and how common-place, how hard-to-keep-awake under, how void of nourishment, are they! The same truths, or the same theories, in the same tone, come week by week and year by year, weakening instead of strengthening us. The best physical food, used constantly, destroys the tone of the stomach, and we loathe what we once delighted in. So, too, with the soul; it craves variety, it sickens at the sameness of the spiritual food dealt it. When Channing began his eloquent appeals, it was not so much his Unitarian theology which made men listen, as they seldom listen to sermons-it was far more his bold address to Reason; not to the logical understanding, but to the inmost spiritual power of man-that power which sees moral truth, to which the blind understanding at best can but feel its way; to this the Bostonian spoke, and crowds, of all sorts and sects, hearkened. But even his eloquence tires, > and men turn with new interest to the less abstract and more practical words of Dewey; and find in his views of Commercial and Social Religious truth real nourishment. There is nourishment, too, in what so many deem the ravings of Thomas Carlyle and Waldo Emerson; nourishment, not so much because they have spoken more truth than many others, but because they have presented truths in new relations. Where else is the religious progress of a soul presented as it is in Sartor Resartus? or the outer world presented in such a light as in Emerson's "Nature?" I may be told these writings are all trash, and they have been called so, and worse, but lately in our own prints, but I know they are not so to all minds, though to some they may be; for in every reception of truth from a book or the world, there needs to be a capacity of reception in the reader or seer; and this capacity depends not upon intellect merely, but upon prejudices, habits of thought and reading, and many other things. Nor is it Revelation alone which suffers by the disunion of which I complain. Nature is robbed of her very soul, and all this beautiful and glorious living frame sinks into dead clay. And Reason, the very faculty which reveals God to us, is outlawed as God's foe. "To take away Reason," says that true old writer, Henry More, "under what fanatic pretence soever, is to disrobe the Priest, and despoil him of his breast-plate; and which is worst of all, to rob Christianity of that special prerogative it has above all other religions in the world, namely, that it dares appeal unto Reason." How different this from the tone of those who have followed the old Platonist, to whom Rational Christianity seems a contradiction in terms, and whose chief office it is to decry Reason. Thus has it come at length to the point, that if a preacher deal with the world, or life, or man's inner nature, he does not preach, but lectures: while the lecturer on Science or Literature, if he so much as name God, or Christ, or faith, or duty, no more lectures, but sermonises. Thus has it come to pass that Religion, the only true conservative element of our Democratic day and land, is crippled of its true power; and we are left to the mercy of that scepticism of the heart which breeds impudence in the young, worldliness in those of middle age, and in the old mere love of bodily comfort or an unnatural religious enthusiasm, based on fear of God's wrath.On the one hand, we have all the extravagancies of physicospiritual revivals;-on the other, the cold, hard, self-sufficient philosophy, which disdains all excitement and earnestness, to which faith is another name for folly, and disinterestedness the synonym of monomania. What God hath joined together, let no man put asunder; Nature, Reason, and Revelation He hath so joined, and let us not part them. This is a Trinity in Unity, which we may all receive; and it may be, perhaps, the very Trinity in which many believe: God, the Creator and Governor, seen in nature and life,-God, the Redeemer, seen in Revelation,-God, the Enlightener and Sanctifier, purifying the heart through the Reason;-one God, known in three forms. In some degree to re-unite these Revelations in our own and your minds, is a great purpose of these lectures. We would look at science and life religiously, and at Revelation as constantly bound up in the world and its doings. Dizzied with theories of storms, and principles of Chemistry, and feeling how hopeless it is that we should fathom these things here, we would turn to our Bibles, and learn to wait patiently for the day when we shall no more see as through a glass, darkly. Borne down by commercial shocks and political prospects, worried with business, worn with hope deferred, full of despondency and doubt, we would learn from this Holy Book to feel new courage, and rise to new strength;-would say to you and to our own souls, in the words of Keble, (p. 176.) "Up, fainting soul, arise and sing! Till Death the weary spirit free, Thy God hath said "tis good for thee To walk by faith and not by sight." Take it on trust a little while; Soon shalt thou read these mysteries right. In the full sunshine of His smile." CHARTISM.-BY THOMAS CARLYLE. Thomas Carlyle, whatever we may say or think of his style, is no ordinary man. He has written much, and on a variety of topics; yet on all he shows a deep insight into things, which makes him ever an instructive companion. It requires, we admit, patience and some industry, to break through his 'crust;' but having done this, having resolved once to bear with his peculiarities, and to look through them, we find him full to overflowing; suggestive beyond most living authors; comprehensive, racy, original. Rumor had announced that he was about to publish a book on the subject of "Chartism," and now that it is before us, we feel as if he could not have helped writing it. He saw around him a huge agitation, not of a parish or a party, but of the whole working class; and he heard that class uttering itself in a new voice, clamoring for redress, claiming its rights, and threatening the common peace, if they were not granted.Now whence this agitation? Who were they that created it? Whither does it tend, and in what is it to issue? Intent as we know Thomas Carlyle to be on all that promises to affect the well-being of man, bound as is his heart to the heart of humanity, these questions would start up in his mind naturally; and he could not have felt easy until he had expressed his convictions. And he has done this in no measured phrase, in the little book before us. In or out of Parliament, he says, darkness, neglect, hallucination must cease on this matter; there must be a true insight into it; "a genuine understanding by the upper classes of society what it is that the under classes mean; a clear interpretation of the thought which at heart torments those wild inarticulate souls, struggling there, with inarticulate uproar, like dumb creatures in pain, unable to speak what is in them." And not only does he understand that thought, but he dares to speak for them. Thomas Carlyle, poor in purse, yet rich in heart, without outward power, yet nerved with energy of will, sends forth his warning and advice; and in clear trumpet tones, speaks for his brethren yet more poor and powerless, proclaiming that unless they be understood, and their rights granted, a battle is begun, which may rend Great Britain. The common idea, that Chartism is extinct, because its wild outbreaks are stopped, he scouts and ridicules. And well he may; for it is silly and short-sighted in the extreme. As if the cause of rebellion against oppression, the world over, has not gone on, even when open rebellion has been put down; as if wrong always and everywhere, despite of violence and mad conduct, must not work out its own cure. A conviction of the heart cannot be extinguished. And yet when discontent murmurs forth its feelings, and asserts its claim to be heard, or when goaded to madness because starvation stares it in the face and relief comes not, it brandishes the torch at midnight, or breathes defiance in open day, armed with pikes and bludgeons, and then the power of the State is put forth, and by edicts of death, fine and imprisonment, tumult is hushed, and quiet restored,-statesmen and men of property console themselves that all is now well, and the danger past. Strange delusion! Chartism is not extinct. It has deep root in English soil, and in the hearts of Englishmen, and must grow. "We are aware," says Mr. Carlyle, "that, according to the newspapers, Chartism is extinct; that a Reform Ministry has 'put down the chimera of Chartism' in the most felicitous effectual manner. So say the newspapers;-and yet, alas, most readers of newspapers know withal that it is indeed the 'chimera' of Chartism, not the reality, which has been put down. The distracted incoherent embodiment of Chartism, whereby in late months it took shape and became visible, this has been put down; or rather has fallen down and gone asunder by gravitation and law of nature; but the living essence of Chartism has not been put down. Chartism means the bitter discontent grown fierce and mad, the wrong condition therefore, or the wrong disposition, of the Working Classes of England. It is new name for a thing which has had many names, which will yet have many. The matter of Chartism is weighty, deep-rooted, far-extending; did not begin yesterday; will by no means end this day or to-morrow. Reform, Ministry, constabulary rural police, new levy of soldiers, grants of money to Birmingham; all this is well, or is not well; all this will put down only the embodiment or 'chimera' of Chartism." Nor, judging from the conduct of the British government, should we say, that the world had grown much wiser from past experience. Denunciation, reviling, low abuse-these cannot eradicate social or moral disease. Nor will coercion do it. Time was when this was thought to be the remedy, and it was made to do its work fearfully; but even then it only silenced feeling and conviction. But neither royalty nor parliament dare any longer attempt to shut in thought, or suppress its free action. The enqniry comes up from all quarters, from all classes, high and low, learned and unlearned,not how shall discontent be put down, but how shall content be brought in; and the question is plainly asked why it is that the powers that be do not strive to remove the cause of disturbance before they resort to police and a hired soldiery. And by and by this feeling gaining strength and growing daily out of doors, stealing in upon the hearts of the people, and breaking forth as a conviction there, will wake a power, which will compel authority to do justice, and not punish the demand for justice, even though this demand is made with violent temper or lawless outbreak. "We have heard it asked," says Mr. Carlyle, "Why Parliament throws no light on this question of the Working Classes, and the condition or disposition they are in? Truly to a remote observer of Parliamentary procedure, it seems surprising, especially in late Reformed times, to see what space this question occupies in the Debates of the Nation. Can any other business whatsoever be so pressing on legislators? A Reformed Parliament, one would think, should inquire into popular discontents before they get the length of pikes and torches! For what end at all are men, Honorable Members and Reform Members, sent to St. Stephen's with clamor and effort; kept talking, struggling, motioning and counter-motioning? The condition of the great body of people in a country is the condition of the country itself: this you would say is a truism in all times; a truism rather pressing to get recognised as a truth now, and be acted upon, in these times. Yet read Hansard's Debates, or the Morning Papers, if you have nothing to do! The old grand question, whether A is to be in office or B, with the innumerable subsidiary questions growing out of that, courting paragraphs and suffrages for a blessed solution of that: Canada question, Irish Appropriation question, West India question, Queen's Bedchamber question; Game Laws, Usury Laws; African Blacks, Hill Coolies, Smithfield cattle, and Dog-carts,-all manner of questions and subjects, except simply this, the alpha and omega of all! Surely Honorable Members ought to speak of the Condition-of-England question too. Radical Members, above all; friends of the people; chosen with effort, by the people, to interpret and articulate the dumb deep want of the people! To a remote observer they seem oblivious of their duty. Are they not there, by trade, mission, and express appointment of themselves and others, to speak for the good of the British Nation? Whatsoever great British interest can the least speak for VOL. VIII.-12 |