The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1868-06-23

self out Hat and cold but made his campaign
the funeral Of the old whig party. Let Gen
eral Grant, in departing on this projected ex-
cursion, beware of the Rocky Mountain COP
perheads or they may flank him, and catch
him, and scalp him, and serve him up like
General Scott Or 80 hasty plate Of soup" e
The Proposed New American Academy.
The newspapers have lately proclaimed an
elaborate scheme for the foundation of new
American Academy, with complete ma
chinery for sections of science, literature, art,
moral philosophy, political economy and 80
forth. We find among the names of the respect
able gentlemen who have united in favoring
this scheme only very few who are particularly
distinguished in any of the aforementioned
sections of intellectual labor And we must
confess that we are as much convinced as ever
of the folly of attempting to establish In the
United States another unsuccessful imitation
Of those European societies of which the
French Academy, instituted in 1855 by Car
dinal Richelieu, is the acknowledged type.
The history of even that academy, as well as
of the Italian, the Spanish, the Portuguese,
the German, the Russian and Polish, the
Scandinavian and the English academies, con-
firms our opinion that all these limitations of
the ancient Athenian and Alexandrian
academies have been, to a greater or less
degree, mutual admiration societies of but
trifing influence in regulating the development
of public opinion, and of almost no influence
whatever in originating it, One of the most
forty first arm chair in the French Academy
there are but forty to which French ambition
can aspire-and this book contains the names
of dozens of illustrious Frenchmen who were
never entitled even to the epitaph which the
witty Piron composed for himself
Ci-git Piron, qui ne fut rien,
-., Pas meme Acad6micien.
All the arguments of Mr.. Matthew Arnold
in favor of the establishment in England of an
institution akin to the French Academy, as
what Richelieu intended it to be, "a h0W
.jury-a jury the most choice and authoritative
that could be found on all important literary
matters before the public;" as what Arnold,
echoing Sainte- Beuve, says it in fact became in
the latter half of the eighteenth century, "a SOW
ereign organ of opinion;" as representing, &C
cording to Renan, ''the authority Of recog-
nized master in matters of tone and tastes"
and as directly favorable, according to Arnold
himself, to the improvement of the journeyman
work of literature, and towards securing ian
open and clear mind, quick and flexible in
telligence, fail to persuade us that either in
England or in America such "a centre of good
taste" is indispensable. Even Mr. Matthew
Arnold's fippant remarks about ''the Corin-
THAN style" for ga good editorial" and about
''this age of Mr.. James Gordon Bennett, of the
NEW YORK HERALD" whom he quotes, or mis-
quotes, as having said ''that the highest
achievement of the human intellect is what he
calls good editorial" does not convince us
that an academy" would necessarily substi
tute the Attic for either the Corinthian or the
Asiatic style.
Mr.. Matthew Arnold himself is driven, after
all, to our own conclusion, on surveying the
history of the literary influence of academies,
that $50 far as routine and authority tend to
embmrass energy and inventive genius,
academies may be said to be obstructive to
tent to the human spirits general advance"
he even says, speaking for the British people
as we say, speaking for the American people,
that ''an academy quite like the French
Academy, asovereign organ Of the highest lit
erary opinion, recognized authority in mat
ters of intellectual tone and taste, we shall
hardly have, and perhaps we ought not to wish
to have it," The most serious work Of the
French Academy has been merely to record
reluctantly the changes which time has
wrought in the French language, and some
times to lend its tardy sanction to genius after
its recognition by the nation and the world
From the days of Calico and Tycho Brahe
and Columbus TO those Of Gibbon and Franklin
and Arago and Leverrier and Morse, what
may be called the academical influence has
vainly obstructed rather than encouraged indi-
vidual energy and inventive genius. To these
latter qualities, together with the prevailing
spirit of the age, all the triumphs of science
and art and literature have been due, and not
to any inspiration of academies on the model
of the Academia della Crnca in Italy, or of
such universal academical system as OBJ
tains to this day in the Chinese empire.
ANOTHER Poor PIERCE WANTED. The old
died-in-the-wool copperheads don't want ma
ional, conservative, first class statesman for
President, like Chase, and as they can't find q
soldier TO suit them they must be in search Of
another poor Pierce-some democratic obscu-
rity against whom nothing can be said because
nothing is known of him. A liberal reward in
greenbacks will be paid for the discovery Of an
other Polk or poor Pierce. Apply TO Mayor Hof-
man or the whiskeyskinski of Tammany Hall.