bach, but only to go down before a less refined materialism. On the other, neo-Lutheranism, guided by Stahl and Hengstenberg, and carrying with it Friedrich Wilhelm IV., became more and more intolerant, averse to the mildest conciliation, hating alike the theology and polity of the moderate and mediating union party. Hence came one of Strauss' happiest literary efforts. He paralleled Julian the Apostate and Friedrich Wilhelm.* The Apostate Emperor was made the mirror of the Evangelical King. His aims, acts, qualities, counsellors, were reflected in those of Julian, and hit off with subtle irony and genial satire. He thus seemed in polity, as in theology, a typical radical, and so was invited by certain electors of Ludwigsburg to stand as a candidate for a seat in the Parliament, which was to meet at Frankfurt.t He failed; the clerical influence, not in the town, but in the rural districts, being too strong for him. Soon after, when the election was urban, he was returned to the Parliament of Würtemberg, but did not long retain his seat. If the clergy opposed his election, the radicals compelled his resignation. While too radical in theology for the former, he was too conservative in politics for the latter. He thought the Government too orthodox to be left unreformed, but did not think the masses ripe for a republic.‡ He proudly laid down the honour the popular vote had given, possibly with the odi profanum vulgus intensified. On his withdrawal from politics the period of his purer literary activity began (1848-60). Its fruits were a series of classical biographies, each more or less representative of the struggle between Religion and Culture, or rather Ecclesiasticism and Humanism. The leader of the series was a Life of the brilliant but unfortunate poet Schubart,§ whose blunt, brave spirit, mirrored in his letters, was shown doing battle against untoward circumstances, professional, domestic, political, and disciplined by a weary imprisonment into patient magnanimity. Then came Christian Märklin, a contemporary portrait, with many miniatures and autobiographic details filled in, a picture of the tendencies that had created Strauss, painted from the standpoint of the creature. He next recalled from neglect into notice Nicodemus Frischlin, critic, scholar, poet, patriot, who had taught the past to instruct the present; had offended old by introducing new modes of classical inquiry; had made Paganism revive to rebuke Lutheranism; and had perished while attempting to escape from the prison into which jealousy Der Romantiker auf der Throne der Cäsaren, oder Julian der Abtrünnige, 1847. The speeches, which are not without autobiographical interest, delivered while on his electioneering tour were afterwards published:-Sechs theologisch-politische Volksreden. 1848. For his political position see Christian Märklin, Zehntes Kap. § Schubart's Leben in seinen Briefen. 1849. 2 vols. Christian Märklin, Ein Lebens- und Charakterbild aus der Gegenwart, 1851. 1 vol. Leben und Schriften des Dichters und Philologen N. Frischlins, 1855. had thrown him. The work that followed was the beautiful monograph on Ulrich von Hutten,* knight, scholar, poet, satirist, whose satire consumed rather than scorched what it touched. It was certainly a Tendenzschrift, meant to show that, while the Humanists alone could not have accomplished the Reformation, Luther's reign was now ended and Hutten's ought to begin. Humanism was the broad and glittering Rhine at Bingen, needing to be narrowed and chafed by religious enthusiasm into wild strength before it could force its way through the mountains to the sea.† Hutten had united in him the culture of the humanist and the energy of the enthusiast, but it was enthusiasm for freedom, fatherland, and humanity. So his spirit still lives and storms against those "who would plant a new Papacy in the very bosom of Protestantism, the princes who exalt their will into law, the scholars who place circumstances and expediencies above truth. It burns in us as hate for everything ungenerous, unfree, and untrue, but glows in us as enthusiasm for the honour and greatness of the fatherland." This aim became more manifest in his next work, an edition of Hutten's Dialogues, § which, like ancient warriors stripped of their rusty mail, and clothed in the modern regimentals of supple and trenchant German, were sent forth to do battle against the Protestantism that had become a Papacy. The preface that introduced the translations pointed their moral. It celebrated with grim humour the semi-jubilee of the Leben Jesu,|| and signalized its author's return to his ancient battle-field. The harmonists of science and religion he rated as little better than knaves. Ewald was abused in terms he himself could hardly have surpassed. The old story of the modern classics being non-Christian was re-told. The positions of "The Old Faith and the New" were in part anticipated. It had long been an open secret that men of culture and thought had ceased to believe the Church dogmas. The Apostles' Creed, or the Augsburg Confession, no one acknowledged as an adequate expression of his faith. And as with the laity, so with the clergy, evasions, hypocrisies before others and one's own conscience, were the order of the day. Why not out with the truth? The moral contents of Christianity and the character of its Founder can be held fast, but let all else go. Whether when it is gone we may still be called Christians is a small matter. What's in a name? "This I know, we shall then, and only then, be once more true and honest men, bound to nothing false, and therefore better than hitherto."** A. M. FAIRBAIRN. (To be continued.) * Ulrich von Hutten. 1858. 2 vols. + Vol. ii. 300. § Gespräche von Ulrich von Hutton, übersetzt und erläutert von D. F. Strauss, Leipzig. 1860. || P. liv. P. 1. Vol. ii. p. 367. THE LATEST THEORY ABOUT BACON. MR. R. SPEDDING, a professional in things Baconian, having caught me trespassing on his preserves, and finding me resolute not to serve him as under-gamekeeper, wishes to trample upon me as a meddling amateur. I hope to show, however, that even an amateur coming to a subject fresh, may have advantages over a professional who has devoted five-and-twenty years to over-training. Mr. Spedding complains that in the introduction to my edition of Bacon's Essays I have "either overlooked things that appear to him important, or have silently set them aside as irrelevant." The latter is the truer statement. I have not overlooked any of his facts, but I have been forced to set aside as irrelevant a good many facts that were not really facts, but only Mr. Spedding's surmises. Considerations of space-and, as I then thought, of good taste, having regard to my obligations to Mr. Spedding-obliged me then to set them aside "silently." In an introduction dealing with Bacon as a philosopher, a theologian, a politician, and a moralist, it was obviously impossible to say-as I might have said six or seven times in a pagethat I did not think Mr. Spedding's facts warranted Mr. Sped ding's conclusions, and to give my reasons for so thinking in each case. But instead of being grateful to me for not exposing his errors, Mr. Spedding is ungrateful, and complains of my "silence." In a forthcoming work I trust to make up for past deficiencies and silences, in such a manner as to leave Mr. Spedding no room for a repetition of his complaints; but meantime, though I am painfully aware that within the limits of this article I cannot do him justice, yet I will ask him to accept these pages as a first instalment of what he wants. Even in these, I hope to convince Mr. Spedding that I have not "overlooked" his facts, and to convince every one except Mr. Spedding that I was justified in "setting them aside as irrelevant." But before proceeding to Mr. Spedding's facts, one word about my much misrepresented "theory." What Mr. Spedding dignifies with the name of “the latest theory about Bacon" consists simply in calling attention to three points: (1). That preoccupation with vast and beneficent schemes may produce an inattention to the rules of morality which, though culpable enough, is somewhat less culpable than simple disregard of them in comparison with one's own interests. (2). That a man may come to persuade himself that to pursue the good of mankind through science is the substance of virtue, and therefore that anything that advances science is lawful. Substitute for "the good of mankind” the "good of the State," and for "science" "politics," and we have here the exact theory of Machiavelli; and I have shown that in morals Bacon was greatly influenced by Machiavelli. It is in this spirit that a recent impassioned advocate of vivisection declared that "the pursuit of scientific truth is the highest, and most civilizing, and most compassionate work in which a man can engage." (3). That intellectual faults may lead to immoral actions, particularly where the moral instincts are feeble, and that Bacon's intellectual faults, as seen in his philosophy, are just of the kind that would lead to moral faults. In estimating Bacon's character, his philosophy is not altogether to be left out of account; and so far from there being a great gulf between Bacon in action and Bacon in speculation, they appear to me, on the contrary, closely connected. Bacon's philosophy professes to command nature by obeying her; Bacon as a moralist and a politician appears to me to have attempted to command the world by obeying the world. In philosophy Dr. Fischer lays stress on Bacon's "suppleness” and compliance with nature, never prescribing to her, but following her through all her windings with obsequious observation; in politics and action Hallam lays no less stress on Bacon's "incomparable ductility:" "ductility" in politics and in morals seems to me to correspond naturally with "suppleness" in philosophic speculation. As a philosopher, Bacon's lofty and discursive mind framed vast visions of world-wide discoveries, but in his practical investigations neglected little details, the neglect of which rendered failure inevitable; Bacon as a statesman and moralist seems to me to have erred in the same way by fixing his mind on colossal plans for benefiting his country and mankind, while neglecting the plain duties that lay before him. The sanguine spirit in philosophy that sustained him through years of expectation-still cheerful, hopeful, confident of ultimate success-appears to me to go hand in hand with that same sanguine spirit which in politics led him to look on James as a Solomon, on himself as Solomon's counsellor and inspirer, and on Villiers as the young and rising spirit who would look up to Bacon as a father, and give the shape of action to the theories of his philosophic statesmanship. Lord Macaulay's theory opposes Bacon the politician to Bacon the philosopher; my modification of his theory attempts to reconcile the two. Lord Macaulay exhibits Bacon as two halves. I have attempted to exhibit him as a whole. All this, of course, does not excuse Bacon, or assert that he is morally pardonable because he is intellectually admirable. On the contrary, it presupposes a certain initial deadness of moral feeling, an absence of response to the appeals that in ordinary minds stir some chords of unselfish pity, or self-risking gratitude, or sympathetic indignation against wrong, or at least some deterring dread of the Nemesis attending offences against the most ordinary social feeling. Such a character is not to be admired, nor to be excused; it is to be condemned. But before condemning, the judge should have all the facts before him. Now, Mr. Spedding inge niously tries to make me out guilty at the same time of excessive moral laxity and of excessive severity. I convict Bacon, he says, of all sorts of faults of which he is not guilty, and then let him off on the score of the grandeur of his intellect. I accuse Mr. Spedding of exactly the opposite error. He affects to be very rigid in his moral principles, but in his estimate of actions he is utterly lax. Both faults are, no doubt, serious. If I could be proved to have let off Bacon, as a great genius, for faults for which an ordinary man would be condemned, I should be ready to admit my error." But of the two, the error attributed to me seems the less dangerous. If I give a paradoxical explanation of the facts, I fail to persuade; but at all events I honestly admit the facts. But Mr. Spedding, with his affected impartial rigour, is likely to do much harm. He does not tamper with principles, but he tampers with facts, so smothering some of them with surmises, commentaries, and * I must take this opportunity to confess that one sentence (the last) in my Introduction to the Essays is fairly open to the charge of being inconsistent with the tenor of the rest of the Introduction and with the view advocated here. That sentence was not in the original text as seen in proof by Mr. Spedding, but was too hastily inserted under a kind of pressure or gentle coercion exercised by him through the medium of the criticism with which he very kindly favoured me at my request while my work was passing through the press. In a future Edition I hope to have an opportunity of cancelling it. I shall have so much occasion to complain of misrepresentation that I gladly admit here, that Mr. Spedding was perfectly justified in taking advantage of my weak concession to him, to make a most effective peroration to his second Article. |