and the mountain before our windows reflects the sun's light upon us like a great mirror, we ourselves being in the shade, for the sun soon sets on this side of the valley.

P. S. Have you seen Taylor's book on Early Christianity? With much allowance for an unpleasant manner, and some other faults, yet I think he is right in his main point, that the question at issue is really one of Christianity or of the Church system.

Because

I believe the New Testament to represent Christianity truly, therefore I reject the Church system, and I think that the Church of England does exactly the same thing for the same reason. But that the Church has always faithfully preserved the Christian doctrine in other points, and much of the purity of Christian holiness, I acknowledge thankfully; and therefore, although I think that in one point Antichrist was in the Church from the first century, yet God forbid that I should call the Church Antichrist. It preserved much truth and much holiness, with one fatal error, subversive, indeed, in its consequences, both of truth and goodness, but which has not always developed its full consequences, nor was even distinctly conscious of its own ground. But that the modern Newmanites are far worse than the early Church writers is certain, and many of their doctrines are disclaimed and condemned by those writers; only in their peculiar system, they are the development of that system which, in the early Church, existed in the bud only; and which, as being directly opposed to our Lord's religion, as taught by Him and His Apostles, I call Antichrist.

CCXIX. TO J. C. PLATT, ESQ.

Fox How, January 12, 1840.

It is a very long time since I have written to you; your last letter to me being dated, I am ashamed to say, nearly a year ago. But I intended to write to you from this place in the summer; and then my stay here was so short, that I had no time for any thing, the greater part of my holidays having been passed on the Continent.

I think that I have to thank you for introducing so much of my little Lecture, on the Divisions of Knowledge, into the Penny Magazine. I printed it, thinking that it might be useful to the members of Mechanics' Institutions; but having printed it at Rugby, and no publisher having an interest in it, and it not having been advertised, it has had, I suppose, but a very limited circulation. I was very glad therefore to see such large extracts from it in the Penny Magazine, which must have brought it to the knowledge of many readers, although perhaps not exactly of that class for whom I most designed it.

I shall be very glad if you can give me good accounts of yourself and all your family. Our life goes on with very little variety beyond its own even alternations of vacation and half-year; and I could be too happy if private comfort did not seem almost inconsistent with justice, while the state of public affairs is so troubled. If you see the Herts Reformer, you will have observed that I have still continued from time to time to write on my old subject, and latterly I have been trying to form a Society to collect information, and draw public attention to the question. The difficulties are very great, but I do hope that something will be done, for I see that men are interested in the question who have a personal interest in manufactures, and a practical knowledge of the state of the people. Such men may really do great good, but I can do nothing more than pull the bell, as it were, and try to give the alarm as to the magnitude of the danger. I was very much struck with Mr. Gill's speech the other day in answer to I do not know how you find it, but for myself I cannot go cordially along with the Radical party, philosophical or otherwise, even on points where in the main

agree with them. They all seem to me more or less overrun with two things, Benthamism and Political Economy; and Bentham I have always thought a bad man, and also, as Carlyle called him in a letter to a friend of mine, "a bore of the first magnitude." I believe I agree with the Radicals as to the mischief of the Corn Laws; yet I cannot but think that the Chartists have some reason in their complaint, that the clamour about the Corn Laws is rather leading men off on a false scent, and that the Repeal will not benefit the working man so much as it is expected. You will not, however, suspect me of thinking that the true scent is to be found in following —'s notions of universal suffrage and universal plunder. He and his companions continually reminded me of slaves, of men so brutalized by their seclusion from the pale of society, that they have lost all value for the knowledge and morality of the civilized world, and have really no more ideas of the use to be made of all the manifold inventions and revelations of six thousand years, than Sir Isaac Newton's dog had of the value of his master's problems. The cry against property is just the cry of a slave, who, being incapable of holding any thing himself as his own, has no notion of any harm in stealing, stealing, in fact, is hardly a word in his language. It is certain, I suppose, that a certain moral and social training are necessary in order to enable us to appreciate truths which, to those who have had that training, are the very life of their life. And again, there is a course of training so mischievous, and degradation and distress are such a curse, as absolutely to make men believe a lie, and to take away that common standing ground of a general sense of the principles of right and wrong, on which we meet uncorrupted ignorance, and so are able to lead it on to a sense of the purest truths and the highest. You mentioned Laing's book on Norway to me. I have got it, and like it very much; but it is easier to admire, and almost envy, the example of Norwegian society, than to apply it to our own state here. It would be a great comfort to me if your experience and observation have led you to look on matters more hopefully; and yet no man feels more keenly than I do the vast amount of goodness and energy which we have amongst us. How noble, after all, is the sight of these Trials for high treason. Such deliberation and dignity, and perfect fairness, and even gentleness on the part of the Government and the law, in dealing with guilt so recent, so great, and so palpable. Therefore we cannot be without hope that, with God's blessing, we may get over our evils, although I own with me that fear is stronger than hope.

CCXX. TO THOMAS CARLYLE, ESQ.

Rugby, January, 1840.

A note of yours to our common acquaintance, Mr. James Marshall, furnishes, I believe, the only shadow of a pretence which I could claim for addressing you, according to the ordinary forms of society. But I should be ashamed, to you above all men, to avail myself of a mere pretence; and my true reason for addressing you is because I believe you sympathize with me on that most important subject, the welfare of the poorer classes, and because I know, from your History of the French Revolution, that you understand the real nature and magnitude of the evil, which so many appear to me neither to comprehend nor to feel.

I have been trying, hitherto with no success, to form a Society, the object of which should be to collect information as to every point in the condition of the poor throughout the kingdom, and to call public attention to it by every possible means, whether by the press or by yearly or quarterly meetings. And as I am most anxious to secure the co-operation of good men of all parties, it seems to me a necessary condition that the Society should broach no theories, and propose no remedies; that it should simply

collect information, and rouse the attention of the country to the infinite importance of the subject. You know full well that wisdom in the higher sense and practical knowledge are rarely found in the same man; and, if any theory be started, which contains something not suited to practice, all the so-called practical men cry out against the folly of all theories, and conclude themselves, and lead the vulgar to the conclusion, that, because one particular remedy has been prescribed ignorantly, no remedy is needed, or at least none is practicable.

I see by the newspapers that you are writing on Chartism, and I am heartily glad to hear of it. I shall be curious to know whether you have any definite notions as to the means of relieving the fearful evils of our social condition, or whether you, like myself, are overwhelmed by the magnitude of the mischief, and are inclined to say, like the Persian fatalist in Herodotus, ἐχθιστὴ ὀδυνὴ πολλὰ φρονέοντα μηδένος κρατέειν.

I have no sort of desire to push my proposal about a Society, and would gladly be guided by wiser men as to what is best to be done. But I cannot, I am sure, be mistaken as to this, that the state of society in England at this moment was never yet paralleled in history; and though I have no stake on the country as far as property is concerned, yet I have a wife and a large family of children; and I do not wish to lose, either for them or myself, all those thousand ties, so noble and so sacred and so dear, which bind us to our country, as she was and as she is, with all her imperfections and difficulties. If you think that any thing can be done, which could interest any other persons on the subject, I should be delighted to give aid in any possible manner to the extent of my abilities. I owe you many apologies for writing thus to a perfect stranger, but ever since I read your History of the French Revolution, I have longed to become acquainted with you; because I found in that book an understanding of the true nature of history, such as it delighted my heart to meet with; and, having from a child felt the deepest interest in the story of the French Revolution, and read pretty largely about it, I was somewhat in a condition to appreciate the richness of your knowledge, and the wisdom of your judgments. I do not mean that I agree with you in all these; in some instances I should differ very decidedly; but still the wisdom of the book, as well as its singular eloquence and poetry, was such a treasure to me, as I have rarely met with, and am not at all likely to meet with again.

CCXXI. TO JAMES MARSHALL, ESQ.

Fox How, January 23, 1840.

I thank you much for your last letter, and I assure you that I attach a great value to such communications from you. The scheme of a newspaper actually tried myself nine years ago, and spent above two hundred pounds upon it. I was not so foolish as to think that I could keep up a newspaper; but I was willing to bell the cat, hoping that some who were able might take up what I had begun. But no one did, and the thing died a natural death at the end of two months. I feel, however, so strongly the desirableness of such an attempt, that I am ready again to contribute money or writing, or both, to the same cause; and I should be doubly glad if we could effect both the objects you speak of, a daily paper and a weekly one. It seems to me, however, desirable that at this point I should make somewhat of a confession of my political faith to you, that you may know how far my views would coincide with yours.

My differences with the Liberal Party would turn, I think, chiefly on two points. First, I agree with Carlyle, in thinking that they greatly over-estimate Bentham, and also that they over-rate the Political Economists generally; not that I doubt the ability of those writers, or the truth of their

conclusions, as far as regards their own science,—but I think that the summum bonum of their science, and of human life, are not identical; and therefore, many questions in which free trade is involved, and the advantages of large capital, &c., although perfectly simple in an economical point of view, become, when considered politically, very complex; and the economical good is very often from the neglect of other points made in practice a direct social evil.

But my second difference is greater by much than this; I look to the full development of the Christian Church in its perfect form, as the Kingdom of God, for the most effective removal of all evil, and promotion of all good: and I can understand no perfect Church, or perfect State, without their blending into one in this ultimate form. I believe, farther, that our fathers at the Reformation stumbled accidentally, or rather were unconsciously led by God's Providence, to the declaration of the great principle of this system, the doctrine of the King's Supremacy;—which is, in fact, no other than an assertion of the supremacy of the Church or Christian society over the clergy, and a denial of that which I hold to be one of the most mischievous falsehoods ever broached,-that the government of the Christian Church is vested by divine right in the clergy, and that the close corporation of bishops and presbyters,-whether one or more, it makes no difference,-is and ever ought to be the representative of the Christian Church. Holding this doctrine as the very corner stone of all my political belief, I am equally opposed to Popery, High Churchism, and the claims of the Scotch Presbyteries, on the one hand; and to all the Independents, and advocates of the separation, as they call it, of Church and State, on the other; the first setting up a Priesthood in the place of the Church, and the other lowering necessarily the objects of Law and Government, and reducing them to a mere system of police, while they profess to wish to make the Church purer. And my fondness for Greek and German literature has made me very keenly alive to the mental defects of the Dissenters as a body; the characteristic faults of the English mind,-narrowness of view, and a want of learning and a sound critical spirit,-being exhibited to my mind in the Dissenters almost in caricature. It is nothing but painful to me to feel this; because no man appreciates more than I do the many great services which the Dissenters have rendered, both to the general cause of Christianity, and especially to the cause of justice and good government in our own country; and my sense of the far less excusable errors, and almost uniformly mischievous conduct of the High Church party, is as strong as it can be of any one thing in the world.

Again, the principle of Conservatism has always appeared to me to be not only foolish, but to be actually felo de se: it destroys what it loves, because it will not mend it. But I cordially agree with Niebuhr,—who in all such questions is to me the greatest of all authorities; because, together with an ability equal to the highest, he had an universal knowledge of political history, far more profound than was ever possessed by any other man,-that every new institution should be but a fuller development of, or an addition to, what already exists; and that if things have come to such a pass in a country, that all its past history and associations are cast away as merely bad, Reform in such a country is impossible. I believe it to be necessary, and quite desirable, that the popular power in a state should, in the perfection of things, be paramount to every other; but this supremacy need not, and ought not, I think, to be absolute; and monarchy, and an aristocracy of birth,- -as distinguished from one of wealth or of office,-appear to me to be two precious elements which still exist in most parts of Europe, and to lose which, as has been done unavoidably in America, would be rather our insanity than our misfortune. But the insolencies of our aristocracy no one feels more keenly than I do: the scandalous exemption' of the peers from

This, so far as it is here correctly stated, was abolished by 4 & 5 Vict. cap. 22.

all ignominious punishments short of death.-so that for a most aggravated manslaughter a peer must escape altogether, as the old Lord Byron did, or as the Duchess of Kingston did, for bigamy:-the insolent practice of allowing peers to vote in criminal trials on their honour, while other men vote on their oath; the absurdity of proxy voting, and some other things of the same nature. All theory and all experience show, that if a system goes on long unreformed, it is not then reformed, but destroyed. And so, I believe, it will be with our Aristocracy and our Church; because I fear that neither will be wise in time. But still, looking upon both as positive blessingsand capable--the latter especially-of doing good that can be done by no other means, I love and would maintain both, not as a concession or a compromise, but precisely with the same zeal that I would reform both, and enlarge the privileges and elevate the condition of the mass of the community. As to your difference of opinion with Carlyle about the craving for political rights, I agree with you fully. But I think that, before distress has once got in, a people whose physical wants are well supplied, may be kept for centuries by a government without a desire for political power: but, when the ranks immediately above them have been long contending earnestly for this very power, and physical distress makes them impatient of their actual condition, then men are apt, I think, to attach even an over-value to the political remedy; and it is then quite too late to try to fatten them into obedience: other parts of their nature have learnt to desire, and will have their desire gratified.

CCXXII. TO SIR THOMAS PASLEY, BART.

Fox How, January 25, 1840. On the difficulties of Scripture I met as to the matter of fact, maintaining that the differences of interpretation are few in number; and that many of the greatest points at issue are altogether foreign to the interpretation of Scripture, and are argued upon other grounds; and that where the Scripture is really difficult, there the boasted authority of the Church gives no help,-the early Christian writers having been quite as much puzzled as ourselves, when they did not attempt to clear themselves by mere guesses, and those generally very bad ones. I have been working hard every morning at my History, and have wanted the evenings for my letters; so that we really declined dining out after the first half of our stay. The second volume is now finished, and I have written besides four Sermons, three Letters to the Herts Reformer, and letters of other sorts, of course, without number. I have had a considerable correspondence with Mr. James Marshall, about our plan of a Society for obtaining and disseminating information about the poorer classes: he is deeply interested in the question. Indeed, it is only a wonder to me that every one is not ener-. getic on this matter; but the security of those who were "buying, selling, planting, and building, and knew not till the flood came and swept them all away," is to be repeated, I suppose, or rather will be repeated, before each of our Lord's comings, be they as many as they may. I have often thought of New Zealand, and if they would make you Governor and me Bishop, I would go out, I think, to-morrow,-not to return after so many years, put to live and die there, if there was any prospect of rearing any hopeful form of society. I have actually got 200 acres in New Zealand, and I confess that my thoughts often turn thitherward; but that vile population of runaway convicts and others, who infest the country, deter me more than any thing else, as the days of Roman Proconsuls are over, who knew so well how to clear a country of such nuisances. Now, I suppose they will, as they find it convenient, come in and settle down quietly amongst the colonists, as Morgan did at Kingston; and the ruffian and outlaw of yesterday becomes to-day, according to our Jacobin notions of citizenship, a citizen,