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It has always been interesting to Englishmen to read the criticisms of Frenchmen upon Shakspeabe . For many years these criticisms had a splendour of absurdity which made them the delight of every one whose sense of the ludicrous was keen . Of late years we have seen this source of amusement gradually disappearing ; its place has been filled by a graver interest-that of watching the serious judgments of able and well-informed men on works which have rarely since their first appearance been judged without absurd partialities . Shakspeabe , in England , m Germany , and in France has been the subject of more criticism , and worse , than any other poet since poems were first written . This should always be remembered in fpeaking of any attempt to judge him . If the modern French critics fail to satisfy us , we are forced to confess that no English nor German critic has succeeded better . An air of unreality , and something also of insincerity , vitiates them all ; and M . Taine , in his remarkable essay published in the Revue des Deux Mondes , says with strict accuracy that " il est si populaire , qu ' au lieu de le juger on l ' admire : " and in place of criticism we have dithyrambics . Even M . Taine constantly forgets the purpose of his essay , and makes it the mere starting-point of rhetoric . He has studied Shakspbare with care , and he interests us by his remarks ; but he shows too plainly the
desire of the writer to write brilliant paragrap hs with small regard as to the fitness of what he says- Phrases fall from his pen which are merely phi-ases , and not expressions of his real meaning . For example , when he speaks of Shaksfeabe ' s inspiration as " superieure a la raison par les revelations improvise " es de la folie clairvoyante , " , elsewhere , lays so much stress on the feverish delirium of the poetry —( " ' arrete avec stupeur devant ces metaphores eonvulsives , qui semblent ecrites par une main Jievreuse dans ttne nuit de delire" ) he is using the cant language of Young France , which cannot conceive poetic exaltation except as delire , which cannot admit genius without madness There is something so essentially opposed to French taste in the
¦ works of Shaksfeare that we ought not to be surprised if , accustomed to the sobriety and precision of their classic authors , Frenchmen should pause u avec stupeur" before such extraordinary productions . M . Taine justly compares this sobriety of the French classics with the profusion of the English poet , in whom three images constantly do the work of one . The French poet employs an image to render intelligible the idea he has to express . Not so Shakspeabe . He thinks in images . He gives you one to express his meaning , and that one calls up another , that other a third ; and delighting in these images for their own sake , he scatters them prodigally along his path . The French poet employs an image as a proposition : the English poet employs it for its own sake , delights in it because it is an image , and indeed cannot express himself otherwise than by images . While M . Taine is endeavouring to make his countrymen appreciate
Shaksfeake , Mr . H . Denison , late Fellow of All Souls , has been endeavouring to persuade his countrymen to translate Suakspeahk—into Latin ! and published a version of Julius Ccesar as a sample of what may be achieved in this direction . Of all languages known to us Latin is the least adapted to render Shakspeabe : a meagre language , having no virtue but its characteristic brevity , a language for epigrams , inscriptions , and aphorisms ; it is incompetent , even in the hands of a master , to reproduce the luxuriant overgrowth of Shaksfeabkan style , so prodigal yet so felicitous , so crowded and at times so simple , and always flexible with the grace of strength ; in the hands of a modern Englishman no approach to success is possible . W will give one specimen of Mr . Denison ' s attempt , and it shall be a passage full of brief sentences and free from Shakspeahk ' s peculiarities : —
C < fs . —Let mo liavo mon about me thai ; aro fat ; Cas- —Qui mihi as tan t , Antoni , obesi Bloek-hoadod men , and such as sleep o' nights : shit ; beno curatA cute ; qui noctem Yond * Cnssius has a lean and hungry look ; edoriniunt . Oaasins isto aspectu macro He thinks too much : such men arc dangerous . « g- ™ ^ vendT ^ n ^ " °° Bltat ""^ Ant . —Fear him not , Caesar , ho a not dangoroua -, Ant—No ilium motuas , Ccesar ; nou Ho ia a noble ttoman , and well given . ost lllo eavendua ; bone natuu ebt , Cas . —Would ho were fatter : —But I fear him opthno nfl ' ectus . not ; Cars . — Utinatn pingitior esscfc : —niliil Yet if my name were liable to fear , motuo tainon : sin uutmn Cecsaris no-I do not know tho man 1 should avoid i . !™} qU 1 - d Cum f » rimdino commune So soon as that spare Cassius , Ho read * much , ^ iZf ^ . ^ u 3 ^ m'ZZ £% & He is a great observer , and he looks 8 ium . Multa legit ; notat multa ; aota Quite through tho deeds of men : ho loves no plays , hoiniiuun usque ad iinum perspicit ; As thou dost , Antony ; ho hears no music : ludou non , ut tu , Antoni , froquentat ; Seldom he smiles ; and smiles * in such a sort musleam fostidit ; raro faoiom in risum A , if homock-d himself , and scornM his spirit -laxat ^ •^ airSSPt . 'W ^ SHS That could bo mov'd to smilo at anything . contisniptu , nui ad hoc ullomodo uio-Buoh mon ou ho bo novor at heart's ease , verl poasit . Talon sompor mgro ferunt , "Whiles they behold a greater than tlieiiisolvcs ; si quando alitun sibi ipsis » upcrioroin And therefore are they very dangerous . aniniodverterint : idcirco imprimis ca-I rather toll thoo what is to bo fear'd vondi mint . Quod vulgo motuondum Than what I fear , for always I am Ca / sar . < iat > llo , < luod 0 ( 5 ° " » i ostondo ; rnmnnnrnvriirlAlinnfi f « iTiiV . \ . ego oniin semper Ouisar . Bed veni in Come on my right hand . for thin oar it * deaf , doxtram , altek onim auro mirdior sum And toll mo truly what thou think ' at of him . et dio mihi quid do illo vero censoan .
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Journalists occupy , so prominent n placo in France that the trial of one of them for libel is thought worthy to fill nearly tho whole of a newspaper . Strange indeed aro tho revelations made in tho proces Jujlks Lkcomtic .
Our readers may perhaps y ge , very flippant and very worthless feuilleton , or " Courrier de Paris , " signed " Jules Lecomte . " This man , who has been thrice before the criminal court , who has forged , and been condemned to the galleys , according to the evidence of the trial , has had the strange audacity to bring an action for libel against some other journalists , and to demand 20 , 000 francs as damages from one , and lesser sums from the others . The jury , after hearing the ¦ whole case , award the sum of 25 francs without costs ! Will the Independence continue to put forward as a principal contributor one whose honour is estimated at the sum of 25 francs?—a man whom even in France nobodywill fight with , because , as Dumas told him when they quarrelled , " Je ne me bats pas avec vous ^ parce que vous etes un escroc /" ,
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MATERIALISM IN GERMANY . Her Materialismus : Seine Wahrheit und Sein Irrthum . Von Dr . Julius FrauenstSdt . D . Nutt . This is the latest of a series of works issued during the last two or three years , which have made great stir in Germany . The origin of the battle , which has since waged fiercely , was Rudolph Wagner ' s ill-judged attack oa Yoo-t . Vo « t , one of the most distinguished of German zoologists , and also one ° o ' f the " extreme left" in the Frankfort parliament , has expressed himself with a plainness amo unting to c rudity respecting the nature of the soul and the origin of the human race . In the scientific views maintained by hum the vas ° majority of scientific men in Germany are unanimous , and when Rudolph Warner ventured to open a discussion at a scientific congress respecting the ' existence of a peculiar " soul-substance" ( or as we m England should term it , " the immaterial principle superadded to the brain ) , he could ffet none- of his brethren to espouse his cause . It would have been wiser had mtter Kina
he been quiet a er this rebuff ; but , unhappily , personalities o \ a , had already passed ; Vogt had ridiculed and attacked both him and his views ; he had retorted ; the quarrel became fierce , pamphlets abundant . We have no space to write the history of this quarrel ; but we may briefly indicate its nature Apart from all personalities , it is the ancient quarrel between i'heolooy and Science ; the endeavour on the theologian ' s side to coerce Scienee \ vithin the doctrines Theology is willing to admit . Such an attempt we may unhesitatingly declare to be in its principle unphilosophical , and fatal in its results , obstructing Science and not advancing Religion . The attempt is , however , one which under other forms continually presents itself as an obstruction to the progress of discovery . It neglects this ' , damental canon of all sound philosophy , namely , that no speculation should be controlled by an order of conceptions not presupposed by it . The canon maybe mnst . Rtrikincrlv exemplified in the absurdity of controlling Poetry by
Mathematics ; and in the necessity of controlling Physical speculations by Mathematics . The very reason which makes Physics amenable to Mathematics absolves Poetry from all such authority ; the speculations of physical philosophers imply , and are dependent on , Mathematical laws , consequently by these laws they must be controlled . Truth is always consistent . Any fears on our parts of the " consequences to which a true proposition can lead or be supposed to lead are as unwise as they are unworthy . A true proposition cannot legitimately lead to false consequences and instead of permitting our anger and our terror to alight on the proposition , we should resolutely set to work first to see if the dreaded consequences are legitimate and inevitable conclusions from the new proposition ; and next , to ascertain whether , if this be so , it will not on the whole be better to give up our old conclusions in favour of the true . It is of no use screaming , " This leads to Toryism ! " or " This is rank socialism ! " both isms . may be very hateful to you , but the thing you are called on to decide is . whether a moral or economical principle is in itself just and true .
Having settled that , the ism will shortly settle itseU . Theology , we need scarcely say , belongs to a totally different order of conceptions from those which constitute science . Its aims are different , its methods are different , its proofs are different . Not presupposing the evidence of science , it cannot be controlled by science . Neither can it control science . The two are as distinct as Mathematics and Poetry . In theology , there may be debates between Catholic and Protestant , Lutheran and Zwinglian , Presbyterian and Quaker , because all these systems proceed from one starting point , all invoke the same evidence , all employ the same methods . But what should we say to Lutheran botany , or Low Church chemistry ? to Presbyterian optics , or Evangelical physiology ? These dissonant phrases express the discordance of the ideas . and Science
We arc justified , therefore , in the assertion that Theology ought to be kept utterly distinct ; the teachings of science cannot be invalidated by anything taught by theology ; if the two clash , we must ascertain their point of contact , and give to each its own . This has been more or less consciously maintained in England for years ; many of our eminent scientific men having been either clergymen or orthodox believers . They have , indeed , heen at all times ready to decry novelties on the ground of " dangerous tendency . " They like to use the arm of the Church as a weapon of olluncc ; but fo r all established truths , or theories , they are willing to let science have credit . This is very much tho position maintained by Wagner . In bis work Veber Wissen und Gluuben ( 1854 ) , he said : " In matters of Faith , 1 prefer ii iuu uuuicuui uuruui uui / ^
lUO piulll null Hiuipiu m uvu » , «• »••«••>•><•»• —« - « .. w-. »» -w , 1 belong to those who are most sceptical . " The phrase produced an uproar . Vogt replied , in a terrible pamphlet entitled Kohlenj laube und Wissenachaft . We think there is a good position to bo made out for Wagner , but it is certain thut ho failed to make one for himself . He tried to support scientific opinions by Scripture ; and he was liberal in accusations against the " consequences" which would ensue if tho opinions he opposed were to prevail-This tone would not succeed with the Germans , although it is eminently successful with us . Tho Ciermuna think more of truth and less of consoquencus . Long ago , Leasing , writing to hia brother , said : — "With ^ Orthodoxy wo were hitherto on comfortable terms } a line of demarcation had
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have occasionallread in JUIndependence Beia Auera 161856 . 1 THE LEADER . 785 . . ^« . «« i ;* . »»«« ll «» vaod Sn /¦ ' TttjJjZnfnsIsi'iisn' Tleijio a
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 16, 1856, page 785, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2154/page/17/
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