Pagina-afbeeldingen
PDF
ePub

1849.]

Its Excellences.

261

the most guilty, furnish our author with materials which need no aid from rhetoric to stir every passion in his readers. Some may think that the truculency of Monmouth is portrayed with too much severity. He is entitled to all the allowance to be found in a naturally weak disposition, and in the bitter disappointment of hopes which had been fed by something more substantial than flattery or popular favor.

We infer, from a note in the volume before us, that Mr. Macaulay has had the use of all the rich and abundant materials collected by the late Sir James Mackintosh for his projected History. England has, indeed, been preparing materials for more than a century to furnish her annalists with the most voluminous and varied sources of information. The British Museum contains a collection, the very catalogues of which would make a small library. It requires a mind like Macaulay's to put such a repository to the wisest use. It would seem as if, through his whole life, he had been what is called a general reader, and had retained the fruits in an available form by crowding commonplace-books and indexes with the gatherings of years. He appears to exhaust all the examples, hints, and illustrations which are scattered over the whole wide field of English literature. His new material has been for the most part derived from the diplomatic correspondence between foreign residents at the English court and their own governments, which is preserved in the archives of France, Spain, and the Low Countries. Ranke was the first among historians to turn this class of materials to the best account. Its value appears, in the work before us, in the elucidation of that dark mystery of the Dover treaty, by which the English Charles and James, for a price, became traitors to their own throne and empire.

Mr. Macaulay shows his strength particularly in defining the relations and divisions of parties, in adjusting the shifting weight which lay between them, as it swayed alternately to one or the other side, and in tracing the rise and development of the elements which were successively manifested. But his signal distinction lies in the vigor and grasp, the keen analysis, and the brilliant skill with which he seizes upon the characters of the men prominent in the movements before him. Clarendon has been generally allowed to be the great master of the delineation of character; - not, however, because he excels in candor, in freedom from prejudice, or in stern integrity. These, indeed, are the qualities which are most VOL. XLVI. - 4TH S. VOL. XI. NO. II.

23

missed in his sketches of mental and moral peculiarities. But he is remarkable for his evident knowledge of the elements of character which make and decide the man. He describes the parts and passions, the idiosyncrasies, the strong points and the weak points, which, variously disposed, and attaching themselves to various combinations of temperament with circumstances, constitute and make up the human being, and in their exercise give shape and direction to his life. Macaulay excels Clarendon in justice and charity, and is his equal in skill and discernment. We quote the following as a specimen of candor in the judgment of parties. The author is speaking of those once called Cavaliers and Roundheads, essentially the respective forerunners of the parties now known as Tories and Whigs.

"It would not be difficult to compose a lampoon or a panegyric on either of these renowned factions; for no man not utterly destitute of judgment and candor will deny that there are many deep stains on the fame of the party to which he belongs, or that the party to which he is opposed may justly boast of many illustrious names, of many heroic actions, and of many great services rendered to the state." pp. 93, 94.

The following character of Archbishop Cranmer stands warranted by the testimonies of many fair judges, as well in the Anglican Church as out of it:

"His temper and his understanding eminently fitted him to act as mediator [between the Roman and the English Churches]. Saintly in his professions, unscrupulous in his dealings, zealous for nothing, bold in speculation, a coward and a timeserver in action, a placable enemy and a lukewarm friend, he was in every way qualified to arrange the terms of the coalition between the religious and the worldly enemies of Popery.

"To this day the constitution, the doctrines, and the services of the Church retain the visible marks of the compromise from which she sprang."— p. 48.

We fear that not only the bigotry of Episcopalians, but also the doctrinal zeal of many of other sects, is faithfully accounted for in what Macaulay says of the country gentry of

1685:

"Their love of the Church was not, indeed, the effect of study or meditation. Few among them could have given any reason, drawn from Scripture or ecclesiastical history, for adhering to her

1849.]

Extracts.

263

doctrines, her ritual, and her polity; nor were they, as a class, by any means strict observers of that code of morality which is common to all Christian sects. But the experience of many ages proves that men may be ready to fight to the death, and to persecute without pity, for a religion whose creed they do not understand, and whose precepts they habitually disobey."— p. 302.

The following sentence we copy without comment :

"It is an unquestionable and a most instructive fact, that the years during which the political power of the Anglican hierarchy was in the zenith were precisely the years during which national virtue was at the lowest point." - p. 169.

We are at a little loss to discover the exact moral estimate which Macaulay affixes to the character of Oliver Cromwell. He, indeed, calls the Protector "the greatest prince that has ever ruled England." We find, too, encomiums upon the prowess, the wisdom, the prudence, the sagacity, and the self-command of Cromwell; but we conclude that Macaulay does not wish to commit himself in the moral judgment of that extraordinary man. We have faith in Oliver. If he be now within the sound of mortal testimony concerning him, we believe that his soul was of such a frame that nothing would afford him a higher pleasure or reward than the judgment which Macaulay pronounces upon the character of his famous army. When that body of fifty thousand soldiers was disbanded, it was feared, that, like all other soldiers, they would become beggars and marauders, a pest to society, filling the land with misery and crime. But what was the fact?

"In a few months there remained not a trace indicating that the most formidable army in the world had just been absorbed into the mass of the community. The Royalists themselves confessed, that, in every department of honest industry, the discarded warriors prospered beyond other men; that none was charged with any theft or robbery; that none was heard to ask an alms; and that if a baker, a mason, or a wagoner attracted notice by his diligence and sobriety, he was, in all probability, one of Oliver's old soldiers." p. 144.

[ocr errors]

There is much good sense in the following sentence, in. which our author moralizes upon his own account of the amateur ladies and gentlemen whom the institution of the Royal Society induced to dabble in science :

"In this, as in every great stir of the human mind, there was

doubtless something which might well move a smile. It is the universal law, that whatever pursuit, whatever doctrine, becomes fashionable, shall lose a portion of that dignity which it had possessed while it was confined to a small but earnest minority, and was loved for its own sake alone."

p. 380.

That this will be a work of extraordinary popularity may be considered as already settled. There is a charm in its pages which no reader will be able to resist, and to which all will be glad to yield themselves, unless some cherished view or fancy of their own be disturbed by it. There is a fulness of information, a strength and accuracy of judgment, and a grace of style, which wellnigh complete our ideal of what history may be. The author does, indeed, suppose a good degree of historical information in his readers, even when he deals with his own defined period and leaves the summary of what preceded. He seems also to aim to connect with his pages those pleasures of sustained interest and surprise which are chiefly ministered to in a romance. Of course, he could not make his work serve for the whole historical furnishing of a reader, unless he expanded it over a much larger number of volumes. We apprehend, however, that some of his readers who may not know the fate of Dr. Oates would have been relieved, had he told them that the creature did not die of his merciless whipping, but lived to receive honor and a pension again, though a second disgrace succeeded. And how many of Macaulay's readers will know, while admiring his lively character of Lord Churchill, that he is afterwards to present himself to them as the famous Duke of Marlborough? We have noticed a score of places where a phrase or a line more from the author would have largely increased the value of his work to the less-informed reader.

That the author of this history will escape the critics and meet only compliment and praise in the arduous task before him, he himself best knows cannot possibly be. He has to cross many debated fields, and to turn up the bones of many dead strifes, the ashes of which are still alive. His general views are those in which the sterling minds of the equally cultivated and liberalized will fully accord. His views of man, of life, of law, of great interests, and of the methods of Providence, are his portion of the common stock of the world's intelligence. On side issues, and on two or three strongly defined positions which he takes, there will be a contest opened with him. But the final decision upon the

1849.]

Remark concerning Puritans.

265

general and the specific merits of his history will be deferred till it is completed, and the exciting glow of interest which its perusal rouses shall have subsided.

we

Two animadversions if that be the proper word feel compelled to utter. Those of our readers who peruse many of the daily or weekly papers, with which no land or neighbourhood is so liberally supplied as our own, have seen in very many of those sheets "Mr. Macaulay's Character of the Puritans," and have doubtless smiled or sighed over one smart and flippant sentence in those paragraphs. Now, if we would have Mr. Macaulay's whole opinion of the Puritans, we must unite three different passages in his volume, in which he sums up his views of them with a different aim, and from a different point of observation or criticism. They present a different figure in history according to the circumstances under which they appear, and the changes in their own fortunes. But the one smart and flippant sentence to which we refer is found in a passage in which he rebukes the excessive and destructive zeal of the Puritans. After pronouncing, certainly with no lack of severity, upon their asceticisms and scruples, he refers to their hatred of all vicious and trifling amusements. He then adds, that

66

Bear-baiting, then a favorite diversion of high and low, was the abomination which most strongly stirred the wrath of the austere sectaries. It is to be remarked that their antipathy to this sport had nothing in common with the feeling which has, in our own time, induced the legislature to interfere for the purpose of protecting beasts against the wanton cruelty of men. The Puri

tan hated bear-baiting, not because it gave pain to the bear, but because it gave pleasure to the spectators. Indeed, he generally contrived to enjoy the double pleasure of tormenting both spectators and bear." p. 151.

Any future writer upon rhetoric, who may have occasion to speak of the risk of offending against right and charity to which an epigrammatic or antithetical style may tempt an author of fair intentions, will find a signal example to enforce his warning in the sentence which we have Italicized. We do not suppose that Mr. Macaulay had malice in his heart when he penned it, but that he was aiming for point, for a happy turn, and he took up with a most unhappy one. The objection of the Puritans to bear-baiting, cock-fighting, and like sports, did recognize the tortures to which such trials

« VorigeDoorgaan »