No. 1166. Fourth Series, No. 27. 6 October, 1866.

POETRY: Stonewall Jackson's Way, 2. To the Members of the Loyal Southern Convention, 2. Stuart Mill Again, 24.

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From the Saturday Review. | published by their author. Some, indeed, LORD MACAULAYS WORKS.* of the essays which he did republish from the Edinburgh were hardly worth that honour. Writing in periodicals had not become so general forty years ago as it has now, but every man who has occupied himself much in such pursuits must have written many things for which his best wish would be speedy oblivion. One advantage has certainly been gained by republishing all these essays. They show how steadily their author improved till he reached the full maturity of his powers. We do not think, however, that after a comparatively early period his mind continued to expand, although of course he was continually acquiring a larger range of knowledge. His best essays, those on Olive and Warren Hastings, for instance, are as good as anything in the History of England, and the faults of some of the essays which please us least, such as the review of Bacon, the review of Mr. Gladstone's work on Church and State, and the review of Ranke's History of the Popes, are faults of which both the scheme and the execution of the History show the permanence.

THERE is always something especially interesting about collective editions of the works of considerable men. Great works like Lord Macaulay's History, or even eminently popular ones like his Essays, have a place of their own, and, so to speak, throw the author himself more or less into the back-ground; but when we see a full coltion of all that a great man thought it worth while to write down in the course of an industrious life, we get not only a collection of books, but something of a mental history of the man who wrote them, and this again is always a more or less valuable contribution to the intellectual history of the time in which he lived. Oddly enough, in the present collection of Lord Macaulay's works, his writings are arranged in what, chronologically speaking, may be almost called an inverted order. First comes the History, then the Essays and biographical articles contributed to the Encyclopædia Metropolitana, then the introductory report and supplementary notes to the Indian Penal Code, then a variety of juvenile contributions to Knight's Quarterly Magazine, then reports of Parliamentary speeches, and, lastly, a number of poems. The "Lays of Ancient Rome" occupy the place of honour amongst these, and the remainder are of very various degrees of merit, the best being the well-known lines on the Armada. The worst, we think, is the dreary production "On the Marriage of Tirzah and Ahirad," two antediluvians :

The bravest he of all the sons of Seth,

Of all the house of Cain the loveliest she.

One of the most remarkable of all Lord Macaulay's performances is the one which is certainly least known to the public at large. We refer to his preface to, and notes upon, the Indian Penal Code. It justifies most completely its author's well-known remarks on the strange ignorance and indifference of English people, even of those who are otherwise well informed, on Indian subjects. There is not to be found in the world any piece of legislation so complete, so practical, and so scientific, and yet there is probably none which is less known even by English lawyers who have specially studied the subject. Parliament is at this moment feebly attempting to redefine the crime of murder, and in doing so is, as far as we can judge, making the existing confusion worse confounded, and reviving obsolete fictions by the use of awkward technical language, in spite of all warnings to the contrary. In vol. vii. p. 493, of Lord Macaulay's works, there is a discussion of the principles of the It is rather to be regretted that this and law relating to offences against the body, some other early and occasional perform- and especially of offences which cause ances should have been reprinted. There death, which fairly exhausts the subject. are several election squibs, for instance, The definitions of the code founded upon which were never meant for permanence, this Report have for many years had the and a good many of the articles in Knight's Quarterly might as well have been left there. They would never have been re

Tirzah was the she. It is a long story about
the sons of God and the daughters of men,
ending with an announcement of the Del-
uge which begins rather grotesquely :-

Oh thou haughty land of Nod,
Hear the sentence of thy God.

The Works of Lord Macaulay, Complete. Edited by his Sister, Lady Trevelyan. 8 vols. London: Longmans & Co. 1866.

force of law in India, and have answered there admirably; yet our legislators treat this fact with calm indifference, and go on cobbling the incoherent language of Coke and Hale, as if it were something too sacred to be ever laid aside. We must not,

however, wander into a general discussion | definite illustrations intended to make its upon the subject of criminal law. Our meaning clear. Another admirable qualifipresent object is Lord Macaulay's way of cation which Lord Macaulay possessed for dealing with it. Of all the numerous sub- the task which he had to perform lay in the jects which he treated at different times, fact that, though he was a real lawyer, and we doubt whether any one suited the pecu- had a pre-eminently legal mind, he was not liar bent of his genius so well as this. He in the least degree a slave to law. He never, we believe, had any considerable criticized it quite as freely, and with as litconnection with the practice of the profes- tle respect for the special weaknesses and sion of which he was a member. Politics failings of lawyers, as if he had stood altoand literature effectually withdrew his atten- gether outside of the subject. He was one tion from it. Yet he had some of the quali- of that almost infinitesimally small number of ties of a lawyer, or at all events of a jurist, lawyers who take the true measure of the in an unrivalled degree. He had in perfec- value of their profession, who can appreciate tion that peculiar systematic logical way of the great amount of practical shrewdness, viewing things which is sometimes described vigour of mind, and general experience as the special gift of the Scotch, and some- which it embodies, whilst they can recogtimes as the great peculiarity of the legal nize the numerous absurdities which have mind. He could affix a special sense to a been imported into the system, and the falgiven word, and go on using it perfectly lacy of many of the theories upon which consistently in that sense, and in no other, certain parts of it are founded. The result throughout the whole of a long and elabo- of this is that Lord Macaulay's notes upon rate inquiry. His theories on all subjects the Indian Code possess a degree of general are laid out with the precision of a mathe- interest which attaches to not more than matical figure. Moreover, he was never one or two other law books. They cannot imposed upon by a word. He knew pre- be known too widely, for they not only concisely the meaning of every expression that tain information in itself valuable and interhe ever used, and never did use one which esting in the highest degree, but they show did not raise before his mind a perfectly dis- how law might be made one of the most detinct and well-defined mental picture. To lightful and interesting of all the branches these qualities, which are indispensably of a liberal education, if its principles were necessary for a codifier, he added several properly investigated and exhibited with others which, if not indispensable, are at their leading applications in a philosophical least useful in the highest degree. His un- shape. One of the most generally interestrivalled power of illustration a power ing of these notes to the code is the one which in some of his writings he uses to an which relates to the law of defamation. extent which makes particular passages It gives the whole theory of the law of cumbrous and ungraceful-is essentially libel, and of the cases in which truth, and the quality of a lawyer. It is, indeed, in which good faith independently of truth, nothing else than the habit of putting cases. All his writings abound with instances of the way in which he uses this gift. He deduces, for instance, in one place, from the principle of passive obedience, the unexpected result that those who held it ought to have fought against Charles II. at Worcester, and against James II. at the Boyne; and he fixes upon Mr. Gladstone's principles about the relation between Church and State consequences, as to the course of duty of the English Government in India, of which it is hard to say whether they are more remarkable for being monstrous or for being inevitable. This power was invaluable to him in the work of codification, in so far as he used it for the purpose of ascertaining, with absolute or nearly absolute precision, what his real meaning was; but competent judges have doubted whether it did not carry him a step too far when it led him to add to each of the provisions of the code

ought to be a justification for defamatory statements, with a system, a completeness, and a power of illustration which we have never seen equalled elsewhere.

Though in some respects they may be considered as the most important of all his performances, Lord Macaulay's contributions to the criminal law of India will naturally be less known than his other writings. The code itself, like other performances of the kind, is founded principally on Bentham's speculations, but it is greatly superior to most other works of the same kind, and especially to the French Code Penal, in the care with which its first principles have been considered and decided on. This is a work to which all legislators are averse, and which is simply impossible in a country like our own, where all legislation has to be passed through the two Houses of Parliament, and submitted to every sort of amendment and distortion at the hands of

all sorts of people who are, for the most part, quite ignorant of the subject. We have noticed the subject rather more fully than the space which it occupies in Lord Macaulay's works would otherwise require, in the hopes of attracting to it some small part of the attention which it deserves.

man.

tory of large numbers of persons on whom Lord Macaulay's works have left no particular impression. If it be replied that Robertson was a preacher, and that as such it was his special function to work upon the emotions, it may be replied that the same observations would apply to Mr. Thackeray. Pendennis and Vanity Fair are far more influential books than Lord Macaulay's History, though the degree of knowledge, mental power, and general ability required to write them was indefinitely less. This cannot be explained by the fact that Mr. Thackeray was a novelist and Lord Macaulay an historian, for the peculiar and distinctive features of Lord Macaulay's treatment of history were precisely those which he possessed in common with novelists. What was it then which deprived Lord Macaulay of the personal influence which one would naturally have expected a man of such varied powers and resources to possess? We should be inclined to reply that he had fully as much influence as a man thoroughly penetrated with his principles ought to expect, or even to wish to exert. We will try to give some sort of sketch of those principles, and of their more important applications.

Of Lord Macaulay's more popular works it is needless to say anything special. They are well known even to those who know little else. It may, however, be interesting to make a few observations on some of the more prominent of their author's doctrines upon the subjects which especially engaged his attention. It has been observed, with much truth, that Lord Macaulay's writings on all subjects, and not only his writings but also his speeches, are distinguished in almost every case by a sort of abstract air. He passed his whole life in writing upon the subjects which interest people most deeply, and yet there is hardly to be found in any part of his writings a sign of any special emotion or any strong belief in particular principles or institutions. He was by no means cold. On the contrary, he was well known to be one of the warmest hearted and most affectionate of men, and his writings are full of patriotic and personal feeling. He was an enthusiastic English- Lord Macaulay's whole view of life repreHe greatly admired William III.; sents, more perfectly perhaps than that of alhe cordially hated James II.; but, not with- most any other man, what may be described standing this, it would be difficult to name as the view of a thoroughly sensible, honourany writer of our own day of anything like able, kindly man of the world; and we are the same mental calibre who had about him disposed to think that his writings have done so very little of the prophet or preacher. as much to incline people to accept it, or at To use the cant of a particular school, he all events to see its strong side, and to re- had no gospel at all for mankind, and did gard them favourably, as those of any author not appear to feel the want of one. He of our own, or indeed of most other, times. had authoritative, decisive views upon all This view is by no means so simple as it may kinds of subjects. He had a very decided sometimes look, and it is well deserving of opinion that, on the whole, the general ten- explicit attention. Let us look upon it first dency of things was towards improvement. on the negative, and then on the positive Yet he viewed this progress without enthu- side. If examined to the bottom, it will be siasm, and without denunciation, and with- found to depend at last upon a determinaout any special emotion whatever which tion on the part of those who hold it to ac-ever made itself manifest to his readers. quiesce in things as they are, and to renounce He was infinitely less influential than a the hope of making any sudden or very score of writers whom no one would think rapid change for the better in them. The of comparing to him in point either of in- fundamental doctrine of a man of the world tellect, of learning, of power of expression, is, The thing that hath been the same also or of grasp of thought. We may take a shall be. People will not be much better or single illustration amongst hundreds. In much worse than they actually are within all the respects which we have mentioned, any short time, or under the operation of as indeed in most others, he was altogether any new or violent cause, and the recognisuperior to such a writer as Mr. Robertson tion of this is the indispensable condition of of Brighton, so superior that there is a cer- such gradual improvements as are possible, tain absurdity in admitting the possibility and as are also sufficiently secure to make it of a comparison; yet we greatly doubt worth the while of cautious persons to take whether the reading of Robertson's sermons the risk of trying to bring them about. This has not formed an epoch in the mental his-habit of mind is in one way positive, since it