The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser. — Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1855-11-27 00:00:00

18G SHEPHERD : Pity me ! how they moan, and groan, and greet, and wring their hauns, and tear their hair, even auld folk their thin grey hair, when death comes into the bed room, or the verra drawing-room, and carries aff in his clutches some wee bit spoiled bairn, yaumtnerin amang its playthings, or keeping its mither awake a' nicht by its per petual cries ! NORTH : Touch tenderly, James—on— 2. . . SHEPHERD : Ane wad think that nae parents had ever lost a child afore--yet hoo mony a slim' funeral do you see ilka day pacin alang the streets uuheeded on, amang the carts and hackney-coaches ! NORTH : Unheeded, as a party of upholsterer's men carrying furniture to a new house. SHEPHERD : There is little or naething o' this thocht less, this senseless clamour in kintra-houses, when the cloud o' God's judgment passes ower them, anti orders are Bien for a grave to be dug in the kirkyard. A' the house is hushed and quate—just the same as if the patient were still sick, and no gane awa— the father, and perhaps the mother, the brothers, and the sisters, are a' gaun about their ordinary business, wi' grave faces, nae doubt, and some o' them now and then dichtin the draps frae their een ; but, after the first black day, little audible greetin, and nae indecent and impious outcries. NORTH : The angler calling in at the cottage would never know that a corpse was the cause of the calm. SHEPHERD : Rich folk, if they saw sic donee, composed ongoings, wad doubtless wonder to think boo callous, hoo insensible were the puir ! That natur bad kindly denied to them those fine feelings that belong to cultivated life ! But if they heard the prayer o' the auld man at nicht, when the survivin family were on their knees around the wa', and his puir wife neist him in the holy circle, they wad ken better, and confess that there is something as sublime as it is sincere and simple, in the resignation and piety of those humble Christians, whose doom it is to live by the sweat o' their brow, and who are taught, almost frae the cradle to the grave, to feel every hour they breathe, that all they enjoy, and all they suffer, is dropt doun frae the hand o' God, almost as visible as the dew or hail,—and hence their faith in things unseen and eternal, is firm as their belief in things seen and temporal—and that they a' feel, sir, when lettin doun the coffin into the grave! While thus sustained in his eloquence, and pathetic in his teaching, the Professor is not less suc cessful or persuasive in some of the merely chance touches with which, as it were unconsciously, he adorns his picture. Take as an example the following appropriately uttered remarks upon SUPPLEMENT TO THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD. STARCHED GENTILITY. MISS GENTLE : Mr. Forsyth's coach [a short stage sort of omnibuss which ran betwean Edir,burgh and Portobello,] seldom starts, I think, till about seven minutes after the hour, and I hope we may have com pany. It is always pleasant to me to see a new face, and hear a new voice, if it should be but for a passing half-hour of cheerfulness and good-will among strangers. MRS. GENTLE : There is an advantage, child-1 had almost called it a blessing, in being not too genteel. People who at all times keep fastidiously aloof from all society but that in which it is their fortune to move, unconsciously come to regard a large portion of their fellow -creatures with a kind of pride not unallied to con tempt, and their sympathies are confined within too narrow a range. Akin to this gentle yet powerful reproof of that dangerous, because unintended repulsiveness, which, through an unnecessary apprehension of defilement, " keep sman from man, and breaks the social tie," is the following broad, burly, and characteristic, yet truthful, castigation of FALSE SENTAMENTALISM. NORTH : Sobriety is the strength of our physical, moral, and intellectaal life. But how can any man hope to continue long sober, who calumniates cordial con viviality—misnames fun, folly, and mirth, malignity— turns up the whites of his eyes at humour, because it is broad, broad as the sea in sunshine—who in his false wis dom knows not what real wit is, or, half knowing it, turns away, abashed and detected, from its corruscations, that are ever harmless to the truly good, and wither only the weak or the wicked. To go on quoting, however, all that we had marked as indispensable, to do justice to the volume in bringing its character before our readers, would far exceed the bounds at our dis posal; and to display all those passages which are worthy of deep study, and will repay in accents of rich wisdom the labour and the time bestowed on their perusal, would be nearly to reprint the book. It is full of sound and healthy criticism upon men and manners—art and literature and science are discussed in its pages, and the true characteristics of each and all of these are traced upon its golden tablets with a pen of adamant. The various subjects introduced are arranged with the skill of the philosopher, and combined with the taste of the artist. They are treated with glowing yet merited and well expressed eulogy, delicate, yet caustic raillery, biting irony, or plastic and brilliant wit, as the nature of the case may require ; while the whole is swept on in a torrent of genial and healthy humour, and borne on a tide of flowing fancy, enriched by the gatherings of profound sagacity, An uncompromising foe to pretence of every kind, Professor Wilson smote small pretenders with an iron rod ; but he at all times, and in every case selected the great sinners as the sub jects of his indignant, if not also sometimes wrathful punishment. The trivial offenders he either compassionately or contemptuously over looked. In this vein of feeling, he severely handled the productions of Hazlit and Hunt, whose literary labours he judged false in politics and dangerous in moral tendency. Regarding them as the heads of a politico-literary clique, which he designated the " Cockney School," he not only exposed the hollowness and evil drift of its teaching, but further, as he never did things by halves, but powerfully expressed what he strongly felt, he flagellated the originators, while he tore the masks from the meritriciously be decked characters of what he believed and knew to be political and moral masquerade. While engaged in this laborious and unwelcome, though ably as well as fearlessly executed task, he was assailed with much bitterness of feeling and great vindictiveness of aspersion. Undismayed by these, he boldly pursued the path of honour which he had prescribed for himself, and long before the brilliancy of his sun had become dimmed by the shades of approaching night, the atmosphere which he had striven so vigorously to maintain the purity of, had become cloudless and serene. The foetid vapours which offended his moral sense had been dispelled ; and to these his much vilified exertions we in a great degree owe the exalted tone of our best and purest literature. The republication of this great and venerable man's works has been, to some extent, a signal for reviving against his memory the charges which lie successfully and heroically repulsed during his lifetime, and the fervid denunciations which he hurled against the evil influences of a mischievous literature, are once more made the subjects of malignant sneers and fierce invective. That he was right in the main features of his condemnation, and fully justified in the severity of his reprobation, has been long acknowledged, and even his personal enemies admit that - he was kind, or if severe in aught, The love he bore to virtue was in fault. Deeply gifted with political sagacity and foresight, and firmly persuaded that a due administration of the state included, as its very basis, a fine sense of public virtue, Wilson watched with extreme jealousy every political movement, however covertly made, and in such movements the sharp ness of his intellectual vision enabled him at once to detect the artful insinuations of the demagogue; with him to descry danger was at once to denounce, to grapple with, and if possible destroy the evil. The Dublin University Magazine. Dublin : James AleGlashan. The November number of this periodical sus tains the high literary character the magazine has so long enjoyed. It opens with an able and suc cinct history of " The Progress of Russia," in which the writer rapidly and briefly (races the rise and progress of that cormorant nation from a barbarous and predatory tribe, through all the ebbs and flows of its still onward destiny, till the [NOVEMBER 97 present time, at which, by the stead, swerving policy of adding state to star aut nefas, it has become a vast and pire, stretching from the Frozen Oc Sea of Azoff ; from Lithuania to th shores of Kamschatska, within which Nv the original " Russia Proper " forms province. " The Roman Empire," tells us, " contained 1,600,00 0 sqn when at the zenith of its grandeur; from the Euphrates to the Weste included a measurement of 3,000 m 2,000 divided the wall of Antonias pillars of Hercules. European Russia prises exactly the same area, whip separated from Audyskoiostrag, in A sia. miles, and 1,750 more extend to thy Peter and Paul in Kamschatska. T r i monarchy was comprehended under B°cie; less than thirty-two degrees of hi t° Russian exceeds thirty-five." miter (4' This vast extent of empire, the —an e 9 article in question considers to beL n to' pOSL"" o mous power of itself in resisting opP- re , aggressive policy. " From its very h at ! f o g, he, " Russia is, of all nations, capab le :ooo sion, and defensive resistance, with ih s pitl alarming advantages. Its enormou s 133 4 (11 is consolidated, not scattered over the "eel the possessions of Great Britain ; whi les it ing from the Caspian to the Baltic , tr, , teg y to Odessa, it leans with preponderatilistoeto upon the smaller part of Europe." g e 0 ready operation of her aggressive PO - , O , ferent causes included in the vast esterlostVv frontier, which, bordering upon barbar ° o o 0 enables her, stealthily, to add fr a y a fragment to her already gigantic btri i eP: l , the pagan and infidel ignorance °l " t dr 4 by which on the south an east she ,q ll clfir; which admits or rather encourages a '„ en to'y sion of fanatical zeal into their opp o9 ;. a coo Latin Christians, by whom alone R 1 17 ,1 1,4 11( successfully withstood. After a care of the advantages and disadvantages p ° Russia, he offers the following PREMONITION AS TO TILE PUTr e' l,o4 Europe can never be too watchful or suspi°l-e , gh e approaches of the rough and superincu rn bege t fi pants for the possession of the Sound as well as nelles, and to compress the west with capacioasL49, progress of such a state may be checked by a t: o cet i st cession of defeats, from this or that gallant 51 ' r CV from its position, it cannot be annihilate d, 0° iii,. even maintain their advantage. it will rise 01:4/ like, to renew the self-same attempt, i pendent nations be not erected and plant' its frontiers, inspired by patriotism, and the watchword of its movements to the W die takl) r iriO, Nor should the East be neglected ; for. for the while, the weight will inevitabi Asia. The strengthening and alliance of creating with him a free communication (long an object of Russian covetousnes s, in the development of his resources, and,' vast army, which, by making him conk the hour of need, will be the truest safeg"` The counsel thus briefly sag e' n which has long occupied the at te-I men, and has been trequentli re ' adoption. That no step has be en its realisation, has probably been the absence of a decent pret o , t out, than to any insensibility °L An apprehension, too, that a n Y realise it would be the s i gn al for a vulsion, has no doubt operated in to check its practical feelings application. sive no longer exist. T 1 been unequivocally afforded by RI ways, and sealed by the aggressiv4 centrated by her at Sebastopol ; European interests has been beg , day tends more and more to pro' iS , come dy tbe e r ate, lvj The o ::01 0 7, the ()till the u su ,be f esti n o. b vide enter bat ers o f this ,' ablt uare i l , 3 elf t s e sob:rit ,iBatienoahilti,, ( if hogttle :ow ~ ted, likes'', I o tit we a u ever reao ite ttit i:lo w orld. t ile , if baffled ill „ e . _ ,bly be turor, , 0:1 the Spat! ?fi, k . from stfc:ing Nee ostr,„in, 0 , i o I t be tow b. ort eft 1 , 3eo of supp . 1 ~ used on that s otpe 'crested is diet. ation of 5.--1 I,s, 0 ri !c otnalre Ja e otao.eui , r) th rae I i more o , :ly pc t for car , l l'ord its inipoo;io i oils ' endea"67 iitkell ( a Euror ' \‘' 4fis • 0 I, Ith'.' no scuPa 14 0( • These Pt 11ttve The pret es Il ta, 4 Russia i 1. .: a n t l t :e ire ageDelv,ct ~istai the coll,lll lie n t g un, avd i‘ 0 10,, ~,. ,r Ye that the • '