ART. XI. CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE. 1. A History of France. (Clarendon Press Series.) By G. W. KITCHIN, M. A. Vols. II. and III. Oxford: At the Clarendon Press. 1877. pp. viii, 541; vi, 555. MR. KITCHIN'S history, in these two volumes, extends from the reign of Louis XI. to 1793, and embraces the most interesting periods of French annals, the solidification of the monarchy under Louis; the rise of the reformed religion in France; the civil wars; the massacre of St. Bartholomew; the Bourbon Monarchy, with Richelieu, Mazarin, the Fronde; the age of the Grand Monarch, and the final decadence of the monarchy, ending with the fall of Louis XVI. It is, in fact, the history of the monarchy, for that Mr. Kitchin considers, with good reason, synonymous with the history of the country itself. His view of the whole subject is essentially an English view. Seeing what all modern students see, that the development of France has been marked by an absence or disappearance of the usual signs of what we are accustomed to consider political progress, of genuine parliamentary institutions, of municipal freedom, of the separation and independence of the judiciary from the executive, etc., he reaches the conclusion that the whole of French history is a failure. Not that he says so in so many words; but he implies throughout the opinion that at every stage in the life of the French the fatal difficulty is the non-appearance of English institutions. We do not mean that he is not right in all his particular conclusions, and we have no doubt that if we can imagine the whole course of French history to have been different, if the Germanic influence had succeeded in obtaining a stronger hold; if centralization had not so thoroughly eradicated feudalism; if the nobles of France, instead of gradually being converted into an impotent noblesse, shorn of real power, but made odious to the people by being permitted to retain the privileges and immunities of power, had remained a real aristocracy; if local institutions could have sprung up and developed in a healthy way; if the reformed religion could have obtained a lasting hold in France, and, let us add, if France could have invented habeas corpus and trial by jury,no doubt it would have been a better and happier country to-day, and would not present the shocking spectacle to the world of a struggle for power between four parties, no one of which has ever given substantial proof that it can provide a stable government. But in that case French history would be so utterly different from what it is that it seems hardly worth while to dwell very much on the possible alternative. Looked at on the other side, taking the French for what they are, their history is a brilliant one, and if their fame is at present in eclipse, it should not be forgotten that their actual achievements, the part they have filled in the world's progress, has been very great. We confess we do not think that Mr. Kitchin does them justice. The evidence of his want of proper historical sympathy is to be found scattered through his pages. We select an instance or two at random. This is all that Mr. Kitchin has to say about Richelieu's great work, the foundation of the Academy : "From its very foundation the Academy busied itself with the form of expression rather than with the substance of things; it is the opposite of that other great creation of this age, the Royal Society of England, which has done as much to promote Baconian and scientific investigation in this country as the Academy has done to secure a polite and well-regulated style in France. French writers lost by it in quaintness and originality; on the other hand, the Academy soon became the arbiter of literary praise, the measuringrod of culture. If it has shown a tendency to exclude the highest names in letters, on the other hand it supported and guided the authorship of the age of Louis XIV. and of later times. French literature long owed to this bright instrument of despotism many of its excellences and much success. Yet it may be doubted whether the equalizing of language and expression, and the discouragement of individuality, however congenial to an autocratic age, really tended to increase the true greatness of French letters. At least the Academy was eminently well suited to the ages in which it flourished most brilliantly; and perhaps also it was congenial to the temper of the French people. The names which are great in French literature owe as little to the patronage of the Academy as the splendid achievement of M. Littré's Dictionary does to that interminable work, the ever-unfinished' Dictionnaire de l'Académie Française.'” (p. 50.) This strikes us as a most extraordinarily inadequate account of one of the most famous institutions of learning of modern times. In fact, it is difficult to make out what Mr. Kitchin means. Why he should compare it with the Royal Society of England we are at a loss to conceive. There was certainly no resemblance between them. The Academy was, as he himself says, founded by Louis XIII. at Richelieu's advice, to advance "the most noble of all arts, eloquence." This Mr. Kitchin says, in a parenthetic exclamation, was "a truly French sentiment"; but as the Royal Society was founded for no such purpose, but was the "opposite" of the Academy, why compare them? Again, if the great names in French literature owe nothing to the patronage of the Academy, what is meant by saying that "it supported and guided the authorship of the age of Louis XIV. and of later times" } It is apparent from this passage that Mr. Kitchin's want of sympathy with institutions which may be, as he naïvely says, "congenial to the temper of the French people," but not to his own, is profound. The bias appears at every turn; as, for instance, in his account of Colbert, one of the most successful ministers of finance France ever had. "It was his," says Mr. Kitchin, "quite against all more modern ideas of wise administration, to foster and subsidize production, literary or artistic, commercial or agricultural." (p. 157.) He somewhat inconsistently says (p. 160), that Colbert "did little for agriculture, where sagacious laws and well-applied helps might have worked miracles"; but, passing this by as immaterial, the idea of asking Colbert to be a political economist of the laissez-faire school is going rather far. Instead of testing his economic ideas by "modern ideas of wise administration," what Mr. Kitchin ought to have done was to test them by the ideas then prevalent, in which case he would have found that they were far more advanced than those commonly prevalent. This was Colbert's great claim to renown. Of course, the result of his efficient administration Mr. Kitchin does not conceal, but the temper in which he allows him credit for it is of the most grudging. To Henry IV. the writer devotes a large part of his second volume; and here, too, he shows a strong inclination for the same sort of criticism. Is it not going rather far to say of such a man as Henry of Navarre that "it would almost seem as if his feelings were simply physical, and that neither memory nor fidelity nor shame entered into them at all"? This severity and absence of sympathy and tendency to try everything by the standard of to-day are the defects of Mr. Kitchin's writing. His merits are so well known already that it is hardly necessary to point them out. We have dwelt at some length on his defects, because they point to a common difficulty in all foreign criticism of France. There is no people about which so many popular errors are afloat, whose history and whose national characteristics are so misunderstood by foreigners. It is the business of the historian to divest himself of these absolutely. Had Mr. Kitchin succeeded in doing this, his work would have been the best English history of France in existence. 2. Isis Unveiled: A Master-Key to the Mysteries of Ancient and Modern Science and Theology. Vol. I., Science. Vol. II., Theology. By H. P. BLAVATSKY. New York: J. W. Bouton. 1877. 8vo. pp. xlv, 628; iv, 692. In her Preface to this Master-key Madame Blavatsky declares that her work is "the fruit of a somewhat intimate acquaintance with East ern adepts, and study of their science." In the pursuit of her studies she came into contact with certain men "endowed with such mysterious powers and such profound knowledge that we may truly designate them as the sages of the Orient." These sages showed her that "by combining science with religion," the existence of God and the immortality of the soul "may be demonstrated like a problem of Euclid." These same sages were at the same time good enough to let her know that "the Oriental philosophy has room for no other faith than an absolute and immovable faith in the Omnipotence of man's own immortal self"; also, that "this Omnipotence comes from the kinship of man's spirit with the Universal Soul, — God"; and further, that "the latter can never be demonstrated but by the former." The author goes on to say that her work is a plea for the recognition of the Hermetic Philosophy, the anciently universal Wisdom Religion, as the only possible key to the absolute in science and theology." She expects the opposition of the following classes: "Christians," "Scientists," "Pseudo-Scientists," "broad Churchmen and Freethinkers," "men of letters and various authorities," and the "mercenaries and parasites of the press." It is difficult to make out from whom she expects support under these circumstances; and yet for two huge octavo volumes on such a subject as the "Hermetic Philosophy" a good deal of support is needed. We must decline altogether to criticise this monumental work. It is a farrago of information, good, bad, or indifferent, about everything relating to magic, mystery, witchcraft, religion, spiritualism, much of which would be, no doubt, valuable in a cyclopædia, but is here of no use, so far as we can see, to any one. The conclusion at which the author arrives at the end of her second volume is that "the worship of the Vedic pitris is fast becoming the worship of the spiritual portion of mankind." To this all we can say is, So much the better; if the spiritual portion of mankind wish to worship the Vedic pitris, let them do it; and if the Christians, or the scientists, or the parasites of the press, or any other of the enemies of the spiritually minded, try to interfere with their freedom of worship, we shall be the first to protest against the outrage. As yet, we believe, the Theosophical Society's elaborate Eleusinian mysteries have been conducted in the handsomest way, without any secrecy whatever, and it certainly is very much to the credit of its corresponding secretary that she has been willing to reveal the masterkey to her new system in two volumes octavo, though we fear that the enormous tax on the neophyte's mind demanded by the perusal of them will, for some time at least, prevent the veil of Isis from being torn asunder, and the beauty of her religion being made thoroughly known to the world. The Life of Edgar Allan Poe. By WILLIAM F. GILL. Illustrated. Mr. GILL's life of Poe has chiefly a negative value. As a destructive analysis of Griswold's memoir it has considerable merits, but it sheds little more light on the sad career of Poe himself. With Dr. Griswold the author has easy work. He produces evidence to show that all the following statements (besides many others) made by Griswold are, to say the least, incorrect: 1st, That the Baltimore committee which awarded Poe a prize for a "manuscript found in a bottle," did so solely on account of the legibility of his handwriting; 2d, That one of the committee, Mr. Kennedy, took him to a clothing-store, and "purchased for him a respectable suit, with a change of linen, and sent him to a bath"; 3d, That "Hans Pfaal" was an imitation of Locke's "Moon Hoax"; 4th, That Poe's connection with the Literary Messenger was merely that of general contributor and writer of notices; 5th, That he was obliged to leave the Messenger on account of his drunkenness ; 6th, That the "Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym" was unsuccessful in England; 7th, That Poe's "Haunted Palace" was written after Longfellow's" Beleaguered City"; 8th, That he pirated Thomas Brown's "Textbook of Conchology"; 9th, That his withdrawal from The Gentleman's Magazine was caused by his irregularities, and by his making improper use of the books of the concern to assist him in getting up a new monthly; 10th, That he quarrelled with his friend Graham, the proprietor of Graham's Magazine, was dismissed by him, and that for some four or five years not a line written by him was purchased for the magazine; 11th, That there was a quarrel between Poe and his colaborer, Clarke. There is so much of this sort of evidence, that a strong support is given to the inference that Griswold's misstatements grew out of a malicious desire to revenge himself on Poe for a criticism the latter had written. But we are compelled to say, after examining Mr. Gill's evidence, and giving it all the weight that can be claimed for it, it hardly leaves us in the enthusiastic frame of mind over the poet's life which the author would seem to think proper. He devotes a good deal of space to show that Poe was not a "sot," and that he could never have drunk to excess, because there is evidence to show that a single glass of wine was enough to upset him. This may have been the case; but it is not enough. to overcome the evidence of letters and conversations showing the general conviction of his best friends during his lifetime that his habits were hopelessly and irredeemably bad. And this, it seems to us, is all that H |