Aberdeenshire man and professor of logic and English literature at his own University of Aberdeen, did some excellent and original critical work and has left his mark upon the study of literature. His Manual of English Literature (1872) and Characteristics of English Poets from Chaucer to Shirley (1874) were his principal books; in addition to these, he wrote some novels between 1886 and 1889, was the author of a book on Defoe (1879) in the "English Men of Letters" series, edited Scott's poetry (1887), and wrote leaders for the London Radical Press during Lord Beaconsfield's ministry of 1876-1880. He is one of the best representatives of the critical mind at the end of the nineteenth century: his opinions, even where seriously in need of support, were distinguished from haphazard conjecture by their foundation of sound scholarship. JOHN STERLING (1806-1844), notable as the centre, for a brief space, of a brilliant intellectual circle, and famous as the subject of Carlyle's admirable Life of Sterling, was a son of Captain Edward Sterling, an Irishman who, from 1815 to 1840, was a very important member of the Times staff. He was born at Kames Castle in Bute, but his youth was spent at Llanblethian in Glamorganshire. He was at Trinity College Al and Trinity Hall, Cambridge, from 1824 to 1827, and made many friends, including Frederick Denison Maurice. He began to write early for the Athenæum, purchased it in 1828 and edited it for a short time, married and went out to the West Indies, and then, returning to England, took deacon's Orders and became curate to his former tutor, Julius Charles Hare, Rector of Hurstmonceaux. He soon left the active service of the Church, and gave himself up to journalism, writing essays and fugitive verse. He was, however, more remarkable as a talker on topics of literary and general interest. though his life ended in consumption and he was obliged to live, now in Cornwall, now in the Isle of Wight, he was for years a conspicuous figure in literary society, and inspired an admiration which gathered round him a remarkable band of friends, known as the Sterling Club. His verse was laboured, and his two chief efforts, the tragedy of Strafford (1843) and The Election (1841), did not succeed with the public. the two posthumous volumes of Essays and Tales (1848), edited by J. C. Hare, the papers on Carlyle (from the Westminster) and on Tennyson (from the Quarterly), with the romance of The Onyx Ring (from Blackwood) are worth reading. In CHAPTER XXV. HISTORY, PHILOSOPHY, AND THEOLOGY DURING THE § 1. Growing attention to historical science. Ancient history: WILLIAM MITFORD, CONNOP THIRLWALL, GEORGE GROTE, GEORGE FINLAY, THOMAS ARNOLD, SIR G. CORNEWALL LEWIS. § 2. Modern history: HENRY HALLAM. § 3. LORD MACAULAY. § 4 JAMES ANTHONY FROUDE. $5. EDWARD AUGUSTUS FREEMAN. § 6. JOHN RICHARD GREEN. $7. Philosophers: JEREMY BENTHAM. The Hamiltonian system: SIR WILLIAM HAMILTON and DEAN MANSEL. § 8. ARCHBISHOP WHATELY and DR. WHEWELL. §9. JOHN STUART MILL and utilitarianism. § 10. CHarles RoberT DARWIN and PROFESSOR HUXLEY. II. SIR HENRY MAINE. § 12. Theology: JOHN Keble, DR. PUSEY, and DEAN CHURCH. § 13. JOHN HENRY NEWMAN. § 14. WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. $ 15. DEAN STANLEY and Broad-church theology. § 16. THOMAS CHALMERS his influence in Scotland. § 1. THE growth of historical science in modern Europe is almost as remarkable as the sudden rise of the novel. In this case the awakening to German influence which Birth of the historical characterised the opening of the nineteenth century sense in was as powerful as in every other instance. Just as literature. Bürger's Lenore, in 1774, opened the way for the romantic movement, so, in 1811, Niebuhr's Roman History taught European scholars the advantage of scientific study in a subject which hitherto had been neglected. It taught them not only to estimate more accurately the value of original authorities, but to enter more fully into the spirit of antiquity and to think and feel as the ancients felt and thought. Previous writers of ancient history, with the exception of Gibbon, seldom had apprehended the ancient world as a living reality. In using their authorities they had shown no critical sagacity and no appreciation of the value of evidence, quoting the fabulous tales of a late mythographer and the sober statements of a contemporary writer as of equal importance. The study of ancient history was accompanied by a similar interest in modern history all through the last quarter of the eighteenth and the first quarter of the nineteenth century the historical sense was in process of formation. The historian of to-day is expected to produce in support of his facts the testimony of credible contemporary witnesses; while the public records of most of the great European nations, now rendered accessible to students, have imposed upon historians a new labour in opening sources of information quite unknown to writers as enlightened as Hume or Robertson. A distinct and novel merit in historical writing begins to appear as early as WILLIAM MITFORD'S History of Greece (1784-1810), which probably may be regarded as Ancient (1744-1827). inspired by the great work of his friend Gibbon. history: Mitford was a Hampshire squire and had been WILLIAM a fellow-officer of Gibbon's in the Hampshire MITFORD militia. It was hardly to be expected that Mitford would be extremely accurate, and, as a matter of fact, his work contains mistakes and errors of prejudice: but it still may have weight with the student as a historical authority. And Mitford's political views, which led him into an unqualified condemnation of democratic institutions, were the cause of two further histories of Greece. The earliest THIRLWALL GROTE of these was the work of CONNOP THIRLWALL, a Yorkshire clergyman who had been a fellow of CONNOP Trinity College, Cambridge, but had been obliged to resign his fellowship on political grounds. Thirlwall's History of Greece was in publication from 1835 to 1844. While it was appearing, in 1840, he was promoted to the see of St. Davids, which he held till his death in 1875. The character of the whole work is scholarly and rather heavy; and it is not at all surprising that it practically was superseded by the History of Greece (1846-1856) of GEORGE GROTE, a Radical banker and sometime member for the City GEORGE of London. Grote, a schoolfellow of Thirlwall's at the Charterhouse, was the older man of the two, and had been collecting materials for a longer time. To say that his History is better than Thirlwall's is to do injustice to Thirlwall's far superior scholarship: Grote retains his place among historians, not on the ground of pre-eminent learning, but because he had a really picturesque sense of what he was writing about, and realised Greek history, not as a mere tableau, but as a great and living epoch in the story of the world. A further element which doubtless made for Grote's popularity was his extreme advocacy of the democratic principle. Thirlwall wrote always like a philosophical politician, Grote often like a mob-orator. But the fact remains that Grote achieved a popularity to which Thirlwall never has attained. Thirlwall is the historian for historians, Grote is the historian for the ordinary reader. He not only effectually superseded Mitford he superseded Thirlwall, save with thorough students: and to-day his great book, a monument of industry, is regarded popularly as the history par excellence of the Athenian Empire. Grote in later life wrote voluminously on the Greek philosophers. The later history of Greece, covering the disastrous period of Roman, Byzantine, and Turkish rule, and coming down to GEORGE modern times, found its chronicler in GEORGE FINLAY, who was five years younger than Grote and died (1799-1875). in the same year with Thirlwall. His posthumously collected and published History of Greece (1877) forms a valuable sequel to Grote, and is nothing more or less than a supplement to Gibbon, although it did something to shake Gibbon's pet theories, and conveyed a more favourable impression of the Greeks of the Lower Empire. THOMAS ARNOLD The history of Rome was taken in hand by THOMAS ARNOLD, better known as head-master of Rugby. His incomplete History of Rome, whose three volumes (1838-43) end at the Second Punic War, is valuable chiefly as a (1795-1842). popular exposition of Niebuhr's views. Its English is clear and masculine throughout. Arnold also published some Introductory Lectures on Modern History (1842), which display more independence of thought. He was also the author of several sermons which exercised great influence upon his generation. The most formidable opponent of Niebuhr was SIR GEORGE CORNEWALL LEWIS, equally remarkable as statesman and scholar, educated at Eton and Christ Church, and an officeholder in more than one cabinet. His Enquiry into the Credibility of the Early Roman History appeared in 1855. His great objection to Niebuhr was that "instead of employing those tests of credibility which are consistently applied to modern history, he attempts to guide his judgment by the indications of internal evidence, and assumes that the truth can be discovered by an occult faculty of historical divination." Sir George Lewis was editor of the Edinburgh from 1852 to 1855, and wrote several political and general treatises, the best known of which is his essay On the Influence of Authority in Matters of Opinion (1849). SIR G. C. § 2. The elder of the two historians who were the first to make modern history their own was HENRY HALLAM, whose Modern history: HENRY HALLAM critical judgment was superior to his grace of style. He was born at Windsor, where his father, the Dean of Bristol, had a canonry; was educated at Eton (1777-1859). and Christ Church; and practised at the bar for a few years. Having an ample income, which was augmented by his appointment to a Commissionership of Stamps, he withdrew from his profession and devoted himself wholly to literature. He was one of the early contributors to The Edinburgh Review, where his criticism (1808) of Scott's edition of Dryden was marked by that power of discrimination and impartial judgment characteristic of all his subsequent writings. As one of the Edinburgh Reviewers, he was pilloried by Byron "classic Hallam, much renowned for Greek." He was, indeed, an excellent classical scholar, who added to his know as ledge of antiquity an accurate and profound acquaintance with the language, literature, and history of modern Europe. The first result of his long studies appeared in his View of the State of Europe during the Middle Ages (1818), a very accurate and philosophical study, in a series of dissertations, of the medieval institutions of each European country. This was followed by The Constitutional History of England from the Accession of Henry VII to the Death of George II (1827); and, from 1837 to 1839, appeared a third great production, the Introduction to the Literature of Europe during the Fifteenth, Sixteenth, and Seventeenth Centuries. Hallam's later years were saddened by the loss of his two sons, the elder of whom was the subject of Tennyson's In Memoriam. The historian died in his eightysecond year. In No one was more qualified to speak of Hallam's literary merits than Macaulay. "Mr. Hallam," he said in his review of the Constitutional History, "is, on the whole, far better qualified than any other writer of our time for Macaulay's the office which he has undertaken. He has great Hallam. opinion of industry and great acuteness. His knowledge is extensive, various, and profound. His mind is equally distinguished by the amplitude of its grasp and by the delicacy of its tact. His speculations have none of that vagueness which is the common fault of political philosophy. On the contrary, they are strikingly practical, and teach us not only the general rule, but the mode of applying it to solve particular cases. this respect they often remind us of the Discourses of Machiavelli. The manner of the book is, on the whole, not unworthy of the matter. The language, even when most faulty, is weighty and massive, and indicates strong sense in every line. It often rises to an eloquence, not florid or impassioned, but high, grave, and sober such as would become a State paper, or a judgment delivered by a great magistrate, a Somers or a D'Aguesseau. In this respect the character of Mr. Hallam's mind corresponds strikingly with that of his style. His work is eminently judicial. The whole spirit is that of the Bench, not of the Bar. He sums up with a calm, steady impartiality, turning neither to the right nor to the left, glossing over nothing, exaggerating nothing, while the advocates on both sides are alternately biting their lips to hear their conflicting statements and sophisms exposed. On a general survey, we do not scruple to pronounce the Constitutional History the most impartial book ever written." : § 3. This was the opinion of an historian by no means impartial. THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY, born at Rothley Temple in Leicestershire, was the son of Zachary Macaulay, an ardent philanthropist and one of the LORD earliest opponents of the slave trade. Educated at home and at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he obtained a fellowship, and called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn, he suddenly achieved a literary reputation by an article on MACAULAY (1800-1859). |