other nation can, from the skill of its workmen, or from the bounty of nature, afford to supply at a lower rate. From this it followed, that, in a mercantile point of view, it would be as absurd to attempt to impoverish a people with whom we trade, as it would be in a tradesman to wish for the insolvency of a rich and frequent customer. The result is that the commercial spirit, which formerly was often warlike, is now invariably pacific. And although it is perfectly true that not one merchant out of a hundred is familiar with the arguments on which these economical discoveries are founded, that does not prevent the effect which the discoveries themselves produce on his own mind. The mercantile class is, like every other, acted upon by causes which only a few members of that class are able to perceive. Thus, for instance, of all the innumerable opponents of protection, there are very few indeed who can give valid reasons to justify their opposition. But this does not prevent the opposition from taking place. For an immense majority of men always follow with implicit submission the spirit of their own time; and the spirit of the time is merely its knowledge, and the direction that knowledge takes. As, in the ordinary avocations of daily life, every one is benefited, in the increase of his comforts, and of his general security, by the progress of many arts and sciences, of which perhaps he does not even know the name, just so is the mercantile class benefited by the great economical discoveries which, in the course of two generations, have already effected a complete change in the commercial legislation of this country, and which are now operating slowly, but steadily, upon those other European states where, public opinion being less powerful, it is more difficult to establish great truths and extirpate old abuses. While, therefore, it is perfectly true, that among merchants, a comparatively small number are acquainted with political economy, it is not the less true that they owe a large part of their wealth to the political economists; who, by removing the obstacles with which the ignorance of successive governments had impeded trade, have now settled on a solid foundation that commercial prosperity which is by no means the least of our national glories. Most assured ly is it also true, that this same intellectual movement has lessened the chance of war, by ascertaining the principles which ought to regulate our commercial relations with foreign countries; by proving, not only the inutility, but the positive mischief, caused by interfering with them; and finally, by exploding those long-established errors, which, inducing men to believe that nations are the natural enemies of each other, encouraged those evil feelings, and fostered those national jealousies, to the strength of which the military spirit owed no small share of its former influence. The third great cause by which the love of war has been weakened, is the way in which discoveries respecting the application of Steam to the purposes of travelling have facilitated the intercourse between different countries, and thus aided in destroying that ignorant contempt which one nation is too apt to feel for another. Thus, for instance, the miserable and impudent falsehoods which a large class of English writers formerly directed against the morals and private character of the French, and to their shame be it said, even against the chastity of French women, tended not a little to embitter the angry feelings then existing between the two first countries of Europe; irritating the English against French vices, irritating the French against English calumnies. In the same way, there was a time when every honest Englishman firmly believed that he could beat ten Frenchmen; a class of beings whom he held in sovereign contempt, as a lean and stunted race, who drank claret instead of brandy, who lived entirely off frogs; miserable infidels, who heard mass every Sunday, who bowed down before idols, and who even worshipped the Pope. On the other hand, the French was taught to despise us, as rude unlettered barbarians, without either taste or humanity; surly, ill-conditioned men, living in an unhappy climate, where a perpetual fog only varied by rain, prevented the sun from ever being seen; suffering from so deep and inveterate melancholy, that physicians had called it the English spleen; and under the influence of this cruel malady constantly committing suicide, particularly in November, when we were well known to hang and shoot ourselves by thousands. Whoever has looked much into the older literature of France and England knows that these were the opinions which the two first nations of Europe, in the ignorance and simplicity of their hearts, held respecting each other. But the progress of improvement, by bringing the two countries frequency with which nations and individuals are brought into contact, have, to an extraordinary extent, corrected their preju dices, raised the opinion which each formed of the other, diminished their mutual hostility, and thus diffusing a more favorable view of our common nature, have stimulated us to develop those boundless resources of the human understanding, the very existence of which it was once considered almost a heresy to assert. This is precisely what has occurred in modern Europe. The French and English people have, by the mere force of increased contact, learned to think more favorably of each other, and to discard that foolish contempt in which both nations formerly indulged. In this, as in all cases, the better one civilized country is acquainted with another, the more it will find to respect and to imitate. For of all the causes of national hatred, ignorance is the most powerful. When you increase the contact, you remove the ignorance, and thus you diminish the hatred. This is the true bond of charity; and it is worth all the lessons which moralists and divines are able to teach. They have pursued their vocation for centuries, without producing the least effect in lessening the frequency of war. But it may be said without the slightest exaggeration, that every new railroad which is laid down, and every fresh steamer which crosses the Channel, are additional guarantees for the preservation of that long and unbroken peace which, during forty years, has knit together the fortunes and the interests of the two most civilized nations of the earth. into close and intimate contact, has dissi- | communication, which, by increasing the pated these foolish prejudices, and taught each people to admire, and what is still more important, to respect each other. And the greater the contact, the greater the respect. For, whatever theologians may choose to assert, it is certain that mankind at large has far more virtue than vice, and that in every country good actions are more frequent than bad ones. Indeed, if this were otherwise, the preponderance of evil would long since have destroyed the human race, and not even have left a single man to lament the degeneracy of his species. An additional proof of this is the fact, that the more nations associate with each other, and the more they see and know of their fellowcreatures, the more quickly do ancient enmities disappear. This is because an enlarged experience proves that mankind is not so radically bad as we from our infancy are taught to believe. But if vices were really more frequent than virtues, the result would be, that the increasing amalgamation of society would increase our bad opinion of others; because, though we may love our own vices, we do not generally love the vices of our neighbors. So far, however, is this from being the actual consequence, that it has always been found that those whose extensive knowledge makes them best acquainted with the general course of human actions, are precisely those who take the most favorable view of them. The greatest observer and the most profound thinker is invariably the most lenient judge. It is the solitary misanthrope, brooding over his fancied wrongs, who is most prone to depreciate the good qualities of our nature, and exaggerate its bad ones. Or else it is some foolish and ignorant monk, who, dreaming away his existence in an idle solitude, flatters his own vanity by denouncing the vices of others: and thus declaiming against the enjoyments of life, revenges himself on that society from which by his own superstition he is excluded. These are the sort of men who insist most strongly on the corruption of our nature and on the degeneracy into which we have fallen. The enormous evils which such opinions have brought about, is well understood by those who have studied the history of countries in which they are, and have been most prevalent. Hence it is that, among the innumerable benefits derived from advancing knowledge, there are few more important than those improved facilities of I have thus, so far as my knowledge will permit, endeavoured to indicate the causes which have diminished religious persecution and war; the two greatest evils with which men have yet contrived to afflict their fellow-creatures. The question of the decline of religious persecution I have only briefly noticed, because it will be more fully handled in a subsequent part of this volume. Enough, however, has been advanced to prove how essentially it is an intellectual process, and how little good can be effected on this subject by the operation of moral feelings. The causes of the decline of the warlike spirit I have examined at considerable, and, perhaps, to some readers a tedious length, and the result of that examination has been, that the decline is owing to the increase of the intellectual classes, to whom the military classes are necessarily antago- | for some centuries, advanced sufficiently far nistic. In pushing the inquiry a little deeper, to shake off the influence of those physical we have, by still further analysis, ascer- agencies by which in an earlier state their tained the existence of three vast though career might have been troubled; and that subsidiary causes, by which the general although the moral agencies are still powermovement has been accelerated. These are ful, and still cause occasional disturbances, -the invention of Gunpowder, the discove- these are but aberrations, which, if we comries of Political Economy, and the discovery pare long periods of time, balance each of improved means of Locomotion. Such other, and thus in the total amount entirely are the three great modes or channels by disappear. So that, in a great and comprewhich the progress of knowledge has weak- hensive view, the changes in every civilized ened the old warlike spirit; and the way in people are, in their aggregate, dependent which they have effected this has, I trust, solely on three things; first, on the amount been clearly pointed out. The facts and of knowledge possessed by their ablest men; arguments which I have brought forward secondly, on the direction which that knowhave, I can conscientiously say, been sub- ledge takes, that is to say, the sort of subjects jected to careful and repeated scrutiny; and to which it refers; thirdly, and above all, on I am quite unable to say on what possible the extent to which the knowledge is diffused, ground their accuracy is to be impugned. and the freedom with which it pervades all That they will be disagreeable to certain classes of society. classes, I am well aware; but the unpleasantness of a statement is hardly to be considered as proof of its falsehood. The sources from which the evidence has been derived are fully indicated; and the arguments, I hope, fairly stated. And from them there results a most important conclusion. From them we are bound to infer, that the two oldest, greatest, most inveterate, and most widely-spread evils which have ever been known, are constantly, though, on the whole, slowly, diminishing; and that their diminution has been effected, not all by moral feelings, nor by moral teachings, but solely by the activity of the human intellect, and by the inventions and discoveries which, in a long course of successive ages, man has been able to make. Since, then, in the two most important phenomena which the progress of society presents, the moral laws have been steadily and invariably subordinate to the intellectual laws, there arises a strong presumption that in inferior matters the same process has been followed. To prove this in its full extent, and thus raise the presumption to an absolute certainty, would be to write, not an Introduction to history, but the History itself. The reader must, therefore, be satisfied for the present with what, I am conscious, is merely an approach towards demonstration; and the complete demonstration must necessarily be reserved for the future volumes of this work: in which I pledge myself to show that the progress Europe has made from barbarism to civilization is entirely due to its intellectual activity; that the leading countries have now, These are the three great movers of every civilized country; and although their operation is frequently disturbed by the vices or the virtues of powerful individuals, such moral feelings correct each other, and the average of long periods remains unaffected. Owing to causes of which we are ignorant, the moral qualities do, no doubt, constantly vary; so that in one man, or perhaps even in one generation, there will be an excess of good intentions; in another an excess of bad ones. But we have no reason to think that any permanent change has been effected in the proportion which those who naturally possess good intentions bear to those in whom bad ones seem to be inherent. In what may be called the innate and original morals of mankind, there is, so far as we are aware, no progress. Of the different passions with which we are born, some are more prevalent at one time, some at another; but experience teaches us that, as they are always antagonistic, they are held in balance by the force of their own opposition. The activity of one motive is corrected by the activity of another. For to every vice there is a corresponding virtue. Cruelty is counteracted by benevolence; sympathy is excited by suffering; the injustice of some provokes the charity of others; new evils are met by new remedies, and even the most enormous offences that have ever been known have left behind them no permanent impression. The desolation of countries and the slaughter of men are losses which never fail to be repaired, and at the distance of a few centuries every vestige of them is effaced. The gigantic crimes of Alexander and Napoleon become after a time void of| effect, and the affairs of the world return to their former level. This is the ebb and flow of history, and the perpetual flux to which by the laws of our nature we are subject. Above all this, there is a far higher movement; and as the tide rolls on, now advancing, now receding, there is, amid its endless fluctuations, one thing, and one alone, which endures forever. The actions of bad men produce only temporary evil, the actions of good men only temporary good; and eventually the good and the evil altogether subside, are neutralized by subsequent generations, absorbed by the incessant movements of future ages. But the discoveries of great men never leave us; they are immortal, they contain those eternal truths which survive the shock of empires, outlive the struggles of rival creeds, and witness the decay of successive religions. All these have their different measures and their different standards; one set of opinions for one age, another set for another. They pass away like a dream; they are as the fabric of a vision, which leaves not a rack behind. The discoveries of genius alone remain; it is to them we owe all that we now have; they are for all ages and for all times; never young, and never old, they bear the seeds of their own life; they flow on in a perennial and undying stream; they are essentially cumulative, and, giving birth to the additions which they subsequently receive, and thus influence the most distant posterity, and after the lapse of centuries produce more effect than they were able to do even at the moment of their promulgation. FROM "THE HISTORY OF CIVILIZATION." THE BLUE AND THE GRAY. [FRANCIS M. FINCH, a lawyer of Ithaca, N. Y., has written "The Blue and the Gray," one of the most striking lyrics of the civil war period, and other poems.] By the flow of the inland river, Whence the fleets of iron have fled, Under the one, the Blue, Under the other, the Gray. These in the robings of glory, All with the battle-blood gory, Under the willow, the Gray. Alike for the friend and the foe :- Under the lilies, the Gray. Waiting the judgment day; Waiting the judgment day; Wet with the rain, the Gray. Waiting the judgment day; Tears and love for the Gray. THE DEATH OF ANTONY. [The author of this Poem was CAPTAIN W. H. LYTLE, U. S. A., who was wounded and died at Chickamauga.] "I am dying, Egypt, dying."-SHAKESPEARE. I am dying, Egypt, dying, Ebbs the crimson life-tide fast, And the dark, Plutonian shadows Gather on the evening blast. Let thine arm, O Queen, support me ! Hush thy sobs and bow thine ear! Hearken to the great heart secrets Thou, and thou alone, must hear. Though my scarred and veteran legions I must perish like a Roman, Let not Cæsar's servile minions Mock the lion thus laid low; "T was no foeman's hand that felled him, "T was his own that struck the blow. His who, pillowed on thy bosom, Turned aside from glory's ray, Should the base plebeian rabble Weeps within her widowed home, And for thee, star-eyed Egyptian! Glorious sorceress of the Nile! Light the path to Stygian horrors With the splendors of thy smile: Give the Cæsar crowns and arches, Let his brow the laurel twine, I can scorn the Senate's triumphs, Triumphing in love like thine. I am dying, Egypt, dying; Shall my heart exulting swell! Isis and Osiris guard thee, WILLIAM H. LYTLE. TOUSSAINT L'OUVERTURE. [WENDELL PHILLIPS, widely renowned in America as a platform orator, comes of the oldest Puritan stock of New England. Born in Boston, Nov. 29, 1811; he was educated at Harvard, admitted to the bar in 1834, but as early as 1837 relinquished professional life for the cause with which his name has since been most conspicuously identified. One of the most brilliant and gifted orators that ever became the apostle of human rights; his earnestness, logical powers, beauty of diction, commanding presence, and persuasive eloquence quickly placed him at the head of the great army of public speakers, and threw even the silver-tongued Everett into the shade. Mr. Phillips has added the advocacy of prohibitory temperance laws and woman's right to the ballot, to the unpopular causes of which he has been the champion, and for more than thirty years he spoke on every platform, and always without pay. His style, of which the following passage is a fair specimen, abounds in keen analysis, copious historical and personal illustrations, brilliant paradox, and powerful invective. He died in 1884.] If I stood here to-night to tell the story of Napoleon, I should take it from the lips of Frenchmen, who find no language rich enough to paint the great captain of the nineteenth century. Were I here to tell you the story of Washington, I should take it from your hearts,-you, who think no marble white enough on which to carve the name of the Father of his Country. I am about to tell you the story of a negro who has hardly left one written line. I am to glean it from the reluctant testimony of Britons, Frenchmen, Spaniards-men, who despised him as a negro and a slave, and hated him because he had beaten them in many a battle. All the materials for his biography are from the lips of his enemies. Let us pause a moment, and find something to measure him by. You remember, Macaulay says, comparing Cromwell with Napoleon, that Cromwell shows the greater military genius, if we consider that he never saw an army till he was forty; while Napoleon was educated from a boy in the best military schools in Europe. Cromwell manufactured his own army; Napoleon at the age of twenty-seven was placed at the head of the best troops Europe ever saw. They were both successful; but, says Macaulay, with such disadvantages, the Englishman showed the greater genius. Whether you allow the inference or not, you will at least grant that it is a fair mode of measure ment. Apply it to Toussaint. Cromwell never saw an army till he was forty; this man never saw a soldier till he was fifty. Cromwell manufactured his own army-out of what? Englishmen-the best blood in Europe. Out of the middle class of Englishmen-the best blood in the island. And |