The Press. — London, England, 1853-09-10 00:00:00

450 Thou art young. and msyest possibly excel early as a mechanical performer. I need not urge thee to prune the exuberanee of the fancy and to bind thy taste—by nature delicate—to the pure AM11". 111()I144 whose names are, at present, to thee their only revelation. For the scapegrace whit figures in thy tinily caletobir as , •0 magnificently thy superior will ever stand thee instead of a warning or um' repulsion so lung as thy style is forming ; and, when formed. that style shall fence thee alike with natural wail artful antipathy against the school he serves, that con fesses to no restrict' , no, nut the restraint of Rule ; and is the servant of its own caprice. 'Thou shalt tied that many who profess the art confess H ot t.• that which they yet endure—a sort of shame in their profession as if they should ennoble if, and not it them Sue,' professors thou shalt ever discover arc slaves, itot sons : their excellenee as per owing to the accidental vulture of their imitative instinct; and they are the ripieni Ili . the universal orchestra wlitose chief dot,' appear but once in I. ery age. Thou shalt be met on to study by thine instructors, and, as I lietOre hinted, wilt ever repose upon their direction. But, in applying to the works they select for thine edification, nhether theoretie sir p r actical. endeavour to disabuse thy self of all thy precious impressions and prepossessions of any author whmtstiever, and to Asia.), thyself in the ism templation of that alone thou busiest thyself upon. Tints slime shall thine Intelligence explore all styles, and su separate each from each as finally to draw the exact eon elusion from thine own temperament and taste of that to which thou 411114 t essentially incline. lit treating of music specifically. remember not to con l'situid its elements. As in ancient mythology many reli gious seeds were sown, and golden mymikols scattered, so nosy we apply its enforcing foibles where the new wisdom denies its utterance. *mil MN's the expression of the actual anus if we observed the literal forms site speech. Tine; ever remember that. las the Aontsia wits a word sig nifying the invisibility of the gusts and the Ai star their in eitruntion, Mil is Titer the Aoramin of Music the godlike and Time its Avatar. Then. in Tim', shalt thou realise that in whielt the ex istetwe of music as infallibly osonsists as in its manifo.sta t• Tome, and thine understanding shall become investosl, with the trite looms. of Rhythm. whit+ alike tbitli exist t Pf-11 tints• and tone, MM. •gto es 1111 l in spiritual ole pomolenew the one with the other inseparably. In do-tooting thine energies to the works of art in ages thine own, thou shalt never be liable to depress thy 14,11,41. i 111 l SHWAS of those which an- meritorious With thee, and poi to violin. Iwtere thee. Foor thorn wilt learn, that to tallow the supreme 10f art with i 111 l 04 . 1 , 111• P and wisoloom was ev I.r allotted to the few whose labours yet endure; while as to the many whose high-flown perfections in their day se• oloseed the ad • •ation of the myriads to the neglect of the Ww. except by cs•w—tied we nothing of them at pmsent hit Ilw• names alone of their operas. or the mention of their having been and being 1111 W no more. And this is while the few are growing l 1 expanding their fame as the gene cootooloos succeed. ever lunging the few of every go-neratit but yet Iwtookening in that still, set-holed 1.1. •n, the itu mortal put-pose fur which they' wrote and died ties. Ite assured that in all works which have endowed there is something of the nation. of truth : therefore, ottsplaint thy self with all, ever reserving the right to I • with pecu liar investigation those works in which the author by scientifie hold uls,u tilrerfUl imagittati intimates that ho vt note with tho. direet intention to illustrate his art. nut abuse tOr the love of it, but in the fear of its service. Thus apply thyself to the otottroitioos of Palest rim', of l'onx-ell. of Alo.ssatiolno Searlatti, and the indefatigable ; thus lend thpoelf to the masterpivees of Pergoolesi, of Mozart, and Handel ; thus lean with thine entire *.ui aunt th e sniglat and majesty of doshit Sebastian Bach. All others, in MAO% lint IlletW in chief, and this last generalissimo, until then bast learnt to govern thyself. Parliamentary RE:/arm—the Educational Fran chime. I Amdmi : liatchard, and Ridgway. I'Ro.IEeTM for the reconstruction of the electoral body are just now at a premium, and will be more so before the comnwneentent of next ses sion—supposing, that is, that the Coalition Ministry remains in Ake, and that Lord Clarendon and the Czar do not between them involve Europe in a war. And, apart from the question of a change of tiovernment, it is im possible not to feel that the parliamentary ar rangetnents of 1832 are discredited in public opinion, partly by election disclosures, but much more by Lord John Russell's tardy con demnations. When the chief author of the first Reform Bill turns against his own work its fate is certain. Some kind of change it seems decided we must have, and the remain ing question is, Change in what direction " The writer of this pamphlet solves the pro blem after a fashion of his own. He begins by lazing it down broadly, that of the three principles on which the franchise is based— namely, population. property, and edueatbm— the last as. and always has been, unduly neg lected. In the counties. sending IM9 members.. the element of property predominates. In the boroughs, sending 3rai, the element of num bers predominates ; while the intellectual or educational element is inadequately repre- AA by the four members returned from the sented by u Univerbitic THE PRESS. Practical mischief results from this unequal apportionment of representation. Men of talent, devoid of local influence, connection, or notoriety, find the doors of Parliament hopelessly closed against them. For the coun ties naturally incline to select their represen tatives from among resident landed proprietors, and seldom, except in the case of persons already distinguished in Parliament, does their choice fall upon a stranger. The towns, again, though less fastidious in this respect, are apt to be unreasonably exacting in the matter of pledges, and to look more to their local inter eats than to those of the empire. And in urban constituencies the proportion which, under our present franchise, the ignorant bears to the educated portion of the electors is such as to preclude careful or discriminating judgment of intellectual qualifications. A borough may be won by promises, or conciliated by jobbery, or purchased through the agency of Coppock and Co. ; but it rarely accepts a candidate who presents himself with no other credentials than those of recognised ability and professions of political independence. How then, asks our author, is this iefect to be remedied ? How are we to introduce into the Legislature " active, able, but independent young men, who will submit to the labour of " business from the stimulus of patriotism and " honour?" How, in an assembly composed for the most part of country gentlemen, mer chants, and barristers, shall we reserve some seats tier the rising talent which every year sends forth from our various educational in stitutions? The plan here suggested is sim ple. It consists in classifying by themselves, to be enrolled in separate constituencies, all members of liberal professions as such. The numbers of these are computed us follows : Ministers of religion, including all denomi nation!' Members of the legal prof. ssion M embers of the mt.:sliest profession Retired officers of the army, navy, and East India Company's service Graduates of the various Universities,and err tificated schoolmasters, upwards of Members of vat' literary, scientific, and ,thistle associations, upwards of 11,500 5,1100 91,5410 The author's estimate exceeds 91,000, but we profess to write only in round numbers. The next question is—how, and in what pro portions, to give representatives to this class ? The writer cuts the knot at once by proposing either to increase the numbers of the House of Commons, or strike off seventy members from the borough representatives. This num ber is arbitntrily taken, apparently without any particular reason. Ile proceeds to divide the whole country into seventy electoral dis bias, and to assign one member to each of these districts, to be elected by the aggregate of all the classes above mentioned within that dis trict by all the clergy, lawyers, attor neys, doctors, naval and milibtry offieers, &e., residing within certain limits. These, as he truly says, would form constituencies incapable of being corrupted—free from local influence —independent, generally speaking. of party — and, owing to the admixture of various inter ests, unbiassed by exclusive professional feel ing. The objections which may be urged against such a proposition. and the difficulty of practically entertaining it, we shall reserve for the present. JOHN WOLFGANG GOETHE. The Poettoi Goethe. With a Sketch (t his Londot Life. By Edgar Alfred Bow•ring. John W. Parker and Son. (;orthe's Opinioss,(te._ By Otto Weneksteni London John W. Parker and Son. The New Pmitominte. By Ed. Kenealy, Esq., Banister at- I .aw. YE . I.L think of me now and then," exelaints Cuddle Heathigg, with heart-rending pathos, to Jenny. as we read in the bewitching sto►y of " Oltt ortal ity " Whiles.—at brose•ti►ne.' is the answer. It is chiefly at " brose•time" that Goethe represents the most transcendental of all his heroes—Jerusalem himself, as musing over the charms of his beloved. " 1 will endeavour," writes the distracted Werther, "to describe SATURDAY, " her to you while I eat my bread and butter When I first beheld this angel, she wore " a white gown, with a red rose stuck in it, and " held in her hand a brown loaf" The " colour ing " here is skilfully managed—white, red, and brown—while the allusion to the loaf im parts a strong human interest to a " bright " and thinslunary " vision. For sixty-seven consecutive years Goethe continued to tell an attentive world what he knew, thought, imagined, doubted, and felt concerning every subject that can interest serious, or amuse frivolous, minds. There have been not a few authors whose writings have produced on the destinies of society am great an effect as the writings of Goethe ; but only a comparatively small number can be named who so long guided in person, or were allowed so fully to witness, their own wide spread and prodigious influence. Dining nearly three quarters of a century of successful labours, progressive fame, and indirect but real authority, Goethe enjoyed those blessings of uninterrupted tranquillity and perfect health, the want of which has broken many a greater heart, and extinguished many a m ore shining intelligence. But, with a mind ' so astonish ingly comprehensive in its powers. so inquisi tive, anti so fond of occupation, he needed only patience and time : by temperament and constitution he was blessed with the first, and the dispensation of Providence granted him length of days. When, in 1832, eighty three years old, he ceased to study and to write, merely because he then breathed his last, he left behind him a mass of publi cations equal to that of one of the most voluminous ecclesiastical authors of the middle ages, together with a national popularity and a foreign fame as great as those of Walter Scott. We will endeavour, with impartiality, to state the apparent causes of the influence which he obtained and still exercises—offering as fair an estimate as we can of his labours, his mind, and his career. Three causes, quite independent ofhis merits or demerits as an author, contributed to his suc cess. The first he owed to the peculiar social dis tribution of Germany; the second is a singu larity in the German character itself ; the third is found in the movements of the epoch in which his lot was cast. Goethe has himself stated with fairness the nature of the first of the conditions to which we would call attention. Germany was full of principalities, all of which, in their internal administration. were independent, and many of which were extremely ancient : they possessed their own histories and traditions, of which they were proud , and, like llogberry, " had had losses," which argued their stability and importance. The principal town in each of these principali ties was a jealous little capital, with all a capital's institutions and means of instruction : its prince or chief magistrate was a potentate who attempted to vie as he best could with the splendour, progress, or influence of his neighbours. Had all these places been dependent on, or affiliated to, sonic great cen tral metropolis, with which rivalry in liberal achievements was impossible, they might have been content to remain much longer in the condition of barbarous villages. But the com petition which would have been hopeless against one gigantic centre was feasible against each other : the great efforts which would not have been undertaken by those from whom little was expected were quickly aroused and stimulated by the responsibility - of indepen , deuce, as well as by the emulation of fairly balanced chances and average equality. it was the glory, the interest, and the effort of each of these separate constituents of a co-ordinate system to be well furnished in all the appliances of civilisation, in the advan tages of science, and in attractions ofliterature and art. There is always a great deal of edu cation. and of every degree and species of education, in a metropolis. A much larger proportion of its inhabitants than uf the in habitants of places less supplied with ad vantages belong to the class of readers and inquirers. But while in England, for example. or in France, but one such centre of compara tive enlightenment existed, there were twenty iu Germany. The resources of each of these were indeed more limited, but their require- / 1°