appear in any part, however inconsiderable, that may be assigned to them. Some piece, made for the occasion, as the " Ménage de Molière,” follows, or an ode in honour of the great French dramatist is recited, and the evening concludes with the ceremony, sacred in the place where it is performed, "the Crowning of the Statue of Molière," amid the shouts and the tears, the religious joy and veneration, with which the populace of Paris hail a triumph of the arts. One of the influences most powerful in France, and most visible in every society of France, is undoubtedly the influence of letters. "I begin my political life," said M. V. Hugo, when his tragedy of "Le Roi s'amuse" was prohibited; and in a country where the public take so deep and lively an interest in literature, the prohibition of a tragedy is, in fact, the commencement of a political life. At the very moment I am writing, the words yet ring in my ear which I heard one of the most distinguished members address the other evening to the Chamber of Deputies:-" And I -I who am speaking to you, 'messieurs,' when people talk to you of an aristocracy, what am I? What am I, whom you think worthy of your attention; who take my place on yonder bench, by the side of men who have gained battles ;* by the side of men bearing the noblest names† in France? What am I, 'messieurs,' but an humble man of letters, whom a little talent, kindly noticed, introduced among you ?” There are countries, the monarchs of which show an enlightened sense of the dignity with which men of learning and science decorate their dominionsthere are countries in which you will find ambassadors and ministers as eminent for their literary attainments as for their high political station; but in no country do literature and science open so free, and honourable, and independent a career as in that France which M. Thiers addressed from the National Tribune, in the few touching words that I have just cited. *Looking at Marshal Soult. Looking at the Duc de Broglie. "Overturn the monarchy :-Give me the liberty of the press, and I will restore it in six months,"* was the noble expression of an author confident in his talent, confident in the genius of his countrymen, and only wrong in the folly of his cause. A great writer in France is a great power. The baron of feudal times sallied forth against his neighbour, or his sovereign, with his armed retainers at his heels; and in those days of violence the goodness of the right depended on the goodness of the sword; the courtier in France, who succeeded the baron, abandoned the glaive and the gauntlet-for the Graces—and trusted to an appropriate smile and a well-turned compliment for the success of his career. But mark yonder pale young man; feeble in his person, slovenly in his dress -holding his pen with a trembling hand, doubled up over his paper! That young man has come from some mean abode, from some distant province, where, amid penury and insignificance, with his eyes now fixed on the page of history, now on the heading of a newspaper, he has long indulged his reveries of immortality and his hopes of power. In him see the baron and the courtier of the day; he attacks the monarch or the minister, but it is not with the falchion and the lance. He glides into the cabinet and the boudoir, not in a powdered wig and an embroidered waistcoat, but bound in vellum. He does not measure his force or his address with yours, but his intelligence: he is the person to admire; he is the person to fear; he is the person-in France which he is nowhere else. He is the person in France that he cannot be in America, for there is no superstition for the arts in America; the vanity of wealth, the natural conse * M. de Châteaubriand. + Mirabeau, consulted by the Queen of France; and the Institût admitted to the Council of Napoleon :-these are the pictures present to the young man who, in some remote village, surrounded by poverty, and born a little above the plough, pursues with indefatigable perseverance studies which he sees every day conducting his fellows to the highest situations in letters and the state, and which, if sometimes a cause of misery to himself, are still a source of energy, and strength, and prosperity to his country. quence of a nation depending wholly on its industry and its commerce, predominates over the diviner thoughts and more graceful occupations of letters. He is the person in France that he cannot be in Germany, for in Germany a "von" before your name is a matter of social necessity; for in Germany, to be "well born," or to be "nobly born," or to be "rightnobly born," is a matter submitted to historical rules, and the superscription of a letter demands the profoundest study, the most accurate knowledge, the nicest distinctions. He is the person in France that he cannot be in England-for in England, politics is the only passion of the men, fashion the only idol of the women -for in England, to be a blockhead is far more pardonable than to live in a bad street-for in England, to have voted against the house and window-tax would make you of far more consequence than to have written the profoundest work on legislation. Observe! Messrs. Cousin, and Villemain, and Royer Collard are made peers, because they are very learned and eloquent professors. M. Lamartine is elected a representative of the French people on account of his poems-M. Arago on account of his mathematical acquisitions-M. Thiers on account of his talent as a journalist and an historian. This takes place in France-and what takes place in England? THE CLOSE OF THE POLL AT A LATE CONTEST. The most distinguished man of science at this moment in England, appears upon the hustings as candidate for a great metropolitan district; he professes liberal but moderate opinions, such as a life of reflection usually engenders. How is he received? Do the people feel grateful and flattered by the philosopher's appearing among them as a solicitor for popular hon ours? Do they esteem his search after their favour as almost the highest compliment that could be paid to popular rights? Are they sensible to the circumstance, that the individual who appears before them and says, "I prefer the pursuit which you can give me-I prefer the honours that you can confer upon me-I prefer the life that is to be passed in combating for your rights and your rewards, to the pursuits which have made me known throughout Europe, to the honours which would be showered upon me by every learned corporation— to the life that in calm and quiet would lead me to an immortal reputation"-Are they even aware that the person who says, or might say all this, is raising to the highest possible pitch the character and the career of a free state? Are they proud and conscious of the fact, that the man who offers to sacrifice his energies to their cause has-at the very moment he does sothe eyes of the learned and the wise directed from every corner of Europe on his labours? No, they see nothing of this; they feel nothing of this. Mr. Duncombe's abilities and principles fully justify, in my opinion, the choice of his electors.-I do not speak of Mr. Duncombe then,-but mark! the unknown Tory, the violent and eloquent demagogue— every kind of man is preferred to the man of science --and the person who, perhaps, more than any other without exception in this country, would, if he went to Paris, or even to Berlin, or Petersburg, or Vienna, be courted and honoured by all who themselves received honour and courtship, hardly obtains one-half of the votes of any other description of persons in the popular borough of Finsbury !* * I know there are some little minds ready at once to say-a man of science is not fitting to be a politician. No view is so narrow, so contrary to truth, to history, and to experience. In the three greatest politicians and generals of past times-Alexander, Julius Cæsar, and Napoléon Bonaparte-their love of letters and their knowledge of science are at least as conspicuous as their other attainments. The greatest orators and politicians that England has ever producedHampden, Shaftesbury, Bolingbroke, Pulteney, the Pitts, Fox, Sheridan, Windham, Canning, Burke, and, let me add, Lord I dwell the more upon this, because the most crude conclusions are drawn frequently from what are falsely seen as analogous facts. In the discussion on the reform bill, it was frequently argued that if the people of England had the free choice of their representatives, they would be sure to choose men of science and literature, because the people in France did--and this passed for excellent reasoning! Nay, if any one had Brougham, and Sir Robert Peel, and Lord John Russell, and Sir John Hobhouse-have all been men of letters and of business; sincerely and deeply attached to academical as to political pursuits; and finding time, as all men of active and clear minds do find time, for elevating and enlarging their views, for cultivating and improving their judgment and their fancy, as well as for handling and grappling with state affairs. "As for matter of policy and government," says Bacon," that learning should rather hurt than enable thereunto, is a thing very improbable; we see it is accounted an error to commit a natural body to empiric physicians, who commonly have a few pleasing receipts, whereupon they are confident and advantageous, but know neither the causes of diseases, nor the complexions of patients, nor peril of accidents, nor the true method of cures; we see it is a like error to rely upon advocates and lawyers, who are only men of practice, and not grounded in their books, who are many times easily surprised when matter falleth out besides their experience, to the prejudice of the causes they handle; so, by like reason, it cannot be but a matter of doubtful consequence, if states be managed by empiric statesmen, not well mingled with men grounded in learning. But contrariwise, it is almost without instance contradictory, that ever any government was disastrous that was in the hands of learned governors. For however it hath been ordinary with politic men to extenuate and disable learned men by the names of pedants, yet in the records of time it appeareth in many particulars, that the government of princes in minority (notwithstanding the infinite disadvantage of that kind of state) have nevertheless excelled the government of princes of mature age, even for the reason which they seek to traduce, which is, that by that occasion the state hath been in the hands of pedants. Nay, let a man look into the government of the bishops of Rome, as by name, into the government of Pius Quintus and Sextus Quintus, in our times, who were both, at their entrance, esteemed but as pedantical friars, and he shall find that such popes do greater things, and proceed upon truer principles of state than those who have ascended to the papacy from an education and breeding in affairs of state and courts of princes. Neither can the experience of one man's life furnish examples and precedents for the events of one man's life: for as it happeneth sometimes that the grandchild, or other descendant, resembleth the ancestor more than the son! so many times occurrences of present times may sort better with ancient examples than with those of the latter or immediate times; and lastly, the wit of one man can no more countervail learning, than one man's means can hold way with a common purse,"and so he continues proving the activity of learned men in public affairs. See Bacon's Advancement of Learning. |