than unjust and prejudiced-who, being incurably ignorant, gross, and callous, are devoid of every ennobling sentiment: who depreciate intellectual philosophy altogether. Let such men endeavor to reflect coolly and rationally; and, even admitting all their ridiculous objections as to the uselessness of intellectual philosophy to be well grounded, let them remember that the evils of a speculative or visionary mind are unfortunately not those which, in the present day, it behoves us to guard against. Are not the calculations of self-interest, and the division of labor, every where chaining down men's minds within miserable limits? Should we not all rejoice that there are spirits of loftier range, whose voices may arouse many to a sense of the grand features and broad principles of humanity, even should their flight be in the clouds?

But philosophy will ever remain one of the loftiest pursuits of the human mind—a noble, a divine science. The anarchy that has signalized its progress during this age, is the necessary consequence of manifold investigations: they will finally terminate in the universal establishment of one sole philosophical doctrine. If historical truth be pursued in so many various ways, if different versions be given to an age, to a fact, and to a science of facts, it cannot be expected that intellectual philosophy should emerge at once formed, perfect, and immutable.

Let us conclude this topic of inquiry with Madame de Staël's definition of philosophy; for it is one succinct and clear, full of beauty and scientific truth :-" Philosophy is the perfection of thought; it attests the dignity of man, who is competent to inquire into the eternal and the invisible, although all that is gross in his nature conspires to unfit him for such contemplations."

CHAPTER THIRD.

POLITICAL TENDENCIES.

Political Spirit of France.-M. de Bonald's Political Works.-Constitutional Tendencies of France.-Manifestations of the Nation.-French Pamphleteers.-M. de Chateaubriand's Pamphlets-bis Political Life and Influence.-M. Guizot's Political Articles-his Political Career during the Restoration-his Political Writings since 1830-his Work on Modern Democracy-his Character.-Political Works of MM. de Carne and Edouard Alletz.-M. Guizot's Article on the Alliance of Catholicism, Protestantism, and Philosophy, in France.-Retrospective Inquiry on the Restoration.-Paul-Louis Courier's Pamphlets-their Character and Merits-Compared to Junius and Swift-Murder of Paul-Louis Courier. Beranger's Political Songs.-Political Pamphlets of M. de Cormenin.-M. de Lamennais-his Paroles d'un Croyant-Character of M. de Lamennais's last Pamphlet.-Political and Religious Works of L'Abbe Gerbet and M. de Genoude.-Socialism in France-Saint-Simon-Sketch of his Life and Adventures -his Death-his Doctrine.-Momentary Prosperity of Saint-Simonisin-its Propagation in France-Extravagances of the Sectaries of Saint-Simon-Decline and Fall of Saint-Simonism.-Charles Fourier-his Works-his Life-his Theories-Propagation of Fourierism-General View of Socialist Utopias.

THE French nation has reached a great phasis of its history: after so many perilous commotions, it aims, in all directions, at a perfect organization. Warfare has disappeared from Europe, and nations, it is to be hoped, will no longer slaughter each other to gratify the caprice and ambition of individuals; if another great and sanguinary struggle occur, it will be a struggle between principles. The deplorable excesses of popular sovereignty at the end of the eighteenth century were, by the terror they inspired, naturally provocative, among enlightened men, of researches into the science of politics. The revolutionary legislation, from which all idea of the Deity was banished, and every page of which was stained with blood, underwent the ordeal of philosophical scrutiny, and, as is usually the case, theorists fell into the opposite extremes. In the very beginning of the nineteenth century, M. de Bonald presented France with a theory of despotism, in his work entitled Legislation Primitive, reproducing the old dogma, that the king is to his kingdom as the father to his family, holding the same sacred, indisputable prerogatives—a doctrine too full of fallacy and paradox, too palpably absurd and untenable in the eyes of all rational lovers of

constitutional sovereignty, to need commentary or refutation: it was the corollary of the catholic school of philosophy. Napoleon appropriated to himself that absolute dominion; his victories gave him for a time in France that hallowed sway which M. de Bonald and his school attribute only to hereditary right; the country was dazzled by the achievements of his armies, and military glory made her forget her rights and dignity.

The constitutional tendencies of France can be traced in her annals for several centuries, and all the eloquent and enlightened men of our time foretell the progressive and final perfection of political liberty. The restoration of the Bourbons, from 1815 to 1830, was the last effort, the convulsive throe, of the old system and society. During the first year or two succeeding the revolution of 1830, the whole country was paralyzed by the terror which the effervescence of the victorious masses had inspired; every one felt that a populace howling in the streets would form a very unsatisfactory legislature; a return of former horrors was dreaded: but the nation had acquired an experience of forty years; no fatal consequences ensued; and the following years were employed in reducing the torrent to its own channel, giving it at the same time more ample space and freedom in its course, so as to render secure and placid its future progress.

The French people do not now, so much as in times past, give vent to impatient discontent by tumultuous assemblages; but we are not thence to infer that they are less alive to their interests and rights. We find a convincing proof of the keen interest taken in political transactions, in the unexampled eagerness with which all political, especially democratical, books are received. Works of this class have never at any time created so great and general a sensation-an impression invested with a character of gravity hitherto unknown; no publications under the restoration seized so effectually on the public mind, or were hailed with such an universal burst of sympathy, as have been the pamphlets of M. de Cormenin and the celebrated work of M. de Tocqueville. It is to be hoped that the strong desire of the French nation for legislative alterations will soon find some of those leaders who modify and moderate cravings after innovation, and who become the links and conciliators between the state and the people. "There is no nation in Europe," says M. de Tocqueville in his Democracy in America, "among whom the great social revolution I have described has made more progress than among ourselves; but it has always advanced at random. The heads of government have never thought of prepar

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ing anything beforehand for its advantage; it has always taken place in spite of them, or without their knowledge. The most powerful, the most intelligent and moral classes of the nation, have never tried to superintend its march and regulate it.”

We trust that these words, so replete with truth and wisdom, will not be applicable to the future political movements of France, and that they will command, as they so fully deserve, the earnest attention of all statesmen. What evidence can be more striking and irrefragable of a spirit of instability and dissatisfaction prevailing in France, of aspirations for political reform being deep and universal, than the extraordinary excitement occasioned under the restoration by the pamphlets of Paul-Louis Courier, and the songs of Béranger ?—and in our own time by the political publications of M. de Cormenin and M. de Lamennais ?

The pamphleteers compose a very influential class of men, and have produced some of the most remarkable works in the history of French literature. M. de Chateaubriand's political pamphlets form, we hold, his chief title to literary eminence, although expressing at different times opinions strangely diverse and anomalous, but each in its turn, as he maintained it, exercising a potential sway over the public mind. The fall of Napoleon was viewed by numbers in France with great satisfaction; the country was in a deplorable state of exhaustion; French blood had flowed for years in every part of Europe; the miseries and terrors of war, in short, had weighed so oppressively on all hearts, that the word "peace" was hailed with boundless enthusiasm. Nevertheless, the partisans of the dethroned emperor were still numerous, lion-hearted, and ready to rush to the field at the first signal. It was with the view of opposing this yet powerful and formidable body of Bonapartists that M. de Chateaubriand-carried away by that passionate excitement so rife in France at the eventful moment-published his celebrated pamphlet on Bonaparte et les Bourbons. It was an unmanly attack on the fallen giant, and naturally provoked in the imperial party a feeling of resentment and hatred that has not yet subsided, though so many years have elapsed since the offence was given-though so many elaborated eulogiums on the emperor have since issued from the author's pen.

This pamphlet of M. de Chateaubriand may be considered as the genuine, ardent, and unreserved expression of the passions that were then misleading the royalist party, and filling it with delirious exultation and dastardly feelings of revenge. It strik

ingly portrays the agitation produced by the terror still felt for the smitten Colossus, and the feverish dread entertained of his rising again, notwithstanding the overpowering blow he had received. There is a torrent of invective in its overwrought passages, stunning the ear like the shock of mail-clad warriors on a field of battle, and giving fearful proof of the deadly rage of parties, of the inveterate animosity that leads to acts of vindictive retaliation, and to ebullitions of wrathful calumny. In it we behold a lamentable instance of how passion may sully the noblest intellects. We are bound, however, in vindication of the illustrious author, to state that, when he wrote this pamphlet, he keenly felt the manifold evils which had resulted from Napoleon's ambition; and at a later period he acknowledged all that was due to the genius of the emperor. M. de Chateaubriand has suffered much from the instability of his political principles; he has been alternately idolized and spurned by the royalists. Among the legitimists of the present day he is looked upon almost as a revolutionist, whilst the friends of the present government consider him, together with the great orator Berryer, as one of the most formidable champions of legitimacy.

However various may have been M. de Chateaubriand's impulses during his political career, however great the versatility of his ideas, it must be allowed that he has always sacrificed his personal interest to what he considered his duty; he has never hesitated to sacrifice his ambition to his conscience. It would be unjust also to forget that, from 1815 to 1830, he always maintained that the best means of governing France were to be found in an unalterable fidelity to the charter of Louis XVIII. He saw in it the anchor of safety for his country, which he had beheld tossed by so many violent gales; and he became, therefore, one of its firmest and most faithful supporters. The consistency of his political life during these fifteen years is, we believe, undeniable, although it may be objected that he sent the French army to crush liberty in Spain; but in his last work, the Congrès de Vérone, published about two years ago, he vindicates his conduct as a statesman during that period, when the French went to Spain in 1823 to relieve Ferdinand from the constitutional demands of a part of his subjects; and he has, we think, succeeded in washing away that blemish on his character according to the ideas of modern France. It may also be added, that M. de Chateaubriand's apparent inconsistency in his political career has often resulted from his being in advance of the parties he joined at different periods; from his bold independence in withstanding