undue respect for authority. Such and such are the meanings of these words, says the teacher or the dictionary. So and so is the rule in this case, says the grammar. By the pupil these dicta are received as unquestionable. His constant attitude of mind is that of submission to dogmatic authority. And a necessary result is a tendency to accept without inquiry whatever is established. Quite opposite is the attitude of mind generated by the cultivation of science. By science, constant appeal is made to individual reason. Its truths are not accepted upon authority alone; but all are at liberty to test them, nay, in many cases, the pupil is required to think out his own conclusions. Every step in a scientific conclusion is submitted to his judgment. He is not asked to admit it without seeing it to be true. And the trust in his own powers thus produced is further increased by the constancy with which Nature justifies his conclusions when they are correctly drawn. From all which there flows that independence which is a most valuable element in character. Nor is this the only moral benefit bequeathed by scientific culture. When carried on, as it should always be, as much as possible under the form of independent research, it exercises perseverance and sincerity.

Education: Intellectual, Moral, and Physical.

GOLDWIN SMITH, LL.D., born 1823, at Reading, England, where hist father was a physician, was educated at Eton, and entered at Christ Church, Oxford, but was shortly afterwards elected to a demyship at Magdalene College; took his degree of B.A. in 1845, having obtained the Ireland and Hertford Scholarship and the Chancellor's Prize for Latin verse, and was subsequently elected Fellow of University College, of which he became Tutor; called to the Bar at Lincoln's Inn in 1850, but did not practise; acted as Assistant Secretary to the first Oxford Commission (that of Inquiry), and as Secretary to the second; and was a member of the Education Commission of 1859; Regius Professor of Modern History in the University of Oxford, 1858 to July, 1866, and since his resignation has delivered many lectures in advocacy of political Reform, of which he is one of the most influential champions; Professor of English and General Constitutional History in Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, 1868.

An Inaugural Lecture delivered at Oxford, Oxf. and Lond., 1859, 8vo; On the Foundation of the American Colonies, 1861,

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8vo; On the Study of History, 1861, 8vo; On some Supposed Consequences of the Doctrine of Historical Progress, Oxf. and Lond., 1861, 8vo; Lectures on Modern History, delivered at Oxford, 1859-61, 1861, 8vo; Rational Religion and the Rationalistic Objections of the Bampton Lectures for 1858, Oxf., 1861, 8vo; Irish History and Irish Character, Oxf. and Lond., 1861, 8vo; An Oxford Professor on Church Endowments, Lond., 1862; The Empire, Oxf., 1863, p. 8vo; Does the Bible sanction American Slavery? 1863, p. 8vo; A Letter to a Whig Member of the Southern Independence Association, 2d edit., Lond. and Camb., 1864, cr. 8vo (in favour, as are others of his publications, of the Federal Government of the United States); A Plea for the Abolition of Tests in the University of Oxford, Oxf., 1864, cr. 8vo; England and America, Bost., 1865, 8vo; Speeches and Letters, from Jan. 1863 to Jan. 1865, on the Rebellion, New York, 1865, 2 vols. 8vo; The Civil War in America, Lond., 1866, 8vo; Three English Statesmen (Pym, Cromwell, and Pitt), Lond., 1867, 8vo and p. Svo: The Reorganization of the University of Oxford, Oxf., 1868, p. 8vo; A Short History of England, down to the Reformation, Oxf., in preparation, 1868. Contributed to the Anthologia Oxoniensis, Oxford Essays (Oxford Univ. Reform), Encyc. Brit., 8th edit. (Sir Robert Peel), Macmillan's Mag., (London) Daily News, etc.

"I am a great advocate of culture of every kind, and I say, when I find a man like Professor Goldwin Smith, or Professor Rogers, who, in addition to profound classical learning, have a vast knowledge of modern affairs, and who, as well as scholars, are profound thinkers; these are men whom

I know to have a vast superiority over me, and I bow to them with reverence."-RICHARD COBDEN: Speech at Rochdale, Nov. 23, 1864.

MARCUS CATO.

Marcus Cato was the one man whom, living and dead, Cæsar evidently dreaded. The Dictator even assailed his memory in a brace of pamphlets entitled " 'Anti-Cato," of the quality of which we have one or two specimens in Plutarch, from which we should infer that they were scurrilous and slanderous to the last degree; a proof even that Cæsar could feel fear, and that in Cæsar, too, fear was mean. Dr. Mommsen throws himself heartily into Caesar's antipathy, and can scarcely speak of Cato without something like a loss of temper. The least un civil thing which he says of him, is that he was a Don Quixote, with Favonius for his Sancho. The phrase is not a happy one, since Sancho is not the caricature but the counterfoil of Don Quixote; Quixote being spirit without sense, and Sancho sense with

out spirit. Imperialism, if it could see itself, is in fact a world of Sanchos, and it would not be the less so if every Sancho of the number were master of the whole of physical science and used it to cook his food. Of the two court-poets of Cæsar's successor, one makes Cato preside over the spirits of the good in the Elysian fields, while the other speaks with respect, at all events, of the soul which remained unconquered in a conquered world,-"Et cuncta terrarum subacta præter atrocem animum Catonis." Paterculus, an officer of Tiberius and a thorough Cæsarian, calls Cato a man of ideal virtue ("homo virtuti simillimus"), who did right not for appearance sake, but because it was not in his nature to do wrong. When the victor is thus overawed by the shade of the vanquished, the vanquished could hardly have been a "fool." Contemporaries may be mistaken as to the merits of a character, but they cannot well be mistaken as to the space which it occupied in their own eyes. Sallust, the partisan of Marius and Cæsar, who had so much reason to hate the senatorial party, speaks of Cæsar and Cato as the two mightiest opposites of his time, and in an elaborate parallel ascribes to Cæsar the qualities which secure the success of the adventurer; to Cato those which make up the character of the patriot. It is a mistake to regard Cato the younger as merely an unseasonable repetition of Cato the elder. His inspiration came not from a Roman form, but from a Greek school of philosophy, and from that school which, with all its errors and absurdities, and in spite of the hypocrisy of many of its professors, really aimed highest in the formation of character; and the practical teachings and aspirations of which, embodied in the reflections of Marcus Aurelius, it is impossible to study without profound re- | spect for the force of moral conception and the depth of moral insight which they sometimes display. Cato went to Greece to sit at the feet of a Greek teacher in a spirit very different from the national pride of his ancestor. It is this which makes his character interesting, that it was an attempt at all events to grasp and hold fast by the high rule of life, in an age when the whole moral world was sinking into a vortex of scoundrelism, and faith in morality, public or private, had been lost. Of course the character is formal, and in some respects even grotesque. But you may trace formalism, if you look close enough, in every life led by a rule; in everything between the purest spiritual impulse on the one side, and abandoned sensuality on the other. Attempts to revive old Roman simplicity of dress and habit in the age of Lucullus were no doubt

futile enough: but after all, this is but the symbolical garb of the Hebrew prophet. We are in ancient Rome, not in the smokingroom of the House of Commons. We are among the countrymen, too, of Savonarola. The character, as painted by Plutarch, who seems to have drawn from the writings of contemporaries, is hard of course, but not cynical. Cato was devoted to his brother Cæpio, and when Cæpio died, forgot all his Stoicism in the passionate indulgence of his grief, and all his frugality in lavishing gold and perfumes on the funeral. Cæsar in Anti-Cato accused him of sifting the ashes for the gold, which, says Plutarch, is like charging Hercules with cowardice. Where the sensual appetites are repressed, what ever may be the theory of life, the affections are pretty sure to be strong, unless they are nipped by some such process as is undergone by a monk. Cato's resignation of his fruitful wife to a childless friend, revolting as it is to our sense, betokens less any brutality in him than the coarseness of the conjugal relations at Rome. Evidently the man had the power of touching the hearts of others. His soldiers, though he gave them no largesses and indulged them in no license, when he leaves them, strew their garments under his feet. His friends at Utica linger, at the peril of their lives, to give him a sumptuous funeral. He affected conviviality, like Socrates. He seems to have been able to enjoy a joke, too, at his own expense. He can laugh when Cicero ridicules his Stoicism in a speech; and when in a province he meets the inhabitants of a town turning out, and thinks at first that it is in his own honour, but soon finds that it is in honour of a much greater man, the confidential servant of Pompey, at first his dignity is outraged, but his anger soon gives place to amusement. That his public character was perfectly pure, no one seems to have doubted; and there is a kindliness in his dealings with the dependents of Rome, which shows that had he been an emperor he would have been such an emperor as Trajan, a man whom he probably resembled, both in the goodness of his in tentions and in the limited powers of his mind. Impracticable, of course, in a certain sense he was; but his part was that of a reformer, and to compromise with the corruption against which he was contending, would have been to lose the only means of influence, which, having no military force and no party, he possessed,-that of the perfect integrity of his character. He is said by Dr. Mommsen to have been incapable even of conceiving a policy. By policy I suspect is meant one of those brilliant schemes of ambition with which some literary men are

fond of identifying themselves, fancying, it seems, that thereby they themselves, after their measure, play the Cæsar. The policy which Cato conceived was simply that of purifying and preserving the Republic. So far, at all events, he had an insight into the situation, that he knew that the real malady of the state was want of public spirit, which he did his best to supply. And the fact is, that he did more than once succeed in a remarkable way in stemming the tide of corruption. Though every instinct bade him struggle to the last, he had sense enough to see the state of the case, and to advise that, to avert anarchy, supreme power should be put into the hands of Pompey, whose political superstition, if not his loyalty, there was good reason to trust. When at last civil war broke out, Cato went into it like Falkland, crying "Peace!" he set his face steadily against the excesses and cruelties of his party; and when he saw the field of Dyrrhacium covered with his slain enemies, he covered his face and wept. He wept, a Roman over Romans, but humanity will not refuse the tribute of his tears. After Pharsalus he cherished no illusion, as Dr. Mommsen himself admits; and though he determined himself to fall fighting, he urged no one else to resistance; he felt that the duty of an ordinary citizen was done. His terrible march over the African desert showed high powers of command, as we shall see by comparing it with the desert march of Napoleon. Dr. Mommsen ridicules his pedantry in refusing, on grounds of loyalty, to take the commandership-in-chief over the head of a superior in rank. Cato was fighting for legality, and the spirit of legality was the soul of his cause. But besides this, he had never himself crossed his sword with an enemy; and by declining the nominal command he retained the whole control. He remained master to the last of the burning vessel. Our morality will not approve of his voluntary death; but our morality would give him a sufficient sanction for living, even if he was to be bound to the car of the conqueror. Looking to Roman opinion, he probably did what honour dictated; and those who prefer honour to life are not so numerous that we can afford to speak of them with scorn.

Macmillan's Magazine, April, 1868.

REV. JOHN RICHARD GREEN

is the author of Stray Studies from England and Italy, and A Short History of the English People, Lond., 1875, sm. 8vo, en

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larged into History of the English People, London, vols. i., ii., 1878, New York, vols. i., ii., 1878; Readings from English History, 1879, 12mo.

SHAKSPERE'S LATER YEARS.

With this great series of historical and social dramas, Shakspere had passed far beyond his fellows, whether as a tragedian or as a writer of comedy. "The Muses," said Meres, in 1598, "would speak with Shakspere's finely-filed phraze, if they would speak English." His personal popularity was now at its height. His pleasant temper and the vivacity of his wit had drawn him early into contact with the young Earl of Southampton, to whom his "Adonis" and "Lucrece" are dedicated; and the different tone of the two dedications shows how rapidly acquaintance ripened into an ardent friendship. Shakspere's wealth and influence too were growing fast. He had property both in Stratford and London, and his fellow-townsmen made him their suitor to Lord Burleigh for favours to be bestowed on Stratford. He was rich enough to aid his father, and to buy the house at Stratford which afterwards became his home.

The tradition that Elizabeth was so pleased with Falstaff in "Henry the Fourth" that she ordered the poet to show her Falstaff in love,-an order which produced the "Merry Wives of Windsor,"-whether true or false, proves his repute as a playwright. As the group of earlier poets passed away, they found successors in Marston, Dekker, Middleton, Heywood, and Chapman, and above all in Ben Jonson. But none of these could dispute the supremacy of Shakspere. The verdict of Meres that "Shakspere among the English is the most excellent in both kinds for the stage," represented the general feeling of his contemporaries. He was at last fully master of the resources of his art. The Merchant of Venice" marks the perfection of his development as a dramatist in the completeness of its stage effect, the ingenuity of its incidents, the ease of its movement, the beauty of its higher passages, the reserve and self-control with which its poetry is used, the conception and unfolding of character, and above all the mastery with which character and event is grouped round the figure of Shylock. Master as he is of his art, the poet's temper is still young: the "Merry Wives of Windsor" is a burst of gay laughter; and laughter more tempered, yet full of a sweeter fascination, rings round us in "As You Like It."

But in the melancholy and meditative Jaques of the last drama we feel the touch of a new and graver mood. Youth, so full and buoyant in the poet until now, seems

to have passed almost suddenly away, Though Shakspere had hardly reached forty, in one of his Sonnets which cannot have been written at a much later time than this, there are indications that he already felt the advance of premature age. And at this moment the outer world suddenly darkened around him. The brilliant circle of young nobles whose friendship he had shared was broken up in 1601 by the political storm which burst in a mad struggle of the Earl of Essex for power. Essex himself fell on the scaffold; his friend and Shakspere's idol, Southampton, passed a prisoner into the Tower; Herbert, Lord Pembroke, younger patron of the poet, was banished from the Court. While friends were thus falling and hopes fading without, Shakspere's own mind seems to have been going through a phase of bitter suffering and unrest. In spite of the ingenuity of commentators, it is difficult and even impossible to derive any knowledge of Shakspere's inner history from the Sonnets; "the strange imagery of passion which passes over the magic mirror," it has been finely said, "has no tangible evidence before or behind it." But its mere passing is itself an evidence of the restlessness and agony within. The change in the character of his dramas gives a surer indication of his change of mood. The fresh joyousness, the keen delight in life and in man, which breathes through Shakspere's early work disappears in comedies such as "Troilus" and "Measure for Measure." Disappointment, disillusion, a new sense of the evil and foulness that underlies so much of human life, a loss of the old frank trust in its beauty and goodness, threw their gloom over these comedies. Failure seems everywhere. In Julius Cæsar" the virtue of Brutus is foiled by its ignorance of and isolation from mankind; in Hamlet even penetrating intellect proves helpless for want of the capacity of action; the poison of Iago taints the love of Desdemona and the grandeur of Othello; Lear's mighty passion battles helplessly against the wind and the rain; a woman's weakness of frame dashes the cup of her triumph from the hand of Lady Macbeth; lust and self-indulgence blast the heroism of Antony; pride ruins the nobleness of Coriolanus.

But the very struggle and self-introspection that these dramas betray were to give a depth and grandeur to Shakspere's work such as it had never known before. The age was one in which man's temper and powers took a new range and energy. Sidney or Raleigh lived not one but a dozen lives at once; the daring of the adventurer, the philosophy of the scholar, the passion of the lover, the fanaticism of the saint,

towered into almost superhuman grandeur. Man became conscious of the immense re sources that lay within him, conscious of boundless powers that seemed to mock the narrow world in which they moved. All through the age of the Renascence one feels the impress of the gigantic, this giant-like activity, this immense ambition and desire. The very bombast and extravagance of the times reveal cravings and impulses before which common speech breaks down. It is this grandeur of humanity that finds its poetic expression in the later work of Shakspere. As the poet penetrated deeper and deeper into the recesses of the soul, he saw how great and wondrous a thing was man. "What a piece of work is a man !"eries Hamlet; "how noble in reason; how infinite in faculties; in form, and moving, how express and admirable! in action, how like an angel! in apprehension, how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals!" It is the wonder of man that spreads before us as the poet pictures the wide speculation of Hamlet, the awful convulsion of a great nature in Othello, the terrible storm in the soul of Lear which blends with the very storm of the heavens themselves, the awful ambition that nerved a woman's hand to dabble itself with the blood of a murdered king, the reckless lust that "flung away a world for love.” Amid the terror and awe of these great dramas we learn something of the vast forces of the age from which they sprang. The passion of Mary Stuart, the ruthlessness of Alva, the daring of Drake, the chivalry of Sidney, the range of thought and action in Raleigh or Elizabeth, come better home to us as we follow the mighty series of tragedies which began in "Hamlet" and ended in "Coriolanus."

Shakspere's last dramas, the three exquisite works in which he shows a soul at rest with itself, and with the world, "Cymbeline," "The Tempest," "Winter's Tale," were written in the midst of ease and competence, in a house at Stratford to which he withdrew a few years after the death of Elizabeth. In them we lose all relation with the world or the time and pass into a region of pure poetry. It is in this peaceful and gracious close that the life of Shakspere contrasts most vividly with that of his greatest contemporary. If the imaginative resources of the new England were seen in the creators of Hamlet and the Faerie Queen, its purely intellectual capacity, its vast command over the stores of human knowledge, the amazing sense of its own powers with which it dealt with them, were seen in the work of Francis Bacon.

History of the English People, Vol. ii.
Book vi., 1858.