The Sun.
London, England, 1837-10-28 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

ON AND TVES'I;MINSTER REVIEW.

Hooper, London, .
This is incomparably the bestlB37 Number we have yet
seen
field.l3f this periodical. It expatiates over a wider
embraces a greater variety of subjects ; and
discusses them in a more tolerant spirit, and with more
freedom from the prejudices of clique, than it has done
si nee its commencement. The article on " Armand
Carrel" leaves nothing to be desired, whether on the
score of style or spirit. It is the production of an
aevowed admirer of the republican French Journalist,
out e is
, uY no means indiscriminate in its eulogiums.
e e nad no idea, till we read this memoir, of the influ-
nee that Carrel exercised over the mind of young
.France. 'We knew of course that he was a clever
°Pular Journalist, and that his " National" was as
'"uch dreaded by the Court as it was in esteem among
the Movement party-we say, we knew this, but not
that he exercised such a paramount sway over his
countrymen, both in Paris and the provinces, as to be
re
g.arded
by them as the future Premier, in the event—
which just previous to Carrell's death was considered
Inevitable--of a change in the political system of Louis
pi illiPPe. The subjoined extract conveys a vivid idea
of ' his character as a public writer. "He "never,"
says the Reviewer :
Separateddered himself from his newspaper. He never.consi-
tows it one thing, and himself another. What was said by a
t.n_P pee to a newspaper, he considered as said by
.a man to.
a, and acted accordingly. He never said anything in his
r-Per to
aa„, , or of, any man, which he would not have both
and thought it right to say personally, and in his pre
f.lee• 'ee•r He insisted on being treated
in the same way, and
Ilioteaa,.llY Was so ; though the necessity in which he thought
fore of repelling insult had involved him in two duels b?-
rsi,'!_s last fatal one. Where danger was to be incurred
117'ena arbitrary authority, he was always the first to seek it.
ver'inmver hesitated to throw down the gauntlet to the G.o-
it nt, challenging it to try upon him any outrage which
Ka:rneditating against the liberty or the safety of the State.
4: as this a mere bravado ; no one will think it so who knows
unscrupulous are all French GovernMents, and how
e f'elaYt t o commit an imprudence rather than acknowledge. a
&Leis: • Carrell thwarted a nefarious attempt of the. Paler
yi„etry to establish the practice of incarcerating writers pre-
L' le to trial."
"An English gentleman, who had occasion to visit
tv;arrell a year or two before his death, bears high
e sthnony to his moral courage, prepossessing man-
'', and modest self-confidence :
in;l knew Armand Carrell as the most powerful journalist
filoofraece, sole manager of a paper which, while it keeps
• from all costeric influence, and from the actively revolu-
ati:oll7y part of the republican body, has for some time been
toer ealy republican ; and I knew that he was a vigorous,
corletic man of action, who would always have couragel and
iishuct in an emergency. Knowing this much of him, was
of thed into the National cflice, where I found six or seven
tall innumerable redacteurs who belong to a French pap.er,
mil! dark-haired men, with formidable moustacaes
4111 Y of the republicans have taken to wearing), and looking.
tree "lY republican Carrell was not there, and after waiting
t' me, 'rile, was intrcuuceo to a slight young man, with ex-
itelY polished manners, no moustaches at all, and apparently
Crt for a drawin-room than a camp. This was the corn-
11:leder-in-chief of those formidable-looking champions. But
was impossible to be five minutes in his company without
Perceiving that he was accustomed to ascendancy, and so ac-
listorra2d as not to feel it. Instead of that eagerness and im-
„ettiosity which one finds in most Frenchmen, his manner is
~y
-Itreinely deliberate ; without any affectation, he speaks in a
8-,,rt,cf mca.ured cadence, and in a manner of which the
quiet eilphasis' are more characteristic than of any
an I know."
°f the political article on " Parties and the Minis-
try
We spoke some days since in The Sun ; there is,
I.:erefore, no need to enlarge on the subject. " Miss
arigwick's Works" is a notice of the fictions of a
zdY who is said to be more popular just now in Ame-
,ea, than any other indigenous author of the day.
The Reviewer whom we suspect to be Miss Mar-
t'tnean—observes of Miss Sedgwick that her various
e4aracters male and female, in her later fictions, are
all drawn fresh and glowing from the life ; that she
Copies no one, but paints from her own vivid itnpres-
ainos of things. This is high praise. The criticism
°n Mrs. Trolloppe's novels is most appropriately
argued ig R. O. D.," for it lays on the rod in the most
remorseless fashion. It is, however, far too severe in
its Strictures on " Jonathan Jefferson Whitlaw," the
tendency of which is excellent—namely, to pourtray
i the strongest and sternest colours, the horrors of
LuiCry, as that accursed system still exists in the
hen,
states of America. Mrs. Trolloppe is one
°I the
‘,„ - most nervous, masculine novelists of the day,
ith a singular penchant for the repulsive, and with
rst-rate powers of caricature ; but to charge her with
t'Ss indelicacy is—to adopt the language of Swift's
°,uhnems to say the thing that is not." In the
1441" of " Theodore Hook's Works," the Reviewer
Zta out in too grave and formal a fashion, just as if
of were about to indulge us with a dissertation on the
111.11 in of evil. We perceive that he repudiates the
et,-"°a of Hazlitt being competent to sit in judgment
eur comic writers ; whence we conclude he has
bever read his criticisms on Congreve, which, next to
1 r' Johnson's, are the soundest and acutest in the
anguage.Hazlitt often errs in his opinions on books
in his " Lectures on the Elizabethan dramatists"
hut seldom or never from ignorance or inability to
appreciate
e them. His mistakes, in nine cases out of
tll' are the result of wilfulness, and a restless desire
Y things in a way that no one else has said them.
IC
to would rather have been guilty of a blunder than a
epTllle°n-place ; but he had unquestionably a keen
I,llPreciation of true humour, as distinguished from the
ely conventional, and had lie been living now,
o
the
<< have been foremost to insist on the merits of
4,1' 'Pickwick Papers." The Reviewer, we think,
b'lerrates Theodore Hook, when lie pronounces him
,3)e little better than a mere farce-writer. He has
A1..1 humour of the first quality ; but if not, then have
htl I"Phanes and Lucian no humour—Plautus no
lit,Tc'ur--and though last, not least, Walcot and Foote
44,04'410u% As for his constant habit of quizzing the
of :ed districts of Bloomsbury and Russell-squares—
etch low geography Mr. Croker publicly expressed
tkevignorance in Parliament—never was fairer game—
e'r `vas ridicule more justly applied, as was shown
J vse t[r
`circumstance of many of the inhabitants of
wait kluaree
quitting them in alarm, and " stepping
d," horror-struck at the idea of remaining
kekeer , a place, which a fashionable wit, for the joke's
Ike% °yd pronounced vulgar. Rents, the Reviewer
lkeerie: VS, have fallen, since Hook thought fit to
Preof at -Bloomsbury-square 1 Is not this a sufficient
tikitt that his " satiric arrows" had been aimed at the
mark,'l4.tely and struck borne to the hearts of the in-
julgar ? If we except these few, unjust stric-
tele "e article in question is most ably written, being
"Rti 'o:4gorous, acute, and occasionally impassioned
hit_JiE cluent in its tone. The writer is clearly young,
4 haslis.t;tl the sterling stuff in him, and will ere long win
ehtit]e
t 1 C
guished name in the literary world. The article
t ongregational Dissenters" is the best in
oad unber
Q, • There is nothing in the last Edinburgh
- Qrterl
,y Reviews that comes near it in energy
Iv• e
eiti and thought. We quote one or two remarks
oh, ,
cen . almost be mistaken for apothegms by
/IT; to'co.:llCh.e sentences marked in Italics appear to
th wie" t" a world of just and subtle reflection.
„,te 44.6 r" we should premise, has been speaking of
att, g influence of Dissent : Opinion is the
ef st of ,
a• lat • "erS• Thoughts are the spiritual parents
etiai 41
Iver:s ore ll' ; the invisible creates things
.seen..
'•
Pped Vas at work. The fate of a nation is
tel.! ore fit its thoughts. In the convictions of
of e z tnhoen actions of men." Of the re-
al each . tilt= articles we have merely time to say,
te
Prit, g"Qd of its kind.
-tee ti •,ce
koti Yqt„-,-„s*terilazy is expected over from Vienna
qls leeting of Parliament to resume his diplo-
.Y;lllos,os., at: the Court of St. James's, which functions
t intend to relinquish for some
.years.
urd lee a lining has
and been appointed Recorder
i‘n bury.