The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1864-12-06

Goldwin Smith on England and America
The Atlantic Monthly ior December con-
tains an article by Professor Golwin Smith,
from which we make few extracts:
ENGLAND AND AMERICA.
"You may think that English freedom falls
far short OF yours. You will allow that it
goes beyond any yet attained by the great Eu-
ropean nations, and that to those nations it
has been and still is the light Of hope. see
1t treated with contempt here; it is not treat
ed with contempt by Garibaldi; it is not treat
ed with contempt by the exiles from French
despotism, who are proud to learn the English
tongue, and who find in our land, as they
think, the greatest asylum Of the free.
Let England and America quarrel. Let
your weight be cast into the scale against US,
when we struggle with the great conspiracy
OF absolutist powers around us, and The hope
OF freedom in Europe would be almost quench-
ed. Hampden and Washinton in arms against
each other What could the powers OF evil
desire more9 When Americans talk lightly
Of war with England one desires to ask
them what they believe the effects of such a
war would be on their own country. How
many more American wives do they wish to
make widows? How many more American
children do they wish to make orphans? Do
they deem it wise to put still greater strain
on the already groaning timbers of the consti-
tuition? Do they think that the suspension of
trade and emigration, with the price of labor
rising and the harvests of Illinois excluded
from their market would help you cope with
the financial difficulties which fill with ankle
ty every rejecting mind? Do they think that
four more years of war-govermnent would
render easy the Tremendous work of recon
struction? But the interests of the great
community of nations are above the private
interests of America or England. If war
were to break out between us, what would be-
come OF Italy, abandoned without help to her
Austrian enemy and her sinister protector?
What would become of the last hopes of lib
erty in France? What would become of the
world?
THE CONDUCT OF ENGLAND.
Sand now as to the conduct of England
towards you in this civil war. 1t is of want
of sympathy, If of anything, on our part, not
of want of interest, that you have right to
complain. Never, within my memory, have
the hearts of Englishmen been so deeply NOV
ed by any foreign struggle as by this civil war
not even, if recollect Alright, by the great
European earthquake of 1848. doubt wheth-
er they were more moved by the Indian mu-
tiny or by our war with Russia. It seemed
that history had brought round again the
great crisis of the Thirty Years. War, when all
England throbbed with the mortal struggle
waged between the powers of liberty and sla-
very on their German battlefield; for expecta-
tion can scarcely have been more intense
when Gustavus and Tilly were approaching
each other at Liepsic, than it was when Meade
and Lee were approaching each other at Get
tysburg. Severed from us by the Atlantic,
while other nations are at our door, you are
still nearer to us than all the world besides.
"The feeling of our aristocracy, as of all ar
istocracies, is against you. 1t does not follow,
nor do believe, that as body they would de-
sire or urge their government to do you a
wrong, whatever spirit may be shown by the
few of the less honorable or more violent
members of their order. With all their class
sentiments, they are Englishmen, trained to
walk in the paths of English policy and JUS
tice. But that their feelings should be against
you is not strange. You are fighting, not for
the restoration of the Union, not for the eman-
cipation OF the negro, but for democracy
against aristocracy, and this fact is thorough
ly understood by both parties throughout the
Old World. As the champions of democracy
you may claim, and you receive, the sympathy
of the democratic party in England and in
Europe; that of the aristocratic party you
cannot claim. You must bear it calmly, if the
aristocracies mourn over your victories and
democracy conceal their joy when despotism
or an oligarehy bites the dust9
"The members of our aristocracy bear you
no personal hatred. An American going
among them even now meets with nothing
but personal courtesy and kindness. Under
ordinary circumstances they are not indiffer-
ent to your good will nor unconscious of the
tie of blood. But to ask them entirely to for
get their order would be too much. In the
success of commonwealth founded on social
and political equality all aristocracies must
read their doom. Not by arms, but by exam.
pie, you are standing menace to the ex-
istence of political privilege. And the thread
of that existence is frail, sE
The London Times.
The Times was in former days great pop
ular organ. 1t led vehemently and even vio-
lently the struggle for Parliamentary Reform.
In that way it made its fortune, and having
made its fortune, it takes part with the rich.
Its proprietor in those days was man with
many faults, but he was man of the people,
Aristocratic society dislik9d and excluded
him; he lived at war with it 10 the end. At
fronted by the wings, he became in a certain
sense tory; but he united his toryism with
chartism, and was sent to Parliament for Not
tingham by tories and chartists combined
The opposition ofhis journal to our New Poor
Law 6NiuCtuy tHOuSu III d pSIfcfb6 way, his
feeling for the people. But his heir, the pres
ent proprietor, was born in the purple. He is
a wealthy landed gentleman. He sits in Par
lament for constituency of landlords. He
is thought to have been marked out for peer
age. 1t is accusing him of no crime to sup
pose that so far as he controls the IinlSS, it
takes the bias of his class, and that its voice,
if itspeaks his sentiments, is not that Of the
English people, but of rich, conservative
squire.
The editor is distinct from the proprietor,
Dut ms connections are still more aIistocratic.
a goou zeal has been said among us OF late
s. ABOUT nls poslton. Before his time our jour-
nalis" wns r .os only anonymous, but imper-
sonai. Inc Journalist wore the mask not only
to those whom he critized. but tn ali the world.
The present editor of the T;,neo wears the
mask to the objects of his Criticism hnt dron 9
it, as has been remarked in Parliamont =, stbe
gilded saloons of rank and power NJ. - o~rY Sro
tent to remain in the privacy which protactod
the independence of his predecessors. he bos
come forth in his own person to receive tho
homage of the great world. That no mage has
been paid in no stinted measure, and as the
British public has been apprised in rather a
startling manner, with somewhat intoxicat-
ing effect.
English peers, after all
are English gentlemen; and no English gen
tlemen would deliberately sanction thetorreni
of calumny and insult which the Times has
poured upon this nation. There are penalties
for common offenders; there are none fol-
those who scatter fire brands among nations
But the Times will not come off unscathed
1t must veer with victory. And its reader:
will be not only prejudiced, but idiotic, if it
does not in the process leave the last remnant
OF Its authority behind.
CARLYLE.
"One English writer has certainly raised hi: