243 Lastly, Mr. Gladstone must beware how he again commits himself to a long period of bewildering opposition. Office is a steadying situation. A minister has means of learning from his colleagues, from his subordinates, from unnumbered persons who are only too ready to give him information what the truth is, and what public opinion is. Opposition, on the other hand, is an exciting and a misleading situation. The bias of every one who is so placed is to oppose the ministry. Yet on a hundred questions the ministry are likely to be right. They have special information, long consultations, skilled public servants to guide them. On most points there is no misleading motive. Every minister decides, to the best of his ability, upon most of the questions which come before him. A bias to oppose him, therefore, is always dangerous. It is peculiarly dangerous to those in whom the contentious impulse is strong, whose life is in debate. If Mr. Gladstone's mind is to be kept in a useful track, it must be by the guiding influence of office; by an exemption from the misguiding influence of opposition. No one desires more than we do that Mr. Gladstone's future course should be enriched, not only with oratorical fame, but with useful power. Such gifts as his are amongst the rarest that are given to men; they are amongst the most valuable; they are singularly suited to our parliamentary life. England cannot afford to lose such a man. If in the foregoing pages we have seemed often to find fault, it has not been for the sake of finding fault. It is necessary that England should comprehend Mr. Gladstone. If the country have not a true conception of a great statesman, his popularity will be capricious, his irregular, and his usefulness insecure. power BOOKS OF THE QUARTER SUITABLE FOR READING SOCIETIES. Modern Painters, Vol. V., completing the work, and containing: Part Lord Macaulay's Miscellaneous Writings. 2 vols. Longman. [Containing many striking essays of Lord Macaulay not previously collected; as, for example, the remarkable essay on Barère.] Metaphysics; or, the Philosophy of Consciousness, Phenomenal and Real. By Henry Longueville Mansel, B.D. Black. [A reprint from the Encyclopædia Britannica. The "Phenomenal" section is distinguished by Mr. Mansel's well-known acuteness; the "Ontological" section reproduces the views on which we have commented in former Numbers.] The Province of Reason: a Criticism of the Bampton Lecture on the "Limits of Religious Thought." By John Young, LL.D. Smith and Elder. [The author has got well hold of the fundamental errors in Mr. Mansel's book, but his treatment of them is not very satisfactory.] Christ in Life: Life in Christ. By J. C. M. Bellew. Chapman and Hall. [Eloquent, and marked by the characteristic faults and merits of eloquence.] Glimpses of the Heaven that lies about us. By T. E. Poynting. Whitfield. [The second part of this book is a very thoughtful and valuable contribution to the philosophy of science, which we should have preferred to have had alone. It deserves careful study.] Thoughts in Aid of Faith, gathered chiefly from recent works in Theology and Philosophy. By Sara S. Hennell. George Manwaring. [We would be the last to deny that these thoughts are an aid to Miss Hennell's faith. They are earnest, intelligent, and candid. But the Pantheistic Positivism they preach, compounded of Comte, Spencer, Buckle, and Strauss, would aid our faith only as the study of negatives aids us in grasping affirmatives.] Memorials of Thomas Hood. Collected, arranged, and edited by his Daughter; with a Preface and Notes by his Son. Illustrated with many Copies from his own Sketches. Edward Moxon. Books of the Quarter suitable for Reading-Societies. 245 Autobiographical Recollections. By the late Charles Robert Leslie, R.A. Edited, with a Prefatory Essay on Leslie as an Artist, and Selections from his Correspondence, by Tom Taylor, Esq. 2 vols. Murray. [A very amusing book, full of point and anecdote.] Life of Sir Martin Archer Shee, President of the Royal Academy. By his Son, M. A. Shee, Esq. 2 vols. Longmans. Sketch of the Life and Character of Sir Robert Peel. By Sir Lawrence Peel. Longmans. [Not excellent, though both the eminence of the writer and his relationship to the subject of the biography will ensure it a certain measure of attention.] Filippo Strozzi: a History of the Last Days of Old Italian Liberty. By T. Adolphus Trollope. Chapman and Hall. Robert Owen and his Social Philosophy. By William Lucas Sargant. Smith and Elder. [A respectable book on a subject of more than ordinary capabilities.] The Arrest of the Five Members. By John Forster. Murray. [A book of sterling value, containing much new detail, and rich illustrations from D'Ewes' Journal and the public records in the State-Paper Office, though bringing out no new feature of any great importance. The inaccuracies of Clarendon are examined and exposed. In form the book is too discontinuous, and too much encumbered with notes.] The History of Italy from the Abdication of Napoleon I.; with Introductory References to that of Earlier Times. By Isaac Butt, M.P. 2 vols. Chapman and Hall. Wycliffe and the Huguenots; or, Sketches of the Rise of the Reformation in England, and of the early History of Protestantism in France. By the Rev. W. Hanna, LL.D. Constable. Rights of Nations; or, the New Law of European States applied to the Affairs of Italy. By Count Mamiani. Translated and edited by Roger Acton. Jeffs. [A work well worthy of the careful translation it has here obtained.] The Lake Regions of Central Africa. By Captain Richard F. Burton. With Map and Illustrations. 2 vols. Longmans. A Summer Ramble in the Himalayas; with Sporting Adventures in the Vale of Cashmere. Edited by Mountaineer. Hurst and Blackett. The Hunting Grounds of the Old World. By the Old Shekarry. Saunders and Otley. An Arctic Boat-Journey in the Autumn of 1854. By Isaac Hayes. Bentley. [Full of interest, in consequence both of the light cast on the character of the Esquimaux and of the Arctic adventure.] 246 Books of the Quarter suitable for Reading-Societies. The Travels and Adventures of Dr. Wolff, the Bokhara Missionary. Second edition. Vol. I. Saunders and Otley. Travels, Researches, and Missionary Labours in East Africa. By the Rev. Dr. J. Lewis Krapf. With Portrait and coloured Illustrations of Scenery and Costume. Trübner. Wild Sports of India. By Captain Henry Shakespear. Smith and Elder. [An unaffected and interesting account of perilous sports.] A Sketch of the History of Flemish Literature and its celebrated Authors from the 12th century down to the present time. By Octave Delepierre, LL.D. Compiled from Flemish sources. Mur ray. Town and Forest. By the Author of "Mary Powell." Bentley. [Contains a pleasant and fresh account of missionary labours among the gipsies of Hainault Forest.] Scarsdale; or, Life on the Lancashire and Yorkshire Border Thirty Years ago. Smith and Elder. Stories from the Sandhills of Jutland. By Hans Christian Andersen. Bentley. [One of Mr. Andersen's most charming collections of tales.] Castle Richmond. By Anthony Trollope. 3 vols. Chapman and Hall. [Not one of Mr. Trollope's most highly-finished novels, but interesting, lively, and vigorous.] A Lady in her own Right. By Westland Marston. Macmillan. The Mill on the Floss. By George Eliot. 3 vols. Blackwood. [Noticed in Article X.] THE NATIONAL REVIEW. OCTOBER 1860. ART. I.-THE FRANKS AND THE GAULS. The Franks, from their first Appearance in History to the Death of King Pepin. By Walter C. Perry. London, 1857. The History of France. By Eyre Evans Crowe. Vols. I. and II. London, 1858-60. The History of France. By Parke Godwin. Vol. I.: Ancient Gaul. London and New York, 1860. WE think it right, at the beginning of this Article, to tell our readers exactly what we are going to talk about, and what we are not. Though we have transcribed the names of three books as the beginning of our task, we are not going minutely to criticise any one of the three. We are not going to plunge into any antiquarian minutiae about the settlement of the Franks in Gaul, or to perplex ourselves and our readers with any questions as to Leudes, Antrustions, and Scabini. Still less are we about to enter on the disputed ground of Gaulish or British ethnology, to trace out the exact line of demarcation between the Gael and the Cymry, or to decide the exact relations of the Belge either to them or to their Teutonic neighbours. Both these subjects possess an interest and an importance which we should be the last to depreciate. And of the books which stand at the head of this Article, two at least might be well worthy of a formal review. The volumes both of Mr. Perry and Mr. Godwin have considerable merit; Mr. Godwin, especially, displays no small amount of the true historic power, though his book is throughout strangely disfigured by errors in detail. But neither the subjects nor the books form our immeNo. XXII. OCTOBER 1860. 8 |