The western Democrat. [volume] (Charlotte, N.C.) 1852-1870, 1857-12-08
SCOTT AND BYRON.

often very strong. If it have the quanty
| of coincidence with other testimony to the
same truth, it takes additional weight
This argument is finally set forth in Paley's
.Hore Paulna,' or Hours aCih Paul. The
J testimony is also held to be strong. SO
! also, if a man of brilliant talents, whose
whole life has been devoted to politics,
literature, craftsmanship or pleasure, drops
in some serious mood of mind, in moments
when reflection is forced upon him, senti-
ments which bear a tone of coloring quite
different from that which prevades his works
! or his characteristic acts, our attention Is
arrested. We pause to contemplate them.
We say, this influences some people more
than all the sermons in the circle of theolo-
gy. Thousands of them read Scotts
romances, who seldom or never read the
| Bible. 1t was never pretended, suppose,
that Sir Walter Scott lived religious man
in the interior sense of the term.
! How was it when he came to die! The
description of his last return to the home
of his love,-which he graced as few nov
elsts ever graced a home, for he was a
! faithful husband. and loving and devoted
father-written for Lockhart, his son-in-
| law, is an affecting conclusion to splendid
biography. He had vainly sought to re-
cover; his health by journeying through the
bland climate and under the soft skies of
the south of Europe. Returning with pros
trate energies and gloomy anticpations, he
re-entered his beloved home at Abbotsford
but to die.
Il have seen much said the languishing
sufferer. bat nothing like my ain house.
| The day after his return, he asked Lock
hart to read to him. To the question what
book should he read, he replied: Need
YOU ask there is bat one.' The l4th
chapter of Johns Gospel was then read
So, after the innumerable volumes he had
written and read, there was but one, which
was fit to be read in dying chamber,
which could give comfort to dying man,
even of his exalted intellect. And the last
words uttered but short time before his
death were these :''Lockhart, l may have
but minute to speak to you, My dear be
good man, be virtuous, be religious, be
good man. Nothing else will give you any
comfort when you come to lie here" This
certainly is very different end from that
of David Hume, who went out of the world
testing with death, and heathenizing fu-
ture life.
Let US now contemplate Byron, that
child of genius, misanthropy and misery.
In letter to friend he writes; "My
| whole life has been at variance with pro-
priety, not to say decency my friends are
dead OF estranged, and my existence
dreary void ~ Or as he expresses it more
strongly in poetry
''The thorns which have rcaped are ofthe tree
panted-they have torn me, and bleed;
! should have known what fruit would spring
| from such seed"
Here is guilt remorse, self-reproach, out
the balm of Gilead is not there. And yet
there were times when the pressure of
truth upon his conscience or Judgment.
extorted a confession, such as he made to
a correspondent who seems to have inform
ed him of the happy death of his wife
This is his remarkable testimony: ''In-
4
pei have great advantage over all others;
| for this simple reason, that if true, they
| will have their reward hereafter, they can be
| but with the infidel in his eternal sleep
having had the existance of an exalted
hope through life without subsequent DIS
| appointment, since lat the worse for them)
'out of nothing, nothing can arise not
even SORROW" This is gloomy enough,
but it is the gloom of agonizing doubt,
on which the Gospel alone can shed light
of an appalling uncertainty, which Christi
anity alone can dissolve. Hence the
glorious superiority of faith. What COM
fort could the worlds applause give such a
man? How could the brilliant laurels he
wore soothe that aching brow? But the
testimony remains the testimony of his
wretchedness, the fruit of sin ; and the
witness he declares of the blessedness of
that gospel, which he would not believe
| NeW York Observer.
| WILLIS ON THE PROGRESS OF WOMAN's
RIGHTs.-That woman should have equal
chance with man in all honorable arts and
professions, and in all decent and proper
pursuits for the gaining of livelihood shut
off from nothing except by her own sense
ofpropriety, or by disqualification of physi
cal formulas long been the Utopian ideal
of the champions of the sex. But various
coincdent circumstances seem, at the pres
ent moment, to indicate the spontaneous
coming about of this desirable era. We
refer to
1st The triumphant claim to MASCULINE
ty of genius made by Rosa Bonheur in
painting, and by Harriet Hosmer in sculp-
ture.
2d. The universally of female eques-
trianism as feature of our agricultural
fairs-(precursory to female assumption of
the lighter labors of agriculture, we pre-