bours. The ascetic and the industrial spirit are necessarily opposed. A more vital consequence of the same tendency was its influence upon marriage. If ascetics inculcated chastity, they took the lowest possible view of married life; the recoil of such extravagant principles is as natural and inevitable in this as in other departments of morality; and we need not follow Mr. Lecky through any of the interesting pages in which he traces the consequences of the conception of life which considers virginity to be the crowning grace of a true saint.

We need only glance at the influence of the Church upon the intellectual virtues, and the degrading theory which attaches the idea of moral guilt to intellectual error. Under its influence, says Mr. Lecky, a literature arose, surpassing in its mendacious ferocity any other that the world had known.' Ecclesiastical writers thought that, first, any lies were excusable in defence of the truth; secondly, that everybody who did not believe them would be damned. Indeed, with such an engine of torture at their command, they had little temptation to be moderate. It was the pleasant belief of those times that the entire human race beyond the Church, as well as a very large proportion of those who are within its pale, were doomed to an eternity of agony in a literal and undying fire.' This superstition is not quite dead; and, as Mr. Lecky remarks, 'It was the custom then, as it is the custom now, for Catholic priests to stain the imagination of young children by ghastly pictures of future misery, to print upon the virgin mind atrocious images which they hoped, not unreasonably, might prove indelible.' The quotation from a tract called, The Sight of Hell, by which he confirms this opinion, is worth noticing by those who would see what kind of doctrines Catholic

priests still venture to put forward.

The facts of which we have been speaking are, of course, familiar in a general way to most educated persons. Mr. Lecky has only illustrated them with abundant learning and grouped them with such skill as to suggest more than he directly states. Their bearing upon the argument of which we have been speaking is indeed rather ambiguous. No rational person could deny that Christianity has been the direct means of conferring many blessings upon the world, and that it has more indirectly provided the channels through which our better instincts may exercise a more powerful influence than formerly. Yet it is also undeniable that the evils which Mr. Lecky has described have had a very close connection, if not with the spread of Christianity, at least with the increasing power of the Church. It is a question of profound interest, not merely in considering the past, but in forecasting the future of religion. The decay of the patriotic virtues was perhaps a mere temporary result of the crushing under the Roman empire of the centres of national life, which were the natural objects of patriotism. It might be necessary at the rise of the spiritual body in the midst of corruption and tyranny that it should for a time attract to itself all the loyalty of its members. The fault was not in the teaching, but in the disturbed medium in which the new force was operating. Such unfortunate concretions round the main body of truth may be gradually dispersed, and a genuine patriotism be found to be as compatible with universal philanthropy as with pure Christianity. The other vices which Mr. Lecky denounces seem to have a greater vitality, and to be more difficult of eradication without injury to the faith upon which they were engrafted. The Roman Catholic Church, and those who gra

vitate towards it, still preach an asceticism which, if it does not take such revolting forms, is in principle as hostile to a genuine religion and to that full development of human nature which should be its ultimate purpose. Very few persons believe in hell-fire; at least,' after the fearless old fashion': they prevaricate and hesitate and provide loopholes of escape from the terrible consequences of their own logic; yet dogmatists cling to the doctrine with a fondness which is almost touching, and the freedom with which a man threatens his opponents with damnation serves as a pretty accurate test at once of the intensity and blindness of his faith. The attitude of the Church towards the intellectual virtues is not profoundly altered; there is less lying than of old, partly because a race of critics have arisen who have very much increased the difficulty of lying with success; but few theologians have learnt to welcome truth, from whatever quarter it may come, or can bear to admit frankly that a man does not deserve damnation because he comes to conclusions radically different from their own.

It is this close connection between the problems of our own time and those of the earlier ages of Christianity which gives a special interest to Mr. Lecky's work. The historical test of the truth of its doctrines is their fitness to regenerate the ancient world; and this can only be demonstrated by careful and candid criticism. The present test of their truth, or, at least, of their chance of permanent hold upon men's minds, is their fitness to meet the problems which are all around us. If the value of Christianity, though

immense at the time, was merely transitory, we shall find that the errors which it embodied were part of its substance, and not mere accretions from without. In the opposite case, it will be able to shake them off, and exhibit its permanent power over the minds and spirits of men. Very few people will shrink from giving an exceedingly confident answer to these questions, on one side or the other, though that does not prove that many people know much about it. We, at any rate, must be content with calling attention to the importance of Mr. Lecky's book in attracting men's minds to such discussions, although it is far from being the only sense in which it is profoundly interesting. We will only remark in conclusion, that it is a curious sign of the times that a book, which, if it does not openly come to heterodox conclusions, at least suggests so many convenient weapons for the use of heterodox hands, has been received with such general complacency, and given so little scandal. The utilitarians have been angry, not, perhaps, without some reason; but more orthodox people, whether disarmed by the amiable and candid tone of Mr. Lecky's writing, or thrown off their guard by the want of definite statements of erroneous principles (that is, principles differing from their own), have received him with remarkable calmness. If they are wise-for we may put any case hypothetically-they will take warning from his book, that an era is opening of more vital controversies than any which have hitherto raged between the faithful and the unbelievers.

IF music be the food of love, play on.' But if music be the murderer of love, the bane of innocent flirtation, the exacting and wearisome tyrant of the evening, cease that eternal crash, stop that piano, and, oh! warbler of the night, who know'st or reck'st not of the imprecations around thee, and vainly hopest that the circle hang enchanted on thy lips-shut up.

I think I like music: I delight in Mozart and Beethoven: I feel they speak to me, although what they say I do not know. But their cadences and phrases touch a chord which sensibly bounds within me, and sets in motion vague, dreamy, delicious thoughts, which tempt me almost to cry aloud with pleasure. I sup. pose, although I know little of the theory of musical composition, that there is as much musical skill displayed by these favourites of mine as by the loudest, harshest crash which Verdi ever inspired. But I hate Verdi and all the banging, braying school, with an unmitigated hatred. Their works seem to me to be composed of muscle only, without an anima ng spirit, an outrage on, and insult to, the real soul of music. Music should steal on you as the stalker steals on the deer. If you go beating drums, and shouting loud huzzas, your intended prey will be the other side the mountain before your work is well begun.

But even music I like is often distasteful to me. I resent and everybody does resent-being told and compelled to listen-that is, being told to hold my tongue, when I wish to talk. It is all very well for you, hideous hypocrite of the drawing-room, knowing not one one note of music from another, to

stand wondering with a foolish look of praise, and forcing your rebellious lips into the mockery of a rapturous smile. The counterfeit is written too plainly on your face, if any one took the trouble to look at it, or think of it. I, who am an honest man, hold my tongue, as I would in any other solemn assembly, but to pretend that I like being interrupted when my pretty neighbour is waxing sociable and pleasant, I should disdain.

I do, indeed, like pleasant melodies to pour into my ear while I talk or am talked to: and that is precisely what should happen on all such occasions, and what is never, on any account, permitted. And, my most amiable, but ah! too exacting hostess, why is it that we may not carry on our innocent chat while your nightingales are singing? Shall I tell you? Conceit and vanity explain it all. It is sweet to sit on a bank on a summer's day, and listen to the chorus of the blackbird and the thrush; but would you enjoy them more if your own pretty prattle were silenced? A pleasant companion, in a pleasant stroll, is all the more agreeable, that the air is vocal all around. That is the music Nature has provided, and she never meant anything so preposterous as that man-still less woman-should be dumb during the performance. Nay, look at the feathered choristers themselves. They don't listen to each other, but swell their little throats, and pour out their musical small talk amid the harmonious discord all around. But, you—you care for nothing but having your phenomenon admired-because you brought her there, and you brought the people to hear her, and she will

be sulky with you if the people talk, and your party won't be a success, and Mrs. Crackenthorpe will come next day, and, scorpionlike, condole with you on the mortifications of the evening. Well, there are meaner motives in the world than those which swell your gentle and good-natured bosom. I quarrel not with them. I shall be as mute and as portentously unhappy as my friends; but say not that this kind of thing is the food of love.

The hostess on such occasionsfor few men are such fiends as to promote actively such scenes of torture-never wastes a thought on her guests. Little she recks that her tall, slim, nervous friend, who stands woe-begone between the folding-doors, not disguising his misery, is as destitute of the sense of music as a blind man of the idea of colour. Why, then, is he there, a mockery of woe? Because he is Lord Charles, and his name will sound well to-night, and will look well to-morrow. She ought to have musical friends at her musical parties: so an oldworld man of sense would think. But that is a vain thought. Some there are that really revel in the enjoyment of sweet sounds, and would be only too grateful for an evening such as this. But then the Grayling girls live on the wrong side of Oxford Street, and no one knows them: and although that which desolates Lord Charles would enchant them, the first is tormented and the last are snubbed.

I do not like the Germans. It is prejudice, perhaps, but I love them not. They speak through their noses, for the most part; they have no notion of fun; they laugh at and revel in the dreary; they look solemn and puzzled at the sound of wit. Their dreaminess is not that of abstraction, but rather of beer; and they have no faith in anything which exists, or hope in anything which is about to exist.

There is but one exception, and that is their passion for music. They love it: they live in it. You never see among them that gloomy, victimised type which stalks through London drawing-rooms. All are musicians. They listen when they wish to listen, and cease when they have listened enough. German music is the only thing real about them-it has real sentiment and real gaiety. Even I, an adopted son of British soil, solemn and amusing myself sadly, believing that no good can come out of foreign parts, relaxed my Britannic morgue, and felt and looked human as I listened morning after morning to that angelic choir, the band at Homburg. Whether it still exists, or whether the desire for German unity has abolished German harmony, I do not know, for it is ten years since I flourished at that questionable watering-place. I rose at six, because other people did, and hated doing so. I drank the waters for no better reason, and hated them also. But how the band played, in those unreasonable, prejentacular hours-warbling forth from their absurd little tent the sweetest strains, and enjoying them to the full as much as their audience! and it was music again at twelve, and music again at five; and merrily the days of Thalaba went by. But, as I have mentioned Homburg, if it stand where and as it did, let me give a word of warning to all. It has nothing to do with music, but something with sweet sounds.

Opposite the Kursaal there is or was a semicircular seat of stone,with a low parapet wall and a group of shrubs in the centre. Its diameter must be fifty feet, and when you sit at one end you cannot see any one who may be at the other. It was rather a favourite resort of affectionate couples in those days, because, although close to the road, it had a sort of seclusion of its own. But one day I made, in regard to

it, a discovery which somewhat alarmed me.

I was sitting in solitary state, nescio quid meditans-probably the vanity of human wishes and Homburg waters when I heard a voice, close at my ear, say 'Don't be silly, Charles.' Now my name is Charles, and thinking I was doing no mischief, I looked round and over the parapet for the airy whisperer, but in vain. It sounded as if the speaker was perched on my shoulder. Being convinced, however, that I was not the delinquent rebuked, I rose and walked round the shrubbery in the centre; and there, to be sure, I saw a young man who might be Charles, and a young lady who might have been the airy whisperer. Of course I retreated, but next morning I took a friend down with me to the semi-circular seat; I sat down at one end and he at the other, entirely out of sight of each other, and then we whispered below our breath to the wall, and every syllable was distinctly heard at the opposite extremity. Friends, countrymen, and, above all, lovers, it

was a WHISPERING GALLERY.

Truth to tell, we are not a musical nation. The taste, as we have it, is an acquired taste for a foreign fruit. Yet I doubt greatly we are degenerate in that respect. What wonder that we do not understand music, who never learn it? How long shall it be that our youth shall go the round of Eton and Oxford, or Harrow and Cambridge, and learn nothing which will refine them socially? To have lessons in music at a public school, would be regarded as a degradation. That great refiner of our homes, that purifier of domestic hours, that sweet inward solace which bursts out in song, is not even regarded as a fitting thing for a boy to learn. In this, as I have said, we are degenerate. Plainly in Shakespeare's time, partsinging was an ordinary accomplishment, and prince and clown

VOL. LXXX.-NO. CCCCLXXVII.

alike join in the catch like 'two gipsies on a horse.' Sir Walter Scott, who always tried to preserve the characteristics of the period of which he writes, makes the king and the jester take up the parts of the roundelay, as they travel through the forest; and Erasmus, in his Laus Stultitiæ, mentions the love of music as one of the characteristics of Englishmen in his time. I hope the next generation will be less provincial and boorish than the present.

What is it that Shakespeare says about 'it alone' being 'high fantas. tical?' He is speaking of the spirit of love, as he calls it; but the phrase is far more applicable to the spirit of music. As to the spirit of love, I know nothing of it. It is a merc phantasy for one of my years. The thick rushing fancies, the raging of the soul, the jealous follies of that hour won't come. The flutter of the heart, the senseless disturbance of the brain, the long abstracted, delicious reveries are unknown to my grey hairs. They are stored away with my bats and marbles. An old man doubtless may fall in love, and when he does, it is with a fury, an intensity akin to and equal to despair. But it is then-unhappy he who is the victim—a passion with a force and a tenacity which youth seldom knows. Far, far from me be that wretched little divinity or demon. I have lived and loved, and luckily need no repetition, like a contented and respectable head of a family as I am. But the spirit of music never dies, and might, were I to yield to it, torment my old age with flames not less agitating than the other. Shakespeare, as usual, knew well what he wrote of, when he penned the lines I am thinking of. The strain that had a sound like the sweet south, suddenly sickened and died. It was not so sweet as it had been, and then he goes off into a rhapsody about the spirit of love. But the reason is plain enough. The duke

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