a

of these contradictions themselves; he the region of these verbal matters, which treats them as if they were supremely to the Bishop of Natal are a sort of ininteresting in themselves, as if we had tellectual land of Beulah, into a higher never heard of them before, and could region ; he apologises for lingering over never hear enough of them now. Spi- them so long : non est cur circa hæc noza touches these verbal matters with diu detinear : nolo tædiosâ lectione all possible brevity, and presses on to lectorem detinere. For him the inthe more important. It is enough for teresting question is, not whether the him to give us what is indispensably fanatical devotee of the letter is to connecessary of them. He points out that tinue, for a longer or for a shorter time, Moses could never have written, “And to believe that Moses sate in the land of the Canaanite was then in the land,” Moab writing the description of his because the Canaanite was in the land own death, but what he is to believe still at the death of Moses. He points when he does not believe this. Is he to ont that Moses could never have written, take for the guidance of his life a great “There arose not à prophet since gloss put upon the Bible by theologians, in Israel like unto Moses." He points who “not content with going mad out how such a passage as “These are “ themselves with Plato and Aristotle, " the kings that reigned in Edom before “ want to make Christ and the Prophets " there reigned any king over the children go mad with them too,”—or the Bible " of Israel," clearly indicates an author itself ? Is he to be presented by his writing not before the times of the National Church with metaphysical forKings. He points out how the account mularies for his creed, or with the real of Og's iron bedstead—“Only Og the fundamentals of Christianity ? If with “ king of Bashan remained of the rem- the former, religion will never produce “nant of giants ; behold, his bedstead its due fruits. A few elect will still be

was a bedstead of iron ; is it not in saved; but the vast majority of man“ Rabbath of the children of Ammon?” kind will remain without grace and -probably indicates an author writing without good works, hateful and hating after David had taken Rabbath, and one another. Therefore he calls urgently found there “ abundance of spoil,” upon Governments to make the National amongst it this iron bedstead, the gi- Church what it should be. This is the gantic relic of another age. He points conclusion of the whole matter for him; out how the language of this passage, a fervent appeal to the State, to save us and of such a passage as that in the from the untoward generation of metaBook of Samuel —“ Beforetime in Israel, physical Article-makers. And therefore, “ when a man went to inquire of God, anticipating Mr. Gladstone, he called his “ thus he spake : Come and let us go book “The Church in its Relations with « “ to the seer; for he that is now called the State.” "Prophet was aforetime called seer”— Thus Spinoza attempts to answer the is certainly the language of a writer de- crucial question, “ What then ?” and by scribing the events of a long-past age, the attempt, successful or unsuccessful, and not the language of a contemporary. he interests the higher culture of Europe. But he devotes to all this no more space The Bishop of Natal does not interest than is absolutely necessary. He, too, this, neither yet does he edify the unlike the Bishop of Natal, touches on the learned. His book, therefore, satisfies fainily of Judah ; but he devotes one neither of the two conditions, one of page to this topic, and the Bishop of which literary criticism has a right to Natal devotes thirteen. To the sums in impose on all religious books : Edify Ezra—with which the Bishop of Natal, the uninstructed, it las a right to say to "should God, in His providence, call them, or inform the instructed. Fulfilling him to continue the work,” will assur- neither of these conditions, the Bishop edly fill folios—Spinoza devotes barely of Natal's book cannot justify itself for a page. He is anxious to escape from existing. When, in 1861, he heard for

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the first time that the old theory of the than by seeing them hesitatingly exhiverbal inspiration of Scripture was un- bited as novelties. In spite of this, tenable, he should, instead of proclaim- however, Mr. Jowett's Essay has one ing this news (if this was all he could quality which, at the tribunal of literary proclaim) in an octavo volume, have criticism, is sufficient to justify it—a remembered that excellent saying of the quality which communicates to all works Wise Man : “If thou hast heard a where it is present an indefinable charm,

word, let it die with thee; and behold, and which is always, for the higher sort " it will not burst thee."

of minds, edifying ;—it has unction. These two conditions, which the Bishop From a clergyman's essay on a religious of Natal's book entirely fails to fulfil, subject theological criticism may have a another well-known religious book also- right to demand more than this; literary that book which made so much noise criticism has not. For a court of literatwo years ago, the volume of Essays and ture it is enough that the somewhat pale Reviews—fails, it seems to me, to fulfil stream of Mr. Jowett's speculation is satisfactorily. Treating religious sub- gilded by the heavenly alchemy of this jects and written by clergymen, the com- glow. positions in that volume have in general, Unction Spinoza's work has not ; to the eye of literary criticism, this great that name does not precisely fit any fault--that they tend neither to edify quality which it exhibits. But he is the many, nor to inform the few. There instructive and suggestive even to the is but one of them—that by Mr. Pattison most instructed thinker; and to give on the Tendencies of Religious Thought him full right of citizenship in the Rein England—which offers to the higher public of Letters this is enough. And culture of Europe matter new and in- yet, so all-important in the sphere of structive. There are

some of them religious thought is the power of edifiwhich make one, as one reads, instinc- cation, that in this sphere a great fame tively recur to a saying which was a like Spinoza's can never be founded great favourite—so that Hebrew mora- without it. A court of literature can list whom I have already quoted tells us never be very severe to Voltaire : with -with Judah Ben-Tamar: “The impu- that inimitable wit and clear sense of dent are for Gehinnan, and the modest his, he can never write a page in which for Paradise.” But even Dr. Temple's the fullest head may not find something Essay on the Education of the World, suggestive : still because, with all his perfectly free from all faults of tone or wit and clear sense, he handles religious taste, has this fault—that while it offers ideas wholly without the power of edifinothing edifying to the uninstructed, cation, his fame as a great man is it offers to the instructed nothing equivocal. Strauss treated the question which they could not have found in of Scripture Miracles with an acuteness a far more perfect shape in the works and fulness which even to the most inof Lessing. Mr. Jowett's Essay, again, formed minds is instructive ; but because contains nothing which is not given, with he treated it wholly without the power greater convincingness of statement and of edification, his fame as a serious far greater fulness of consequence in thinker is equivocal

. But in Spinoza Spinoza's seventh chapter, which treats there is not a trace either of Voltaire's of the Interpretation of Scripture. The passion for mere mockery or of Strauss's doctrines of his Essay, as mere doctrine, passion for mere demolition. His whole are neither milk for babes nor strong soul was filled with desire of the love meat for men ; the weak among his and knowledge of God, and of that only. readers will be troubled by them; the Philosophy always proclaims herself on strong would be more informed by see- the way to the summum bonum ; but too ing them handled as acquired elements often on the road she seems to forget for further speculation by freer exponents her destination, and suffers her hearers of the speculative thought of Europe, to forget it also. Spinoza never forgets

his destination : “The love of God is name to a school. Truth, he thought, “ man's highest happiness and blessed- should bear no man's name. And, s« ness, and the final end and aim of all finally,—“Unless," he said, “I had “human actions ;—The supreme reward “known that my writings would in the " for keeping God's Word is that Word “ end advance the cause of true religion, " itself-namely, to know Him and with “I would have suppressed them-ta“ free will and pure and con ant heart “ cuissem.” It was in this spirit that “ love Him :" these sentences are the he lived ; and this spirit gives to all keynote to all he produced, and were he writes not exactly unction-I have the inspiration of all his labours. This already said so,—but a kind of sacred is why he turns so sternly upon the solemnity. Not of the same order as worshippers of the letter,--the editors the Saints, he yet follows the same serof the Masora, the editor of the Record- vice : Doubtless Thou art our Father, because their doctrine imperils our love though Abraham be ignorant of us, and and knowledge of God. “What !” he Israel acknowledge us not. cries, "our knowledge of God to depend Therefore he has been, in a certain “ upon these perishable things, which sphere, edifying, and has inspired in “ Moses can dash to the ground and many powerful minds an interest and “break to pieces like the first tables of an admiration such as no other philo* stone, or of which the originals can sopher has inspired since Plato. The “ be lost like the original book of the lonely precursor of German philosophy, " Covenant, like the original book of the he still shines when the light of his “ Law of God, like the book of the successors is fading away : they had

Wars of God!...which can come to us celebrity, Spinoza has fame. Not be" confused, imperfect, miswritten by cause his peculiar system of philosophy “copyists, tampered with by doctors! has had more adherents than theirs; on " And you accuse others of impiety! It the contrary, it has had fewer. But

is you who are impious, to believe that schools of philosophy arise and fall; “God would commit the treasure of the their bands of adherents inevitably “ true record of Himself to

any

substance dwindle ; no master can long persuade “ less enduring than the heart!” And his a large body of disciples that they give life was not unworthy of this elevated to themselves just the same account of strain. A philosopher who professed the world as he does ; it is only the that knowledge was its own reward- very young and the very enthusiastic a devotee who professed that the love who can think themselves sure that of God was its own reward, this philo- they possess the whole mind of Plato, or sopher and this devotee believed in what Spinoza, or Hegel at all. The very mahe said ! Spinoza led a life the most ture and the very sober can even hardly spotless, perhaps, to be found among

believe that these philosophers possessed the lives of philosophers; he lived it themselves enough to put it all into simple, studious, even-tempered, kind; their works, and to let us know entirely declining honours, declining riches, de- how the world seemed to them. What clining notoriety. He was poor, and a remarkable philosopher really does for his admirer, Simon de Vries, sent him human thought, is to throw into circulatwo thousand floring—he refused them : tion a certain number of new and strikthe same friend left him his fortune ing ideas and expressions, and to stimu- he returned it to the heir. He was late with them the thought and imagiasked to dedicate one of his works nation of his century or of after-times. to the magnificent patron of letters So Spinoza has made his distinction in his century, Louis the Fourteenth ; between adequate and inadequate ideas he declined.

His great work, his a current notion for educated Europe. Ethics, published after his death, he So Hegel seized a single pregnant sengave injunctions to his friends to publish tence of Heracleitus, and cast it, with a anonymously, for fear he should give his thousand striking applications, into the

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world of modern thought. But to do Times are changed since Spinoza wrote; this is only enough to make a philosopher the reserve which he recommended and noteworthy; it is not enough to make practised is being repudiated by all the him great. To be great, he must have world. Speculation is to be made popusomething in him which can influence lar, all reticence is to be abandoned, character, which is edifying; he must, every difficulty is to be canvassed pub in short, have a noble and lofty charac- licly, every doubt is to be proclaimed ; ter himself, a character—to recur to that information which, to have any value at much-criticised expression of mine-in all, must have it as part of a series not yet the grand style. This is what Spinoza complete, is to be flung broadcast, in the had; and because he had it, he stands crudest shape, amidst the undisciplined, out from the multitude of philosophers, ignorant, passionate, captious multitude. and has been able to inspire in powerful

“ Audax omnia perpeti minds a feeling which the most remark

Gens humana ruit per vetitum nefas :" able philosophers, without this grandiose character, could not inspire. "There is and in that adventurous march the no possible view of life but Spinoza's," English branch of the race of Japhet said Lessing. Goethe has told us how is, it seems, to be headed by its clergy he was calmed and edified by him in in full canonicals. If so it is to be, so his youth, and how he again went to be it. But, if this is to be so, the him for support in his maturity. Heine, Editor of the Record himself, instead of the man (in spite of his faults) of truest deprecating the diffusion of Spinoza's genius that Germany has produced since writings, ought rather to welcome it. Goethe-a man with faults, as I have He would prefer, of course, that we said, immense faults, the greatest of should all be even as he himself is; them being that he could reverence so that we should all think the same thing little-reverenced Spinoza. Hegel's in- as that which he himself thinks. This fluence ran off him like water : “I have desire, although all might not consent

seen Hegel," he cries, “ seated with to join in it, is legitimate and natural. “ his doleful air of a hatching hen upon But its realisation is impossible ; heresy “his unhappy eggs, and I have heard is here, it is pouring in on all sides of “his dismal clucking.–How easily one him. If we must have heresy, he himcan cheat oneself into thinking that self will admit that we may as well

one understands everything, when one have the informing along with the “has learnt only how to construct dia- barren. The author of the Tractatus " lectical formulas !” But of Spinoza, Theologico-Politicus is not r ,re unortholleine said: “His life was a copy of dox than the author of the Pentateuch

the life of his Divine kinsman, Jesus Critically Examined, and he is far more “ Christ.”

edifying. If the English clergy must Still, the Tractatus Theologico-Politicus err, let them learn from this outcast of was deemed by Spinoza himself a work not Israel to err nobly! Along with the suitable to the general public, and here weak trifling of the Bishop of Natal, let is Mr. Trübner offering it to the general it be lawful to cast into the huge calpublic in a translation ! But a little dron, out of which the new world is to reflection will show that Mr. Trübner is be born, the strong thought of Spinoza! not therefore to be too hastily blamed.

MATTHEW ARNOLD.

MACMILLAN'S MAGAZINE.

FEBRUARY, 1863.

A VISIT TO LÜTZEN IN OCTOBER, 1862.

BY HERMAN MERIVALE.

THE BATTLE TO THE DEATH OF

GUSTAVUS.

in the heart of much-enduring and PART I.

much-writing Germany, the home of “la nation écrivassière." But the result is nevertheless somewhat perplexing.

The literature of Lützen would alone The Battle of Lützen, 1632, still consti- furnish out a small catalogue. The tutes one of the most interesting chapters presses throughout Germany, France, in military history, notwithstanding all and Italy, seem to have gone to work the gigantic additions which the annals simultaneously and immediately on the of the last and present century have receipt of the news. “ Flying sheets," made to it. Though not precisely one containing professed descriptions of it, of the “decisive battles of history, swarm in every library. Preachers, for it occurred just half-way in the Protestant and Catholic, improved the period of the Thirty Years' War, yet occasion from a thousand pulpits, and it was, in truth, the turning-point of that every one of them, that could afford it, contest : up to that day, the event in resolved that the world should not lose debate was the annihilation of one the benefit of his pious eloquence. Then party by the other; after it, the terms the caricaturist and the ballad-monger of separation only. To the soldier it is got hold of it, whose fugitive but somememorable as the last field in which times authentic hints must be studied the old system of tactics—that inherited in the bulky republications of modern from the ancients by the men of the antiquaries. Nor did the interest cease “Renaissance"-was fairly pitted against

-was fairly pitted against when the graver class of authors came the modern ; for the modern military on the stage. Political historians, reliart may be truly described as a develop- gious historians, dynastic historians and ment only of that introduced by Gus- genealogists, topographers, biographers, tavus Adolphus. But it is more famous all had something to say on as the occasion of victory and death to nowned a catastrophe, and everyone was one of the few leading spirits of the in duty bound to add something new, of world's history-one of the few in whom fact or speculation, to what had been nobleness of heart and purpose, and ascertained by his predecessors. Next, pre-eminence of genius, were so fused in the last century, followed the herd, together as to constitute the true cha- of German professors and other literates, racter of the hero.

whose quaint little Latin dissertations in It was well, no doubt, for a curious quarto darken so many a question, and posterity, that an action of this import- deepen so many a paradox. These atance occurred in a civilized period, and tached themselves, by predilection, to

No. 40.-VOL. VII.

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