434 CHAP. XVII. 1814. Jeremy Bentham. July 29th.-Mr. Wakefield called on me with Jeremy Bentham's "Panopticon," and he occupied me till one Bentham. o'clock. Wakefield belongs to Jeremy Bentham's select society. He is voted nobody, i.e. free of the house. He gives an interesting account of the philosopher's abode, where a Panopticon school is to be erected. Bentham's James Mill. constant inmates are Koe, whom I have seen, and Mill, whom I dined with at Hamond's, and whom Wakefield represents as one of the greatest men of the present day. He is writing a history of India. Wakefield says that Bentham has considerable respect for Hamond's understanding. Wordsworth's July 31st-Read Bentham's "Panopticon" and first Appendix. All that respected the moral economy of his plan interested me greatly, but for want of plates I could not comprehend the mechanical structure. The book is (as all Bentham's are), full of original and very valuable matter. But it would possibly have had more effect if it had contained fewer novelties in substance and in language. Men are prepared to oppose when novelty is ostentatiously announced. August 13th.-(At Norwich.) Accompanied some Excursion. friends to the theatre. The actors did not edify me. Stole out to call on Madge, at whose apartments I found the great new poem of Wordsworth, "The Excursion." I could only look into the preface and read a few extracts with Madge. It is a poem of formidable size, and I fear too mystical to be popular. It will, however, put an end to the sneers of those who consider, or affect to consider, him puerile. But it will possibly draw on him the imputation of dulness. Still, I trust it will Kastner. Mrs. Pattisson. 435 strengthen the zeal of his few friends. My anxiety is CHAP.XVII. great to read it. August 18th.-Tiarks brought Kastner to me. Kastner is an enthusiast, but his enthusiasm impels to action, and it is accompanied by talent of very high rank and great variety. Having distinguished himself as a chemist he became Volksredner (orator for the people); and he is now striving to interest the Government in favour of freemasonry, in order to oppose priestcraft, which he thinks is reviving. He also conducted a newspaper, and assisted in raising the Prussian Landwehr. Having fought with this body in France, he came to England to solicit a grant out of the contributions for the Germans in favour of the Landwehr. Though every one thought his attempts vain, he has succeeded in obtaining £1,000, and hopes for much more, out of the Parliamentary grant. 1814. Kastner. H. C. R. TO MRS. PATTISSON. Bury St. Edmunds, July 27th, 1814. My dear Friend, Though my own plans were in some measure disarranged by it, I was sincerely glad to hear that you had resolved to undertake the northern journey. I trust it has proved to you a source of other pleasures than those for the sake of which you made it. The reward which Solomon received for a wise choice of the blessings of life I have very frequently seen conferred on a small scale. I should be very glad if some accident were to bring you acquainted with any 436 1814. Jeremy Taylor on Friendship. CHAP. XVII. of the Stansfelds. That is so highly estimable a family, that I could almost consider myself the friend of every member of it, meaning only to express my very peculiar esteem for them. I have just risen from the perusal of the most admirable discourse on friendship which I believe was ever penned. It is a sort of sermon without a text by Jeremy Taylor; so delightful that, if I had no other means of conveying it to you, I think I could almost walk to Witham from Bury with the folio volume containing it in my hand, in order to have the delight of reading it to you. Though it is arrant pedantry to fill a letter with quotations, I cannot resist the temptation of quoting two or three golden sayings. Soame Jenyns, you may recollect, vindicates Christianity for excluding from its system those false virtues, patriotism, valour, and friendship!!! This very insidious paradox-in effect, not intention, I mean-is as to friendship, with equal truth and beauty, thus exhibited by Jeremy Taylor:-" By friendship you mean the greatest love, the greatest usefulness, and the most open communication, and the noblest sufferings, and the severest truth, and the heartiest counsel, and the greatest union of minds, of which brave men and women are capable. But then I must tell you that Christianity hath new christened it, and called it charity. . Christian charity is friendship to all the world. And when friendships were the noblest things in the world" (referring, I suspect, to Cicero, &c.), "charity was little, like the sun drawn in at a chink, or his beams drawn into the centre of a burning-glass; but Christian charity is friendship expanded, like the face of the sun when it mounts the eastern CHAP.XVII. hills." Still, the individual appropriation of love was to 1814. be explained; he therefore goes on, "There is enough in every man that is willing to make him become our friend, but where men contract friendships they enclose the commons, and what nature intended should be every man's, we make proper to two or three." In these lines are contained all the ideas necessary to a development of friendship speculatively. The following sentences are gems:-" He that does a base thing in zeal for his friend, burns the golden thread that ties their hearts together." Secrecy is the chastity of friendship." "Friendship is charity in society." 66 If I can, I will take a bait at Witham on my way from Norwich to London; but I do not know that I can stay even a day with you. One circumstance may call me to town earlier than I might otherwise have thought necessary. I have received some letters. from a most amiable and worthy man, a Jena acquaintance, who has made a journey to London, in order to solicit relief for a particular class of sufferers-the Prussian Landwehr. He seems to expect great assistance from me, and it will be a painful task to me to show him that I can do nothing. He is a benevolent Quixote. He has written me an account of his life, and his sufferings and pathetic tale will interest you. He is made up of love of every kind—to his wife and children, to his country, for which he fought, and to religion, to which he seems devotedly attached. I wrote to Aders to offer Kastner my chambers during my absence; but Aders has procured him a lodging at six 438 Sessions Business. Tour in France. CHAP.XVII. shillings a week. Kastner has luckily met with my friends in town. 1814. Annual excursions. Duchesnois. You will expect to hear of the success of my Sessions Circuit. It was not so productive as I expected, from the retirement of Twiss, but this was more from the want of business than from the preference of others before me. At Norwich and Bury, I had more than my reasonable share of business. At Bury, not even Alderson held a brief, or had a motion; the very little was divided between Storks and myself, I taking a third. However, my individual success is great, though the decline of professional business in general is enough to alarm a man now entering into it. Lawyers have had their day! Your affectionate Friend, Rem.*-During my fifteen years at the Bar, I relieved myself from the dulness of a London professional life by annual excursions, of all of which I kept Journals. In collecting reminiscences from them, I shall for the most part omit descriptions of places, and confine myself to the persons I saw. The present journey in France immediately followed that great event, the restoration of the French monarchy, after twenty-five years of revolution. August 26th.-Arrived at Rouen in the evening, and heard that Mademoiselle Duchesnois was to perform. Tired and even hungry as I was, I instantly set out for the theatre, and went into the pit, which had no seats, * Written in 1850. |