14 SEPTEMBER 1867, Page 20

STUDIES IN CONDUCT.*

A suorrr change in this title would remove all those objections to its appropriateness and acv uracy of description which are modestly hinted at in the author's prefatory note. The addition, of two' words, and the alteration of one, give us Studies in the Conduct of Short Essays for the Saturday Review, with which every one would ba contented, and which would indicate most exactly the point of view from which all the papers were written. In saying this we do not mean to be sarcastic. The author of this. book has achieved a true Saturday success. Many of his headings are familiar to our memory. In the essays we recognize many thoughts which impressed us favourably at the time of their first. appearance, and led to meditation or discussion. Some of those smart sentences which have given the Saturday Review a name, and the thought of which brings even triflers to plod through philosophical articles, freshen up the tritest disquisitions, and take off the chill of common sense, when it is becoming too sen- sible. It is refreshing to find that a reviewer whose weekly duty it is to tell great historians, and statesmen, and poets, and em- perors that they are making fools of themselves, can see that when this principle is carried out in private life it becomes rather inconvenient. "A man has made an undoubted fool of himself ; therefore you have a right to let him know that you think so. Therefore, as on this theory there is no distinction between a right and a duty, you are bound to exercise your right." It is just possible that if the motives of some literary and political critics. were put to this test, there would be fewer complaints of unfair- ness made against a certain paper, and fewer exciting articles- for country clergymen to talk over on their way back from church. But when a man has been preaching peace and goodwill he naturally wants a relaxation. Serious questions would not find an audience in these frivolous days, unless there was a little spite and a little scandal wrapped up in the philosophy. A man about town will only read an essay on Mill on condition of there being an allusion to Harper Twelvetrees. We do not accuse the writer of this volume of pandering to such tastes or debasing such subjects. But he is what we should call a hard thinker, and we have little doubt that if he had his choice, he would prefer not to season with epigrams. There is something rather dry and absent in his mode of expressing himself. He is always wanting to go deeper than he is allowed to go, and he resents being pulled up into the surface waters of general intelligence when he sights a thought beyond the reach of the ordinary plummet. He reminds us of a diver lowered down to inspect a leak in the ship's bottom,. who wants to be free from the rope and the modicum of air • Studies in Conduct. Short Bows from the Saturday Review. Loudou: Chapman. end Hall.

pumped into his helmet, and explore the recesses of the ocean. It is an annoyance to come up every ten minutes and make practical remarks in a cheerful tone, instead of being married to a mermaid and singing duets of " Rule Britannia."

What makes this sense of restraint the more conspicuous is, that all the essays in this book are written from one point of view, and with some definite purpose. This is more than can be said of most papers of the kind. Although much of the talent of the day is employed in writing short articles, few of the articles written have a permanent value, or one that is at all commensurate with the sterling ability of their authors. Men write very much as they talk, with a view to present effect. They fall into frequent inconsistencies, because facts vary, and no important principle is at stake. If they have strong opinions they do not like to obtrude them at all times, partly for fear of becoming bores, partly for fear of developing into unrecognized prophets. In conversation a man who is always preaching up some object is sure to be avoided, and if the object is not one of real moment he is despised into the bargain. If the proverbial stone had free-will or power of motion, it would get out of the reach of the continual droppings as soon as they began to affect its surface. The feeling, " If r listen to this man a moment longer I shall go mad," is often too much for politeness. The writer of these essays is the best judge of the effect produced on his friends by some of his repetitions. So far as this volume goes they are not tiresome or obtrusive. They may possibly escape the eye of the uncritical reader. Bat, reading the book as we have read it, we could not fail to see how often the thread which was too long for one reel was broken off and the winding continued on'another. If each reel had not to seem complete in itself this would not much matter. But each time that there is a break, a new peg must be chosen, and the thoughts which followed naturally on the former train must appear to have been wholly suggested by the present subject. At a village debating society which we frequented in our youth there was no limit to the number of speeches each might make, but every speech was limited to ten ' minutes. To avoid being cut short in the middle of a sentence, a speaker used to have his coat-tail twitched at the ninth minute, and ended with some show of completeness. When it came to his turn again he made a remark on something that had fallen from an intermediate speaker, and then doubled back to .the place where he had been interrupted. There is rather too, much of this in the essays before us. The two papers on. " Country Life," excellent as they are, would be better if they were_wouud on one reel. The hundred pages which separate " Small Hypocrisies" from " Diplomacy in Private Life " do not blind us to there having been a twitch of the coat tail. But of the iterations which are most conspicuous, incidental cen- sures of worldiness and the love of riches produce the effect which we have described, and haunt us, not at every turn, but when we least.expect them. First, we are told that pleasure is proscribed by those who think money-making the first of duties. Then we learn that making rponey is the sure test of success, and that the life of those who do not make it is viewed as a break-down. Then, under the head of "Short Cuts," we are told of the immoderate haste, the matter-of-fact fashions of the business world. The same subject is renewed- in the essay on " Mental Ripeness ;" "Sins Against. Health "teach the same moral as "The Capacity for Pleasure." And then all these hints and allusions are summed up in the paper on "Middle-Class Morality," where they are thoroughly in their place. It is not that they are forced or un- graceful in the other essays. If we take each one by itself there is no reason why the Saturday Review should not teach what Horace and Pope had taught before it. But when these de- tached papers are collected into one volume, the effect produced by such repetition is that of narrowness of range and poverty of illustration. At all events, the writer must have a strong bump of adhesiveness.

The same impression is made on us by his method of alluding to contemporary incidents. What chiefly distinguishes these papers from the general run of articles is the distant and reserved tone in which current events are noticed. It is this that takes away the ephemeral stamp which marks other and better writing, but at the same time this robs the essays of that ephemeral interest which is the more intense because it is so transient. During this autumn people may not care to read an article on the artistic morality of a young poet who was the hero of so much controversy a year ago. But the essay on "Sympathy with Nature" is just as fresh as it was then, and the personal allusion will be quite as easily recog- nized. We cannot say that this is altogether a compliment. We readlind discussed the article on its appearance, and it seemed to us wanting in directness. There were people in the country who did not catch its meaning. It was not juicy enough for a fruit of the season, and now that it is a dried fruit it is not firm enough to be worth keeping. These distant and general allusions are good of their kind, but one is not enough for•an essay. If an essayist is to be contented with a single peg, he must not put too fine a point on it. If he wants to avail himself of temporary interest, he must either spread it out wide for the present age, or pack it up tightly for posterity. The writer of these essays has too often taken a middle course, and failed to gain the votes of either party. Indeed, it is not only in this respect that he is a trimmer. He hovers between the pointed paradoxes of two extremes, in the hope of pitching on the golden mean of wit and natare. Perhaps he is sometimes carried away by his own example, and having tri- umphantly refuted a fallacy, he does not atop short in time to avoid an opposite one. For instance, it. may be true that a Lord Chancellor is not moved to shed a joyful tear as he revisits the spot where he thrashed an ill-conditioned schoolmate. It may also be true that a fallen women who indulges in a retrospect of the days when she clung about her mother's knees is irresistibly driven by it to the solace of gin. But it is too much to conclude from these two small instances that " of all the agreeable fancies that have gained room among the stock sentiments of the world, that of there being some pleasure in renewing old associations with places is the most delusive." Again, there is a total want of logic in declaiming against the hollowness of society, " because people who ask you to dinner and are very happy to have you at their dancing parties, decline to lend you money or to let you marry their daughters." It is perfectly legitimate to argue that "if asking a man to dinner implies an invitation to help himself to as much money as he requires, or to take whichever of the daughters of the house is most to his fancy, then, as soon as this is discovered, the man will not be asked to dinner—that is all." But it by no means follows that there is per- fect sincerity in shaking hands with a man with the utmost cor- diality and enthusiasm one day, and being just as cheerful next day on hearing that he has become bankrupt. " Surely," argues the writer, "one may be pleated to see an agreeable man without binding our heartstrings round him, or staking our peace of mind upon his solvency. When people say that society is selfish and insincere, we scarcely have a much more accurate idea of what they specifically mean than if they said that a locomo- tive was selfish." If so, we fear that we have rated the writer's comprehension too highly. We should suppose that any characteristic which may be ascribed to one man, might be as- cribed equally to a body of men. The insincerity of affecting a deep interest in a person one day, and being absolutely indifferent to him the next, seems to us much the same, whether it proceeds from one or twenty. Why should you be cordial with a person who has not even a place on the outside surface of your heart ? Why show enthusiasm towards a man for whom you care no- thing? You need not bind your heartstrings round a man whom you are pleased to see, in order to regret anything that deprives you of that pleasure. It is the exaggerated regard of one day, and indifference of the next, that gives an air of insincerity to one or the other.

In all these instances, however, we are not certain whether the writer is thinking of individual or of typical cases. Many of his theories have an air of being personal arguments in disguise. He is particular when he seems to be universal. Thus, in speaking of youthful promise, and accounting for the disappointment which so often ensues from it, he attributes this to the confusion of con- duct with capacity, and of goodness with power. "The grounds on which a lad earns a reputation for promise are, in an ordinary way, exclusively moral grounds. He is industrious, persevering, docile, well-mannered. He always knows his lessons, and is never insolent or quarrelsome." But is this the kind of boy from whom great things are generally expected ? It may have been so in some instance that came under the knowledge of the writer. Perhaps when he was a boy he showed no leanings towards " punctuality and conformity to discipline, and an aversion to blots and dog-eared books and the ruder tastes of his compeers." And possibly some model boy who has since become a clerk in a public office, and who plays the flute, may have been held up as an example to the future Saturday reviewer. Yet, as a rule, something like intellect is an accompaniment of promise, and the mere assurance of being a good boy, however comfortable in the present, does not bold out very definite hopes of future greatness. We rather think the writer has confused the promise of goodness with the promise of power, and hearing favourable prognostica- tions, has interpreted them according to his own views and aspi- rations. Again, when he says, "The tourist who tells you that he is going to Switzerland or Italy to freshen his passion for nature, generally means by it a passion for dawdling in the sunshine with nothing on his mind," he surely means, as Johnson said of Pope, to hurt some one. An annotated edition of the Studies in Con- duct by the writer's bosom friend would probably add much to the interest with which we have read them, and would enable us to see the shafts of some of the epigrams, which we are sorry not to have found a place to quote, quivering in the flesh of his asso- ciates.