virtues have won for a large number of your fellow-workers-that precious Saturday's halfholiday-precious almost to man as to boy, when manhood, having borrowed the endearing name from childhood, seeks to enrich it with all that remains to it of childhood's delightsprecious as a noble proof of the respect and sympathy of the employers for those whose in-sphere to which they are native; when of a dustry they direct-and most precious of all in its results, if, being brightened and graced by such images as your association invokes on your leisure, it shall leave body and mind more fit for the work and service of earth and of heaven. Thus regarding myself as a partaker, at least in thought and in spirit, of the various benefits of your association, I would venture to regard them less as the appliances by which a few may change their station in our external life, than as the means of adorning and ennobling that sphere of action in which the many must continue to move; which, without often enkindling an ambition to emulate the immortal productions of genius, may enable you the more keenly to enjoy, and the more gratefully to revere them; which, if they do not teach you the art of more rapidly accumulating worldly riches; and if they shall not-because they cannot-endow you with more munificent dispositions to dispense them than those which have made the generosity of Manchester proverbial throughout the Christian world, may ensure its happiest and safest direction in time to come, by encouraging those who may dispense it hereafter, to associate in youth, with the affection of brotherhood, for objects which suggest and breathe of nothing but what is wise, and good, and kind. It may be, indeed, that some master mind, one of those by which Providence, in all generations and various conditions of our species, has vindicated the Divinity which stirs within it, beyond the power of barbarism to stifle, or education to improve, or patronage to enslave, may start from your ranks into fame, under auspices peculiarly favourable for the safe direction of its strength; and, if such rare felicity should await you, with how generous a pride will you expatiate on the greatness which you had watched in its dawning, and with how pure a satisfaction will your sometime comrade, your then illustrious townsman, satiated with the applause of strangers, revert to those scenes where his genius found its earliest expression, and earned its most delightful praise. If another "marvellous boy," gifted like him of Bristol, should now arise in Manchester, his "sleepless soul" would not "perish in its pride;" his energies, neither scoffed at nor neglected, would not be suffered to harden through sullenness into despair; but his genius, fostered by timely kindness, and aided by your judicious counsel, would spring, in fitting season, from amidst the protecting cares of admiring friends, to its proper quarry, mindful, when soaring loftiest, of the associations and scenes among which it was cherished, "true to the kindred points of heaven and home." But it is not in the cultivation and encouragement of such rare intellectual prodigies, still less in the formation of a race of imitators of excel lence, that I anticipate the best fruits of your peaceful victories. A season has arrived in the history of mankind, when talents, which in darker ages might justify the desire to quit the obscure and honourable labours of common life in quest of glittering distinction, can now only be employed with safety in adorning the multitude of competitors for public favour, few only can arrest attention; and when even of those who attain a flattering and merited popularity, the larger number must be content to regard the richest hues of their fancy and thought, but as streaks in the dawn of that jocund day which now "stands tiptoe on the misty mountain's top," and in the full light of which they will speedily be blended. But if it is almost "too late to be ambitious," except on some rare occasions, of the immortality which earth can bestow; yet for that true immortality of which Fame's longest duration is but the most vivid symbol; for that immortality which dawns now in the childhood of every man as freshly as in the morning of the world, and which breaks with as solemn a foreshadowing in the soul of the most ordinary faculties, as in that of the mightiest poet; for that immortality, the cultivation of wisdom and beauty is as momentous now as ever, although no eyes, but those which are unseen, may take note how they flourish. In the presence of that immortality, how vain appears all undue restlessness for a little or a great change in our outward earthly condition! How worse than idle all assumptions of superior dignity of one mode of honourable toil to another!-how worthless all differences of station, except so far as station may enable men to vindicate some everlasting principle, to exemplify some arduous duty, to grapple with some giant oppression, or to achieve the blessings of those who are ready to perish! How trivial, even as the pebbles and shells upon "this end and shoal of time," seem all those immunities which can only be spared by fortune, to be swept away by death, compared with those images and thoughts, which, being reflected from the eternal, not only through the clear meridian of holy writ, but, though more dimly, through all that is affecting in history, exquisite in art, suggestive in eloquence, profound in science, and divine in poetry, shall not only outlast all the chances and changes of this mortal life, but shall defy the chilness of the grave! Believe me, there is no path more open to the influences of heaven, than the common path of daily duty; on that path the lights from the various departments of your Athenæum will fall with the steadiest lustre; that path, so illumined, will be trodden in peace and joy, if not in glory; happy if it afford the opportunity, as it may to some of you, of clearly elucidating some great truth, which, being reflected from the polished mirrors of thousands of associated minds, sure of the opportunity of affording the means of perceiving and accepting, embracing and diffusing many glorious truths, which, when once fairly presented, although they may be surveyed in different aspects, and tinted with the hues of the various minds which receive them, may or forsake him;-while the voluntary toils of thundered as the watchwords of unnumbered associated labour and study shall nourish struggles for power are now fast waning into among you friendships, not like the slight alli- history, it is too much to hope, perhaps to ances of idle pleasure, to vanish with the hour desire, until the education of mankind shall they gladdened, but to endure through life with more nearly approach its completion, that the products of the industry which fed them;- strong differences of opinion and feeling while in those high casuistries which your should cease to agitate the scenes on which most ambitious discussions shall engender, the freemen are called to discharge political duties. ardent reasoner shall recognise here the beat- But the mind of the staunchest partisan, exings of the soul against the bars of its clay panded by the knowledge and embellished by tenement, and gather even from the mortal the graces which your Athenæum nurtures, impediments that confound and baffle it, assu- will find its own chosen range of political rance that it is winged to soar into an ampler associations dignified-the weapons of its warand diviner ether than invests his earthly heri- fare not blunted, but ornamented and embossed tage; while the mind and heart of Manchester, and, instead of cherishing an ignorant atturning the very alloy and dross of its condi-tachment to a symbol, a name, or a ribbon, tion to noble uses, even as its mechanists transmute the coarsest substances to flame and speed, shall expand beyond the busy confines of its manufactures and commerce to listen to the harmonies of the universe;-while, vindicating the power of the soul to be its own place, it shall draw within the narrow and dingy walls to which duty may confine the body, scenes touched with colours more fair and lovely than "ever were by sea or land," or trace in each sullen mass of dense and hover-and seeks his incentives and examples in the ing vapour, "A forked mountain, a blue promontory, With trees upon 't that nod into the world, expressed in vulgar rage, infuriated by intemperance to madness, blindly violating the charities of life, and disturbing sometimes its holiest domestic affections-it shall grow calm in the assertion of principle, disdain the suggestions of expediency, even as those of corruption, and partake of the refinement which distance lends, while "with large discourse looking before and after," he expands his prospect to the dim horizon of human hopes, tragic pictures of history. A politician thus instructed and ennobled, who adopts the course which most inclines to the conservation of establishments, will not support the objects of his devotion with a mere obstinate adherence, while it shall give the last and noblest proof of chiefly because they oppose barriers to the the superiority of spirit over matter by com- aims of his opponents, but will learn to revere manding, by its own naked force, as by an en- in them the grandeur of their antiquity, the chanter's wand, the presence of those shapes human affections they have sheltered and nurof beauty and power which have hitherto nurtured, the human experiences which mantle tured the imagination in the solitude and still-round them, and the inward spirit which has ness of their realities;-while the glory of such institutions shall illumine the fiercest rapids of commercial life with those consecrating gleams which shall disclose in every small mirror of smooth water which its tumultuous eddies may circle, a steady reflection of some fair and peaceful image of earthly loveliness, or some glory of cloud or sky, preserving amidst the most passionate impulses of earth some traces of the serenity of heaven;-then may we exult as the chariot of humanity flies onward with safety in its speed,-for we shall discover, like Ezekiel of old, in prophetic vision, the spirit in its wheels! There is yet one other aspect in which I would contemplate your association before I enter on the more delightful part of my dutythat in which success is certain-the soliciting for you the addresses of distinguished men, some of them attached to your welfare as well by local ties as by general sympathy, others gladly attending on your invitation, who feel your cause to be their cause, the cause of their generation and of the future. It is that in which its influences will be perceived, not merely banishing from this one night's eminence, raised above the level of common life, and devoted by knowledge to kindness, all sense of political differences, but softening, gracing, and ennobling the spirit of party itself as long as it must continue active. For although party's out-worn moulds have been shivered, and names which have flashed and rendered them vital; while he who pants for quers the yet desert regions of the earth which | conquests of civilization, shall new Athenæums was given him to be replenished and subdued, arise, framed on your model-vocal with your the same magic by which you are here ena- language-inspired with your hopes-to echo bled to let in on the densest population the air back the congratulations which shall be wafted and feeling of mountain solitude, will, in turn, to them even from this place, on each succeedbreathe through the opening wilderness the ing anniversary, if not by yourselves, by your genial refinements of old society; that, as the children and your children's children, and yet forest yields to his stout heart and sturdy arm, more remote descendants, and to bless the the dominion of imagination and fancy will names of those who, amidst the toils, the cares, extend before him, their powers investing the and the excitements of a season of transition glades he opens with poetic visions, shedding and struggle, rescued the golden hours of the the purple light of love through thickets and youth around them from debasing pleasures groves till then unthreaded, and touching the and more debasing sloth, and enabled them to extremest hills, when first disclosed to the set to the world, in a great crisis of its moral human eye, with the old familiar hues of condition, this glorious example of intellectual Christian hope and joy. Then, in the remotest courage and progress.* LORD ELDON AND LORD STOWELL. [QUARTERLY REVIEW, DEC. 1844.] THE remarkable success which has attended thus appreciated, vividly suggests the rememthe publication of Mr. Twiss's Life of Lord brance of a kindred instance of industry, Chancellor Eldon is a striking proof of the worth, and success-less prominently placed deep and enduring interest which attaches to before the world, because less intimately assothe character it develops. More than six ciated with its contests and its changes, but years had then elapsed since Lord Eldon's not less crowned with emolument and honour, death, and many more since he ceased to dig- and hardly less fertile of instruction—that of nify the highest seat of British Justice-or to Lord Eldon's elder brother, Lord Stowell; and influence, except by the weight of reputation if each life is worthy of separate contemplaand age, the discussions and the conflicts of tion, both are attended with additional interest the busy world. The principal incidents of his when considered as springing from one source, life were too well known to leave room for the and fostered in the same nurture. That two gratification of curiosity-the political scenes sons of a reputable tradesman in a provincial in which he moved had passed from the arena town at the extremity of England, devoting of living things without having reached an their powers to different branches of the same historical distance-and yet the sale of these profession, should attain the highest honours three massive volumes has exceeded that of which could be achieved in the course which any similar work within our recollection. each had chosen-and that each, after attainThis success has not, we think, been height-ing an age far beyond that usually allotted to ened by the courtly revelations and piquant man, should leave, with a magnificent fortune, anecdotes with which the work is diversified a name indestructibly associated with the desome of which, indeed, so far impair its effect partment in which his work was performedas to suggest the wish we expressed for their is a moral phenomenon not worthy only of excision-but has arisen purely from the inte- national pride, but of respectful scrutiny. rest excited by a vigorous, honest, and affec- This similarity in the results of the labours tionate delineation of the character and the of these two brothers is rendered more refortunes of a great Englishman of sturdy na-markable by the points of strong difference ture, by a hand peculiarly fitted for its office. This remarkable career, thus depicted and *TO SERJEANT TALFOURD, On reading his Address to the Manchester Athenæum. BY EDWARD KENEALY. O'er the white urn that held the sacred heart Won the whole world by its enchanting spells; To lure mankind to death her voice was given; between their intellectual qualities and tastes, as developed in their mature years: inviting us to inquire what faculties were inherent in their youth; how far they were affected by early education; how far varied by the circumstances of their history. The incidents of Lord Stowell's life, not supplying materials for voluminous biography, are laboriously collected and admirably detailed in an Essay in the "Law Magazine," apparently from the pen which, in a series of papers, seemed to have done enough for Lord Eldon's fame, until Mr. Twiss proved how much more might be achieved by happier opportunity and larger scope. Fortunately, however, the intellectual triumphs of the elder Scott were of a nature capable of preservation as they will be found recorded entire in the Reports of his judicial decisions, of which Dr. Haggard's form the most interesting specimen, as they relate to a class of cases in which manners and affections are frequently involved, and were corrected by the judge himself with sedulous nicety. It is a subject of deep regret that his Lectures on History, which he delivered at Oxford from the Chair of the Camden Professorship, have hitherto been withheld from the world. Of these lectures Dr. Parr writes:-"To these discourses, which, when delivered before an academical audience, captivated the young and interested the old-which are argumentative without formality, and brilliant without gaudiness-and in which the happiest selection of topics was united with the most luminous arrangement of matter-it cannot be unsafe for me to pay the tribute of my praise, because every hearer was an admirer, and every admirer will be a witness." The writer of the article in the "Law Magazine" confirms a rumour we have elsewhere heard, that "a copy of those lectures, transcribed with all the care and accuracy which their noble author was accustomed to bestow on his labours, exists in manuscript;" and we cordially join in this hope "that no false delicacy will prevent their publication," as we feel assured that they will gratify a similar curiosity to that which Gibbon expressed, and justify even Dr. Parr's architectural praise. It would be interesting, for a different reason, to recover the Essay by which the younger Scott, when scarcely twentyone years of age, obtained the prize of English Composition at Oxford-"On the Advantages and Disadvantages of Foreign Travel," a subject far removed from his experience, alien from his studies, and which, therefore, would seem to have owed its success either to the ingenuity of its suggestions, or the graces of its style. As, in after-life, the essayist was never distinguished for felicity of expression or fertility of illustration, and acquired a style not only destitute of ornament, but unwieldy and ponderous, this youthful success suggests the question-Whether, in devoting all his powers to the study of the law, he crashed the faculty of graceful composition with so violent an effort, that Nature, in revenge, made his ear dull to the music of language, and involved, though she did not darken his wisest words? -- The school-day annals of the brothers disclose no trace of difference between them: unless the statement of their various recollections of the Sunday sermon-William gives a lucid detail of its substance, and John an exact detail of portions-may be so regarded: which may scarcely be, when it is recollected that if they were required to perform the exercise at the same time, there was a difference in their ages of six years. That intervallong as a section of school-boy life-implies, however, no variety in the system of their education for Mr. Moises, the master of the ancient grammar-school of their native town, one of the best" of the old leven," admitted no innovations: the stern requisition-the unspared rod-the hearty commendation, which customary severities made more sweet-had the same influence at first as at last: no fayour was shown to the youth of one generation more than to that of one degree over another; and the results seem to have been equally uniform-the insurance of that "holy habit of obedience," which is not only the most wholesome, but the happiest state of boyhood; and of a life-long affection to the veteran distributor of justice and praise, which the modern instructor-who, instead of the master, governing by old rules, is the instrument of new theories-can never hope to enjoy. Each of these celebrated pupils of Mr. Moises delighted in the opportunity which after-life afforded him of acknowledging his obligations to this excellent person; and each testified his gratitude in a manner appropriate to his position, and perhaps characteristic of his nature: Lord Eldon, by the substantial promotion of their schoolmaster, till the good old man declined all worldly favours, and then by transferring them to his son; and Lord Stowell, by contributing to his monument an inscription of graceful and just praise, expressed in Latin, which Dr. Parr might envy. Among the lawyers who have emerged from that rank which the honest coal-fitter of Newcastle adorned, few have enjoyed, like his sons, the blessings of an education completed at one of our old English Universities. Many youths of such parentage, by means equally honourable to their own ambition and industry, have worked and cut their way through the impediments of fortune to forensic eminence-perhaps acquiring, from the difficulties with which they have struggled, nerve and courage for the painful controversies in which they aspired to mingle-and deriving from the varieties of "many-coloured life" with which they were personally conversant, "a learned spirit of human dealing," which they were able forcibly and happily to apply to the sudden exigencies of their professional career. But no such advantages can supply, however they may sometimes compensate for, the want of that protective influence, extended over opening manhood, which, superseding the restraints of school by a more generous and appropriate discipline, delays the fever and turmoil of life for a few of life's happiest years-which presents to yet unworldly ambition the achievements of praise and fame, before it is compelled to seek the lower rewards of fortune-which, amidst the flutterings of expectation and beneath the uncertain gleams of fancy, lays the deep and sure foundation of principle to be cemented in the mind amidst pliant affections-and which blends the veneration for ancient things with the aspirations of hope and the quickenings of joy. The youth who, quitting school, has been initiated at once into the perplexities of the law as practised in the most respectable attorney's office, or immersed amidst its more refined technicalities in the chambers of an eminent pleader, will acquire an earlier aptitude in some points of practical routine and pigeon-hole knowledge; but, unless gifted with some rare felicity of nature, will be less prepared for the systematic acquisition of legal learning, than |