The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862
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Various >> The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862
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19 THE
CONTINENTAL MONTHLY:
DEVOTED TO
LITERATURE AND NATIONAL POLICY
VOL. II.--SEPTEMBER, 1862.--NO. III.
* * * * *
HENRY THOMAS BUCKLE.
The death of Henry Thomas Buckle, at this period of his career, is no
ordinary calamity to the literary and philosophical world. Others have
been cut short in the midst of a great work, but their books being
narrative merely, may close at almost any period, and be complete; or
others after them may take up the pen and conclude that which was so
abruptly terminated. So it was with Macaulay; he was fascinating, and
his productions were literally devoured by readers of elevated taste,
though they disagreed almost entirely with his conclusions. His volumes
were read--as one reads Dickens, or Holmes, or De Quincey--to amuse in
leisure hours.
But such are not the motives with which we take up the ponderous tomes
of the historian of Civilization in England. He had no heroes to
immortalize by extravagant eulogy, no prejudices seeking vent to cover
the name of any man with infamy. He knew no William to convert into a
demi-god; no Marlborough who was the embodiment of all human vices. His
mind, discarding the ordinary prejudices of the historian, took a wider
range, and his researches were not into the transactions of a particular
monarch or minister, as such, but into the _laws_ of human action, and
their results upon the civilization of the race. Hence, while he wrote
history, he plunged into all the depths of philosophy; and thus it is,
that his work, left unfinished by himself, can never be completed by
another. It is a work which will admit no broken link from its
commencement to its conclusion.
Mr. Buckle was born in London, in the early part of the year 1824, and
was consequently about thirty-eight years of age at the time of his
death. His father was a wealthy gentleman of the metropolis, and
thoroughly educated, and the historian was an only son. Devoted to
literature himself, it is not surprising that the parent spared neither
money nor labor to educate his child. He did not, however, follow the
usual course; did not hamper the youthful mind by the narrow routine of
the English academy, nor did he make him a Master of Arts at Oxford or
Cambridge.
His early education was superintended by his father directly, but
afterward private teachers were employed. But Mr. Buckle was by nature a
close student, and much that he possessed he acquired without a tutor,
as his energetic, self-reliant nature rendered him incapable of ever
seeing insurmountable difficulties before him. By this means he became
what the students of Oxford rarely are, both learned and liberal. As he
mingled freely with the people, during his youth, a democratic sympathy
entwined itself with his education, and is manifested in every page of
his writings.
Mr. Buckle never married. After he had commenced his great work, he
found no time to enjoy society, no hours of leisure and repose. His
whole soul was engaged in the accomplishment of one great purpose, and
nothing which failed to contribute directly to the object nearest his
heart, received a moment's consideration. He collected around him a
library of twenty-two thousand volumes, all choice standard works, in
Greek, Latin, Spanish, French, German, Italian, and English, with all of
which languages he was familiar. It was the best private collection of
books, said some one, in England. It was from this that the historian
drew that inexhaustible array of facts, and procured the countless
illustrations, with which the two volumes of his History of Civilization
abound.
At what age he first conceived the project of writing his history, is
not yet publicly known. He never figured in the literary world previous
to the publication of his first volume. He appears to have early grasped
at more than a mere temporary fame, and determined to stake all upon a
single production. His reading was always systematic, and exceedingly
thorough; and as he early became charmed with the apparent harmony of
all nature, whether in the physical, intellectual, or moral world, he at
once commenced tracing out the laws of the universe, to which, in his
mind, all things were subject, with a view of illustrating that
beautiful harmony, every where prevailing, every where unbroken. All
this influenced every thing, 'and mind and gross matter, each performed
their parts, in relative proportions, and according to the immutable
laws of progress.'
With a view of discussing his subject thoroughly, and establishing his
theory beyond controversy, as he believed, he proposed, before referring
to the _History of Civilization in England_, to discover, so far as
possible, all the laws of political and social economy, and establish
the relative powers and influence of the moral faculties, the intellect,
and external nature, and determine the part each takes in contributing
to the progress of the world. To this, the first volume is exclusively
devoted; and it is truly astonishing to observe the amount of research
displayed. The author is perfectly familiar, not only with a vast array
of facts of history, but with the principal discoveries of every branch
of science; and as he regards all things as a unit, he sets out by
saying that no man is competent to write history who is not familiar
with the physical universe. A fascinating writer, with a fair industry,
can write narrative, but not history.
This is taking in a wide field; and Mr. Buckle may be regarded as
somewhat egotistic and vain; but the fact that he proves himself, in a
great degree, the possessor of the knowledge he conceives requisite,
rather than asserts it, is a sufficient vindication against all
aspersions.
Mr. Buckle regards physical influences as the primary motive power which
produces civilization; but these influences are fixed in their nature,
and are few in number, and always operate with equal power. The capacity
of the intellect is unlimited; it grows and expands, partially impelled
by surrounding physical circumstances, and partially by its own second
suggestions, growing out of those primary impressions received from
nature. The moral influence, the historian asserts, is the weakest of
the three, which control the destiny of man. Not an axiom now current,
but was known and taught in the days of Plato, of Zoroaster, and of
Confucius; yet how wide the gap intervening between the civilization of
the different eras! Moral without intellectual culture, is nothing; but
with the latter, the former comes as a necessary sequence.
All individual examples are rejected. As all things act in harmony, we
can only draw deductions by regarding the race in the aggregate, and
studying its progress through long periods of time. Statistics is the
basis of all generalizations, and it is only from a close comparison of
these, for ages, that the harmonious movement of all things can be
clearly proved.
Mr. Buckle was a fatalist in every sense of the word. Marriages, deaths,
births, crime--all are regulated by Law. The moral status of a community
is illustrated by the number of depredations committed, and their
character. Following the suggestions of M. Quetelot, he brings forward
an array of figures to prove that not only, in a large community, is
there about the same number of crimes committed each year, but their
character is similar, and even the instruments employed in committing
them are nearly the same. Of course, outside circumstances modify this
slightly--such as financial failures, scarcity of bread, etc., but by a
comparison of long periods of time, these influences recur with perfect
regularity.
It is not the individual, in any instance, who is the criminal--but
society. The murderer and the suicide are not responsible, but are
merely public executioners. Through them the depravity of the _public_
finds vent.
Free Will and Predestination--the two dogmas which have, more than any
others, agitated the public mind--are discussed at length. Of course he
accepts the latter theory, but under a different name. Free Will, he
contends, inevitably leads to aristocracy, and Predestination to
democracy; and the British and Scottish churches are cited as examples
of the effect of the two doctrines on ecclesiastical organizations. The
former is an aristocracy, the latter a democracy.
No feature of Mr. Buckle's work is so prominent as its democratic
tendencies. The people, and the means by which they can be elevated,
were uppermost in his mind, and he disposes of established usages, and
aristocratic institutions, in a manner far more American than English.
It is this circumstance which has endeared him to the people of this
country, and to the liberals of Germany--the work having been translated
into German. For the same reason, he was severely criticised in England.
Having devoted the first volume to a discussion of the laws of
civilization, it was his intention to publish two additional volumes,
illustrating them; taking the three countries in which were found
certain prominent characteristics, which he conceived could be fully
accounted for by his theories, but by no other, and above all, by none
founded upon the doctrine of free will and individual responsibility.
These countries were Spain, Scotland, and the United States--nations
which grew up under the most diverse physical influences, and which
present widely different civilizations.
The volume treating upon Spain and Scotland has been published about a
year; and great was the indignation it created in the latter country. In
Spain it is probable that the work is unknown; but it was caught up by
the Scottish reviewers, who are shocked at any thing outside of regular
routine, and whose only employment seems to be to strangle young
authors. _Blackwood_, and the _Edinburgh Review_, contained article
after article against the 'accuser' of Scotland; but the writers,
instead of calmly sifting and disproving Mr. Buckle's untenable
theories, new into a rage, and only established two things, to the
intelligent public--their own malice and ignorance.
Amid all this abuse, our author stood immutable. But once did he ever
condescend to notice his maligners, and then only to expose their
ignorance, at the same time pledging himself never again to refer to
their attacks. A thinking man, he could not but be fully aware that
their style, and self-evident malice, could only add to his reputation.
As already remarked, he did not write to immortalize a hero, but to
establish an idea; did not labor to please the fancy, but to reach the
understanding; hence we read his books, not as we do the brilliant
productions of Macaulay, the smooth narratives of Prescott, or the
dramatic pages of Bancroft; but his thoughts are so well connected, and
so systematically arranged, that to read a single page, is to insure a
close study of the whole volume. We would not study him for his style,
for although fair, it is not pleasing; we can not glide over his pages
in thoughtless ease; but then, at the close of almost every paragraph,
one must pause and _think_.
Being an original writer, Mr. Buckle naturally fell into numerous
errors; but now is not the proper time to refute them. He gives more
than due weight to the powers of nature, in the civilization of man; and
although he probably intimates the fact, yet he does _not_ add that as
the intellect is enlightened, their influences become circumscribed, and
must gradually almost entirely disappear. In the primitive state of the
race, climate, soil, food, and scenery, are all-powerful; but among an
enlightened people, the effects of heat and cold, of barren or
exceedingly productive soils, etc., are entirely modified. This omission
has given his enemies an excellent opportunity for a display of their
refutory powers, of which they have not failed to avail themselves.
The historian is a theorist, yet no controversialist. He states his
facts, and draws his conclusions, as if no ideas different from his own
had ever been promulgated. He never attempts to show the fallacies of
any other author, but readily understands that if he establishes his
system of philosophy, all contrary ones must fall. How fortunate it
would have been for the human race, if all innovators and reformers had
done the same!
That which adds to the regrets occasioned by his loss, which must be
entertained by every American, is the circumstance that his forthcoming
volume was to be devoted to the social and political condition of the
United States, as an example of a country in which existed a general
diffusion of knowledge. Knowing, as all his readers do, that his
sympathies are democratic, and in favor of the elevation of the masses,
we had a right to expect a vindication-the first we ever had--from an
English source. At the time of his death he was traveling through Europe
and Asia for his health, intending to arrive in this country in autumn,
to procure facts as a basis for his third volume, and the last of his
introduction.
Although his work is an unfinished one, it will remain a lasting
monument to the industry of its author. He has done enough to exhibit
the necessity of studying and writing history, henceforth as a
_science_; and of replacing the chaotic fragments of narrative, called
history, with which the world abounds, by a systematic statement of
facts, and philosophical deductions. Some other author, with sufficient
energy and industry, will--not finish the work of Mr. Buckle, but--write
another in which the faults of the original will be corrected, and the
omissions filled; who will go farther in defining the relative
influences of the three powers which control civilization, during the
different stages of human progress.
AN ANGEL ON EARTH.
Die when you may, you will not wear
At heaven's court a form more fair
Than beauty at your birth has given;
Keep but the lips, the eyes we see,
The voice we hear, and you will be
An angel ready-made for heaven.
THE MOLLY O'MOLLY PAPERS.
VIII
Better than wealth, better than hosts of friends, better than genius, is
a mind that finds enjoyment in little things--that sucks honey from the
blossom of the weed as well as from the rose--that is not too dainty to
enjoy coarse, everyday fare. I am thankful that, though not born under a
lucky star, I wasn't born under a melancholy one; that, though there
were at my christening no kind fairies to bestow on me all the blessings
of life--there was no malignant elf to 'mingle a curse with every
blessing.' I'd rather have a few drops of pure sweet than an overflowing
cup tinctured with bitterness.
Not that sorrow has never blown her chill breath on my spirit--yet it
has never been so iced over that it would not here and there bubble
forth with a song of gladness.... There are depths of woe that I have
never fathomed, or rather, to which I have never sunken--for there are
no line and plummet to sound the dreary depths--yet the waves have
overwhelmed me, as every human being, but I soon rose above them.
'One by one thy griefs shall meet thee,
Do not fear an armed band;
One shall fade as others greet thee--
Shadows passing through the land.'
I have found this true--I know there are some to whom it is not
true--that, though sorrows come not to them 'in battalions,' the shadow
of the one huge Grief is ever on their path, or on their heart; that at
their down-sittings and their up-risings it is with them, even darkening
to them the night, and making them almost curse the sunshine; for it is
ever between them and it--not a mere shadow, nor yet a substance, but a
_vacuum of light_, casting also a shadow. Neither substance nor shadow,
it must be a phantom--it may be of a dead sin--and against such,
exorcism avails. I opine this exorcism lies in no cabalistic words, no
crossing of the forehead, no holy name, in nothing that one can do unto
or for himself, but in entire self-forgetfulness--in doing for, in
sympathizing with, others. So shall this Grief step aside from your
path, get away from between you and the sunshine, till finally it shall
have vanished.
I know--not, however, by experience--that a great _sorrow-berg_, with
base planted in the under-current of a man's being, has been borne at a
fearful rate, right up against all his nobly-built hopes and projects,
making a complete wreck of them. May God help him then! But must his
being ever after be like the lonely Polar Sea on which no bark was ever
launched?
But surely we have troubles enough without borrowing from the future or
the past, as we constantly do. It is often said, it is a good thing that
we can't look into the future. One would think that that mysterious
future, on which we are the next moment to enter, in which we are to
live our everyday life--one would think it a store-house of evils. Do
you expect no good--are there for you no treasures there?
How often life has been likened to a journey, a pilgrimage, with its
deserts to cross, its mountains to climb!... The road to---- Lake,
distant from my home some eight or ten miles, partly lies through a
mountain pass. You drive a few miles--and a beautiful drive it is, with
its pines and hemlocks, their dark foliage contrasting with the blue
sky--on either hand high mountains; now at your left, then at your
right, and again at your left runs now swiftly over stones, now
lingering in hollows, making good fishing-places, a creek, that has come
many glad miles on its way to the river. But how are you to get over
that mountain just before you? Your horse can't draw you up its rocky,
perpendicular front! Never mind, drive along--there, the mountain is
behind you--the road has wound around it. Thus it is with many a
mountain difficulty in our way, we never have it to climb. There is now
and then one, though, that we do have to climb, and we can't be drawn or
carried up by a faithful nag, but our weary feet must toil up its steep
and rugged side. But many a pilgrim before us has climbed it, and we
will not faint on the way. 'What man has done, man may do.' ... Yet,
till I have found out to a certainty, I never will be sure that the
mountain that seemingly blocks up my way, _has not a path winding round
it_.
Then the past.... Some one says we are happier our whole life for having
spent one pleasant day. Keats says: 'A thing of beauty is a joy
_forever_.' I believe this: to me the least enjoyment has been like a
grain of musk dropped into my being, sending its odor into all my
after-life--it may be that centuries hence it will not have lost its
fragrance. Who knows?
But sorrows--they should, like bitter medicines, be washed down with
sweet; we should get the taste of them out of our mouth as soon as
possible.
We are as apt to borrow trouble from the might-have-beens of our past
life as from any thing else. We mourn over the chances we've missed--the
happiness that eel-like has slipped through our fingers. This is folly;
for generally there are so many ifs in the way, that nearly all the
might-have-beens turn into couldn't-have-beens. Even if they do not, it
is well for us when we don't know them.... The object of our weary
search glides past us like Gabriel past Evangeline, so near, did we only
know it: happy is it for us if we do not, like her, too late learn it;
for
'Of all sad words of tongue or pen,
The saddest are these--_it might have been!_'
So sad are they, that they would be a suitable refrain to the song of a
lost spirit.
Well, I might have been ----, but am ----
MOLLY O'MOLLY.
IX.
If one wishes to know how barren one's life is of events, the best way
is to try to keep a journal. I tried it in my boarding-school days. With
a few exceptions, the record of one day's outer life was sufficient for
the week; the rest might have been written _ditto, ditto_. Even then,
the events were so trifling that, like entries in a ledger, they might
have been classed as _sundries_. How I tried to get up thoughts and
feelings to make out a decent day's chronicle! How I threw in profound
remarks on what I had read, sketches of character, caricatures of the
teachers, even condescending to give the bill of fare; here, too, there
might have been a great many _dittos_. Had I kept a record of my
dream-life, what a variety there would have been! what extravagances,
exceeded by nothing out of the _Arabian Nights' Entertainments_. Then,
if I could have illuminated each day's page with my own fancy portrait
of myself, the _Book of Beauty_ would not have been a circumstance to my
journal. Certainly, among these portraits would not have been that
plain, snub-nosed daguerreotype, sealed and directed to a dear home
friend; but to the dear home friend no picture in the _Book of Beauty_
or my fancy journal would have had such charms; and if the daguerreotype
would not have illuminated this journal, it was itself illuminated _by
the light of a mother's love_. Alas! this light never more can rest on
and irradiate the plain face of Molly O'Molly.
After all, what a dull, monotonous life ours would be, if within this
outer life there were not the inner life, the 'wheel within the wheel,'
as in Ezekiel's vision. Though this inner wheel is 'lifted up
whithersoever the spirit' wills 'to go,' the outer--unlike that in the
vision--is not also lifted up; perhaps _hereafter_ it will be.
The Mohammedans believe that, although unseen by mortals, 'the decreed
events of every man's life are impressed in divine characters on his
forehead.' If so, I shouldn't wonder if there was generally a large
margin of forehead left, unless there is a great deal of repetition....
The record (not the prophecy) of the inner life, though it is
hieroglyphed on the whole face too, is a scant one; not because there is
but little to record, but because only results are chronicled. Like the
_Veni, vidi, vici_, of Caesar. _Veni_; nothing of the weary march.
_Vidi_; nothing of the doubts, fears, and anxieties. _Vici_; nothing of
the fierce struggle.
One thing is certain; though we can not read the divine imprint on the
forehead, we know that either there or on the face, either as prophecy
or record, is written, _grief_. Grief, the burden of the sadly-beautiful
song of the poet; yet we find, alas! that _grief is grief_. And the
poet's woe is also the woe of common mortals, though his soul is so
strung that every breeze that sweeps over it is changed to melody. The
wind that wails, and howls, and shrieks around the corners of streets,
among the leafless branches of trees, through desolate houses, is the
same wind that sweeps the silken strings of the AEolian harp.
Then there is _care_, most often traced on the face of woman, the care
of responsibility or of work, sometimes of both. A man, however hard he
may labor, if he loses a day, does not always find an accumulation of
work; but with poor, over-worked woman, it is, work or be overwhelmed
with work, as in the punishment of prisoners, it is, pump or drown. I
can not understand how women do get along who, with the family of John
Rogers' wife, assisted only by the eldest daughter, a girl of thirteen,
wash, iron, bake, cook, wash dishes, and sew for the family, coats and
pantaloons included, and that too without the help of a machine. Oh!
that pile of sewing always cut out, to be leveled stitch by stitch; for,
unlike water, it never will find its own level, unless its level be Mont
Blanc, for to such a hight it would reach if left to itself. I could
grow eloquent on the subject, but forbear.
Croakers to the contrary notwithstanding, there is in the record of our
past lives, or in the prophecy of our future, another word than _grief_
or _care_; it is _joy_. My friend, could your history be truthfully
written, and printed in the old style, are there not many passages that
would shine beautifully in golden letters? I say truthfully written; for
we are so apt to forget our joys, while we remember our griefs. Perhaps
this is because joy and its effects are so evanescent. Leland talks
beautifully of 'the perfumed depths of the lotus-word, _joyousness_;'
but in this world we only breathe the perfume. Could we eat the
lotus!... The fabled lotus-eater wished never to leave the isle whence
he had plucked it. Wrapped in dreamy selfishness, unnerved for the toil
of reaching the far-off shore, he grew indifferent to country and
friends.... So earth would be to us an enchanted isle. The stern toil by
which we are to reach that better land, our _home_, would become irksome
to us. It is well for us that we can only breathe the perfume.
Then, too, the deepest woe we may know--not the highest joy--that is
bliss beyond even our capacity of dreaming. Some one, in regard to the
ladder Jacob saw in his dream, says: 'But alas! he slept at the foot.'
That any ladder should be substantial enough for cumbersome mortality to
climb to heaven, was too great an impossibility even for a dream.
But read for yourself the faces that swirl through the streets of a
city. Now and then there is one on which the results of all evil
passions are traced. Were it not for the _brute_ in it, it might be
mistaken for the face of a fiend. Though such are few, too many bear the
impress of at least one evil passion. Every passion, unbitted and
unbridled, hurries the soul bound to it--as Mazeppa was bound to the
wild horse--to certain destruction.... But I--as all things hasten to
the end--will mention one word more--the _finis_ of the prophecy--the
_stamp on the seal_ of the record--_Death_.... We will not dwell on it.
Who more than glances at the _finis_, who studies the plain word stamped
on the seal?
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