the working of human institutions, how it really came to pass, that, at about the same time, Athens and Rome, the two most famous cities of antiquity, changed the basis of the right of suffrage from birth to fortune. When you say that Roman society was founded upon respect for family, for property, and for religion; that the government was founded upon election and its policy upon conquest, you write compactly, and deal with great results; and when you add, that the aristocracy used the people's hatred of tyrants as the chief instrument of their own aggrandizement, you indulge in a commonplace which is not without its excuse. Undoubtedly it was characteristic of the Roman institutions to form men apt for all functions, that thus the best soldiers in war should be the best rulers in peace; but how came it to pass, that, when so trained, unconsciously to themselves and all the world, they became in general the worst enemies of the Republic, and, at the bitter end, the real betrayers of the Empire? How came it to pass, that, with the best practical principles of government, with the noblest sentiments of honor, and the most persevering faith in religion, the Roman state drifted, silently but surely, all through its most splendid successes, into that fatal gulf of civil strife, in which at last perished the hopes of liberty in the ancient world?

That is the question which haunts us as we read the story of Rome, suggesting the most solemn lessons and the most distressing doubts, a question which Gibbon, with his philosophhical scepticism and his spiritual blindness, has, after all, done nothing to answer, except so far as to clear away the rubbish of ages, and let the awful drama rehearse itself before us, a question, indeed, which, as history is usually written, we should hardly expect the historian to answer; for it goes behind facts into that uncertain region of moral causes which no dogmas can reach, and no statements comprehend.

But it is the question which Napoleon presses upon us with singular emphasis in the work to which we now allude. His whole structure of the character of Cæsar, so to speak, rests upon the assumption that he alone could see the fatal result of the corruption, moral and political, which had eaten out the life of the Republic; and that, forecasting as nobody else could the inevitable course of events, he was justified by his genius and by fate in anticipating the catastrophe; in seizing with one bold movement the reins of power, which were falling from hands that were too weak, into those that were too wicked to hold them. His argument assumes, that the elements of dissolution were too strong to be any longer resisted in a lawful way by constitutional means; and we admit, that to grant the facts is to justify Cæsar. But when he goes further, and undertakes, as it is undoubtedly the purpose of the book to do, to establish a parallel between Cæsar and Bonaparte; and, because Rome was so corrupt as to need a despot, to maintain that France was so likewise, to such degree indeed that the first empire was a condition of its existence; and that, moreover, for half a century, it continued so corrupt that the second empire was a boon which the people should

the

have been only too glad to receive at his hands, it seems to us that he makes an unfair use of the past, in order to insult the present. As an historical vindication, therefore, of the first Bonaparte, who had a right to break the laws "when society was hurrying on to its ruin, and a desperate remedy was indispensable for its salvation;" and, by consequence, of the second Bonaparte, who had a right to break the laws also "when the government, supported by the mass of the people, had become the organ of its interests and their hopes," -the book has the character of a political pamphlet; and as such it will not fail to be judged, and judged severely. For, granting that the elements of dissolution in Roman society were electoral corruption, and the laws of high treason, which furnished to arbitrary power afterwards under the emperors one of its deadliest weapons, agrarian laws and slavery and debts (for, as the citizens made war at their own expense, they were always in debt), what possible resemblance have these causes of decline to the condition of society in France, when purged by the fires of the Revolution, or taught by fifty years of increasing enlightenment how to use the liberty it had bought, after so many horrors, with so much blood? Surely the Emperor owes to the country, which otherwise, on his own theory, he libels by the mere fact of his rule, to explain clearly the nature and source of the corruption of which the Imperial dynasty is the only remedy. Rome may have been bad enough in the first century before Christ, to need a Cæsar,- we are inclined, indeed, from our own study of that age, to think it was; but that, in the nineteenth century after Chirst, France must take refuge from ruin in the arms of a Bonaparte, seems to us a playful satire upon the progress of mankind hardly to have been expected from so serious a person as the nephew of the man of destiny.

The last fifteen years of Cæsar's life remain to be told in the second volume; and we trust it will appear in that, how, in the empire of his ideas after his death, in the final triumph of his principles and his system, we are to recognize in Cæsar the true sign of greatness. It is true, that neither the murder of Cæsar, nor the captivity of Bonaparte, were able to check the tendencies of Rome towards despotism, or of France towards freedom. It is true, that Brutus, by slaying Cæsar, did nothing to prevent the reign of Augustus, while he rendered possible that of Nero; and it is true, likewise, that the ostracism of Bonaparte by confederated Europe did not prevent the resuscitation of his empire. But it is false alike to the truths of history and the teachings of philosophy, to represent the struggles of Cæsar and Bonaparte for power as popular causes surviving the league that, under the mask of liberty, sought to overthrow them. Neither Bonaparte nor Cæsar was a man of ideas in the usual meaning of that phrase. Their policy was conquest: their end was power. Born out of the seething elements, the one of corruption, the other of revolution, it was impossible for them to separate themselves from that taint of selfishness which for them meant existence. When Bonaparte swept over Italy, and invaded Russia, and ravaged Spain, and upset kingdoms in Germany, what idea could have lain at

the bottom of his wild career but the greed of power? That he was an instrument in the hands of Providence, working out great results of beneficence to mankind, is the view which we may take; just as in the rush of the whirlwind and the tumult of the earthquake, we recognize an ultimate purpose of good: but it was not the view which Bonaparte himself could have taken. Not that he meant harm to anybody on the contrary, he preferred to benefit rather than injure mankind; but first, and last, and above all things, he preferred to establish and benefit himself. Cæsar's ambition seems in some respects purer. Rome was in the full swing of conquest. To bring the civilized world under its sway was its legitimate occupation. But what had Bonaparte to do in Russia? Both were men of vast activity and genius, called into being, as it were, for a special purpose. But as for principles or a system, neither had any, except despotism; and despotism is wholly a personal matter. There is nothing in it to survive the despot, except the example; and that was fruitful enough in woe, we all know, to Rome, and might be so to France if the empire were an idea, as Louis Napoleon so persistently strives to represent it, and not an ephemeral fact, as France and Europe so stubbornly insist upon regarding it.

MR. WOOLSEY'S exposition of the law of nations* was written, as the author states in his preface, for the purpose of supplying a practical want which he felt while engaged in teaching that subject; the want, that is, of a compendious treatise intended not for lawyers, but for young students of political and moral science. It is, therefore, not merely a statement, necessarily brief, of the actual condition of the law of nations; but may claim, to a certain extent, the character of an ethical work, in so far as it attempts to compare that law with the general principles of justice established among the most civilized

nations.

In a well-written introductory chapter, the author defines the grounds and sources of international law, and briefly sketches its historical growth from the first vague indications of its existence among the ancient nations to the consciousness of its necessity in the mediaval age, and the fuller development of its principles in modern times. In the two parts into which the work is divided, the author then proceeds to treat, in the first, of the general faculties or powers of States and their relations of peace, together with the rights and moral claims, the obligations and duties, which have their operation in a state of peace; and therein he discusses the following topics: The rights and obligations of States as independent sovereignties; the rights of property, and rights over territory, belonging to States; the rights and duties of intercourse between nations, with the relations of foreigners within the territory to the State; the forms and agents of

* Introduction to the Study of International Law; designed as an Aid in Teaching, and in Historical Studies. By THEODORE D. WOOLSEY, President of Yale College. Second edition, revised and enlarged. New York: Charles Scribner & Co. 1864.

intercourse between the States themselves; and, lastly, the right of contract or of treaties. In the second part, the author considers the relations arising from a state of war, first, as affecting the belligerents themselves; and, secondly, as bearing on the rights and obligations of neutrals. Upon the latter points, which have been of such great interest to this country, we do not find the discussion so exhaustive, nor, we may add, so suggestive, as we desired. But, in all other respects, Mr. Woolsey is to be commended for the industry and care with which he has made his compilation.

This is not an original and profound treatise, to take its place with the writings of Grotius and Vattel and Wheaton and Lawrence. It was not meant to be. But it is an excellent guide, nevertheless, for the general reader as well as for students, and cannot fail to do a good part in popularizing the elements of the science it discusses, a science, in which, above all others that touch upon juridical relations, the freest scope is left to the operation of the general principles of justice and the common sense of maukind. And in this country, where the people are supposed to do their own thinking, and decide upon their own wars, and make their own peace, international law is a subject which cannot be made too clear to the average intelligence of the people. As a responsible member of the body politic, every educated person, as Mr. Woolsey well remarks, ought to become acquainted with it. In the case of the "Alabama," for instance, environed as the question is with feelings of irritation which artful devices on either side might kindle into a terrible flame, but which at bottom is a mere case in international law, to be settled after fair discussion, and in a dispassionate temper, - how very necessary that the general mind should be freed from the prejudices of passion, and enabled to consider it in its proper light; not as an occasion for war between two of the most powerful and most civilized nations of the earth, a war which might well make us despair of civilization itself, but as an opportunity for the vindication of reason as the arbiter of national quarrels, and an illustration to all nations of the progress and success of enlightened democracy! To this beneficent work of popular education, Mr. Woolsey has contributed not a little in this present volume, to the merits of which we are glad to bear our cordial testimony.

CRITICISM.

To no poet, perhaps, since the world began, has there been paid so universal, heartfelt tribute of love and gratitude as that which broke forth from the German people upon Schiller's hundredth birthday, the 10th of November, 1859;* for to no poet, perhaps, since the world began, has it been given to exert so immediate and deep-reaching an influence upon his people, to none to represent, in his life and striving, the ideal of his nation; to be at once reformer and prophet. Born

* Beiträge zur Feststellung, Verbesserung und Verwahrung des Schiller'schen Textes. Von Prof. Dr. JOACHIM MEYER. [1859 and 1860.]

of the people, partaker of their trials and grief, yet rising ever above them; taking life, with all its sorrow, and making of it a consoling opportunity; resolutely refusing to acknowledge the shadows and the clouds which haunt it, but ever seeing the good and beautiful in it; unconquerable in hope, thus Schiller lived his life on earth; for his nation a beloved leader, for the world evermore a luminary name.

Every memorial of him has been carefully treasured. The record of his days is complete. We doubt if any new fact of importance will ever be added to it; yet to no other German writer has it happened, it is said, to leave his writings infested with so many errors, the result, in great part, of the too careless supervision of Körner. Since 1844, however, especially through the critical investigation of Dr. Joachim Meyer,* great progress has been made in removing these imperfections. It is to his investigations that we owe the edition (said to be the best) published in 1860. Schiller left no collected edition of his writings: his premature death prevented his putting the last hand to his works. There appeared, however, during his life, a collected edition of his smaller prose works, and a collection of his poems up to 1803. After his death, his dramas were published under the title, "Theater von Schiller" (1805-1807). The first regular collected edition was prepared by Körner (1812-15). It has been the basis of all subsequent editions up to 1840; but it was neither complete nor correct. The manuscripts of the poet, the periodicals and almanacs in which his poems first appeared, were by no means exhausted. The "Nachträge" of Boas, the "Supplemente" of Hoffmeister, the explanatory labors of Viehoff, have supplied many omissions and corrections. Several poems, also, whose genuineness has been doubted, are shown by Meyer to have been incontestably Schiller's. He has also restored to its place among Schiller's poems the beautiful October poem of 1788, not hitherto received into Schiller's ⚫ works.

The Schiller-cultus, as the Germans term it, has no parallel, perhaps, with any poet among any nation. With us, the great masters of speech have hardly been recognized till they and their age have faded into history. Schiller, on the contrary, was the outgrowth of his time, which found in him voice and utterance. The nation took him at once to its heart. One memorable result of the celebration of the 10th of November, 1859, was the establishment of the Schiller Institute, for the support of indigent authors or their orphaned families. There is a similar institution in London, founded in 1790, called the Royal Literary Fund, which distributes relief through a committee, without divulging names. At the annual dinner in 1822, Chateaubriand said that he had reason to know something of the value of the society; for, in the time of the French Revolution, it had aided a poor refugee, who had returned to represent his country in England. That man was himself. For many years there has been a similar society in Paris, called the Société de Gens des Lettres. On the 10th of November, 1860, the superintendent of the German society, Dr. Dingelstedt, of Weimar, rendered his first yearly account of its condition and working. The contributions which flowed in, from the stimulus