The Press. — London, England, 1855-03-10 00:00:00

238 that of the solemn organ-tones of Lucretius. If we may draw a comparison between the music of ancient and modern poets, the long-sounding roll of the Lucretian hexameter reminds us of the deep and continuous har mony of Milton, or rather, perhaps, from its monotony and want of complexity, of the must solemn passages in the " Excursion ; ' while Catullus, in that beautiful poem which restores one page of old epic legend, by the simple yet stately and tranquil march of his rhythm, in which the music of each single line is often complete in itself, and yet blends harmoniously with the whole effect, brings to our mind the calm finished simplicity and mellow ca dences of the " Morte d'Arthur " (a fragment, like the poem of Catullus, rescued from old romance ), of " Ulysses," the " Princess," and the beautiful idylls of our great living poet. The music of Virgil hardly equals that of Lucretius in solemnity and in solid massive power, while it is superior (and in this respect more like that of Milton) in variety and complexity. The lines in the grandest passages of Lucretius seem to follow one another with a swelling and cumulative force : we seem to hear in them echoes from the " Magnis amfractibus iequor," as it breaks on the shore, lonely, solemn, and monotonous, yet rising from time to time in some majestic TFix.up.ia with snore sonorous and awful music. This essay has undoubtedly earned the first place in the volume. The second is by Mr. J. A. Froude, late of Exeter College, on the " Best Means of Teaching English History." This species of study has not long been admitted into the schools, but its ad mission has been a real benefit to the students. A complaint was often made before this inno vation that young men coming from Oxford knew more about the Constitution of Rome than about that of England : as Mr. Fronde says, " Pericles is better understood at Oxford " than Lord Burleigh, and we can quite as " accurately realise the impression which an " interview would make upon us with Isaiah " or Ezekiel as with John Knox or John " Milton." But at present there is a modern history school at Oxford, and we may see that the study of history is made a more important feature than it was formerly by the appoint ment of most able professors. Mr. Fronde recommends the study of the statute book, as being far more likely to impart a real know ledge of the life of our forefathers than end less analyses of Lingard, Hume, and Sharon Turner. We have not space to follow out his arguments, which are certainly ably put, and seconded by sundry examples drawn from the earliest times of English history. The great benefit that will accrue from such a study would be that we should no longer have to rely on such historians as Macaulay, whose writings are clever enough to impose fictions upon their readers in the place of facts, and to colour facts so artfully as to give them an opposite signification. In defence of Oxford as a school of education, Mr. Fronde says Oxford has done well what she has done ; and she may appeal proudly and justly to the experience of life to bear witness for her. When the men whom she and Cambridge have educated pass out into the arena of the world, in spite of all that has been said, they maintain there an easy supremacy. They have gained at the universities not perhaps information, but what lies at the bottom of all power to gain information for any useful purpose—a power of active insight into common things, which the more showy education of rival systems is something less successful in conferring. Mr. Henry J. S. Smith, of Balliol, contri butes an essay on the " Plurality of Worlds," taking as his text Dr. Whewell's essay, and Sir David Brewster's " More Worlds than One." Mr. Smith considers the essay on the " Plurality of Worlds" brilliant and suggestive, but uncon vincing, that the essayist has imposed upon himself by his powers of lucid statement, and his copious command of illustration, which have led him to attribute more value to his arguments than they really possess. "He has " mistaken the perfection of the form in which " he has clothed them for an indication of their " substantial truth." At the same time, Mr. Smith states that Sir David Brewster s reply is quite unequal to the essay : In his knowledge of physical facts, Sir David is, no doubt, a full match for his opponent ; but he has no chance against him when it comes to questions of a moral or re ligious bearing. He is wholly wanting in that peculiar kind of subtlety so essential in such discussions, which consists in clearly seeing the consequences of t h e by e assertionscareful we undertake to de fend, and guarding oursel limitations against the most inconvenient of them. In the present controversy, Sir David possesses neither mode ' of affecting it ; and he is, consequently, ' 4 ' o pen to attack. We regret to deficient in common courtesy, and angry feelings to mingle is too remote from all meaner sullied. There is something . which is, we own, provoking ; think the stars and planets have a THE PRESS. right to resent the scientific persiflage which he has di rected against them. But what is Sir David to the stars, that he should take up their quarrel as if it was his own? We have but a brief space left wherein to treat of the other essays. Mr. Phillips's essay on the " Neighbourhood of Oxford and its Geology " is far too much filled with scientific words to be comprehended by any but a goo logian. This fault is not to be found in any of the other essays, which, even when treating of classical subjects, are sparing of technical terms. Mr. Palgrave's essay on " Alfred de 'gusset" is hardly as light as the subject requires. It seems as if Mr. Palgrave natu rally entered into the spirit of the author whom he criticises, but that he refrains from writing of him in the light tone that befits a light subject, by some thoughts of the dignity to be kept up by an Oxford fellow. Mr. Cowell's essay on " Persian Literature " shows great knowledge of the chief poets whom Moore must have drawn upon for the learning contained in " Lalla Rookh." His account of Sufeyism is well worth reading, while the specimens of the fables and mystical poetry of the Sufis contain many poetical thoughts and much beauty of imagery and language. Mr. Thomson's essay on " Crime and its Excuses" grapples with the subject in an able manner, the author producing many cases of crime which the law has decided in an inconsistent spirit, and remarking on them that since, ac cording to Hesiod, Dike weeps before the throne of Zeus whenever the earthly judge decides wrongly, ingenious sculptors have fitly represented her with bound eyes : she has gone weeping-blind. Mr. Pattison's essay Oxford Studies" extends to a length that precludes us from giving any summary of its propositions, but we would recommend all who wish for a knowledge of what men learn at Ox ford to peruse it carefully. We believe the publication of this volume will do much towards raising the character of Oxford, and that many who before had a foolish horror of sending their sons there, will send them now, their eyes being opened to the importance of academical education by the favorable speci mens it presents of the wealth of Alma Mater. The Official Handbook of Church and State New Edition. London : Murray. NUMEROUS as have been the native and foreign jurists who have taken for their theme our English Constitution, it is wonderful how much ignorance of the machinery of our ex ecutive prevails, not only in foreign countries, but even at home. Our continental neigh bours, no doubt, have been somewhat lin proving in that branch of knowledge since Napoleon asked Erskine whether, being Lord Chancellor, he " had ever been Lord Mayor? " but yet one can hardly take up a work relating even remotely to our domestic government without finding how deeply the author is bewildered by the miscellaneous collection of departments and great offices, the creations of different ages and various necessities, and which constitute at length a whole that, like many of our old mansions, derives whatever beauty it has from the various dates and styles of its architecture. The convenience of despotism nobody ever doubted. It multi plies only hands, but free Governments ought to multiply, not hands only, but heads—not mere acting machines, but thinking men. On this principle our English liberty has been raised ; and the praise of any party in the State is most truly due when it can find in its ranks Ministers who yield, not a blind obedience, but a free, intelligent aid to the general working of one mighty engine of government, neither martinets nor dilletanti, men, in a word, who understand the genius of the British Constitution, and do their duty from principle and not from apprehension of loss of place, who have higher and nobler aspirations than the glorious goal of escaping a mischievous demagogue or a " select com mittee." To the Abbe Sieyes, or the late Mr. Jeremy Bentham, a Constitution upon paper was a matter "as easy as their garter." To M. Proudhon, or M. Louis Blanc, the classifi cation of mankind was as simple as the classification of beetles, birds, or beasts to a curator of the British Museum. They did not even, like him, get occasionally posed by SATURDAY, the occurrence of a social ornithorynchus. But, unfortunately, all the code-makers find themselves in the condition of Fuseli when his model the guardsman could not stretch his limbs half a yard farther than anatomy would permit, though they were not candid enough to make the painter's reflection— " Curse Nature ! she puts me out !" These speculations the history of our Con stitution alone, amongst those of all existing nations, disproves. That a principle of freedom once found is to pervade all departments of the Govemment--that a controlling power shall be exercised by the intelligence and wealth of the nation, by its representatives, whether those that are hereditary legislators representing the chivalry or learning of pre ceding ages, or those that are elective reflect. ing the temper of the time—these are the strict and binding conditions of such a system as the English, so greatly lauded by those who do understand it or do not. How far the balance of this power has gone wrong, and with what results, it is not fit here to inquire; the whole administrative system over which it is supposed to exercise the least control is set out in this handbook under its appropriate heads, and the consideration of those heads is full of much more than passing interest, suggesting more curious considerations than the supposed duties of this or that officer, his emoluments or his rank. The decay of the royal power in its legisla tive character dates from the earlier Parlia ments of Elizabeth, when Wentworth and Bell, though " straitly questioned " by the Queen for freedom of speech, nevertheless spoke very broadly what has been often echoed since—that Elizabeth " disliked religion." Still the exact amount of the prerogative and the extent of its exercise is one of the most common subjects of error ; and the Czar who asked Queen Anne to cut off the head of the Sheriff of London mistook it not much more widely than the Austrian Minister who de manded the condign punishment of Messrs. Barclay and Perkins's draymen, and provoked the present Premier's " wit that loves to play, " not wound," when he said that Marshal Haynau might come back and give evidence before the grand jury at the Old Bailey. A résumé of the constitutional law relating to the Crown is very clearly given by Mr. Redgrave in this handbook. Those who read the paragraph headed " Queen's Civil List" will come to a pretty clear notion of the value of the outcry against over-taxation and " ex travagance " that rose some time ago in the North, but has dwindled so sadly now that we see before us the effects of " financial reform" on the army at Sebastopol. Even they could hardly have cavilled at the 1,2001. per annum allotted to " persons who have j Ist claims on " the royal beneficence, or who, by their per " sonal services to the Crown, by the perform " anca of duties to the public, or by their " useful discoveries in science and attainments " in literature and the arts, have merited the " gracious consideration of their sovereign and " the gratitude of their country ;" nor at the precautions taken that Parliament shall have a strict account when the annual 315,0001. a be exceeded to the extent of 15,0001- a year. A curious field of inquiry is opened by the chapters of the handbook on the " Officers of the Household," from the days when the care of the Chamberlain was to look to the supply of rushes for carpets down to his nominal office of appointing tradesme n. Those great officials whose places and dignities are hereditary were never numerous in England, and they now, if we mistake not, consist of the joint Lords Great Chamberlains (the Lord Willoughby d'Eresby and t Mauis of Ch o lmondeley), the Earl Ma he rshal ( Duke of Norfolk), the Hereditary Grand Almoner and the Hereditary Grand Falconer (Duke of Albans), whose office is not noticed in this handbook. The court of the Earl Marshal charged itself with two very important func tions, which even yet might be somewhere used without much evil to the commonwealth— " To give relief to such of the nobility as think themselves aggrieved in matters of " honour, and to keep up the distinctions of " the degrees of quality." Doubtless, if the Earl Marshal's court had still survived we 11 I ra tion nor the art of aff ectin g continually laying himself of add that he is frequently di and has allowed his temper s in a discussion which surely interests to deserve to be so I in the irony of the essayist 1 end, in particular, we thin