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charmingly drawn , from the same originals , we suspect , as Mrs . Pendennis and Blanche Amory . The attentive reader will note , however , that in the portrait of the coquette , Beatrix , he has thrown so much real impulsive goodness , that she becomes a new creation—and , let -us add , a true one . She is not bad—she is vain ; and her fascination is made very What novel readers will say to Lady Castlewood ' s love , and to Esmond ' s love for the woman who calls him " , " we will not prophecy ; for ourselves we feel , that although vrai , it is not always vraisemblable . Novel readers will be more unanimous about the dramatic interest of the scenes at the close of the first and third volumes . We give no hint of the story ; but byway of extract will take a passage or two of the purely reflective kind . Who will gainsay this : —
LOVE S YOUNG DREAM . " ' Twas easy for Harry to see , however much his lady persisted in obedience and admiration for her husband , that my lord tired of his quiet life , and grew weary , and then testy , at those gentle bonds with which his wife would have held him . As they say the Grand Lama of Thibet is very much fatigued by his character of divinity , and yawns on his altar as his bonzes kneel and worship him , many a home-god grows heartily sick of the reverence with which his familydevotees pursue him , and sighs for freedom and for his old life , and to be off the pedestal on which his dependents would have him sit for ever , whilst they adore him , and ply him with flowers , and hymns , and incense , and flattery j—so , after a few years of his marriage , my honest Lord Castlewood began to tire ; all the highflown raptures and devotional ceremonies with which his wife , his chief priestess , treated him , first sent him to sleep , and then drove him out of doors ; for the truth must be told , that my lord was a jolly gentleman with very little of the august or divine in his nature , though his fond wife persisted in revering it , —and
besides , he had to pay a penalty for this love , which persons of his disposition seldom like to defray : and , in a word , if he had a loving wife , had a very jealous and exacting one . Then he wearied of this jealousy : then he broke away from it ; then came , no doubt , complaints and recriminations ; then , perhaps , promises of amendment not fulfilled ; then upbraidings , not the more pleasant , because they were silent , and only sad looks and tearful eyes conveyed them . Then , perhaps , the pair reached that other stage which is not uncommon in married life when the woman perceives that the god of the honeymoon is a god no more ; only a mortal like the rest of us , — and so she looks into her heart , and lo ! vacua sedeset inania arcana . And now , supposing our lady to have a fine genius and a brilliant wit of her own , and the magic spell and infatuation removed from her which had led her to worship as a god a very ordinary mortal—and what follows ? They live together , and they dine together , and they say ' my dear' and ' my love' as heretofore ; but the man is himself , and the v / oman herself : that dream of love is over , as everything else is over in life ; as flowers and fury , and griefs and pleasures are over . "
The question of " Woman's Bights , " and especially of that unholy right Man exercises in the name of husband—a name which sums up in itself all domestic rights — having lately been discussed , let us hear Thackeray on
OUE SLAVES . " Much of the quarrels and hatred which arise between married people come in my mind from the husband ' s rage mid revolt at discovering that his slave and bedfellow , who is to minister to all his wishes , and is church-sworn to honour and obey him—is his superior ; and that he , and not she , ought to be the subordinate of the twain ; and in these controversies , I think , lay the cause of my lord ' s anger against his lady . When he left her , she began to think for herself , and her thoughts were not in his favour . After the illumination , when the love-lamp is put out thsit anon we spoke of , and by the common daylight you look at the picture , what a daub it looks ! what a clumsy effigy ! I low many men and wives come to this knowledge , think you ? And if it be painful to a woman to find herself mated for life to a boor , and ordered to love and honour a dullard : it is worse still for the man himself perhaps whenever in his dim comprehension the idea dawns that his slave and
drudge yonder in , in truth , his superior ; that the woman who does his bidding , and submits to his humour , should be his lord ; that ( the can think a thousand things beyond th « 0 power of his muddled brains ; and that in yonder head , on tho pillow opposite to him , lie a thousand feelings , mysteries of thought , latent scorns and rebellions , whereof he only dimly perceives tho existence us they look out furtively from her eyes : treasures of love doomed to perish without a hand to gather them ; sweet fancies and images of beauty that would grow and unfold themselves into flower ; bright wit that would shine like diamonds could it bo brought into the sun ; and the tyrant in possession eruslies the outbreak of all these , drives them buck like slaves into the dungeon and darkness , and chafes without that his prisoner is rebellious , and bis sworn subject undutifiil and refractory . So the lump was out in Castlewood Hall , und the lord and lady there saw each other as they wore ; . With her illness and altered beauty my lord ' s fire for bin wife disappeared ; with his selfishness and faithlessness her foolish fiction of love and reverence was rent uway .
Love ?—who is to love what is bane and unlovely r Respect r—who is to respect what is gross and sensual ? Not all the marriage oaths sworn before all the parsons , cardinals , ministers , muftis and rabbins in the world , can bind to that monstrous allegiance . This couple was living apart then : the woman happy to be allowed to love and lend her children ( who were never of her owiKgood-will away ironi her ) , and thankful to have saved . such treasures uh these" out of the wreck in which the better part of her heart went down . " Before concluding , vvo must quote one of those simple passages , which , coming quietly from tho depth of real experience , go straight to tho heart ,:
—"At certain periods of life we ; live years of emotion in a few weeks ; und look back on those times as on great gaps between tho old life and . the new . You do not know how much you Miller in those critical maladies of the heart , until the disease in over , and you look back on it afterwards . The day passes in more or less of ' pain , and the night wears away somehow . "
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lUmilOlt'N ANAMHJY v . MODKltN UN UNLINK . The . Anuhufi ) of /{ . til'i ion , Natural and Itevealcd . . Hy . Joseph Hutlcr , JMVL . ( Standard Library . ) ' " " «»> n . ( kkcond artici . k . I Having treated of Rowan la and i ' liriinhrneiifcH , Huiler next proceed * to Bhow that ( iod ' s government of tho world in moral , und that , this moral government i » tho bukio as wo iiud taught in fcJcriplure . If men wore in
the habit of attending to logic when debating such questions , they would see at once that the proof of a moral government was no proof of th particular moral government for which Sutler argues , but was proof as demonstrative as such proof can be , of the very contrary . And vet Butler himself emphatically calls upon us to employ our logic , to appeal to the supreme arbiter , Reason : the passage is so explicit that we must quote it : — " I express myself with , caution , lest I should be mistaken to vilify reason which is indeed the only faculty toe have wherewith to judge concerning anythiva even revelation itself : or be misunderstood to assert , that a supposed revelation cannot be proved false from internal characters . For , it may contain clear immoralities or contradictions ; and either of these would prove itfdlse . " We meet him on this ground ; we call in Reason to decide . Let us begin with one of his propositions : —
" The fact that God has given us a Moral Nature is in itself a proof that He will finally support virtue . The fact that God influences mankind to act in the same way , and to favour virtue and to discourage vice , is not the same proof , but an additional proof of his Moral Government . It shows that He does at present favour and protect virtue . " Reason here may ask , Who gave us our immoral nature ? To say that we gave it ourselves , is to say that God is not the Author of our Being , but only of a part thereof ; to say that it belongs to our " fallen condition" is no answer—it only removes the difficulty , since the origin of the fall has still to be lained Who is the author of that ? God
exp : , Satan , or Man ? And , with reference to this said " fallen condition , " let Reason , also , suggest another question . We are told that although placed with a sinful nature amidst allurements to sin , yet we have Free Will , which , enlightened by Foresight , may guard us from sin . Our foresight of the consequences makes us responsible for our acts . The argument is held to be conclusive . It must be extended . If foresight makes us responsible , we must either deny foresight to the Creator , or hold him responsible ! It is the old dilemma : either the Creator could not foresee the results of placing man in such a condition ; or he could not help it . He is said to " permit wickedness : " but he must foresee the result of that permission , and yet he punishes I Butler lends us an illustration : —
" Suppose two or three men , of the best and most improved understanding , in a desolate open plain , attacked by ten times the number of beasts of prey : would their reason secure them the victory in this unequal combat ? Power then , though joined with reason , and under its direction , cannot be expected to prevail over opposite power , though merely brutal , unless the one bears some proportion to the other . " If " power , joined with reason , " cannot be expected to prevail over a wild beast , how can human strength prevail over Satan P And what is to be said of the morality which " permits Satan , " and condemns the defeated struggler to eternal torments ? These arguments have , of course , presented themselves to almost every mind " in the spacious circuit of its musing , " and theologians , feeling their force , have invented a method of eluding them : this is the doctrine of Probation .
Life is said to be a trial , a state of moral discipline , preparing us for eternity . Moral government implies moral trial . There would be no virtue were there no vice . If men were not in danger how could they be strong P There is in this general doctrine a truth which carries the assent of all religious minds ; and we who hold the " development hypothesis , " may readily concede what is here claimed . But , as we have noticed before , the artifice of gaining assent to a general doctrine , and then assuming that it proves the truth of a particular doctrine , is to bo guarded against . One may assent to the assertion that there are winged creatures , and yet withhold belief in Ariosto ' s Hippogrif . In the observations we are about to
make , therefore , the reader will bear in mind that they aim at the particular not at the general doctrine , —at Scripture , not at Religion , —at the Hippogrif , not at morality . What , then , shall we say of the morality of a system of Government , wherein the governor publishes edicts which he knows cannot be obeyed by the vast ; majority of his subjects—which he foresees must be and will be disregarded , 1 . By millions who can never hear of those edicts ; 2 . By millions who , having heard of them , cannot , under the circumstances , obey them ; 3 . By others who , having read them , cannot , believe in their authenticity , but consider them to be forgorieH P ttuc / i is the state of this world : and damnation , ih the result ! Indeed , us liuLler
naively confesses , — " Tiulml the present state is so far from proving , in event , a discipline of virtue to tho generality of men , that , *> n the contrary , they . seem to make it a discipline of vice . And tho viciousnesa of the world is in different , ways the great tewpt'ition which renders it a state of virtuous discipline , in the degree it is to good men . " . . If " Analogy" tells uh anything here , it certainly does not tell us t hat , the Scriptural scheme is a moral one . Indeed , the very notion oi » " scheme" destroys the idea of sin , when the Creator is tho schemer ; lor , if Hia were not involved in the scheme us a constituent element , it n have an author external to the Creator . But it in taught by Butler
himself Mint nil things in this world are ? inter-related : — i " It i . s most obvious , analogy renders it highly credible , that , ujk > ii ( supposition <> a moral government , it uiuk ) , be a scheme ; for the world , and tho whole , mllur " government of it , appears to be so ; to be » scheme , HyHtein , or constitution . wlios ^ parts correspond to euch other , and to n whole , as really as any work of art , or ils any particular model of a civil constitution ilnd government . In thin great sclioinc of tho natural world individuals have various peculiar relations to other individua to olic
of their own specie * . And whole Rpeeles « re , we find , variously related , species upon this earth . Nor do wk ) know how much further these kinds of n' *" tions may extend . And , an there 1 m not ; any action or natural event , which w ° " ; acquainted with ho nirigle ami unconnected m not to have a respect to some o . it actions and events , so possibly each of them , when it has not an immediate , lmj yet have u remote , natural relation to other actions and events much beyond . ocinpaHs of this present world . There seems indeed nothing from wluinco we cno much « w nuiko u conjecture whether all creatures , actions , and events , throiifc
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1072 THE LEADER . [ Satprda *
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Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 6, 1852, page 1072, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1959/page/20/
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