And the wondering what might be the thought
Of every one that met me!

Thus thought on thought would gather,
Till, with humbug and bother,

The coat cost me more thought

Than had well made another.

Since, then, the price depends
So much upon its wearer,
Waste little thought upon your coat,
For nothing can be clearer

Than that each thought you put upon it,
Makes that coat the dearer.

THE FOUNTAIN OF ARETHUSA.

BY ROBERT EYRES LANDOR, M.A. LONDON. LONGMANS. 1848.

THE purpose of this remarkable book is to exhibit the inconsistency that exists among the most virtuous classes of Christian society, between the conduct they believe to be right, and the religion they acknowledge to be true. The fanciful machinery which the author has chosen for the conveyance of his thoughts, is not quite original; but he has made it highly entertaining, and given to it, moreover, the allegorical form of a very important truth, and a very serious question, pointed out by himself in the following words: " We certainly get farther from nature, and probably from happiness, by our riches, our refinements, our industry,-Do we get nearer to heaven ?"

Anthony Lugivardine is a bachelor of easy fortune, who, after spending some twenty years of his early life in the east, has settled down on his estate among the hills of Derbyshire. Mr. Bartholomew Horncastle is his friend-a man of plebeian origin, unlearned, except in the matter of minerals and mining, but a Barmaster in the Peak, a Quaker, and of course a thriving man.

"He hath spoken at quarterly meetings with good acceptance; he hath shaken hands with the Bishop of Carlisle, his hat upon his head, though the Bishop's was off; he hath saved money, let land, built a lime-kiln, a brick-kiln, and a windmill, at Tideswell Rough. He holds five shares in the Grand Junction Canal, and hath speculated advantageously in two or three Newcastle Collieries. Besides his malt-house at home, and his tan-yard at Bakewell, he hath more than a share he hath an undivided property, in the heart of Joanna Warrington, the rich miller's only daughter"-(Vol. 1, p. 28.)

The two friends discover a cavern in Anthony's stone quarry. There are indications of mineral veins and a rich mine. In respect of money, they have enough; but of course it is better to have more. They agree upon a partnership, and determine to explore the cavern. Now the cavern proves a very long one, and the veins of ore grow richer as they proceed and run under a neighbour's field. Should the said neighbour obtain any inkling of the truth, he might be beforehand with them, and sink a shaft into the middle of their El Dorado. They resolve, therefore, on close secrecy, till the work of exploration be complete, and trust

no one but Jacob Blizzard, the gardener. At the bottom of the subterrean passage there was water. What there was beyond the water they could not see, but they determined to discover. A small stout boat was dragged through the dark passage to the edge of the unexplored pool. A hair trunk and a hamper, contained, with admirable forethought, bread, meat, candles, and a double Gloucester cheese, and the adventurers prepared for their voyage. The passage of the cavern being rough and narrow, they had widened it by knocking away sundry projecting pieces, and the roof was supported meanwhile by props and lintels..The guardian angel of Jacob Blizzard made him forget the flint and steel which were to be carried in the boat against an unlucky contingency; he was sent back to find them. Anthony and Mr. Horncastle waited his return by the side of the dark water, when a low rattle, a loud crash, a long groan, a continuous earthquake-like commotion, filled the cavern with dust," and their hearts with terror. The props had been removed in order to admit the boat. The roof of the passage had fallen in-they were stopped down with a cork of rock full two hundred yards in length!"

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Some hours of horrible reflection brought them the consolatory assurance, that of their return to the outer world there was no hope at all, and no chance but one. Their lamps were still burning; they had candles and food for some days; they got into the boat, and pushed off through the still water, and the impenetrable darkness.

The details of this marvellous voyage must be read in the original. We can only inform our readers, that out of the subterranean lake ran a subterranean river; that the travellers managed to keep afloat upon it through it's rocks and rapids for the space of seventeen or eighteen days, and that when at a moderate reckoning they had descended some seventy or eighty miles into the bowels of the earth, when the last piece of double Gloucester was digested, and the last candle burning low in the socket, the river ended in a second lake as dark as the other. In this lake, however, there was a whirlpool; by slow degrees the boat was drawn into the vast but ever-decreasing circle; faster and faster they flew towards the fatal centre; they are dashed into the vortex--the broad shoulders of Mr. Horncastle stick for an instant in the rocky funnel, and then boat, box, and passengers, are hurled through the opening by the obstructed current, and the two friends find themselves in a quiet pool, among large water lilies, and under the light of day.

It was not the light of mortal day, however, nor were the lilies such as perish by the scythe of Time. They had not issued at the bottom of the Atlantic, as Anthony anticipated, nor in the West Indies, as the less learned Mr. Horncastle supposed. The sun shone with no dazzling lustre, but with the mellowed light of rainbow colours in all imaginary hues. The warm air passed over fields of flowers more gorgeous than the wings of humming birds, and wafted their fragrance through branches loaded with perpetual fruits, as delicious as they were various and abundant. But there were no insects in the grass, no birds among the trees, no shining scales in the clear water. The sun stood motionless overhead; there was neither night nor the change of seasons; they were surrounded by the splendour of unimagined vegetation, by a light of unfading beauty, and by the silence of death.

The scientific lore of Mr. Anthony Lugivardine soon fixed the locality

of their whereabouts. They had evidently passed through the crust of the hollow earth, and were standing on the concave surface of the interior. Their sun was the globe of central fire, where existence had been conjectured before, and was now made certain by their discovery, and the place itself was the Hades of the pagan world.

Mr. Anthony Lugivardine was perfectly right. In honour of its Sicilian prototype, he named the Spring, by which himself and his companion had emerged from darkness, the Fountain of Arethusa, and the travellers having refreshed themselves and washed their linen, advanced into the country. A new prospect burst upon them as they reached the summit of a range of hills. The great valley below was filled with a city of colossal palaces, and, no longer a solitude, the scene was swarming with countless multitudes of beings in the forms of Adam and of Eve. They were the dead of all nations, except the Jews, who had died before the Christian era. Since then, no new visitor from the outer world had ever reached them. Here, clothed with lighter bodies than those of clay; freed from all desires that were not of the mind, and from every passion except remorse, their existence was continued, subject to one single law-Memory ever occupied about the things of their former lives, without the power either of forgetting or disguising. There was no growth and no change; dispositions, tastes, affections, never altered. Some additional experience was gained, but nothing more. Little children, nineteen hundred years old, were still running after the butterflies -no, not the butterflies, for there were none, but after one another ;orators were still busy with their tongues, and sculptors with their chisels; what the warriors did to amuse themselves seems rather doubtful, as there were no wars; Alexander the Great was probably glad of the opportunity of ordering Mr. Anthony Lugivardine to be bastinadoed when he caught him, as he thought, telling a lie. Those whose memories could recal only evil deeds, passed their lives apart from the rest, in solitude and remorse. The different tribes and nations dwelt in separate places, but in friendly intercourse with one another. Our travellers had stumbled on the Romans. Mr. Horncastle, innocent of all classical knowledge, knew nothing of Rome, save as the residence of the Pope and the Scarlet Woman, and immediately prepared himself for martyrdom; but Anthony soon made acquaintance with Cicero, Julius Cæsar, and others, among whom Aristotle and Alexander were fortunately visiting at the time. Of course they are curious to hear how the world has gone on since they passed into the inside of it, and in the dialogues which occur between them the purpose of the book is developed. Mr. Anthony Lugivardine is a Christian; at least he thinks so, and says so, and would undoubtedly be thought so on the outer surface of the world, though Cicero and Aristotle are very much disposed to take him for an impudent impostor instead. He describes to them the general features of society, and the principal parts of Christian belief-the divine authority of the Great Teacher; his character and example; his precepts, promises, and warnings; the loving kindness he practised and enjoined; the eternity of a future life of retribution. His soul expands with the subject; already he feels himself the dispenser of truth and wisdom to the wise of the old world, when a terrible scowl on the brow of the king of Macedon makes him pause in astonishment, and becomes the signal for a general assault upon his character and integrity. What!

cry the hearers, is this Christian doctrine and practice, and do you, nevertheless, call yourself a Christian ? you who have buried yourself in a lead mine for the sake of wealth when you had enough before? who have left the active duties of charity for no end but to become richer than your neighbours ? Do you tell us your trust is in the providence of God, while you are toiling day and night to make yourself independent of all chances and changes? Do you say that Christ is your model while you make mockery of his example? Do you profess that your chief business as a Christian is to promote the happiness of others, while you give your life to gain riches for yourself; and is it true that others are like you? ? Such inconsistency is impossible among serious and honest men. You are deceiving us. The Christians you speak of are only the hypocrites of your world; the virtuous, the pious, the honest men among you are quite different to these. They hear their master's voice, and knowing it to be divine, they obey it with a perfect obedience; they see his example, and aspiring to share his glory, they love to follow him, and to resemble him more than anything besides.No? Do you deny it? Do the best among you seek to be richer than the rest? Is it really most honorable to be most wealthy? Has a fortunate speculation more praise among you than a charitable deed ? Ah! truly; the error is our own; your charity is longer-sighted than ours. We see our mistake, and crave your pardon. These rich Christians know the power of accumulated wealth, and they accumulate simply in order to bless their brethren. Their large fortunes are all employed in works of love. You have no poor among you; none houseless; none friendless; you pass one half of your lives in gathering wealth, that you may pass the other half in dispensing it to the less prudent and less fortunate-a noble and a wise philanthropy! How! are we again mistaken ? What is it you say? that your wealth is gathered for yourselves, and spent upon yourselves, while, nevertheless, you are Christians? Audacious and irreclaimable liar!

We cannot attempt to give our readers more than a very concise idea of the general character of the book. Our constitution, our legal forms, our oaths, our justice, our philosophy, are brought under the review of the ancient sages, who listen, dispassioned and disinterested, and compare, with terrible exactness, the practice and the profession of the Christian world. We will quote the following extract on our boasted trial by Jury:

LUCULLUS-You said something of the jury-what is a jury?

LUGIVARDINE-Twelve subordinate judges, whose office it is to determine whether the accusation be true-whether the person impeached be guilty-whether the property disputed between you and me be yours or mine.

CATO-There is hardly any question whatever, unless it be from its simplicity incapable of a doubt, about which twelve men will not disagree. If it be incapable of a doubt it ceases to be a question. By assembling as many as twelve you ensure a difference of opinion wherever it is possible to differ. Where it is not possible, one opinion is as valuable as a thousand. What constitutes a sufficient majority among these twelve?

LUGIVARDINE-They must be unanimous.

CATO-If each of them had exercised an uninfluenced opinion on any difficult subject, twelve men never were unanimous. Where the subject is clear, why engage so many understandings in its examination? where complicated or obscure, how do you accomplish this unanimity ?

LUGIVARDINE-If they disagree, we lock up the twelve jurors, and fast them till they grow wiser.

LUCULLUS-The old remedy still! But in this instance its operation seems to be less direct. Possibly you may fast your kings till they have ceased to be tyrannical-their ministers, till they have acquired wisdom and patriotism-your generals, judges, counsellors, till they have become humane and dispassionate, and sincere. Your slave may be fasted till he is diligent, your son till he is dutiful, your wife till she is quiet. But how can this vacuity in the bowels reconcile people's opinions, and operate upon twelve judgments in the same way? In our time men's brains were not situated beneath their girdles.

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LUGIVARDINE-It is enough that our jurymen agree in the same verdict. Their opinions are left to their consciences, with which we never interfere.

Q. CICERO-IS an oath required from them as the name implies ? LUGIVARDINE-With an obligation yet more imperative, if possible, even than the rest, are they sworn to declare the truth.

CATO-A question proposed by me remains unanswered; but there is now no necessity that I should repeat it. My doubts have disappeared. I asked whether Christians do really believe in any God at all. Still, as a sacrifice to decency, you might dispense with these oaths. Of what use are they? Assembling twelve men, distinguished by neither natural nor casuistical intelligence, you require them to decide on some such intricate question as, in every opulent country, must arise. By all the solemnities of an oath you constrain them to determine, not after each other's judgments and consciences, but their own. You exact unanimity from the discordant, not by satisfying their understandings, but by distressing their stomachs. * * No instance ever came to

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my knowledge of barbarity so extravagant as this. Q. CICERO-Perhaps in criminal cases you have recourse to torture, and your twelve jurors suspend their sentence till they see its effect? They condemn when the criminal has confessed?

fess.

LUGIVARDINE-So far otherwise, we refuse to believe him when he does conWe recommend him to retract his confession-to reassert his innocenceto take the chances of a trial. * Who recommends this?

CATO-Then you teach him to lie.
LUGIVARDINE-The judge.

CATO-TO what end?

LUGIVARDINE-That the malefactor may escape through some error in the indictment, or some contradiction in the witnesses, or some insufficiency in the proof, or some misapprehension in the jurors, or some other fortunate casualty which cannot be foreseen.

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Q. CICERO-What do you call such advice? LUGIVARDINE-We call it fair play. * CATO-You told us that the judges bound their conscience by the sanctity of an oath. What have they sworn?

LUGIVARDINE-To execute the laws, to punish offences, to determine justly, to show no favour.

CATO-It would seem that every man among you, except the thief, has sworn to do something which he never does or thinks of doing. What a wonderful people is this! As supplying the atmosphere of their morality, how inconceivably mischievous must be their religion! For though it is impossible that they should believe in the presence or the providence of God, they appeal to him as if they could provoke him, and swear by him as if he did indeed hear!-Vol. 2. p.p. 169 to 176.

The great problem of human riches is one which it is difficult to dismiss from the mind. To the thoughtful and sincere it has doubtless been in all Christian ages a trouble and perplexity. To reconcile the master who had not where to lay his head with the disciple who know not where to bestow his treasures-the divine warning against the dangers of the rich, with the human warning against the troubles of the poor is at least a difficulty. Our estimate of wealth is no doubtful one; it is stereotyped upon our lives, our manners, our language; it is told in the single word by which we call the poor "the unfortunate."