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6. The sovereignty of so principal a medium of communication between the two hemispheres, as this port is again contemplated, would now further bestow on us a preponderating power and influence in both, not more founded on our ability to injure any point which might excite our displeasure, than on the habitual good will which all would feel towards the state, the protecting privileges conferred by which, would thus constitute the foundation of their individual prosperity. In our author's own words, "the breasts of all would progressively warm to the port and country which

Lord Chatham's eloquence were directed; neither do we believe that any such peremptory and permanent lesson of moderation has been taught us by that catastrophe, as would of itself secure to us, ceteris paribus, the prolonged dominion of India, were it colonized; or still less, that such an effort

could be guaranteed from any conceivable military or political ascendancy acquired by the Cape of Good Hope over it. On the contrary, we are of opinion that our North American colonies were lost to us through the operation of a long series of injudicious restrictions imposed by us on their trade generally, but particularly on that maintained by them with the French West Indies;restrictions, the impolicy of enforcing which was seen by Sir Robert Walpole, but overlooked by Mr Secretary Pitt, (Lord Chatham), who thus himself contributed equally with others to produce the ultimate separa tion. (See Macpherson's Annals of Commerce, vol. 8. passive, but especially p. p. 330-414.) And arguing thence, we would infer, that it is the lesson of liberality in our mercantile and colonial policy generally, not that of mere moderation in minute questions of executive control, which is the "true practical instruction to be drawn from this page of history;" and that it is to the general freedom of trade which Captain M.'s schemes would disseminate throughout the whole southern hemisphere, and which would render the recurrence of similar mistakes impossible. That we would have to look, affection and allegiance of India, colonized were they to be adopted, for the continued or not colonized, neither to any supposed, but in truth, problematical wisdom, in future administrations, founded on a long, past, misunderstood, and almost forgotten experience, nor to any control or power of control over our Indian empire, which our policy might bestow on any other portion of our dominion. And hence, as we think, might have been drawn, a very strong argument indeed in favour of the whole schemes in question, but of which our author has almost entirely neglected to avail himself.

still divide their time and their domestic associations: they would be half our subjects, to whatever other lord the remainder of their fealty might incontestibly be due."

7. This power and influence will, however, Captain M. observes next, always be exactly commensurate with the degree to which the facilities which we may afford at this point shall be improved, "will just fall short of the unbounded extent to which they might be carried by the precise sum of competition which these may not yet be able to supersede, and by the precise deficit of those points in either hemispheres, which may yet continue to have no share in the mutual communication." Hence he argues, our acquisition of this medium, this free port, which we have thus considered in so many points of view, would give us a strong interest, a very strong interest in the prosperity of all, thus identified with that of this point, the fulcrum, as it were, of this immense lever; an interest rivetted, it is true, "by another link than this, for the revenue arising from the contemplated transit of the produce of both hemispheres, though its stores would always be equally dependent on the same circumstance," but which, he maintains, would be quite as strong in war as in peace, "unless we would deem it good policy to lessen our power, dimidish our influence, and curtail our revenue, precisely at the moment when their whole united strength may be strained to the uttermost to cope with the blow levelled at our existence." At this point, accordingly, he proposes, as an improvement on his entire scheine, that we should adopt, and openly declare our resolution to rescue this precious trade from the vacillations even of our military policy, by exempting it in all time to come, (unless we ee occasion, on experiment, to alter our however to be equally explicit) by expolicy; the declarations of such change empting it in every case from that confiscation of private property, which we inflict on all other branches of foreign commerce, on every occasion of national hostility.

"Whatever," he observes, " may be the advantages of situation, or freedom of trade, or moderation of impost, which we may be able to offer at this point, it can never presume to hope for the monopoly of the whole communication between the two he

mispheres, unless we cast into the balance with it this privilege also, which we alone of all the world can bestow. Without this, the principle of its establishment would be adopted on other points by other powers; and the sum of benefit which it is calculated to confer, not merely on ourselves, who would be its masters, but on those also who, under the shadow of our power, would enjoy its privileges, would be dissipated and destroyed by the endless jarrings which competition is ever calculated to excite among rival powers. With this high privilege, on the other hand, there would be no room for these sources of contention, these occasions of inimical discussion, these pretexts for bloodshed and strife. The subjects of all powers alike would seek this neutral bound, within which war could find no place, and the very idea of competition would vanish

from their minds."

8. If the foregoing reasoning be correct," Captain M. proceeds, "then would our acquisition of such a free port as has been contemplated be in the very highest degree acceptable to every humane mind, of whatever country or clime, inasmuch as it would develope the principle, and illustrate the facility, with which we might give up altogether the practice of confiscating private property as an engine of public hostility; as it might tempt us accordingly to the more general experiment; and as it would thus strip war of half its horrors and miseries, while it at the same time removed many of the temptations which usually excite to its renewal.

* We wish it were in our power to extract the whole passage (p. 310-329.) in which this portion of the subject is considered in the work before us, both as it would give us a very favourable specimen of its general style of execution, and as it relates to a proposal which peculiarly excites our interest and attention, and to which accordingly we shall certainly recur, when we shall have prepared materials for placing it in the point of view it seems to merit. We cannot meddle with it however now; and must content ourselves therefore with this simple recommendation of it to our reader's attention, expressing, at the same time, our surprise at a contemporary criticism of the whole work, in the main very favourably couched, but which censures this particular passage, as conveying a proposal, that "free bottoms should make free goods, or some thing very like it." This is a complete and even very gross mistake. The proposal really made by Captain M., as we have seen, is, that free British ports should make free goods; in other words, that if our enemies choose to purchase from us, and thereby be nefit our resources, national and individual, equally with their own, they shall, in such case, enjoy a trade, even under their own flag, protected and assured to them by British honour and maritime superiority; o

And lastly," The measures thus successively proposed for the promotion of our commercial and political interest in the Pacific and Atlantic Ocean, their colonies, and the minute and permanent intercourse which they would necessarily occasion with even the most remote points of both hemispheres, would facilitate the preaching and propagation of Christian knowledge throughout the world, and thus accomplish readily, and without difficulty, that most important object which our Missionary Societies profess indeed as the ultimate end of all their labours, but which it is but too evident to even the slightest examination, their limited powers are utterly unable without assistance to attain.”

Such are the principal speculations contained in this very interesting and entertaining little volume, and which are illustrated in its pages with considerable variety of historical anecdote and allusion, and their effect further heightened by an exceedingly precise and perspicuous general arrangement.

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therwise they shall go without it altogether, and shall not even have the privilege of complaint, for the result, whatever it be, will have been their own choice. Surely nothing would appear more reasonable than this, nothing more gratifying to British pride than its general acceptance; need we add, nothing more essentially different than its adoption, from any acquiescence with those neutral pretensions, the object of which, on the contrary, it would totally defeat. It is in fact the cause of belligerent direct, not that of neutral carrying trade, which is here advocated; to this last Captain M. shews himself peculiarly hostile in every part of his work.

that character. We can bear, we can revere the virtue for which we have no sympathy, and justify the father who gave up his children to his country; but we should turn from him with loathing if he could immolate them to his own renown.

The nature of the sacrifice appears sufficiently to condemn this passage, as assigning such a motive for such an action. But, taking it more largely, as a sort of general conception of the character of Roman patriotism, from their philosophic poet, it would yield matter of more doubtful and curious inquiry. I have no intention of pursuing the inquiry. What interested me at the moment in the passage, and induced me to cite it, was the singular discrepancy it suggests between our conception of the character of Brutus, and that of the Roman poet,-implying, as it would seem to me, a purer imagination of heroic virtue received among us than has found its place even in the loftiest strains of Roman poetry.

I say a purer imagination of heroic virtue. We require, in our idea of virtue of any kind, more singleness of affection, as well as more exaltation. We imagine that there existed in the mind of the highest Romans, an image of their country as of a being-a power-a Rome deified in deep passion, and which in deep passion they worshipped. We conceive of their patriotism not as a love merely, but as an obedience of duty to highest law, and as such it appears to us a virtue. I am not now speaking of our historical intelligence of their patriotism, but of its aspect to our imagination. That idea, beautiful, august, and stern, seems altered in its purity the moment there is seen to mingle in it the desire of human applause.

It is not that we slight the passion for praise the desire to live in the voice of men. We acknowledge the love of glory as a passion of high and generous natures. We do not separate it at all from our general conception of the Roman character; only, we exclude it from the purest character and the highest acts of their vir

tue.

Something analagous to this will be found in our conception of the same passion, as part of the character of genius.

In our reverent admiration of ge

nius, the love of fame finds no place. We conceive of exalted minds, dwelling as spirits among men, exempt from their infirmities, though possessing and rejoicing in their nature. From the intermingled weaknesses, the mournful oppressions, the enthralling passions of our nature, they seem to us gloriously free. Free in the purity, the power, and the bliss of their ethereal being, they seem to us to walk in the midst of men as visitants, yet to have their place among them as brothers. I am now speaking of our imagination of genius,-not of our knowledge or philosophic belief, but of that momentary ideal belief which is impressed upon our minds during the contemplation of its perfect works. Then, while we are held in wonder and strong delight by the power present upon the soul, and by the sense of its great creations, what is our thought of the mind which gave those creations birth? Perhaps there is some illusion in our thoughts; but, if so, rather in what they exclude than in what they shew. They discover to us the human soul in exaltation of pure delight-genius in the height of its power-only they do not discover to us the whole human being, the man in whom that state of power, that "access of mind," must of necessity pass away. We believe, then, that at times a nature is given to genius higher than our own, in its majesty of undishonoured power, in its immunity from our weaknesses-and we may take this feeling as our guide, at least to know what the temper of the mind may be for the hour while its own genius fills it.

Trusting to this feeling, it may be safely said, that we have no conception during our admiration of genius in its highest acts of power, that it acts under the desire of fame. It seems to act in the delight and glory of its own conceptions. If the man himself, with his whole life, can seem to us, when under the impressions of that transport, to be exempted and lifted up from his human passions,-far more must the soul in its acts of power, and rejoicing in its ideal worlds, be freed from them. For a time, at least, the earth is forsaken, and this terrestrial life. For a time the spirit feels its wings, mounts in its own region, shapes its path in light, and looks solely on the forms that are kindred to its own essence. How can

we imagine that mind, in the very act of conceiving and embodying those creations which lift us up out of our ordinary life, which really awaken in our souls the sense of their highest powers, constrain us from the habit ual temper of our minds, and force upon us a momentary consciousness of exaltation and purity in ourselves-how can we imagine that such a mind should yet be occupied at the very time by the working of the passions from which it delivers us? Conceiving in their entire beauty, and moulding into material elements those wondrous creations, can we believe that in that act it has sense for other thoughts and other feelings? Can we believe, that Homer, Phidias, Michael Angelo, Shakspeare, Milton, while contemplating within their own souls, or in dawning existence, in marble under their hands, or in words flowing in inspiration through their lips, those forms of being and embodyings of power which have held nations in wonder, and impressed a permanent spirit on the minds of the people to whom they were given,-can we believe that those mighty spirits were themselves possessed with emotion, not from the grandeur of their ideal creations, but from the passions of their human life?

The poet and the mighty sculptor return from their ideal world into their human life. They are men once more, and they resume the feelings and the frailties of men. In their human life, and not in their ideal world, they find again their love of fame, their wishes and their hopes of immortal praise.

Is this frailty, or is it lofty passion? It is human passion at least-a passion of that life which binds them to their race, not of that which lifts them above it. There is a sphere to their souls in which their highest powers move, and in which this desire has no power to act. But they descend into the life of men, and feel again the sun that shines on that life. No human soul is at all times superior to the sad realities and necessities of our mortal existence. Milton was not always rapt in the highest heavens. Pure as he was, his life bears many an earthly stain.

What then may be the nature of this gratification of renown, this love of glory, to these great minds? It is VOL. III.

the acknowledgment of their power. They could not chuse, they could not endure to close up that power within themselves. They must pour it forth upon the world. It is not enough to them to have felt and known; but that which they have felt and known they will bring into being. They will do so, not for themselves, and that it may endure for themselves; but that it may be an enduring power among the spirits of other men and other generations. They passionately desire that their thoughts may not pass away from the earth, but that they may live as powerful, as full of life, as glowing as in the first conception, during endless ages. They passionately desire that the joy, the greatness, the dilatation of thought, the truths which have been imparted to them, may have a permanent dwelling on the earth, through them and by their act. It is fit that they who felt should perpetuate-that they to whom it was given should bestow-and that they should feel that what they have received they have not suffered to perish. From the depths of being which were discovered to them, they have brought forth, by their own act and power, wealth to their whole kind. They feel, that the powers by which they were honoured among their people-among their race-and by which they were made accountable to men for its use, have not been wasted in their possession, but that they have done work answerable to those powers. This assurance, that what they have felt and known they have given to be felt and known for ever, they receive from their fame.

Such, it is conceived, is the nature of the love of fame felt by men of genius. It is a noble feeling, but having intensity of self. The emotion of genius, during production, is or ought to be purely impersonal. It is in the intense feeling of his individual life, and of his relations to men, that a man of genius feels his power, after that power has been gloriously exercised. Whereas he felt it, during his inspiration, in the might of absolute life, and a life without any distinct relations.

But their fame-the light of their glory is something more to such minds than an acknowledgment of their powers. It is something more tender, more endearing. It is felt by them as in part of their sympathy with 4 U

their kind. By this they feel, think, act, not in individual exertion, but as participators in universal existence. I do not now speak of their power to bow down the spirits of others before their own-to make their minds a law to the minds of men to come-but of the feeling they have of a community with all spirits of their consciousness of living with men by one common law. These acts of power by which they manifest the common nature of men, prepare for them a deep-felt consciousness of their own kindred with the race of beings with whom they share this nature. Thus, then, is a deep and mighty sympathy engendered to the poet with his species, by his acts as a poet. And his fame is dear to him, as an acknowledgment on their part, an answer to this sympathy, as ratifying a commutual bond, or covenant of human faith and feeling, between them.

Thus it appears difficult to conceive that a mind of great genius should be indifferent to fame; and that there are powerful and honourable causes for a deep impassioned interest in fame. The love of fame beyond the tomb can seem absurd only to those who know not what constitutes the mystery of life.

It must be apparent, however, that there is great danger of this principle becoming exceedingly injurious in minds which have genius, but have not, altogether, the very highest constitution of passions and powers. Minds of the very first order are calm in their thoughts of glory. They feel a secret possession, enthroned in the hearts of men. But, if the desire be greater than the power,-if distempered sensibilities, or if those more ignoble motives to the desire of fame, which it is needless to speak of, rising into strength, pervert the nature of the passion, then, not only may great misery be cast upon life, instead of a light of happiness, but the faculty of genius itself will be disturbed in its most proper acts. Then will the love of fame, a restless uneasy feeling, intrude upon and profane the holiest acts of its worship. There is, in that case, no spirit rejoicing to ascend into its native empyreal day, but a man of troubled heart, compelling his genius to work for purposes not its own, enslaving his noblest powers to the passions of his lower life-and, like

the master of a spell, tasking good spirits to work his unworthy will, and minister to his debased desires.

If the love of fame be subsequent and subordinate to might, and arise out of it, then will it necessarily be calm; and being of noble origin, it will maintain its nobility. If the love of fame be paramount, it must be restless and distempered. It is a lower principle that has got, by usurpation, the place of the higher. The love of fame as a law of action-is restless, because it is an undetermined, fluctuating, unselfsufficient law. And genius, subjected to it, not only partakes of its painful and troubled unrest, but has also in that subjection the separate and proper pain and self-disturbance of its own dishonour.

The whole argument is this: virtue and genius are each, to our conception, a pure and entire affection of the soul. To do the acts of either for men's praise destroys their essence. I have been led to illustrate this in one kind of virtue-heroic patriotism

by the accidental recollection of a case in which that particular virtue is falsely described as capable of acting for fame. I have allowed, that a patriotism doing acts of splendid power might be blended with the love of glory, and it certainly was so, to a great extent, in the general Roman character. But in their greatest men, those whose patriotism we are required to revere as an awful virtue, the desire of fame, as a part of that patriotism, and a motive of its actions, is not to be conceived of. Each alike is a pure affection of the soul. Patriotism is a love of country deified. Genius, or the essential affection of genius, is a love of beauty and greatness in their perfect idea. But each of them, as being a pure affection or passion, must have within itself its law of action. Hence, to act from the desire of praise is necessarily repugnant to the essence of each, for that is to accept a law of action from the mind of others. In neither, then, can the love of fame be a constituent part of power.

So far genius and virtue are alike. But there is between them an essential difference. Virtue occupies the whole life. The virtuous man can never leave his virtue. All his feelings and passions must conform to its highest law. And, therefore, what is true of him in his highest acts of

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