The Online Library of Liberty

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• Introduction
• Textual Introduction
• Acknowledgments
• Essays On Politics and Society
• Mignet’s French Revolution 1826
• Modern French Historical Works 1826
• Scott’s Life of Napoleon 1828
• Alison’s History of the French Revolution 1833
• The Monster Trial 1835
• Carlyle’s French Revolution 1837
• Armand Carrel 1837
• Michelet’s History of France 1844
• Guizot’s Essays and Lectures On History 1845
• Duveyrier’s Political Views of French Affairs 1846
• Vindication of the French Revolution of February 1848 1849
• Appendices
• Appendix A: Guizot’s Lectures On European Civilization (1836)
• Appendix B: French Texts of Material Quoted In Vindication of the French Revolution of February 1848 (1849)
• Appendix C: Textual Emendations
• Appendix D: Index of Persons and Works Cited, With Variants and Notes

Appendix A

Guizot’s Lectures on European Civilization (1836)

it is not many years since an English nobleman, who long performed his duties of hereditary legislator, under no apprehension of unfitness, on his part, or distrust of his abilities, on that of the public, declared to a brother Peer that he knew no more of the history of England than what he had learnt in Shakspeare.^[*] Since the period to which this fact belongs there has been a considerable improvement in the education of all classes. Yet if we could obtain equally unreserved confessions, it is probable that the increase of historical knowledge, in any valuable sense of the term, would be found still to be a rare acquirement among our public men. Few indeed, who have been at a tolerably good school, will not be able to repeat the list of English Sovereigns, with the dates of their accession, and the principal events of their reigns, as they are given in Goldsmith’s history,^[†] or some more recent abridgment. Most of our legislators will, besides, be found to have, at some period, been moved by a certain degree of secret shame, to make their way through the pages of Hume.^[‡] But the number of those who may have made a serious study of history, as an indispensable preparation for an enlightened discharge of their parliamentary duties, will, we fear, be found very small.

Statements of this kind are certainly difficult to be proved; but the present is one not likely to be questioned. When, as it happens with the regular branches of public education, the average of knowledge acquired by the mass of those who have been trained under the system is in value far below the expenditure of time and property which it occasions, though there may exist a strong general conviction of the fact, the assertion of that conviction is invidious, and exposed to a flat denial. It is obvious indeed, but, when denied, not easily substantiated, that, out of ten who have passed between twelve and thirteen years in the study of Latin and Greek, nine can make scarcely any use of those two languages for any purpose of utility or rational amusement. The case is, however, very different in regard to the knowledge of which we are now lamenting the scarcity. The difficulty here would be to prove the existence: for it will not easily be supposed that men will generally become well acquainted with any thing which is slightly thought of, if not totally neglected, in the system of public education; and so it unfortunately happens in regard to history.

The accidental connexion of ancient history with the study of Latin and Greek, which makes up the main literary department cultivated in our universities, gives an opportunity to some of the more zealous tutors to oblige a few of their pupils to become acquainted with the historical periods described by Herodotus and Thucydides. Roman history fares generally worse; for very few undergraduates can take up the whole of Livy for their examination, much less fill up the chasms of the narrative from other sources.^* The second Decad is the portion most usually read. But even such an imperfect acquaintance with ancient history as this incidental study (for language is the immediate object) of two fragments of that history is likely to produce is by no means a necessary condition for taking a degree. From the circumstance that Herodotus presents little difficulty to the student, though a portion of his work is very frequently chosen for the examination required to obtain a common certificate from the examiners, he is not among the Greek writers preferred for the display of scholarship demanded from the young men who aim at honours. As the being able to translate Livy cannot be considered a great feat of scholarship—and as accurate knowledge of the historical narrative makes no remarkable show in the schools (the place of examination), the diligent and able students are disinclined to historical books, and take the poets in preference. It may therefore be truly said that, in general, ancient history forms no important part of the university education. Dr. Cardwell, the public professor of ancient history at Oxford, has for some years attracted a numerous audience to his terminal lectures,^* by the transient interest produced by the taste and talent with which he treats detached subjects of classical antiquities. The professor of modern history,^[*] after having several times attempted, in vain, to collect a class, was obliged to be silent. The truth is, that no kind of knowledge whatever will be attended to at any place of education, unless it is a means of distinction at the examinations; and no kind of knowledge will be made a subject of examination in which the examiners (who, during the time of our intimate acquaintance with Oxford, were frequently not much older or much higher in the ranks of literature than the examinees) cannot also distinguish themselves. Hence the almost impossibility of enlarging the circle of studies which limits the ground-work of education in a place which ought to compete with the first universities of Europe. Some men of higher standing have of late been appointed examiners at Oxford;^[†] but though a few among these able and learned individuals have contributed to raise the standard of public honours, they have it not in their power to multiply the subjects of examination. That could only be done if the university professors were the regular instructors as well as examiners; enjoying, of course, the privilege of appointing, at the beginning of every scholastic year, a course of study for the whole body of undergraduates.

The general disregard of historical studies in English education becomes a melancholy topic of reflection in the presence of the work which is the subject of this article. But before we say a word on the book itself, we must endeavour to obviate a just prejudice which attaches itself to the name of M. Guizot. He is known in England chiefly as one of the principal instruments of the profoundly immoral, as well as despotic régime which France is now enduring. One of the detestable arts of that system, as of the system of Napoleon, of which it is an imitation, is to seek out, and place in stations of eminence, all the most distinguished abilities in the nation, provided they are willing to prostitute themselves to its service. In the capacity of a tool of this system, though we believe him to be greatly more sincere than most of the other tools, we have nothing to say for M. Guizot. But in the more honourable character which he had earned for himself as a professor and as a literary man, before practical politics assailed him with their temptations and their corrupting influences, he deserves to be regarded with very different feelings. He is among the first, if not the very first, of a school of writers on history, and the philosophy of history, which has arisen within the last twenty years, and which, though to the infinite discredit of our country it has scarcely been heard of here, is, in all the other countries of civilised Europe, known and estimated as it deserves.

The Histoire de la Civilisation en Europe (a work complete in itself), and the five volumes which have appeared of the Histoire de la Civilisation en France, may be cited as models of the manner in which history should be studied—its facts made to elucidate one another, and the workings of the great determining causes traced through the complication of their multifarious effects. The character of M. Guizot’s writings is besides so popular and attractive, that they may be said to be addressed to every one who, being previously acquainted with a mere outline of the history of Europe, from the decline of the Roman empire to the end of the sixteenth century, has also the still more necessary preparation of what might be called an ethical taste—that is, an interest in the workings of external events upon man, and the reaction of man’s mind upon the world that surrounds him. The applause with which the lectures, which make up these two works, were heard at Paris, proves that among the educated classes of that capital there exists far more of the taste just mentioned than in the corresponding ranks of society among us. Were any such taste alive in England, the works of M. Guizot—(nay, the works of a constellation of French historical writers, which may well excite the emulation of even the most advanced and refined nations)^* —would not be generally unknown on this side of the Channel. Even a recent writer, who, though he began to print his work on the English Commonwealth one year before the publication of M. Guizot’s Civilization in Europe, seems to have kept it on the anvil till 1832, takes no further notice of his illustrious contemporary and fellow-labourer upon a much ampler scale, than a dry controversy with him in a note near the end of his first volume, and a “See Mably and Guizot” in the more interesting one, which contains his “Proofs and Documents.”^[*] One can easily understand why a writer who chiefly cultivates the valuable but not very attractive erudition of the mere antiquarian, should turn away from the pages of a more philosophical historian. But that the mass of the reading public, among whom few persons would not be ashamed to be found ignorant of the French language, should remain unacquainted with Guizot’s historical Lectures, betrays an evident misdirection in the process of their instruction. It shows that French is cultivated as a mere accomplishment—for show; and that for any of the more essential purposes of a liberal education, it is not cultivated at all. Few, very few of the vast numbers who are taught French at school, acquire the habit of reading that language with ease; and this may account for the general ignorance of modern French literature in England.^* Yet, if the young mind were properly trained, through English reading, so that among the multitude of purchasers in the book-market there were but one-fourth who either wished for instruction, or could derive amusement from anything requiring the slightest expense of intellect or thought, the English booksellers would not have omitted the publication of, at least, Guizot’s Civilization in Europe, in English. That volume by itself is not only invaluable to the philosopher, and most interesting to every reader of cultivated intelligence, but is admirably suited to be put into the hands of young people near the close of their pupillary instruction, immediately after they have read Koch’s Tableau des Révolutions de l’Europe.^[*] Guizot’s lectures would unite and arrange in the mind the dry facts of the Tableau;—would not only fix them in the memory, but transform them into that practical wisdom which the ancients expected from history, and which, considering the increased experience of ages, and our greater wealth in historical documents, our own age has an infinitely higher right to demand. It would, lastly, perform what, in regard to Koch’s Abridgment,^[†] as we have it, is of the highest importance—for it would help a sensible teacher, and still more a sensible learner, to correct the false and mischievous views which the French continuator,^[‡] one of the conservative sages (if we do not mistake) of the restored Bourbons, has attached to the original work.

M. Guizot’s manner of treating history will be best exhibited by specimens. Could we venture to give extracts in the author’s own language, we should feel more sure of interesting our readers; but the conviction which we have already expressed, that the number of those who in this country can freely take in the meaning of philosophical French writing is comparatively very small, absolutely prevents our indulging ourselves in quotations. We cannot, on the other hand, feel satisfied that we are able to do full justice to our author in our translations of detached passages. He who, with a sufficient command of the two languages, should undertake a version of these works, would be able gradually to lead the English reader into a familiarity with a certain phraseology—with a peculiar set of figurative or allusive expressions, the philosophic significance of which is clear and determinate in the author’s mind, and is seized at once by all educated Frenchmen, but which imply combinations of ideas not equally familiar to the English reader. The national mind of no two countries advances in exactly the same track: every nation, which is rapidly progressive in intellect, has innumerable meanings to express, which have not yet arisen in the national mind of any other country; and possesses phrases which at once summon up those meanings, and which other countries can only gradually learn to understand. There is a way to translate, not words, but style, by means of which, without destroying individuality, the translator should render such works as have an European interest into an European style. We are quite opposed to the abolition of national forms of thought, which necessarily produce peculiar forms of expression; but, like national dress, these should be allowed to prevail at home, and when engaged in our domestic concerns. For the concerns of the human mind, for the great interests of European civilization, we should, by mutual consent, endeavour to modify such forms of thought and expression as produce a feeling of strangeness; and, whilst we carefully avoided all corruptions or distortions of individual languages, we should strive after a general assimilation of tone and manner. This may be done by means of able translations of eminent works—such as those with which we are at present concerned; but it is impracticable in the version of detached passages. A metaphor, a sentiment, for instance, too French (we might say, too Continental) to be verbally translated into English, must in such a case be omitted, or something so different be substituted as must destroy the character of the passage. In the translation of a long work, however, the outlandish phrase may be half suppressed the first time it occurs, in the hope that, by means of an imperfect version, the reader may on the next occasion be ready to approach nearer to the original: in fact, the translator of a long work has a constant opportunity to gain over the national ear by means of the universal understanding. For let it be observed, that what people object chiefly against are not words, but combinations, figures, forms of thought;—and that, whilst they imagine they dislike such expressions because they are not national, the true source of the objection is their not understanding the meaning—or even mistaking it.

In spite of the difficulty which we have attempted to describe, we will introduce detached passages in English, begging the indulgence of our readers, if in general we content ourselves with very imperfect imitations. We have also to apologize for not attempting to give a general abstract of the works before us, on the obvious ground that they themselves are a very compressed abstract. Our purpose is to invite readers to M. Guizot’s works, and encourage a taste for his manner of treating history.

The subject of M. Guizot’s Lectures, as the titles of the two collections express it, is Civilization. The course of 1828 comprehends the history of European Civilization in general. In the subsequent courses, the series of which was interrupted by the political events which in an evil hour engaged the Professor in the vulgar career of politics, he commenced filling up that general outline with facts and illustrations taken from the history of his own country. The sources of civilization being the same among the whole European family, the philosophical historian may choose any of the nations where the growth of civilization has been continuous and vigorous, as an example, applicable to all the rest, under certain modifications which must be learnt from the detailed history of each. It was natural that M. Guizot should prefer France: yet it must be acknowledged that his reasons for that choice justify it, independently of his national predilections, and the peculiar interest of the subject to the audience he was addressing. He considers the general progress of European civilization to be more faithfully imaged in the history of France than in that of any other country.

Two things (says M. Guizot) present themselves to the mind, when we assert that a country is highly civilized: an organization of the national body, which makes the advantages of union greatly preponderate over the inconveniences and necessary evils of social restraints; and a free and vigorous development of the mental powers and moral faculties in individuals.^[*]

When we say that a country advances in civilization, we may mean that external life is becoming more secure and more agreeable—that mankind are improving their physical condition, subduing the powers of nature more and more to their use, and so improving their social arrangements, that all the conjunct operations which constitute social life are better performed than before: Or we may mean that the mental faculties of mankind are unfolding themselves—that a higher spiritual culture is introducing itself—that the individuals of whom society is made up, are advancing more and more towards the perfection of their nature—that the national mind is becoming wiser, nobler, more humane, or more refined, and that more numerous or more admirable individual examples of genius, talent, or heroism are manifesting themselves. When we use the word civilization in its largest sense, we, according to M. Guizot, include in it both these requisites: the improvement of society and outward life, and that of the inward nature of man. If either improves, and the other does not improve along with it, we have no confidence in the reality, or in the durability of the improvement; we do not consider it as a permanent advance in civilization. The two elements do not always keep pace with each other; but when either of them advances, it surely paves the way for the other. When either gets the start, it is soon arrested till the other has overtaken it; and for the healthy and rapid advancement of both, it is of great importance that their development should take place pari passu.

M. Guizot is of opinion, that though other countries may have for a time outstripped France in one or other of these two constituents of civilization, there is no country in which the two have accompanied each other so closely, and been developed so harmoniously together. This opinion he substantiates by a critical survey of the civilization of all the principal nations of Europe: the substance of which we will extract, because, though it does not exemplify M. Guizot’s historical method, it is a specimen of his general tone of thought, and is ingenious, and much of it eminently just and important.

He begins with England. English civilization (we adopt M. Guizot’s ideas, but do not bind ourselves by the laws of translation) has been mainly directed to the improvement of the social arrangements, and of everything relating to external life: its physical comfort—its freedom—and even its morality; but still, external well-being, and such inward culture only as has a direct and evident bearing on external well-being, have engaged the greatest part of the attention of the English national mind. Society, in England, has developed itself more nobly and more brilliantly than man: immediate and narrow applications have been more thought of than principles: the nation makes a greater figure in history, than the individuals who compose it. This eagerness for outward results—this comparative indifference to truth for itself, and to the development and exercise of the human faculties for themselves, M. Guizot considers to be perceptible even in our most purely speculative philosophers—for instance, our metaphysicians. With less questionable accuracy, he affirms the absence of interest in general and commanding views, to have been, at all periods, characteristic of the nation at large.

The power of religion has been greater in England than in any country whatever. The earnestness and concentration of the convictions which have impelled the English religious parties have hardly a parallel in history; and their convictions have acted largely on their outward lives. But all their zeal has been spent practically. Leading and luminous views have seldom, if ever, issued from among them. The speculations of English divines have generally been confined by some political aim—have been limited to the removal of some definite and local evil, or to the mere refitting and patching up of old doctrines. The spirit of England is practical. The nation has had, and still possesses, great minds; but neither in number nor power (though the latter is unquestionably great) do they bear a due proportion to the colossal growth of the external, the social civilization of the country.

Germany presents a contrast to this picture. The social or external progress has there been difficult and slow: the coarseness of German manners has been proverbial till our own days. But how infinitely beyond this progress of the social body has been that of the individual intellect in that country! Compare the mental powers displayed by the German reformers, Luther, Melancthon, Bucer, with the semi-barbarous manners which they themselves betray, and which, considering their circumstances, may be taken as samples of those which prevailed in the nation. The existence of such minds, in such a state of society, appears a paradox. If we pass on to the seventeenth century, we find Leibnitz and the German Universities in the first rank among the leaders of the mental progress of mankind; while the Courts of Brandenburg and Bavaria, described as we find them in the memoirs of the same period,^[*] present the most shocking picture of coarseness and sensuality. Even at this moment, when the good sense and personal virtues of some of the German despots have made external Germany advance, its social improvement bears only a very small proportion to the dimensions of its collective mind.

Perhaps it is to this circumstance that we might trace the peculiarites of German literature. The German mind appears to have grown without communication with things external. Unsatisfied with the social structure, which always confines, and not unfrequently galls it, if not sufficiently aloof from it, the German mind has created a world for itself, into which the possessors of power have generally had the good sense not to intrude.

The country to which Beauty was given as a curse^* —Italy—wants the two characters just mentioned; its civilization is not essentially practical like the English, nor almost exclusively speculative like the German. It is most certain that individual Italians have reached to the highest eminence of pure intelligence, and that the nation has exhibited a degree of social activity and life not inferior in kind to that of any other people. Man and society have there displayed themselves with considerable lustre: the Italians have excelled, at once, in science, arts, philosophy, and in the practical concerns of government and life. Italy seems indeed to have now for a long time stood still: she advances on neither of the two paths of civilization; both her social energies and those of her individual minds seem to have become enervated and paralyzed. But if we observe Italy more closely, we shall find that this debility and faintness are not the effect of her own incapacity, but of a foreign yoke: she suffers like a flower struggling to expand its petals under the pressure of a callous, cold hand. The intellectual and political capabilities of Italy are undestroyed: what she wants, what she has ever wanted, is faith in truth. It is not enough to have intellect for speculation and talent for conduct; there must be a link to connect the two; there must be a deep conviction that they who know, can and ought to act according to what they know; that the truths which are known do not exist solely for speculation, but have the power and the right to prevail in the government of the outward world. To this faith Italy has always been a stranger. She has been fertile in great minds, and has opened grand and noble views to the intellect: she has also swarmed with practical statesmen of the most surprising talents: but the two classes, and the two pursuits, have always been strangers to each other. The philosophers, the men of general ideas, have never conceived themselves authorized to act; and strong as their conviction of the abstract truth of some great principles may have been, they could never persuade themselves that one atom of the external world might be moved out of its place by the power of such principles. The practical men, on the other hand, the arbiters of society, despised general notions, (the pen which reports M. Guizot’s thoughts is irresistibly moved to add—except generalized principles of deception,) and have never felt the least desire to regulate the facts under their control, in conformity with any great and comprehensive views. Both classes have acted as if truth was only fit to be known, but not to be acted upon. This, even in the fifteenth century, the principal period of Italian social activity, as well as in subsequent times, has smitten with a kind of sterility both the speculative genius and the practical talent of Italy, and must be assigned as the principal cause of her present hopeless condition.

From these facts, compared with the general progress of civilization in France, our author concludes in favour of that country as the best suited to illustrate the general character and growth of European civilization. In justice to M. Guizot, we are bound to repeat that this preference is not the effect of national vanity. Highly as he estimates French civilization (and who that is himself free from national partialities will not agree with him?) he does not choose France on account of absolute superiority above the three nations which might illustrate the subject in hand; but because, in that remarkable country, the advance of the two elements of civilization—the internal and the external development—has always been more parallel and harmonious than either in England, Germany, or Italy. Though inferior to England in every thing relating to the organization, activity, and freedom of action of the social body; though unable, in the development of the individual mind, to contend with Germany or Italy, the combination and mutual support of theory and practice is better seen in the progress of French civilization, than in the more irregular, though partially more vigorous and extensive growth of other countries.

This description, which, as applied to the present French character, is strikingly just, M. Guizot proves to have been true in all former periods, by a most able general view of his country’s history. The historical sketch to which we allude cannot be further reduced than it is in the original, and in that state it is too long for insertion: it is contained in the first lecture on the civilization of France. The whole course of lectures affords ample confirmation of M. Guizot’s conclusion.

But whatever may have been the amount of benefit obtained by France herself from the co-ordinate growth of the two civilizations within her territory—the impulse which, evidently from the same cause, she has imparted during the last two centuries to the rest of the European family, both in the old and the new world, is too manifest to be questioned. The spread of French speculations on government, and on moral questions intimately connected with the organization of society, was quite prodigious during the last century. It is common to attribute the diffusive power of French ideas to a peculiar power of the language. But whoever examines the subject with a competent knowledge, will easily perceive that the charm of the French writings does not belong to the language itself, but to the mental habits which have fashioned it into its highly attractive forms. German stands higher above French, as a language, than Greek above Latin. Yet the great master of German poetry and eloquence was, in spite of his anti-Gallican prejudices, obliged to confess that every educated mind must owe a great and most important portion of its education to the instrumentality of the French language.^* This peculiar power has, in our opinion, its source in the circumstance, that all French writers above mediocrity have the peculiar art of imparting their speculative principles in a manner which makes the reader feel that by means of them he has acquired a command over a multitude of scattered details, and increased not only his theoretical knowledge but his practical power. They bring the speculative reader into contact with the external world, and accustom the practical one to look to the light of principle for guidance in the concerns of life. They, in fact, unite the two characters which, according to M. Guizot, have always been equally balanced in French civilization: their theory has a constant reference to practice, and their practical maxims are the realization of their theories. It is a common observation that French is a clear language, though, as a language, its structure is by no means superior to its sister-languages, Italian and Spanish, which are by no means celebrated for clearness. But the clearness wrongly attributed to the French language, belongs to the French habits of thinking: it arises from the happy combination of theory and detail, which has existed in France as a national habit. Thus, while the wants and concerns of life have, as they must in all countries, moulded the language to express easily and clearly the conceptions which relate to material objects, the taste for generalization upon every subject has established and popularized modes of expression well suited to convey the most abstract notions. Such is the real foundation of that perspicuity, which has already established French as the common language of the civilized world.

That the decided tendency of the present period of mankind is to establish a similar alliance, and mutual interchange of beneficial influence, between pure reason and experience, among the leading nations of the world, must be evident to every unclouded mind. The natural right of principles to direct human affairs is already perceived by such a majority, even in this practical country, that its universal recognition cannot be distant among us; and the blemish which M. Guizot notices in our national habits of mind has, we venture to hope, a tendency rapidly to disappear.

Modern civilization, (according to M. Guizot,) as compared with the various civilization of antiquity, is distinguished by one remarkable characteristic,—the multiplicity of the elements of which it is compounded.^[*] The European family of nations have grown up to their present condition amidst the conflict of several influences struggling for ascendency, none of which was ever able completely to subdue the others. These warring elements, from which European society has been moulded into shape, may be classed under three heads:—1st. Notions, habits, and institutions, derived from the imperial sway of Rome: 2nd. The sentiments and customs which the northern nations brought with them when they overran the Roman empire: 3rd. The teaching and influence of the Christian clergy—of the hierarchical association called the Church. From each of these three sources some important feature of our modern civilization has been derived; and that civilization would have been wanting in some valuable quality which distinguishes it, if any one of these three sets of influences had been completely put down and annihilated.

All other civilizations, on the contrary, have been comparatively one-sided. The various nations of antiquity, especially in the East, grew up to maturity under the predominant influence of some one civilizing principle, which opposed all tendencies, mental and social, except such as might be made subservient to its exclusive end.

This unity must strike every philosophical reader of ancient history. In Egypt, for instance, every thing proceeded from the notion of a theocracy. A priesthood enjoyed supreme power in the name of the deity; the king himself was a priest, and the extent of his power, supported by the hierarchy, cannot be better expressed than in the words of one of the Pharaohs, at the moment of appointing Joseph his vizier. “I am Pharaoh, and without thee shall no man lift up his hand or foot in all the land of Egypt.” (Genesis, 41 [:44].) Not the smallest fraction of Egyptian knowledge, or Egyptian polity, could be traced to any other source but its priesthood. When that body of men had imparted as much civilization as, in their opinion, might be given to the people with safety to their hereditary power, Egyptian civilization stood still, and acquired a permanency which might well be compared to that of the mummies. The still older civilization of India may, at this moment, be observed as possessing the same unity of character. In other cases, the principle which was in the ascendant was the dominion of a conquering race; and the sole end of society and education was to enable that race to maintain its superiority. In other and most memorable instances, every thing yielded to the democratic principle; or, in other words, (for that was the meaning and purpose of the ancient democracies,) the passion for political equality among the free citizens of the state, was the influence which shaped all things after its own guise. M. Guizot does not overlook the fact that, in periods previous to that in which the civilization of these various countries began regularly to advance, fierce struggles took place for mastery, between the powers which represented the various principles, theocracy, military aristocracy, and democracy. The warrior-race, for instance, contended for ascendency with the priesthood among the Egyptians, the Etruscans, and the Greeks: the clan or family system had also its contests with that of purely democratical union. But when these contests were decided, the conquering principle became completely preponderant, if not entirely exclusive. This simplicity in the civilizing principle naturally produced, in favourable circumstances, a much more rapid progress than is observable in modern Europe. In Greece, the democratic principle produced the most astonishing growth of civilization which was ever recorded, or even conceived. But the unity and simplicity of the animating force, which caused the rapid development of Greece, seems to have been the cause of its quick exhaustion. When the only source of Greek social life happened to be dried up, the moral and civil death of that wonderful people was inevitable. The unity of the civilizing principle had an opposite result in Egypt and India. The civilizing influence spent itself; it did all that its nature admitted, and then civilization stood still. To use our author’s expressive language, in those two countries “unity produced monotony: society continued to exist, but motionless, and, as it were, frozen.”^[*] Another result of this ancient unity was the intolerant and jealous tyranny of each of the exclusive principles which happened to gain the ascendency. The whole of every society of that kind was under the sway of an active principle which could not endure the least approach of any other. This exclusiveness and intolerance extended itself to literature and the arts, especially among the Indian nations. The monuments of Indian genius which, within a few years, have become known among us, present the most surprising uniformity of spirit, of views, of taste.

Let us compare with this unity the almost bewildering variety which appears in our modern civilization. The history of Europe is the picture of a stormy chaos, where the most opposite elements have been for ages fermenting into a life ever new and varied.

A civilization produced by the mutual action of so many principles in a state of constant warfare, both in society and in the human breast, must necessarily be of slow growth: it can only emerge very gradually from chaos. Each of the contending powers is long and greatly counteracted in the good which it has a tendency to produce, as well as in the evil. A great part of the strength of each is exhausted in warring with the others; and hence the slow progress of the modern, compared with the best of the ancient civilizations. Long indeed was the period during which the strongest faith in perfectibility might be shaken at the view of the events which were daily taking place over the face of our portion of the globe. The progress which Europe was making resembled that of a ship in a storm, that threatens destruction at every movement. But the same cause which made the development of our civilization slower, has made it also richer—has introduced into it a great number and variety of beneficent principles, and promises a grander and better ultimate result.

If space permitted, we would transfer to our pages, in nearly its original extent, that portion of the second lecture on the Civilization of Europe, in which M. Guizot assigns to each of the three sets of causes which were at work when modern European society issued from chaos, the portion of influence which has actually belonged to it.^[†]

The degenerate and perishing civilization of Rome, left, according to him, three legacies to modern Europe. The first was, municipal institutions, and the spirit of local association and local self-government. The Roman empire was originally compounded of city-communities, managing their own affairs: Rome itself was such a community; and again in its decay the empire gradually resolved itself into such communities—the municipalities being the only portion of Roman institutions and Roman society which had any vitality left, when the northern nations overran the western world.

The second gift of ancient Rome to modern Europe was her written laws. These laws had great imperfections; but they were a system, and therefore could not have been formed by mere barbarians; they were fashioned by a series of cultivated minds, with the assistance of the experience of ages; they presented to the northern invaders an image of a much higher state of civilization than existed among themselves—of a state of established order and regular government, in which rights were recognised and protected, and much consideration paid to the dictates of justice and the feelings of humanity.

Finally, one great idea, originating in the Roman empire, survived its dissolution, and exercised, as M. Guizot shows, a great influence in modern history, by the aid it afforded to the consolidation of the regal power. This was, the idea of unity in the sovereign authority;—that notion of the majesty of the empire, round which such a host of associations clustered in the mind of a Roman, and which alone could have kept the empire together for ages after the imperial dignity had become the prize of the most able or fortunate military leader of a province.

To the Church, Europe is indebted for whatever it owes to Christianity, and all its moral and religious convictions have bodied themselves forth under that influence. M. Guizot is persuaded that, humanly speaking, Christianity could not have maintained itself against the inroad of Pagan barbarians merely by its intrinsic merits, and by the energy of individual convictions. But its interests were under the special care of a body of men, the most cultivated whom the age afforded, and the only body who, in the general dissolution of all things round them, remained compactly knit together, powerfully organized for a common object. The influence which this body acquired over the barbarian invaders, and which was so early manifested in their outward conversion to Christianity, introduced among them the belief in an authority superior to that of the sword, and in a law binding on the conscience, even in the absence of any temporal sanction. The power of the Church—a power exerted through men’s convictions, and by their voluntary concurrence—was for ages the only counterpoise to the mere law of the strongest. From this peculiar position arose the separation of spiritual and temporal power: a fact peculiar to modern Europe, and to which M. Guizot attributes a most salutary influence upon her civilization. It is certain that wherever spiritual and temporal authority have been concentrated in the same hands, civilization has stopped at an early stage. And it is difficult to estimate in how much worse a condition we should now have been, if the great struggle of the middle ages, between the feudal monarchy and aristocracy, and the Romish hierarchy, had terminated in the complete victory of either.

Lastly, to the northern invaders we are indebted for one of our greatest peculiarities—the spirit of liberty, in the peculiar sense attached to the term in modern times: the spirit of personal independence, which repels the interference of the state with the private concerns of the individual: as distinguished from the spirit of liberty as understood in the ancient republics, which may be characterized as the successive sacrifice of each to all. Greek and Roman liberty did not mean that the power exercised by the community over the persons composing it, should be no greater than was conducive to their well-being; it meant that each of those persons should have an equal chance with any other person, of exercising a share of that power. The love of liberty, in the modern sense of the phrase, was repudiated by the notions prevalent in those commonwealths respecting the duties of a citizen. The imaginary being, the civitas, the πόλις, demanded the annihilation of every individuality. Every citizen was a perfect slave of the domineering principle, and of those who, for the time being, were its living representatives.

It is manifestly impossible, in an article like the present, to convey any but a most imperfect notion of the general character of M. Guizot’s historical speculations. We cannot follow him through the various periods of European history. At each period, his method is one and the same—the only method which a philosopher will ever use. He begins by familiarizing himself with the literature of the period, and any other evidences which it has left of its state of society. From these, when he has sufficiently imbued himself with their spirit, he learns what were at each period the causes actually at work, and within what limits each of those causes was operating. This being known, the general laws of human nature suffice to show of what kind must have been the influence exercised by each; and the conclusion is then tested by the history of the succeeding ages. Unless studied in this way, history is indeed nothing but an “old almanac,” and has neither any meaning of its own, nor throws light upon anything else.

We shall extract one specimen—a part of the observations on the feudal times, in the fourth lecture on the Civilization of Europe. Even when abridged, those observations exceed the ordinary dimensions of an extract; but the great interest of the subject, and the striking and original manner in which it is treated, are an ample justification for the space which our quotation occupies:

M. Guizot then examines the situation of the feudal landholders, relatively to one another. He observes, that from their mutual relations to each other, and to their liege lord, there naturally grew up in their minds some notions of mutual obligation, of fidelity, of adherence to engagements, of devotion to a common interest; but that the attempt to convert these moral sentiments into legal obligations, and to create national institutions and a regular government, always failed; and failed inevitably: for it was an attempt to establish, in a rude state of society, that kind of government, the existence of which is only possible in high civilization,—a federal government. He then sums up the general results of the feudal system as follows:

This is followed by further remarks, showing that the history of the times confirms the view here taken of the influences of feudality.

Every one who reads these quotations must, if we mistake not, experience the twofold sentiment most complimentary to a philosophic writer, conviction that here is at length the true and commanding view of a great subject; and astonishment that truths so simple and apparently obvious should not have been as distinctly perceived and as prominently brought forward by former writers. It is scarcely exaggeration to say that M. Guizot’s work excites these feelings continually.

It ought not, however, to be suppressed, that while the work abounds in such luminous views as those which we have been following up with delight, the attentive reader will nevertheless perceive here and there something like a half-suppressed or gently-breathed sigh of the author for that very unity of society which he himself has so ably demonstrated to be both injurious to the true interests of civilization in general, and particularly opposed to the essential character of our own.

In the masterly picture which M. Guizot draws of the Church and its civilizing influence, from the fourth to the thirteenth century, he dwells with particular pleasure on the unity of that body. He calls that unity a glorious and powerful fact.^* The unity of the Church alone (he proceeds) was the bond which kept together the various nations, which lay like unconnected fragments of the fallen Roman empire. The notion of this union contained the rudiments (though confused and greatly distorted) not only of a vast and comprehensive sympathy, but (he says) of the grandest and most enlarged conception which ever rallied human beings round it—that of a spiritual human society: i.e., mankind reduced to one vast family, united by means of the moral and intellectual faculties. From the fifth to the thirteenth century (says M. Guizot) this idea of the Church rendered great services to mankind:

Were it not for a few of the concluding lines, the passage just quoted might be supposed to be from the pen of the most mystical and puzzle-headed divine on this side of the Channel. What could M. Guizot mean by the assertion that “an intellectual union is the only true society;” that “men cannot live together unless they all partake of one and the same feeling, arising from one or more facts, so that the single fact, or if there be many, each of them may be agreed upon as truth by all?” Of what facts does he assert all this? Are they physical, political, or historical facts? Does he maintain the notion of the Church of Rome, and indeed of the Protestant churches which still cherish an essential part of its spirit—the notion that Christianity, as an historical belief, is the basis of true society? Does he forget the testimony of universal history to the fact that the social nature of man will avail itself of the merest trifles to form and maintain associations for power and defence? There is an inaccuracy of language, a confusion of ideas in all this, which betrays a mind under a paroxysm of that weakness which is often occasioned by a temporary ascendency of early habits and feelings over the convictions of the mind. It is a curious fact, that our author was here inspired—will our readers believe it?—by M. de la Mennais, from whom he borrows one of the mystical principles asserted in the passage.^* This was certainly not accidental. There are other portions of M. Guizot’s lectures which have not a little perplexed us during the considerable period which we have devoted to the study of that excellent work; but which his political conduct, and, above all, his share in the recent attempt to put down the freedom of the press, has painfully explained.^[†] M. Guizot is evidently one of those men who, to a clear view of the soundest principles, join an unconquerable attachment to institutions and practices which militate against them. No writer ever pleaded the cause of intellectual freedom with more power of argument; and yet, having done this, he can turn a wistful eye to some of those nebulous spots which float in the full light that surrounds us at the present day: he can speak of the “limits and rights of authority in the intellectual and spiritual world” . . . “a purely moral authority, whose whole power lies in persuasion and example.” He complains that “in almost all Protestant countries there is something wanting—something imperfect in the organization of the intellectual society, so that the regular action of the established and ancient opinions is impeded. The rights of tradition have not been reconciled with those of liberty.”^* What, in the name of wonder, are the Rights of Tradition? How is the regular action of established and ancient, opinions to be encouraged by any organization, without encouraging the mischievous activity of established errors? Such indeed are the contradictory wishes of men who see the truth, but cannot make it part and parcel of their souls. This is what some men call moderation—namely, the assertion of a principle, combined with practical views and conduct in direct opposition to it. In this manner are the people lulled from year to year, and made to wait for a period when there shall be a constant succession of virtuous despots—a wealthy and pampered hierarchy, exempt from intolerance and pride—and perhaps a series of popes who will publish a jubilee with plenary indulgence, to encourage the philosophers of Europe to hold a public meeting in the Capitol. M. Guizot’s inconsistencies, admiring his works as we do, raise more of regret than anger in our heart. He seems to have been fully aware of the temptations to which he was exposed. We remember a passage, which we shall lay before our readers in the original language, lest it should lose part of its force in a translation: it is to be found at the very opening of his first course of published lectures. In a most eloquent conclusion to the first lecture he observes, that people indulge an unlimited ambition in thought, demanding instantaneous wonders, and nevertheless, when it comes to practice, content themselves with the most imperfect means: fluctuating between the most exaggerated sense of existing evils, and the most easy acquiescence in any supposed remedy which first occurs.^[*] Then he adds:

How lamentable that a man who has this clear view of his mental danger should forget to apply this wise caution to himself when he most wanted it! How unfortunate that he did not stumble on this passage when the practice of stopping men’s mouths—when the laws for the suppression of free thought on public concerns—when the principles of the deposed Bourbons—when the policy of the most abominable tyrants, were courting his support and official sanction! Alas! we must say of M. Guizot, what he so feelingly and truly has declared of Italy—“Il lui manque la foi, la foi dans la vérité!”^*

We had prepared not a few observations on the civilizing power of the Church, to which so large a part of M. Guizot’s lectures relate; but we are obliged to put them aside until a better opportunity. In the present state of things, when not only history, but facts which are taking place before our eyes, are constantly distorted to serve the interest of the hierarchy—a call to rectify the many false notions which the pious fraud of some, and the pious ignorance of others, industriously propagate and keep alive, for the honour of that imaginary being the Church, and the substantial benefit of the party which the law makes its representative, cannot fail to come upon us at no great distance of time. We shall conclude, therefore, by the mere statement of one or two remarks, with the truth of which we have been forcibly struck, in surveying, under the guidance of M. Guizot, European civilization in the successive stages of its development.

One truth, of which M. Guizot manifests a strong sense, and which cannot be too often enforced, is, that civilization (in the extended meaning in which he uses the word, to denote all kinds of improvement) is at present almost in its infancy. “I am persuaded,” says M. Guizot in his very first lecture,

Imperfect, however, as is our present state, a comparison of it with all those which have preceded leaves in M. Guizot’s mind no doubt of its superiority to them on the whole; and proves, too, that during all the time which has succeeded the destruction of the Roman empire, both society and human nature have been steadily, though slowly advancing. This progressive improvement has been attended with two circumstances sufficiently remarkable to deserve notice.

One is, that those changes which have proved most salutary in the end,—which, when we now look back to them, seem to have been the only means by which some great good could have been achieved, or some insuperable obstacle to further progress removed,—were mostly, in their origin, viewed with the utmost alarm and aversion; and were often considered even by the wisest and best men of the time, as pregnant with the most direful results. Thus, the feudal régime, the first step out of anarchy on the only road which could possibly lead to the reconstruction of a regular government, was looked upon by the most enlightened contemporaries with a kind of horror, as a breaking-up of society into fragments,^[*] and the final blow to that unity of the empire with which all their notions of security and of the social union were associated, and which even the vigorous hand of Charlemagne had vainly attempted to revive.^[†] So slow are mankind to perceive when the traditional ideas of their forefathers have ceased to be applicable, and when the time has come for pursuing old ends by new means.

The other remark is of a more encouraging kind: That no sincere and honestly intended effort for the good of mankind, aiming at right objects in the right spirit, even when it entirely failed of its meditated purpose, was ever entirely thrown away. Though the benefits which were intended were not at the time realized, every such attempt is fruitful in unforeseen good tendencies, which often meet with better fortune.^[‡] What, for example, could have appeared more utterly lost, than the efforts and sufferings of the heroic men who at various periods, from the commencement of the dark ages, asserted, even to the death, the independence of individual intellect against the pretended infallibility of popes and priesthoods? They perished—their bodies were torn limb from limb—the car of the idol to whom they were immolated passed over them, all voices which responded to them or bewailed them were reduced to silence, and the tyranny which they had made war upon, waxed in compactness and intensity for generations after their names had passed from the minds of all save those who remembered them to abhor them. Yet, even these men, who suffered so cruelly for what they had hoped and ventured in behalf of injured humanity, did not labour and suffer in vain. For though they could not avert from mankind the bondage they were not strong enough to break, they at least recorded on the archives of the human race their solemn and indignant protest against it. That protest did not perish, though they did. For in the lapse of ages, when more favourable times had at length arrived, and human nature was now ripe to free itself from its shackles, new and more fortunate inquirers searched into theological antiquity to verify the pretensions of spiritual despotism, and found there these men, and the memory of what they had done. That discovery broke the spell of the pretended universality on which the Romish hierarchy rested the very foundation of their empire. And no small share in the honour of the ultimate emancipation of the human mind belongs to those who perished obscurely, and as it seemed for ages afterwards, altogether unavailingly, in its cause.

[[*] ]John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough. For the story, see Mark Noble, A Biographical History of England from the Revolution to the End of George I’s Reign, 2 vols. (London: Richardson, et al., 1806), Vol. II, p. 189.

[[†] ]Oliver Goldsmith, The History of England, from the Earliest Times to the Death of George II, 4 vols. (London: Davies, et al., 1771).

[[‡] ]David Hume, The History of England (1756-62).

[* ]Two class-books have been for some years published in Germany, which might be used with advantage at the universities, if (what we cannot help calling) an affectation of extreme classical purity, besides other objections arising from want of uniformity in the studies carried on privately by the different colleges, did not preclude the use of such books. The titles of these works are Antiqua Historia ex ipsis veterum Scriptorum Latinorum narrationibus contexta, 2 vols., 8vo. [(Leipzig: Hahn, 1811)]—Antiqua Historia ex ipsis veterum Scriptorum Graecorum narrationibus contexta, 4 vols., 8vo. [(Leipzig: Weidmann, 1811-12).] Both are compiled by Jo. Godofr. Eichhorn. The latter work is printed on very bad paper, and abounds in typographical errors. But if ancient history should, at any future period, be made a regular and serious study, under a public professor, we conceive that no better text-books than these could be adopted. It is true that, as the various portions of the narrative are taken from different writers, the style is very unequal. But the passages from each writer are commonly very long, and all with references to the originals; so that this very circumstance might give occasion to appropriate remarks on the authors themselves, the periods to which they belong, and the peculiarities of their styles.—These observations are made in reference to the system of education at Oxford; but we have reason to believe that they are substantially applicable to Cambridge.

[* ]By terminal lectures those are understood which the public professors are, in some cases, expected, in others obliged (according to the foundation statute), to deliver every term.

[[*] ]Edward Nares.

[[†] ]The reference presumably is to such scholars as William Hayward Cox, Edmund Walker Head, Richard Michell, George Moberly, Frederick Oakeley, and Travers Twiss.

[* ]We need only allude to Thierry, Barante, Cousin, Villemain, and their numerous pupils and successors—together with the many writers who, without participating in its extravagances, have issued from the St. Simonian school. We confine our examples to those writers who may be considered to represent the new historical method of the present age in France: omitting those, however eminent, who might have been produced at any other period in the development of the national intellect.

[[*] ]Francis Palgrave, The Rise and Progress of the English Commonwealth, Anglo-Saxon Period, 2 pts. (London: Murray, 1832), Pt. I, p. 519n (presumably), and Pt. II (“Proofs and Illustrations”), p. ccclxxxix n. But there is a full acknowledgment to Guizot’s Essais, Pt. I, pp. 528n-9n, and other references to Guizot in the text and notes (usually finding slight fault), e.g., Pt. I, pp. 514n, 542-3 (and note), and 545-6 (and note). Palgrave’s reference is to Gabriel Bonnot de Mably, Observations sur l’histoire de France (1765), new ed., rev. Guizot, 3 vols. (Paris: Brière, 1823), with which was published the 1st ed. of Guizot’s Essais.

[* ]Of the universality and density of this ignorance, striking instances are continually offering themselves. In the present year, 1835, a new Review, calling itself the British and Foreign, and professing to devote peculiar attention to foreign literature and philosophy—in an introductory address, written generally in a liberal spirit, speaks of the obligations of the human mind to France in the present era as limited to “what we owe to the modern chemists, natural historians, mathematicians, and astronomers of France.” [Christopher Bird, “Introduction,” British and Foreign Review, I (July-Oct., 1835), 9.] The writer was evidently unaware that France had, since the Revolution, produced a single distinguished name in any other department. And it is our firm conviction, that most of the literary men of celebrity in Great Britain at the present time are ignorant of the very existence of any French writers of eminence (except, indeed, Madame de Staël) posterior to Voltaire and Rousseau: although it is a fact, recognised by all the rest of Europe, that the last twenty years are the most brilliant period in the literary history of France—a period in which she has not only produced her very greatest writer (Paul-Louis Courier), and a host of first-rate works in the most various departments, but in which the tone and character of French intellect has undergone a complete transformation.

[[*] ]Christophe Guillaume de Koch, Tableau des révolutions de l’Europe, depuis le bouleversement de l’empire d’occident jusqu’à nos jours (Lausanne and Strasbourg: Bauer, 1771).

[[†] ]Abrégé de l’histoire des traités de paix entre les puissances de l’Europe depuis la paix de Westphalie, 4 vols. (Basle: Decker, 1796-97).

[[‡] ]Maximilian Samson Friedrich Schoell, who reissued Koch’s work as Histoire abrégée des traités de paix. . . . Ouvrage entièrement refondu, augmenté et continué jusqu’au Congrès de Vienne et aux Traités de Paris de 1815, 15 vols. (Paris: Gide, 1817-18).

[[*] ]Civilisation en Europe, pp. 15-19.

[[*] ]Translated from Civilisation en France, Vol. I, p. 12.

[[*] ]See, e.g., Pierre Philippe Emmanuel, marquis de Coulanges, “Extrait d’un manuscrit de M. de Coulanges, intitulé: Relation de mon voyage d’Allemagne et d’Italie ez années 1657 et 1658,” in Mémoires (Paris: Blaise, 1820), pp. 13-16, and Antoine, duc de Gramont, Mémoires du maréchal de Gramont, in Collections des mémoires relatifs à l’histoire de France, ed. Claude Bernard Petitot, 2nd ser., 78 vols., (Paris: Foucault, 1820-29), Vol. LVI, pp. 463-4, 477, Vol. LVII, pp. 4-5.

[[†] ]Translated from Civilisation en France, Vol. I, p. 15.

[* ]“Dono infelice di bellezza.” [Vincenzio da] Filicaja [“All Italia, Sonnetto I,” Poesie toscane (Florence: Matini, 1707), p. 320 (l. 2)].

[[*] ]Translated from Civilisation en France, Vol. I, pp. 18-19.

[[*] ]Translated from ibid., pp. 20-1.

[* ]See Goethe’s Wilhelm Meister, [in Werke, 55 vols.] (Stuttgart and Tübingen [. Cotta’schen Buchhandlung, 1828-33]), Vol. XIX, p. 239.

[[*] ]Civilisation en Europe, pp. 6-8.

[[*] ]Translated from ibid., Lecture 2, p. 5.

[[*] ]Translated from ibid., pp. 6-8.

[[†] ]Ibid., pp. 12-39.

[[*] ]De l’esprit des loix, Vol. I, pp. 360-443 (Bks. XIV-XVII).

[[*] ]See p. 284 above.

[[*] ]Translated from Civilisation en Europe, Lecture 4, pp. 9-21.

[[*] ]Translated from ibid., pp. 30-2.

[* ][Translated from] Civilisation en France, Lecture 12 [Vol. I, p. 424].

[[*] ]Translated from ibid., pp. 424-7.

[* ]Ibid., p. 425. [See Hugues Félicité Robert de La Mennais, Essai sur l’indifférence en matière de religion, 4 vols. (Paris: Tournach-Molin, et al., 1817-23), Vol. I, pp. 321-4.]

[[†] ]Loi sur les crimes, délits et contraventions de la presse et des autres moyens de publication, Bulletin 155, No. 356 (9 Sept., 1835), Bulletin des lois du royaume de France, 9th ser., Pt. I, VII, 247-56; Loi sur les cours d’assises, Bulletin 155, No. 357, ibid., pp. 256-9; and Loi qui rectifie les articles 341, 345, 346, 347 et 352 du code d’instruction criminelle, et l’article 17 du code pénal, Bulletin 155, No. 358, ibid., pp. 259-62.

[* ][Translated from] Civilisation en Europe, Lecture 12 [pp. 29-30].

[[*] ]Ibid., Lecture 1, pp. 32-3.

[† ]Ibid., p. 33.

[* ]Civilisation en France, Vol. I, p. 17.

[[*] ]Translated from Civilisation en Europe, Lecture 1, pp. 30-1.

[[*] ]Ibid., Lecture 4, p. 7.

[[†] ]Ibid., Lecture 3, pp. 27-9.

[[‡] ]Ibid., Lecture 6, pp. 7-9.