gcls_courant_026 7

THE COURANT ; A SOUTHERN LITERARY JOURNAL 207

[column 1]
address chiefly with the consideration of the prejudices
still prevailing, not only among the people at large, but
amoung statesmen and politicians themselves, against the
science and studies cultivated by that division of the
Institute of France ; * and Hegel, esteemed by many
the most profound and comprehensive thinker of modern
times, says in his Philosophy of History, when speaking
of that method of treating history which is called on
the continent of Europe the pragmatic method, that
"rulers, statesmen and nations are wont to be emphatically
commended to the teahing which experience offers
in history. But what experience and history teach is
this—that peoples and governments never have learned
anything from history or acted on principles deduced
from it. Each period is involved in such peculiar circumstances,
exhibits a condition of things so strictly
idiosyncratic, that its conduct must be regulated by considerations
connected with itself, and itself alone. Amid
the pressure of great events, a general principle gives
no hope. It is useless to revert to similar circumstances
in the Past. The pallid shades of memory struggle in
vain with the life and freedom of the Present."

I have quoted this passage, which appears to me
feeble and unphilosophical, for the purpose of shewing
that it is by no means useless to dwell, even in our age
and in the midst of a civilized people, on the moral and
practical importance, not only on the scientific interest
of the study of history and politics, and must dismiss,
at least in this brief introductory lecture, a thorough
discussion of these remarks—inconsistent, since their
author admits on teaching of history and experience ;
suicidal to the philosopher, since they would extinguish
the connexion between the different "periods;" and
what becomes of the connexion of the events and facts
within each period? What divides, philosophically
speaking, the periods he refers to, so absolutely from one
another? What becomes of continuity, without which
it is irrational to speak of the philosophy of history?
—unhistorical, for every earnest student knows how
almost inconceivably great the influence of some political
philosophers, and of the lessons of great historians,
has been on the development of our race ; unreal, since
Hegel makes an intrinsic distinction between the motive
powers of nations and States, on the one hand, and
of minor communities and individuals on the other;
destructive, because what he says of political rules might
be said of any rule of action, of laws, of constitutions ;
and unpsychological, because he ignores the connexion
between principle and practice, the preventive and
modifying effect of the acknowledge principle or rule,
whether estavlished by experience, science or authority,
and its influence in many cases in spite of the actor, not
unlike Julian, the apostate, whom Christianity did not
wholly cease to influence though he warred against it.

Was ever usurpation stopped in its career of passion
by a moral or political apothegm? Possibly it was.
The flashes of sacred truth sometimes cross the clouds
of gathering crime, and shew how dark it isl but
whether or not, is not now the question. Was ever
burglar, crow-bar in hand, stopped in his crime by reciting
the eighth commandment? Probably not, although
we actually know what murder, already unsheathed, has
been heathed again; but, what is more important for
the connected progress of our race is, that millions
have prevented from fairly entering on the path of
filching or robbery, by receiving at home and in the
school, the tradition of that rule, "Thou shalt not steal,"
and of the whole decalogue, as one of the ethical elements
of their society, which acts, although unrecited,
and even unthought of in a rhousand cases, as the multiplication
table or Euclid's Elements act, unrecited and
unrememebred at the time, in the calculations of the
astronomer or of the carpenter, and in the quick disposition
which military genius makes in the midst of confused
battles, or sea-captain beaiting in dirty weather
through a strait of coral reefs.

We Americans would be peculiarly ungrateful to
political science and history, were we to deny their influence.
Every one who has carefully studied our early
history, and more especially our formative period, when
the present constitution struggled into existence, knows
how signally appear the effects of the political literature
on which a great measure of intellects of our patriots
had been reared, and how often the measures which
have given distinctness and feature to our system, were
avowedly supported for adoption, by rules and examples
drawn from the stores of history or political philosophy,
either for commendation or warning. It is the very
opposite to what Hegel maintains, and the finding of
these threads is one of the greatest delights to the philosophic mind.

Even if the science of political were only, as so many
mistake it to be, a collection of prescriptions for the art
[footnote] *Even the minor lubrications of this excellent writer have acquired
an additional interest since death has put an end to his work.
I would refer, therefore, to the National Intelligencer, Washington,
6th May, 1852, where the entire address alluded to is given.

[Column 2]
of ruling, and not quite as much of the art and science
of obeying (why and when, whom and what, and how
far we ought to obey)—but it is more that either—
even then the science would be as necessary as the
medical book is the the physician, or as the treatise on
fencing, and the fencing-master himself, are to him who
wishes to become expert in the art. No rule learned
by heart will help in complex cases of highest urgency,
but the best decision is made by strong sense and
genius that have been trained. It is thus in grammar
and composition. It is thus in all spheres. Every one
that we may call the practitioner, requires much that
no book can give, but which will be of no use if not
cultivated by teaching; or if it does not receive the
opportunity of being brought into play, when natural
gift, theory and its interpretation by experience, melt
into one homogeneous mass of choice Corinthian brass, in
which the component elements can no longer be distin-
guished.

Although I shall not attempt to teach, in this course,
actual statesmanship, or what has been styled the art of
ruling, yet that which perhaps the older English writiers
more especially meant by the word prudence, that is
foresight (prudentia futurorum), must necessarily ener
as a prominent element in all political discussions; nor
do I desire to pass on without guarding myself against
the misconception that I consider the scinece, the Know-
ing, as the highest aim of man. As mere erudition
stands to real knowledge, so does Knowledge stand to
Doing and Being. Action and character stand above
science. Piety stands above theology; justice above
jurisprudence; health and healing above medicine;
poesy above poetics; freedom and good government
above politics.

One of the most serious obstacles in the way of a
ready reception of political science with that interest and
favour which it deserves for the benefit of the whole
community, is the confounding of the innumerable
theories of the "Best State," and of all the Utopias,
from Plato's Republic to modern communism, with
political science. There is suspicion lurking in the
minds of many persons that the periods of political
fanaticism through which our race has passed have been
the natural fruits of political speculation. But has the
absence of political speculation led to no mischief, and
not to the greater ones? Let Asia answer. Our race is
eminently a speculative race, and we had better specu-
late about nature, language, truth, the state and man,
calmly and earnestly, that is scientifically, than super-
stitiously and fanatically. One or the other our race
will do. Brave jurists, noble historians, and free publi-
cists have, to say the least, accompanied the rising
political movement of our race, with their mediations
and speculations. The most sinister despots of modern
times have been, and are to this day, the most avowed
enemies of political science. Inquiry incommodes them,
and although absolutism has had its keen and eloquent
political philosophers, it is nevertheless true that the
words embroidered on the fillet which graces the brow
of our muse have ever been: In Tyrannos.

On the other hand, is there any period of intense ac-
tion free from these caricatures by which the Evil One
always mocks that which is most scared? Is theology,
is medicine, are the fine arts, was the early period of
Christianity, was the Reformation, was ever a revolu-
tion, however righteous, was the revival of any great
cause, the discovery of any great truth, free from its
accompanying caricature? The differential calculus is a
widely-spread blessing to knowledge and our progress,
yet it had its caricature in the belief of one of the
greatest minds that it might be found a means to prove
the immortality of the soul. The humanitarian, the
theological and the political philosopher know that the
revival of letters and the love of Grecian literature
mark a period most productive in our civilization, while
the rise of modern national languages and literatures
ushered in the new era, and has remained a permanent
element of our whole advancement; yet Erasmus, the
foremost scholar of his time, contemned the living
speech of Europe, and allowed the dignity of language
to none but the two idioms of antiquity. Our own age
furnishes us with two notable instances of this historic
caricature, appearing in the hall of history not unlike
the gimacing monkey which the humourous architect
of the middle ages sometimes placed in the foliage of
his lofty architecture, near the high altar of the solemn
cathedral. The history of labour, mechanical and pre-
dial, its gradual rise in dignity from the Roman slavery
to its present union with science, is one of the golden
threads in the texture we call the history of our race;
yet we have witnessed, in our own times, the absurd
effort of raising physical labour into an aristocracy as
absolute, and more forbidding, than the aristocracy of
the Golden Book of Venice, an absurdity which is cer-
tain to make its appearance again in some countries.
Should we, on that account, refuse to read clearly, and
with delight, the rise of labour in the book of history?
[End of column 2]

[Column 3]
Should we deplore the gradual elevation of the woman
peculiar to our race, and all that has been written to
produce it, because in our age it has been distorted by
folly, and even infamy, or by that caricature of courtesy
which allows the blackest crime to go unpunished be-
cause the malefactor is female, thus depriving woman
of the high attribute of responsibility, and therefore
degrading her?

We honour science; we go farther, we acknowledge
that no nation can be great whcih does not honour intel-
lectual greatness. Mediocrity is a bane, and a people
that has no admiration but for victories gained on the
battle-field, or for gains acquired in the market, must be
content to abdicate its position among the leading
nations. But no nation can be great that admires
intellectual greatness alone, and does not hold rectitude,
wisdom and sterling character in public esteem. The
list of brilliant despots, in government or science,
always followed, as they are, by periods of collapse and
ruin, is long indeed.
[CONCLUDED IN OUR NEXT.]

—————————————.————————————————————————
MILAN CATHEDRAL.—The interior of the cathedral
is imposing, from its vast extent and lofty height. We
were there during the performance of high mass, and
the whole space of those high arches and dim aisles re-
sounded with the notes of the grand organ, flooding the
solemn air with its billowy sound.

Beneath the church is the renowned shrine of San
Carlos Borromeo, which holds in sacred darkness the
bones of the patron saint, and the countless treasures
which his faithful worshippers have accumulated on his
tomb as the slow years go by. No description is able
to give an adequate conception of the elaborate decora-
tion of this little many-sided room, the sides of which
are said to be of silver altogether, and are wrought in
bas-relief representing scenes in the life of San Carlos.
The coffin in which the remains of the saint repose is of
rock crystal, which reflects the light like diamonds, and
is encased by a ponderous silver cover, which is liften
and replaced by machinery. This outer coffin is orna-
mented in the same way as the sides of the room.
The saint, clad in costly vestments, lies in his lonely
resting-place, and above his hands is suspended a large
cross of emeralds and diamonds, which flash a living
radiance from out their dreary prison-house, and shame
the feebler lustre of the lamps which strive to light up
their dark abode The amount of wealth shut up here
from the light of day, is the accumulation of many
years, and the offering of many wealthy, if not pious
hands. The shrine is kept under strong lock and key,
and covered from all change of vulgar gaze, except
upon high festival days, when, from a railed aperture in
the church above, the public are allowed to gaze down
into its splendour. As a fee paid to the priest redeems
the stranger from all imputation of curiosity, and makes
even the possibility of heresy tolerable, we easily ob-
tained entrance to the shrine, conducted by an attendant,
who donned official robes for the occasion, and went
through the showing of the relics with dignified gravity
and politeness.—Highways of Travel.
————————————.————————————————————
LIQUID MARBLE.—A French correspondent an-
nounces that M. Jobarb, of Brussels, has invented a
composition which, when moulded and hardened, is not
to be distinguished from marble—not the veiny, greasy
stuff in use for chimneys and vases, but the pure and
spotless Carrara, transparent, polished and hard as the
real substance taken from the quarry. This marble,
which is to be prepared for the sculptors in a liquid
state, will, like many other artificial inventions, possess
an immense advantage over the natural production itself.
It can be moulded on the plaster figure, and thus, instead
of having to hack and hew the shapeless block, with
great pains and labour, the artist will henceforth realize
the genuine impression of his cast at once, and, with
scarcely any further exertion, bring out his creation with
all the freshness and vigour of the first idea. The in-
vention, which has created an immense sensation in the
world of art, is due to a practical chemist of Brussels,
of the name of Changy, the same skilful practitioner
who discovered the divisibility of the electric light,
and the miraculous draught of fishes by means of the
chemical light, which is sunk at the bottom of the sea.
M. Jobarb, whose word cannot be doubted, pledges his
honor that the table on which he writes has been com-
posed by M. Changy's process, and possesses every
quality of the finest marble, and that after having sub-
mitted various specimens of the substance, both black
and white, to every chemical test in use, he had come to
the conclusion that the composition of marble is no
longer a secret of Dame Nature, and that man has at
length learned to rival her in the most cunning of her
works, while Art will rejoice at beholding her sons freed
from the laborious toil which hitherto rendered the
sculport's profession so difficult of pursuit.
———————————.————————————————————
He who forsees calamities suffers them twice.
[End of column 3]