The age-herald., 1898-01-01
SOME LITERARY STATESMEN.

The entertaining volume of essays recent ry published by MT. Norman Hapgood un- der the title Literary Statesmen and Others" was happy in its choice of a sub ject. For, while there are many readers sufficiently familiar with the critical works of the Rt. Hon. John Morley, so little is known in this country of the writings of Lord Rosebery and A. J. Balfour that the papers upon them come as a pleasant sur prise. It is news to many people, for ex- ample. to learn that Lord Rosebery has written life of William Pitt, always a favorite in America because of his attitude toward the revolting colonies, which is not only valuable in itself, but gains in inter- est in manner lately pointed out by MT. Theodore Roosevelt because it is the life history of prime minister of England told by one who has himself occupied that high office. Of MT. Gladstone 1t was not nec- essary that MT. Hapgood should speak; he is almost as wei known as a man of letters as any one now writing, dividing his honors nearly equally between litera- ture and statesmanship He is accordingly omitted and the writer's attention taken up by names less well known in both fields.
 Besides the life of Pitt by Lord Rose bery. numoer of his speeches, his well known address at Edinburgh in particular, have appeared in book form; though re- gently written biography of him makes mention of any writings at all as having come from his pen. Mir. Balfour, on the other hand, admits that his activities ex- tend from the presidency of the Society for Psyehical Research to the captaincy of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club, and that his publications comprise books as big with learning as should be indicated by their titles, "A Defense of Philosophic Doubt" and "The Foundations of Belief Being Notes Introductory to the Study of Theol- ogy," being among them, together with an intermediary volume of Essays and Addresses" MT. Morley's list is much more extended, including no fewer than fourteen volumes of various sizes, in addi- tion to the great mass of writing unpub- lished in book form but done by him in his successive editorships of the Literary Ga zette, the Fortnightly Review, the Pail Mall Gazette, and Macmillan's Magazine, respectively. Apart from his critical work in general, the paper on Ralph Waldo Em- erson is of particular interest to Ameri- cans, especially to those who differ from Matthew Arnold's too inappreciative esti- mate.
 MT. Hapgood finds Lord Rosebery's prose style 'impeccable," but places small value on his attempts to introduce poetical ele- ment into his work, and in general looks upon IlIn dIQ all or HIS Klnu as seldom important in life or letters." The con- cluding words of the estimate are shrewd and valuable: "A constitutional states man. says Bagehot is in general a man of common ideas and uncommon abilities Of Lord Rosebery the reverse would be more nearly true. He has the virtues of the cultivated few and lacks the abilities that alone can reach the many" As a judgment upon MT. Morley that "certainly strikes the keynote the essayist here @I,<< ell upon the British statesman's fanaticism which, he says, ''is always exhilarating to me, though l feel that 1t would have the same placdly convinced expression if my head were rolling at his feet at the exig- ence of some principle" So far as Mr. Balfour is concerned MT. Hapgood admits the difficulties attendant upon a judgment from his books alone passed upon a man whose activities have assumed so many forms, and names his essay upon him as "Seen from @ Distance" But he holds that there is deal of truth in the old saying that "the style is the man." and so finds himself enabled to instruct his read CTS by an ingenious and convincing argu- ment, which is summed up follows: "It is in England that we see most often the uncompromising critic of the final ends of life in the man who has the keenest taste for the battle about him, and the combin- ation has seldom been seen in so striking a form as it can be seen in MT. Balfour."
 In this field of literary expression Amer ica has been particularly strong from the beginning. The papers of Washington. Franklin, Jefferson, Hamilton and many another are worth the reading for more reasons than those grouped as historical nothing better has ever been written than Gen. Grants memoirs Ex-Presidents Har- rison and Cleveland have both published books within a few month and, among men of less exalted station, there are to be named Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, with Certain Accepted Heroes and Other Es- says" and Theodore Roosevelt assistant secretary of the navy, with American Ideas and Other Essays" It is a reassur- ing sign of the times when scholarship and politics mingle in public life.