilling ! Sir Philip Hetherington is a novel of the Miss Austen school , not by any means comparable in ability to the works of that consummate artist , but following in the same quiet , unpretending track of pourtraying human nature as it is in our country places . Better
by many degrees than two-thirds of the three volume novels which claim to represent actual life , Sir Philip Hetherington has , moreover , the great advantages of a healthy tone , an unexceptionable morality ( in the broadest sense ) and an unforced interest . It never sparkles , but it never flags j the reader is not agitated—no flushed cheek or suspended breath proclaim the triumph of stimulated curiosity—but with a pleasant even pace the chapters are gone through ; and the end is reached without impatience and without fatigue .
The subject is mainly an inversion of the old and ever charming story of Cymon ; instead of being softened from rudeness by love , Sir Philip is rescued by it from effeminacy and coxcombry . The change is , perhaps , a little rapid : nevertheless , the phases are artistically enough indicated . Besides , this conversion of the dandy by the plain , sensible , loveable Susan , there is a second plot of cross purposes between Susan ' s sisters and her lovers . Major Adams is a failure , though one of the central figures ; but his flirtation with the twq women at once is most artfully pourtrayed , and has a living truth in it . There is some nice observation of character
occasionally displayed , and a proper avoidance of melodramatic effects ; but there is no invention in the incidents , nor is there any merit in the descriptions and remarks , which are , however , sparingly introduced . Altogether , though a work of no pretensions , it is decidedly agreeable , and can be recommended as a harmless , pleasant book for young ladies , no less than as a gentle relaxation in the intervals of more serious affairs .
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LONDON LABOUR AND THE LON ' DON POOR . London Labour and the London Poor . . By Henry Majhew . Oflice , CD , Fleet-Ktiect Europe gravitates towards Democracy . Whatever obstructions Ueaction may place or seem to place in the way of progress , it is quite clear to all who penetrate beneath the vexed surface of the political sea and discern whitherwards tend the mighty currents , that the social fabric is everywhere undergoing a thorough investigation , which is tantamount to saying that it will be thoroughly reformed . The rapidity with which we in England are making progress in this direction is quite startling . It is the work of no party , it is the business of all . The political agitator who lives by the exposure of abuses meets in his daily rounds with the nobleman bent upon the same search . Tories and Radicals , Philanthropists and Demagogues , the cry of one and all is " Amelioration of the People ! " If any public man deserves a statue it is Henry Mayhcw . The accelerating impetus given tq , the Condition of England Question by his revelations in the Morning Chronicle in incalculable . They startled the rifiost supine . They inspired the earnest . And here he is availing himself of his vast experience and of the interest raised in the subject , to produce an encyclopaedia of London Labour and the London Poor : a hook , which when completed will remain an imperishable record of English life in the nineteenth century . Several ' ' i '
qualities combine to make Henry May hew peculiarly fitted to his work , hi th « first place he has that something in his manner which wins the confidence of tht ) working classes ; he has a real sympathy witli them , mingling in their amusements , throwing . hiimclf imaginatively into their lives , and forgetting that he is not of them . Ho does not go among them with philanthropic tenderness and cambric handkerchief ; pitying them with no little self-reference ; and giving them the best " advice . " lie goes among them like one who were he not an author would perhaps be a coster ! To this we must add a nice sense of generalities , which his philosophic training has induced ; nnd ,
b eyond the power of distributing his knowledge , he hasalso the power , of presenting it artistically . Altogether , we read this work with great admiration for the writer , and with inexpressible interest . He opens with some philosophic remarks on Wandering Tribes in general , # nd sums up thus : — " Here , then , we have a series of facts of the utmost social importance . ( 1 ) There are two distinct races of men , viz . : —the wandering and the civilized tribes ; ( 2 )
to each of these tribes a different form of head is peculiar , the wandering races being remarkable for the development of the bones of the face , as the jaws , cheekbones , &c , and the civilized for the development of those of the head ; ( 3 ) to each civilized tribe there is generally a wandering horde attached ; ( 4 ) such wandering hordes have frequently a different language from the more civilized portion' of the community , and that adopted with the intent of concealing their de 8 igns and exploits from them .
" It is curious that no one has as yet applied the above facts to the explanation of certain anomalies in the present state of society among ourselves . That we , like the Kafirs , Fellahs , and Finns , . are surrounded by wandering hordes—the ' Sonquas' and the ' Fingoes * of this country—paupers , beggars , and outcasts , possessing pothing but what they acquire by depredation , from the industrious , provident , and civilized portion of the community ;—that . the heads of these nomades are remarkable for the greater development of the jaws and cheekbones rather than those of the head ;—and that they have a secret language of their own—an English ' cuzecat ' slang' as it is called—for the concealment of their designs : these are points of coincidence so striking that , when placed before the mind , make us marvel that the analogy should have remained thus long unnoticed .
" T , he resejnblance once discovered , however , becomes of great service in enabling us to use the moral characteristics of the nomade races of other countries , as a means of comprehending the more readily those of the vagabonds and outcasts of our own . Let us therefore , before entering upon the subject in hand , briefly run over the distinctive , moral , and intellectual features of the wandering tribes in general . " The nomad , then , is distinguished from the civilized man by his repugnance to regular and continuous labour —by his want of providence in laying up a store for the future—by his inability to perceive consequences ever so slightly removed from immediate apprehension—by herbs and rootsandwhen
his passion for stupefying , , possible , for intoxicating fermented liquors—by his extraordinary powers of enduring privation—by his comparative insensibility to pain—by an immoderate love of gaming , frequently risking hisown personal liberty upon a single cast—by his love of libidinous dances—by the pleasure he experiences in witnessing the suffering of sentient creatures—by his delight in warfare and all perilous sports—by his desire for vengeance—by the looseness of his notions as to property—by the absence of chastity among his women , and his disregard of female honour—and lastly , by his vague sense of religion—his rude idea of a Creator , and utter absence of all appreciation of the mercy of the Divine Spirit . " ,
Passing from generalities he enters into the most special and interesting details of the statistics , habits , morals , religion , amusements , and commerce of the London street folk . The way in which the multifarious details are grouped betrays a masterly hand , and renders the work doubly important . But , as it is by far too extensive for us to follow , we will content ourselves with a few random selections : — VAUIKTIUS OF STHERT FOLIO "Tho ' putterers , ' or the men who cry the last dying speeches , &c .., in the street , and theme wlio help off their wares by long harangue * iu tlie public thoroughfares , are again a separate class . TIjckp , to use their own
term , arc ' tlie aristocracy of the Btreot-nrUers , despising ; the costers for their ignorance , and boasting th . it they live by their intellect . The public , they say , do not expect to receive an equivalent for their money—they pay to hear them talk . Compared with the coHtmnonpcrR tho patterem are generally an educated clans , and among them are some classical Hcholars , one clergyman , and ninny sons of gentlemen . They appear to l « o tin ; counterparts of the old inountehivnkH or street doctors . Ab a body they Heeni far lenH improvable than tlie costers , being more ' knowing' and leas impulsive . The street performers differ again from those ; these appear to possess many of the characteristics of the lower class
of actors , viz ., a strong desire to excite admiration , an indisposition to pursue any settled occupation , a love of the tap-room , though more for the society and dinpiny than for the drink connected with it , a great fondness for finery and predilection for the . performance of dexterous or dangerous feats . Then there are the street mechnnicH , or artizans—quiet , melancholy , struggling men , who , unable to find any regular employment at their own triide , have made up a low things , and taken to hawk them in the streets , as the last riliift of independence . Another distinct . cln «« of % tre « -r . folk are the blind people ( mostly musicians in a rude way ) , who , iftor the loan of their eyesight , have nought to keep a > : emselves f . om the workhouse , by some , little excuse for alms-seeking- These , ho far ns my experience goes , nnpear to be a far more deserving claim than is usually supposed—their nflliction , in most cases , seems to have chastened them and to iiavo tf iven " peculiar n-ligiouB cast , to their thoughts . " lime is a most graphic picture of—TUN M > NI > OM RTUHI ' . T MAItKI ' . TH ON A . SATURDAY NIGHT . " The street sellers are to bo seen in the greatest numbers ul the London Hh-.-et markets on a S . uurduy uikIii
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Mahcii "] ,. 185 ! . ] Ct ) £ & £ && £ ?« 203
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terms forms . I cannot believe in a manufacturing God as implied in the idea of a , Creator , and a creation ; nor can I believe in any beginning or end to the operations of Nature . The cause in nature or of nature is eternal and immutable . The earth and stars may pass away into other forms ; but the law is eternal . Man , animals , plants , stones , are consequently in nature . The mind of man , the instincts of animals , the sympathies ( so to speak ) of plants , and the properties of stones , are the results of material development ; that development itself being ' a result of the properties of matter , and the inherent cause or principle which is the basis of matter . If to have this conception of things is to be an Atheist , then am I an Atheist . If to renounce all idolatry , and to repose upon the deep and solemn conviction of an eternal and necessary cause , —such a cause as that , with our faculties , we could not know , or , as it is expressed , ' could not see and live ;'—if this be atheism or materialism , —be it so . I care not about terms . " Throw into this creed the emotive requisite , and it will not greatly differ from that splendid burst of poetry in which Faust replies to Margaret : Wer darf ihn nennen ? "Which , for want of a better at hand we give in the version by Miss Swanwick : — Him who dare name And yet proclaim , Yes , I believe ? "Who that can feel His heart can steel , To say : I disbelieve ? The All-embraeer , The All-sustainer , Doth he not embrace , Sustain thee , me , himself ? Lifts not the heaven its dome above ? Doth not the firm-set earth beneath us lie ? And beaming tenderly with looks of love Climb not the everlasting stars on high ? Are we not gazing in each other ' s eyes ? Nature ' s impenetrable agencies , Are they not thronging on thy heart and brain , Viewless , or visible to mortal ken , Around thee weaving their mysterious reign ? Pill hence thy heart , how larsje soe ' er it be ; And in the feeling when t . hou ' rt wholly blest , Then call it what thou wilt—Bliss ! Heart ! Love ! God ! I have no name for it—' tis feeling all !
we come round to me point whence we startedthat the soul is larger than logic , and philosophers must learn to suspect the absolute supremacy of logic in questions which transcend it . The same arguments apply to the belief in Immortality . " The desire of a future existence , " it is written in this volume , " is merely a pampered habit of mind , founded upon the instinct of preservation . " Rather let us say that it is the natural and irresistible product of the mind , founded upon an instinct , and assuming various shapes , according to the culture which endeavours to express it . We observe variations in the belief similar to those of the belief in God ; but equally with the belief in a Gorl , the belief in a future state is universal and ins'in'ctive . The horror , the dread , or simply the vngue uneasiness we feel at death in any shape , be it that only of a flog lying in the road , has its correlative in the desire for future existence . That desire finds its expression in doctrines of a future state . The Philosopher will say , What the future state will be I do not , cannot know ; but I feel that I shall not perish , and I repose in the profound conviction that the Great Goodness everywhere revealed to me in I this existence will not be absent from tlie next ! If you tell me that I trust in a fallacious guide in trusting thus to feeling , my answer is that you trust to a guide not less fallacious in trusting to knowledge , for the stern proclamation of the wisest thinkers has been tho absoluteness of our ignorance tlie moment we transcend phenomena ! While , therefore , Philosophy cries aloud that Knowledge on such matters is impossible , I have Home reason not to relinquish my position , that Feeling has an equal claim to be heard : Ignorance for Ignonmec , 1 prefer what is universal and instinctive to what is particular and ratiocinative !
- » t ^ Apiu »> m' .: ' j <; thought of ( . his article , we should say that , in the province of logical demonstration The Lit and Atheist are et / ualh / power / ess ; where there ar « no data ,, there can be no' demonstration , li' Logic i . s to be Hole arbiter , the only legitimate result will be a state- of absolute scepticism * or non-allinnation on ono side- or the other , lint , whereas tho Atheist is equally with tho Theisfc without proofs , there rises on the Hide of thoTheist thiy enormous and overwhelming presumption of universal feeling , wliich has in every age and -every country irresistibly forced men into the belief of conscious intelligence animating phenomena ! Iteasou in daylight ; by if ; we see all that can be won , „ daylight ; but there are realities the perception of which daylight destroys , and among these are the Stars ! To see them daylight must be withdrawn from the earth—the mystic Night alone re-
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), March 1, 1851, page 203, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1872/page/15/
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