under the most liberal form of government, before they convince the nation and find their way into its legislation. But when the truth has a chance to work in this way, it will always prevail sooner or later. Under arbitrary governments the pressure from the people must be very great before legislation gives way to it. It is true that there has been a great change in the character of such governments within a few years. The welfare of the whole people has come to be recognized as the proper end of legislation. This change has had a great influence upon their economical policy, and their rulers have been more willing to listen to the teachings of science. But the surest means of influence which political economy can have, is a free and enlightened public. It is a fact of history, that political improvements usually come from the people rather than from their rulers. This fact, together with the agency of popular knowledge in producing changes, is very forcibly illustrated by Mr. Buckle, in his "History of Civilization in England." The commercial reforms of that country have certainly been wrought through the people. The repeal of the Corn Laws did not come from the ministry, but from the people, who had been convinced of the desirableness of the change through the reasonings of political economists. Legislative reforms and improvements become inevitable when the mass of the population have ascertained what is correct, and have patiently waited a while for the operation of the great moral power of disseminated truth.

It cannot but be noticed that the principal improvement which has been made in the economical legislation of modern times, has consisted in undoing earlier legislation. We have already noticed some of the restrictions that were formerly placed upon trade, under the mistaken belief that the national industry would thereby be benefited. There were heavy duties upon exportations, and heavy duties upon importations; while foreign trade in many articles was wholly prohibited. The exchange of commodities was so hampered with numberless restrictions, that it has recently been declared by a French writer of great authority on the history of political economy, that, had it not been for smuggling, commerce must have perished. Besides the more strictly commercial restrictions, there

were oppressive laws of apprenticeship, laws to regulate wages and prices, and laws to regulate profits and expenses. Legislatures had marked out for the people the particular branches of industry which they might pursue, the way in which they might exercise them, and the extent to which they might carry them. It has been the merit of modern legislation to remove many of these unnatural impediments, and to leave society free to choose its own path of industry. The laissez faire principle has been a ruling one of modern economical progress. Under its influence many useless and mischievous laws, which had long encumbered our statute-books, have been passing away one after the other. But although the principle is a wise one, and has accomplished much good, it should be kept in mind, that, like all other principles of politi cal economy, it is not directly applicable in all countries and under all circumstances.

Till a very recent day, the prosperity of one country has generally been thought to be inconsistent with the prosperity of its neighbors. Each country did what it could to injure the commerce and depress the industry of every other. This mistaken view of national policy has been conspicuous among the causes of war during the last two or three centuries; and it was a mistake, not only of jealous rulers, but even of philosophers. "Such is the condition of humanity," says Voltaire, "that to wish the greatness of one's own country, is to wish evil to one's neighbors. It is clear that one country cannot gain except another loses." The Earl of Shaftesbury, while Lord Chancellor of England, declared that the time had come when the English must go to war with the Dutch; for that it was "impossible both should stand upon a balance, and that, if we do not master their trade, they will ours. They or we must truckle. One must and will give the law to the other. There is no compounding where the contest is for the trade of the whole world." Ideas of this kind were founded upon ignorance of the true nature of trade. It is the science of political economy which has shown that man's relation to man rests upon no such ruinous basis; but that every nation has an interest in the prosperity of its neighbors; and that a calamity to one member of the great family of nations is a

calamity to all. This felicitous doctrine is beginning to be reduced to practical realization in the intercourse of nations. The most happy consequences have already ensued from it; and human progress has great hope in it for the future.

Enough has already been said to show that the legislation of modern times is largely indebted to the science of political economy for its improvement. The science itself is daily assuming a more definite form, and daily gaining increased respect from practical men. Economical legislation has now a surer ground than mere opinion to rest upon; and we may hope that it will cease making vast and uncertain experiments with the welfare of nations, and will seek a solution of its great problems by means of the fixed principles of political economy. It is certainly incumbent upon legislators vigilantly to learn its truths, to watch its development, and to note all the changes which time produces in it; and then to see that the art which they practise keeps pace with the science which is its chief aid. But the condition of the greatest influence of political economy upon legislation is popular knowledge; and in the general diffusion of knowledge and the enlightened spirit of the age it has its surest means of advancing the progress of humanity.

ART. XI. 1. Les Lettres d'Everard. Par P. LANFREY. 2. Histoire du Consulat et de l'Empire. Tom. XVII. Par M. THIERS.

3. Le Duc Job. Une Comédie. Par LÉON LAYA.

4. Le Père Prodigue. Une Comédie. Par A. DUMAS (Fils). 5. Port Royal. Par SAINTE BEUVE. 6 vols.

RARELY has a book had the success of Les Lettres d'Everard, and rarely has a book so thoroughly merited success. We are not aware that any article has been written upon it, or that any journal of note has ever alluded to it; yet this curious work is in every hand in France, and it is hard to meet any one who has not read it, and who has not

formed upon it the same favorable opinion we have above recorded. Report, from sources which we cannot but regard as perfectly authentic, affirms that the most positive orders were issued in Paris to the entire government press, enjoining that no notice whatever should be taken of the book; and we confess that, after carefully reading it, we can fully understand the apparent necessity of such a proceeding to persons used to the practices of despotism. M. Lanfrey's work, without mentioning the name of the Emperor, is the most severe attack upon the second Empire that has been published. But it is not an attack upon the Empire only, it is an attack also upon France, - upon the condition to which her present institutions, coming as they do after a series of revolutions, have brought the French

race.

It is difficult at first to see under what precise category of works of fiction Les Lettres d'Everard is to be classed. It is not a biography nor an autobiography, although its sole subject is the psychological development of one man, and the record of the sufferings which end by crushing him out of life. It is hardly to be styled a novel, for it has no plot and no love-story; there is scarcely what is to be called an "incident," certainly not an "adventure," in the whole volume; and yet it seizes on the reader with the charm of romance, and this charm attaches itself to a fictitious personage. We, however, suppose the great interest of the work to have its source in what circumscribes that interest, and, so to speak, localizes it. What attracts the reader of M. Lanfrey's volume is its truth, and that truth can be appreciated only by those who have lived long enough in France to enter into the conflicting feelings of the present generation. We doubt whether Les Lettres d'Everard could be read to the end by any one who is not familiar with French civilization in these days; whereas to those who either know anything of modern France, or have any care for her grandeur or decay, the book is one of such intense attraction that it cannot be laid down when once opened.

We look upon Les Lettres d'Everard as a work so very important to the foreign reader, that we will, as much as

possible, let the author speak for himself, only guiding the attention of our countrymen to this or that topic, as it is treated in these strange pages. In the very first pages of the Introduction, M. Lanfrey tells us who and what his hero is:

"At all periods of time men are to be met, whose ideas, characters, passions, tastes, and prejudices even, are in direct contradiction to the spirit of their age, and who refuse obstinately to bend before that spirit, to bow to the authority of their time. This resistance to the despotic sway of received opinions does not always come, as the crowd likes to declare, from mere eccentricity of temper, which is the pretext of cowards and the excuse of fools. From this revolt have sprung heroes who are the honor of human nature, and by this one particular form of opposition none are tempted save proud and powerful natures."

This at once tells us that M. Lanfrey's Everard is one of these solitary strugglers, out of harmony with the age; and out of harmony with it precisely because he is in perfect harmony with everything noble and great, and vibrates through every fibre of his whole being to the faintest touch of the sublime. Now it may be objected, at the outset, that characters like this have been produced at all periods, and in other countries than France; but there are peculiarities in the incompatibility visible between Everard and all around him, that mark him with the exclusive impress of the Frenchman of our present epoch. At almost every period of the world's history there has been some one point in time and space where a despotism has established itself, and been opposed by a resolute few. The chronicles of oppression are everywhere the chronicles of contest, of courage, and mostly of success, that in the end crowns a righteous cause. But what characterizes the actual condition of France is the hopeless, helpless lassitude of an entire race, its complicity in its own debasement, its acquiescence in its own shame. It is against this that M. Lanfrey's hero protests. "One may rise up against a mere tyrant," he exclaims, "and the chances are that your movement will be the signal of a general rising against his force; but you cannot rise up against the heavy, stupid, unimpressible weight of a crowd." It is against the languid, dull,