The Sun.
London, England, 1840-02-27 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

ON THE OBJECTS, PLEASURES, AND
ADVANTAGES OF POLITICAL SCI-
ENCE. London, 1840. •
How many essays have we not had, within the last
twenty years, on this theme ! but how few that are
readable ! Reviews, monthly and quarterly—Journals,
daily and weekly—Pamphlets, Encyclopaedias, and
Penny Magazines—all have lent their aid to enlighten
the public on the subject of Political Science, yet
scarce'y one has so handled it as to attract the unin-
formed reader to its study. Hume led the way to this
field of fertile speculation, and Adam Smith followed
him ; but, if we except these agreeable and luminous
writers, many of whose doctrines are now, we believe,
obsolete, it is hardly possible to mention one, whose
work is penned in a sufficiently popular spirit to induce
the tyro to master its contents. Maculloch is, we un-
derstand, sound authority on most points connected with
this department of intellect ; but there is no denying the
fact that he is also one of the dullest essayists that ever
spawned a sentence. His very name begets a yawn.
Ricardo, who is equally well versed in Political Science,
and whose opinions have not been without their influ-
ence, is another writer of the same dry, wearisome cha-
racter, whose speculations, however they may suit the
tastes of the congenial Few, are certainly caviare to the
Many. What the public wants, is, not so much a grave,
profound, cumbrous volume on the Science, as a shrewd,
concise essay penned in a familiar and unaffected style,
which all who read may understand. We do not wish to be
bewildered and frightened into conviction by a formal
array of pedantic arguments and abstruse theories ; but to
be entertained, while we are instructed, by terse, perti-
nent reflections, set off by those lighter graces of man-
ner—such as are of constant occurrence even in the
profoundest works of the philosophic Bacon—which
usually accompany a clear and vigorous understand-
ing. Of such an attractive character is the essay be-
fore us, which we have little hesitation in ascribing to
the pen of Lord Brougham. The object of this mas-
terly treatise is to set forth the pleasures and advanta-
ges that attend the study of Political Science ; and
this it does with a heartiness of feeling, a vigour—preci-
sion—and vivacity of style, a strength and luminous-
ness of reasoning enriched and enforced by illustrations
drawn from a variety of sources, of which no other
writer of the day is capable. It was said 'of 'Burke,
by one not prone to undue panegyric, that he could
render the most matter-of-fact and uninviting subject as
entertaining as a fairy tale ; and the same may be said
of the author of this elegant essay. By the grace and
lightness of his touch, and the numerous little sallies of
fancy that escape him—quite accidentally, as it were—
he has imparted an interest to his theme, of which few,
if any, would suppose it susceptible. With what fervour
he insists on the paramount advantages of Political
Science ; and how generous and elevated is his tone
when he comes to discuss the vulgar, utilitarian notion
that the most important advantage derived from the
sciences is their practical adaptation to the uses of life :
" There cannot," he says, " be a greater oversight, or
a greater confusion of ideas, than that in which such a
notion had its origin. It is nearly akin to the fallacy
which represents profitable or productive labour as only
that kind of labour by which some substantial or material
thing is produced or fashioned. The labour which of all
others most benefits a community, the superior order of
labour which governs, defends, and improves a State, is by
this fallacy excluded from the title of production, merely
because, instead of bestowing additional value on one mass
or parcel of a nation's capital, it gives additional value to
the whole of its property, and gives it that quality of secu-
rity without which all other value would be worthless. So
they who deny the importance of mere scientific contem-
plation, and exclude from the uses of science the pure and
real pleasure of discovering, and of learning, and of sur-
veying its truths, forget how many of the enjoyments de-
rived from what are called the practical application of the
sciences, resolve themselves into gratifications of a merely
contemplative kind. Thus, the steam-engine is confessed
to be the most useful application of machinery and
chemistry to the arts. Would it not be so if steam-navi-
gation were its only result, and if no one used a steam-
boat but for excursions of curiosity or amusement ? Would
it not be so, if steam-engines had never been used but in
the fine arts ? So a microscope is a useful practical ap-
plication of optical science as well as a telescope, and a
telescope would be so, although it were only used in ex-
amining distant views for our amusement, or in showing us
the real figures of the planets, and were of no use in navi-
gation or in war. The mere pleasure, then, of tracing
relations, and of contemplating general laws in the mate-
rial, the moral, and the political world, is the direct and
legitimate value of science; and all scientific truths are
important for this reason, whether they ever lend any aid
to the common arts of life, or no. In like manner, the
mental gratification afforded by the scientific contemplations
of natural religion are of great value, independently of
their much higher virtue in mending the heart and im-
proving the life, towards which important object, indeed,
all the contemplations of science more or less directly tend,
and in this higher sense all the pleasures of science are
justly considered as practical uses."
We cannot too highly applaud the pure and elevated
character of this fine passage, whose tone is as far supe-
rior to anything one meets with in Paley—a shrewd but
by no means a lofty-minded writer—as " Hyperion to a
Satyr." On the subject of public instruction, Lord
Brougham speaks out, as might be expected from him,
in a bold, generous, and beneficent spirit. He is an ad-
vocate for education to the utmost extent to which it
can be carried. He will hear of no half-measure—no
compromise on the subject. The more you instruct the
people, the more guarantees you give for good govern-
ment, the more you strengthen the foundations of social
order. Such is the tenor of his reasoning on this most
momentous subject, especially as regards the political
education of the people. But let him speak for himself
" It may be said that there is this peculiar to a course of
political instruction, that many of the principles explained in
it are those which the existing parties in the State are at
the time appealing to, and disputing about—many of the il-
lustrations used in expounding those principles are the very
topics of most vehement discussion among the practical
statesmen and faction of the day. The whole subject, it
may be argued, is more or less controversial, and the con-
troversy is one in which, as it involves men's real or sup-
posed interests, and consequently engages their passions
deeply, no instructor can easily avoid taking a side, and
no audience can help being swayed by the prevailing sen-
timents of the times; so that instruction becomes difficult,
from the interference of party prejudice in both the teacher
and the pupil, while a factious spirit is sure to be fostered,
and unkindly feelings to be exacerbated, if not engen-
dered. In this remark there is, unquestionably, much
truth ; it refers to the principal difficulty that attends poli-
tical instruction. But it can never be allowed to prove
that no such instruction should be conveyed ; it only warns
us to guard as much as possible against falling into the
errors which it points out. If it were suffered to operate
as a conclusive reason against teaching politics, this would
follow—that upon the things most necessary to be known,
ignorance is better than knowledge—that in proportion as
the subject is more interesting to men, they should take
the less pains to understand it. But that is not all ; it
would also follow that, upon topics calculated to excite
strong feelings, it is better and safer for the people to be
kept in the dark. For by the supposition which forms the
ground of the whole objection, you cannot keep the peo-
ple from taking an interest in these subjects : you cannot
help their being excited and split into parties ; their being
so is the very origin of the remark with which we are deal-
ing. Then, because such excitement and such party dif-
ferences prevail, is there any common sense in prescribing
an entire ignorance of the questions those dissensions re-
late to, as a likely means of allaying them? Are political
differences the more sure to be reconciled, by keeping
those who are split by them in ignorance of the subjects
under dispute? Are men more likely to agree upon any
matter, the less they know about it ? The people, it seems,
feel strongly upon certain subjects, and are much divided,
many being for a certain course of policy, many against it.
The argument is, that for the purpose of bringing about
an understanding, and making all in its favour, or all join
in rejecting it, or all unite in preferring some middle
course safely placed at a distance from either extreme, the
parties should be prevented from comprehending the na-
ture of the measure in question, and kept in ignorance of
all the arguments for it, all the arguments against it, and
all the arguments for a middle course. Once upon a time,
says the old fable, two gallant knights met upon a plain
where a shield stood upright; and one of them having
called it a white shield, the other asserted it to be black,
whereupon they prepared to fight after the manner of that
age, somewhat in vogue at the present day. But a der-
vise or priest came up, and, having learnt the cause of
their quarrel, suggested that each had better look at both
sides of the buckler—when they found that each knight
was right—the one side being pure white, the other jet
black. The minister of peace performed his duty wisely;
but our objectors, and some of them nominally of the same
vocation with the dervise, have no better expedient to pro-
pose than that the shield should be covered up from both
combatants, and the fight go on.:'
We have given but a hasty and imperfect notice of
this Essay, but trust we have said quite enough to induce
our readers to peruse it with the deep attention it de-
serves. They need not take fright at the subject, and
imagine that they will meet with a series of abstruse,
perplexing arguments and theories, as difficult of diges-
tion as an ounce of lead ; Lord Brougham does not dis-
cuss his theme in this dry, repulsive fashion ; his manner
is as familiar as it is conciliatory, and his logic uniformly
recommended by good sense, rendered impressive by its
earnestness and animation, and attractive by the sty le
in which it is set, like a precious jewel in gold. We hope
he will continue his essays on Political Scienc,., and
thereby bequeath to the world a legacy calculated to
benefit it through all time.

CUBA, WITH NOTICES OF PORTO RICO
AND THE SLAVE-TRADE.
BY DAVID 7URNBULL, ESQ.

Longman and Co., 1840.
This volume represents the fragment (in the words
of the author) of a tour of considerable extent on the
western side of the Atlantic, begun in 1837 and con-
cluded towards the close of 1839, and will be followed
by another, embracing, in like manner, historical and
geographical notices of other foreign colonies. A con-
siderable portion of the present work relates to the
slave-trade and the sugar and coffee plantations in the
island of Cuba. The author had good opportunities of
ascertaining the effects of the attempts of Great Britain
to abolish the slave-trade, and he comes exactly to the
melancholy conclusion of Mr. Buxton, that the suffer-
ings of the unfortunate slaves have been greatly aggra-
vated since concealment and escape became necessary
conditions to the slave-trader's profit. To remedy this

frightful evil by putting an end to the trade, he pro-
poses that the " ultimate proprietor of the imported
slave should be made insecure in his right to his illicit
acquisition ;" in other words, that the holders of African
slaves should be amenable to the Courts of Justice, and
be compelled to emancipate all those illicitly imported.
That these Courts should by law be directed to con-
sider the civil right under the existing laws of Spain of
an imported African to his freedom after the fact of
his being landed in the island. This is all
very plausible, but we fear utterly impracticable.
If, after entering into a solemn treaty with Portugal
for the abolition of the slave trade, Great Britain can-
not compel the Government of that country to observe
anything like a decent observance of the treaty on the
open seas, what chance could she have of compelling
slave-holding judges and slave-holding attorneys in the
interior of Cuba, or any other settlement belonging to
Spain or Portugal, to carry into effect any law which
would lessen the value of their property, and the pro-
perty also, possibly, of some of the members of the
Government ? We fear this is what the French call a
chateau en Espagne. But we must refer our readers
to the book itself, where they will find some curious
particulars about the designs of the people of the
United States on Cuba and the Canadas. We give
the following extract as a specimen which, we trust, is
much exaggerated :
At the close of the last Session of Congress I spent a
month in Washington ; and during the outrageous debates
on the boundary question, which have never been fully or
faithfully reported, I was in daily attendance in the House
of Representatives, or the Senate, in order to witness their
proceedings. • •
In the more popular body I heard one man, the repre-
sentative of one of the Carolinas, who is styled by courtesy
a General, get up in his place and say, that he was for
open and immediate war, without waiting for the running
of lines, or the issue of idle negotiations. And what was
he to do, think you, when he declared war against England
or broke ground without any declaration ? Why, the first
thing he was to do was, to take possession of the island cf
Cuba; the next was, quietly to annex the young republic
of Texas to the Union ; and, in the third place, by way of
seriously commencing the struggle, he was to send an
army, with himself doubtless at its bead, across the lakes or
the St. Lawrence, to drive out the British intruders on
the soil of his own continent, and convert it into one vast
arena for the enjoyment of so much liberty as is consistent
with " the peculiar institutions of the south." As this gen-
tleman's rhapsody was received with the most rapturous
applause, and as the two Houses were all but unanimous
in proclaiming their eagerness for a fresh struggle with
Great Britain on the boundary question, it is difficult to
doubt that the first aspiration of the Carolina representative
is also the first wish of the majority of his countrymen. It
was not easy to restrain a smile at the vehement tone of
his oration, and the extravagant gestures with which it was
enforced ; but both would have been strangely damped, had
any one whispered the word " Seminoles" in his ear, and
recalled to his recellection that, for several years, within
a few hours' sail of Cuba, the whole military force of the
Union has been fruitlessly employed in the attempt to sub-
due a mere handful of naked barbaria.ns

LIFE OF WELLINGTON. 2 Vols.
Churton, London, 1840.

Next to Maxwell's Life of the great Duke, which
has lately been published in numbers by Bailey, we
consider this the best biographical memoir, for it is
penned in a perfectly calm and equable spirit ; is full of
well-considered and well-digested facts ; and is distin-
guished in many places by a flow of easy, unaffected
eloquence. We may instance, in particular, the bio-
grapher's account of the Battle of Waterloo, which
deserves high praise, not only for force and animation
of description, but for the generous feeling and uniform
perspicuity of details that characterize it. At the
close of the work we find the character of the Duke
pourtrayed with much skill and subtlety, though we
must enter our protest against the remark, that " it
would be difficult to show that he had any human
sympathies." This is hastily said, and will certainly
not bear consideration. The volumes are embellished
with several passable wood-cuts, and are of the same
size, and are printed in the same style, as the well-known
Life of Buonaparte, in Murray's Family Library.

NICKLEBY MARRIED.
Williams, London, 1840.
A mere catchpenny, professing to be a sequel to Ni-
cholas Nickleby, but possessing nothing in common with
that clever tale but the title.