The Press.
London, England, 1858-04-10 00:00:00

THE PRESS, APRIL 10, 1858,

and expanded, through his songs, popular instincts and
passions in opposition to everything that recalled the old
system, and, above all, against the pretensions and supre•
macy of the Church. M. Beranger, in his heart, was
neither a revolutionist nor an unbeliever ; he was morally
more honest, and politically more rational, than his songs ;
but, a democrat by conviction as well as inclination, and
carried away into licence and want of forethought by the
spirit of democracy, he attacked indiscriminately every-
thing that was ungracious to the people, troubling himself
little as to the range of his blows, looking upon the success
of his songs as a victory achieved by liberty, and forgetting
that religious faith and respect for things holy are nowhere
more necessary than in the bosom of democratic and liberal
associations. i belir.•ve he discovered this a little too late,
when he found himself individually confronted by the
p salons which his ballads had fomented, and the dreams
he had transformed to realities. He then hastened, with
sound sense and dignity, to escape from the political arena,
and almost from the world, unchanged in his sentiments,
but somewhat regretful and uneasy for the consequences
of the war in which he bad taken such a prominent pert.
Under the Restoration he was full of confidence and z-al,
enjoying his popularity with modesty, and more seriously
hostile anti influential than any sonnetteer had ever been
before him.

Our French copy of this work has not come to
hand, but Guizot could scarcely have called
Beranger a " sonnetteer," for which the French
word would be ‘1 sonnettier "or poetereau."
it is more probable that Guizot used Beran-
gees own modest word for his vocation, " ehan
sonnier," which exactly means a " ballad-
maker." Elsewhere, also, we find the word
" sonnetteer" absurdly misemployed in this
volume.

The further portions of this work will in-
crease in personal interest, and we hope that
we may have the pleasure of receiving another
volume during the present season. It was
after 1830 that M Guizot became a man of
action ; and in describing that part of his
career he will, probably, give the world some
extraordinary revelations.

Essays and Re►nains of the Rev. Robert Alfred
Vaughan. Edited, with a Memoir, by the
Rev. Robert Vaughan, D.D. London: J. W.
Parker and Son.
THE practice of reprinting articles contributed
to Reviews " has increased, is increasing, and
" ought to be diminished." There is an incon-
gruity in elevating that which is by its nature
ephemeral into the ranks of permanent litera-
ture. Hence no doubt the rule for many years
adhe red to by the managers of the Literary
Fund, that periodiciti writers should not be
classed among regular professional authors.
The practical requirements of literature at the
present day have compelled the relaxation of
this provision, and it is of course undeniable
that the expansion of the old-fashioned cri-
tique into the elal-orate modern essay has
done much to break down the distinction be-
tween the critic and the original writer. As
the line of demarcation grows fainter, the ob-
jection to this system of republication of
course grows less. But it still exists ; and
even now a composition may be highly ser-
viceable to the reading world in the columns
of a magazine which is altogether deficient in
the qualities requisite to constitute it a
x74"/Acs t:r In the second place, the system
of which we speak is as it were a short road to
fame, and eagerly pursued by many writers
who have neither the abilities nor the industry
to complete an independent work. Ushered
into public notice under the wing of some
first•class periodical, the young litterateur at
once secures a favourable audience. Nothing
that is not good, people think, can have been
admitted into the columns of this or that
celebrated review or journal ; forgetting that
what was very good there is not necessarily of
equal merit in another sphere. It is a fact,
also, that the uninitiated public are apt to look
with reverence on any man who has penetrated
through the triple brass with which the
approaches to all first-class periodicals are
fenced off, and has succeeded in becoming one
of that mysterious plurality whose utterances
possess corporate weight. This is shown by
their readiness to attribute articles to cele-
brated people who have perhaps never called
themselves "we " in all their lives ; and men
who come before the world as regular contri-
butors to a work of this character shine with
a degree of reflected light which gives them
an undue advantage over other members of,
tho craft.

MI

.b•••
But we are wandering from Mr. Vaughan
Many of the above remarks do not apply to hi;
particular case. He has written a book—and a
book of mark and merit. This is sufficient to
exonerate him from the charge of stealing into
a position to which his literary calibre did not
entitle him. But it by no meialnaspsfo,lalto:setshuast
the same fact affords any good ground for the
present reprint. Nothing, perhaps,
more in reading the serious portions of these
essays than the youthfulness which pervades
them—youthfulness both of idea and of style.
The effect is, that although we are convinced
all the time that the writer was a very clever
man, we cannot get on with his productions.
A young man of extensive reading and most
accomplished mind he evidently must have
been. But it may fairly be doubted whether
at the age of two and twenty the greatest
genius on record could have written much de-
serving the attention of men on such subjects
as Mr. Vaughan selected for his maiden effort.
Accordingly, the essay on ()tiger', though
full of reading, written throughout with
smoothness and ease, and adorned at inter-
vals by a happy illustration or a well-chosen
epithet, totally fails to arrest the attention or
to leave any definite impression on the mind.
The same may be said of the essays on
S3hleiermacher and Savonarola. Page after
page presents itself with the most inviting
heading at the top of it, and the most dis-
appointing vacuity below. We search in vain
for thought. We find instead of it a reproduc-
tion of the thoughts of others, arranged to
look original. This is the art of the Prize
Essay. He who is a master of it proves no
doubt that he has a good intellectual diges-
tion ; gives good promise of a powerful mind
that may hereafter bring forth fruit, but
nothing more. We do not at all intend to
depreciate Mr. Vaughan. We only mean that
he has not risen superior to the conditions
under which a youth of one and twenty com-
monly exerts his reflective faculties, and that,
however valuable may be his prolusions as
evidence of future vigour, they have little or
no value as deliberate judgments on the sub-
jects he has taken in hand.
Even in the essays which were composed at
a more advanced period we fail to catch any-
thing very striking or original. In an essay
on " Hypatia" we find a page headed " Charac-
teristics of Mr. Kingsley's style," and wo read
below :

The strength so conspicuous in Mr. Kingsley 's writings
is power of that kiud which results from the consecra•
tion of great gifts to a great purpose.

We might as well say the violence so conspi-
cuous in a cannon-ball is power of that kind
which results from the application of a great
discovery to a great gun. We assure our
readers that there is no unfairness in the
choice of the above instance. The essays
abound in similar platitudes ; and we cannot
resist the suspicion that Mr. Vaughan was
unlucky enough to have been clothed in early
life with the character of an infant phenome-
non—that a fond family puffed him into a
spurious precocity, and made him what Nature
never intended him to be—a juvenile pedant.

It appears to us that Mr. Vaughan himself
had a truer presentiment of his real vocation
than his friends had. He possessed many of
the qualities which are characteristic of poetic
genius. Sometimes his fancies are truly
graceful and beautiful. The simile of the
willow and violet ia the Origen essay is an
example :
The men who have embraced such voluntary humilia-
tion have too commonly accounted it quite proper to in-
demnify themselves by deriving from the meagreness of
their diet supplies whereon their self•righteousuess may
fare sumptuously every day, and from the spareness of
their apparel abundant reason fur compassing themselves
with pride as witii a garment. Their humility has been
less that of the violet than that of the willow, which, while
it bends its head with a graceful submissiveness, seems to
be constantly employed in contemplating its image in the
stream.
This illustration was greatly admired by Sir
James Stephen. as we arq informed in the
memoir prefixed to these volumes, in winch a
long letter of Sir James is inserted. We may
here take the opportunity of observing that
wo should have liked the preface a great deal
better without this and similar quotations,
which remind one rather painfully of the
puffing advertisements of publishers. Sir

James, however, detected at once the weakness '
of Mr. Vaughan's style. " Occasionally," says
he, " the landmarks between prose and poetry
" are broken dawn."
We cannot help fancying that this letter
may have had an injurious effect upon Mr
Vaughan's style. Subsequently he allowed his
love of illustration to run riot ; nor does he
seem capable of distinguishing between what
is really new and striking and the veriest
dregs of the metaphor-monger. In the article
on Nlackay's " Religious Development in
Greece," we have counted no fewer than seven-
teen, of which scarcely one has any peculiar
propriety or any true wit. In the first six
pages we have the eight following ones :
The teeth of St. Apollonis were once believed effectual
to cure the tooth-ache. Edward VI. ordered them to be
collected—each possessor of one of the inestimable grinders
was to give it in to a public officer—and, saith Fuller,
they filled a tun therewith." Their number was fatal to
their credit. The profusion of our author's references is
similarly suspicions.
But, alas ! we are persuaded that he has sacrilegiously
facilitated his journey, and has attempted to secure the
praise without the pain, acting as that naughty old lady
did, who, having vowed a barefoot pilgrimage to a distant
shrine, took off her shoes and stockings, and travelled
thither in a sedan•chair.

It is said that the Australian aborigines may always be
kept at a distance from the habitation of the intrusive
European if he takes care to bury a dead man before his
threshold, for they have a superst►tious dread of crossing

a grave.
The man who divided bread into the three classes of
white bread, brown bread, and French rolls, was an Aris-
totle at classification compared with Mr. Mackay.
In such dry places the foot-notes are at least so far a
boon that they direct you allay from the lucubrations of
your author. One welcomes them much as a man, de-
siring to find his way oat from some place of entertain-
ment which has proved utterly flat and unprofitable,
brightens up on seeing painted in large characters—THE
WAY OUT.

He resembles the giant he himself tells us of, who was
suffocated by his own wisdom.
Perched on an Olympus of German books, he scans the
panorama of old Greece through a modern opera•glass.
Humboldt tells us that he met one day in his travels
with a naked Indian, who had painted his body so as to
represent a blue jacket and trousers, with black buttons.
The religion of Mr. Mackay presents a similar substitute
of colour for attire. If that Indian might be pronounced
dressed, Mr. Mackay may be called a Christian.

There is, however, one merit in these
essays which is rare in young writers.
Mr. Vaughan has the art of keening close to
his subject. The review from which the
above extracts are taken is in this respect
admirable. The critic dogs Mr. Mackay
through all his turnings and windings, strips
him of fallacy after fallacy, and leaves him
naked and contemptible. This is, perhaps,
the truest ground for praise which we can dis-
cover in the volumes before us. We should be
sincerely sorry to have wounded the feelings
of Mr. Vaughan's surviving relatives. But we
must speak the truth. We honestly believe
thtt the republication of such essays as these
is either profitable to the writer's fame, nor
beneficial to literature or philosophy. It may
be wonderful, as Sir J. Stephen said, for a
young man of one and twenty to have written
the essay upon Origen. But that is not to the
point. Is it such as a middle-aged man of
one and forty would care to read ? We fear
not.

NEW NOVELS.

1. Paved With Gold. By the Brothers Mayhew.

London : Chapman and Hall.
2. A Lover's Quarrel. By the Author of "Cousin
Geoffrey." Three Vols. London: Hurst and

Elackett.
3. The Old Palace. By Julia Tilt. Two Vol 9. Lon-
don : Beutley.
4. The Netherwoods of Otttrpool. Three Vols. Lon.
don : Bentley.
5. Katherine Randolph ; or, Self Devotion. By the
Author of " The Only Daughter." Edited by

the Rev. G. R. Gleig. London : Hodgson.
1. WE have so often noticed the numbers of
" Paved With Gold" on their monthly appearance
that we need do no more than draw attention to the
hook in its complete form. It is in some respects of the
same cle.ss as " Cream," but differs from it in being
made up of a large number of scenes and cha-
racters, such as Mr. Reade describes, woven into a
whole by a plot of the ordinary kind. The incidents,
personages, and localities are realistic, and appear
drawn from life ; the string on which they are
threaded would probably be reckoned by Mr. Reade
among the "oily probabilities', which, as we