or other matter, to give way to those who have the power of affecting his pecuniary interests; but when he has realized such an amount of property, or attained such a position in society-O, then how independent he will be! and though he does not follow those who are going right, he will then become himself a leader of the right, and a most determined and energetic leader he will prove. But what goes on meanwhile? That, by their temporary conformity, he cuts the sinews of mental and moral energy; he forms habits which are no education for the honesty and independence he purposes to realize; he becomes, with every day that passes over his head, increasingly incapable of such a course; until, perhaps, should external circumstances ever come round to the point previously fixed in his own mind, these circumstances find him incapable of profiting by the advantages to which he has so long deferred all other good; they find him reaping the internal moral results of his own perversity; the iron has entered into his soul; the chain no longer is upon his limbs from without, but it is within him, upon his very mind and conscience; and he who meant to be an exalted being as soon as external events would allow, when they actually come, is sunk into a weak and degraded being, perhaps proud of that degradation, his whole system perverted and polluted and rejoicing in the moral darkness which he once knew to be darkness, and as such denounced. "Failure is often worth more to the world than success. That may be inexpedient, that may be defeated, which yet by the just and honourable endeavour works on mankind, through their minds, through their hearts, in its enduring moral influences, the highest good that individuals are capable of bestowing upon millions. Caiaphas was a man of expediency; he assembled the Sanhedrim that they might consult, lest the Romans should come and take away their place and nation, and asked, 'Know ye not that it is expedient that one man should die for the people? And the priest of expediency triumphed; the one man' was crucified. Within fifty years from that time, Christianity was going forth into all the regions of the earth, and gathering together the Roman and the Greek, the barbarian and the Scythian, the bond and the free, into the fold of Christ. Meanwhile, the ploughshare was passing over the dust of Jerusalem." Bronterre's Life and Character of Maximilian Robespierre. Watson, London: 1838. Much credit is due to both author and publisher of this daring work, undertaken, in the very teeth of prejudice, to prove, "by facts and arguments," that Robespierre, the "monster" of History, was one of the most humane, virtuous, noble-minded, and enlightened reformers that ever existed; and explaining the reasons why History' has belied his character." The portion of the work at present published carries us to the close of the first National Assembly; and in the account of the revolutionary proceedings, as well as by the numerous extracts from Robespierre's speeches and writings, satisfactorily establishes his high intellectuality. This is much: but more remains to be done. The world may, without much grimacing, allow thus much: but of the moral? The biographer is pledged to defend this count also; and his own reputation is staked upon the result. If successful, and the manifest probity of the part before us promises a corresponding conclusion, Mr. O'Brien will merit a high name among the vindicators of truth, the disabusers of the world's credulity. It is a noble outstarting from the herd of historic prejudices:-but the goal is not yet reached. We shall watch anxiously, and trustingly, for the completion of the work, which we commend to the best attention of all who, wishing success to the Many in the coming struggle, would understand the real causes of the failure of the French Revolution, in order to avoid a repetition of its fatal errors. NOTES OF THE MONTH. THE government has struck the first blow, by the arrest of the Rev. Mr. Stephens for suiting his words to the actions of which he speaks. He dared to call Evil by its proper name. He is accused of using violent language against the unchristian Poor-law. Will the framers of that Act to relieve the monopolizers of the earth's produce from the expensive maintenance of their useless beasts of burden defend its Christianity? As a zealous Christian, Mr. Stephens has but obeyed his conscience, in expressing his feelings. Certainly the expression is a libel on the Government, as our law has it, that the greater the truth, the greater the libel, and, therefore, he is to be prosecuted. Christ was crucified for such another libel. Surely any man, possessing as much feeling as did Dr. Malthus, may be pardoned for not speaking of the trampled and tortured in the same tones, or even in the same terms, as he might pleasantly discourse on those gentlest of nuisances, the little squabbles of courtiers. Good God! may not a beaten hound cry out? may no man bear witness against murder, though men do "die slowly?" We doubt whether Mr. Stephens has used stronger language than those curses appointed by the "establishment" to be read, not applied, in churches. "Cursed is he that perverteth the judgment of the fatherless and widow! Cursed is he that taketh reward to slay the innocent! Cursed are the unmerciful, covetous persons and extortioners!" Now, we much object to bad language under any circumstances; but we object more to bad Acts; and we venture to assert that a government really representing the People, or at all desirous of their welfare, would hesitate before giving cause for such language it is true they would lose the pleasure of prosecutions. But, beyond all this, we look on this arrest as the first of a series of provocations, to be applied by our evil-disposed rulers, to excite an ill-concerted and partial outbreak and to create a pretext for a "strong" government, another Manchester massacring, a Canadian pacification of such of the working men as should escape the sword or the gallows, a triumphant re-enthronement of the old feudal brutality, and a long deferral of popular liberty. We trust that the Working Classes will not have read in vain of Ministerial doings: that all endeavours will be made to keep out of the clutches of the monster, Law; and that nothing will be done unadvisedly or without sufficient preparation. We are on the brink of a revolution. Wronged men, almost tired of petitioning, meet at night, by thousands, armed with torches, to denounce their oppressors: will dragoons stand fire-brands? are noblemen's and gentlemen's seats fire-proof? The British Senate keeps holiday! The trampled Many have run the gauntlet of misery; the stricken slave, the People, has crouched in turn to every legal wrong, but the last, Starvation:Is it come to this? We will fight it out!-Wheat is at eighty-three shillings a quarter; and families are expected to live upon seven shillings a week. The pampered Few still "craze their chariot wheels;" there are no fewer prodigalities in the mansions of the Rich. But the Queen, our royal and gracious mistress-she sympathizes with the distressed millions? She has come express to London to-see the Pantomime. To the Unenfranchised. They will use every art to disunite you, To conquer separately, by stratagem, Whom in a mass they fear-but be ye firm :- And while you spurn the hated name of slaves, Jan. 26, 1839 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON, THE APOSTLE OF THE BLACKS: FROM THE WRITINGS OF HARRIET MARTINEAU WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON was, not many years ago, a printer's boy Now he is a marked man wherever he turns. The faces of his friends brighter when his step is heard; the people of colour almost kneel to him; and the rest of American society (at least, the slave-holding portion) jeers, pelts, and execrates him. Amidst all this, his gladsome life rolls on; he is too busy to be anxious, too loving to be sad;" he is meek, sympathetic, and self-forgetful. His countenance of steady compassion gives hope to the oppressed, who look to him as the Jews did to Moses. It was this serene countenance, saint-like in its earnestness and purity, that a man bought at a print-shop, where it was exposed without a name, and hung up in his parlour, as the most apostolic face he had ever seen. The face was not altered, though the man took it out of the frame and hid it, when he found it was Garrison. As for Garrison, he sees in his persecutors but the creatures of unfavourable circumstances. He early satisfied himself that "a rotten egg cannot hit truth;" and then the whole matter was settled. Such is his case now. In 1829 it was very different. He was an obscure student in a country college, when he determined on embracing the cause of the Abolition of Slavery. A New England merchant freighted a vessel with slaves for the New Orleans market, in the interval of the annual thanksgiving that the soil of his state was untrodden by the foot of a slave. Garrison commented upon this transaction, in a newspaper, in the terms it deserved. He was, of course, tried for a "libel," and committed to prison till he could pay a fine of one thousand dollars. He was just as able to pay a million. After three months' imprisonment, he was freed by the generosity of Arthur Tappan, a New York merchant, who paid his fine for the principle's sake; and whose entire conduct has been in accordance with this one noble deed. Garrison now lectured in New York, for the abolition of slavery; and was warmly encouraged by a few choice spirits. He went to Boston for the same purpose: but, in that enlightened and religious city, every place in which he could lecture was closed against him. He declared his intention of lecturing on the Common: and this threat procured him what Le wanted. At his first lecture he fired the souls of some of his hearers; among others of Mr. May, the first Unitarian clergyman who espoused the cause. On the next Sunday, Mr. May, in pursuance of the custom of praying for all distressed persons, prayed for the slaves; and was asked, in descending from the pulpit, whether he was mad. Garrison and his fellow-workman, both in the printing-office and the cause, his friend Knapp, set up the Liberator,in its first days sheet of shabby paper, printed with old types, and now a handsome and flourishing newspaper. These two heroes, in order to publish their paper, lived for a series of years in one room, on bread and water, "with sometimes," when the paper sold unusually well, "the luxury of a bowl of milk." In course of time, twelve men formed themselves into an abolition society at Boston, and the cause was fairly afoot. Afoot amidst a series of persecutions! The Abolitionists were execrated and insulted and foully maltreated by the respectables of a large portion of the United States. Gentlemen-mobs (working men were not among them) attacked the meeting-houses of the abolitionist women; who escaped with difficulty. The houses were pulled down. The Abolitionists were obliged to suspend their meetings, for want of a place to meet in. They could hire no public building: no one would take the risk of having his property destroyed, by letting it to so obnoxious a set of people. Rewards were offered by the slave-holders, the supporters of "things as they are," through advertisements in the newspapers, and handbills, for the heads, or even the ears of anti-slavery leaders. Families wer |