the Divinity with flowers which are useless, should be preferred to doing it with the productions which are necessary tc us? How happens it, that what serves for the support of our lives, has less dignity than beauties which have no object? I is because the beautiful recalls to our minds an immortal and divine existence, the recollection and the regret of which live at the same time in our hearts.

It certainly is not from a want of understanding the moral value of what is useful that Kant has separated it from the beautiful: it is to ground admiration of every kind on absolute disinterestedness; it is in order to give sentiments which render vice impossible, the preference over the lessons which only serve to correct it.

The mythological fables of the ancients were seldom intended as moral exhortations or edifying examples, and it does not at all argue that the moderns are better than the ancients that they oftener endeavor to give a useful result to their fictions; it is rather because they have less imagination, and carry into literature the habit which business gives, of always aiming at some object. Events, as they exist in reality, are not calculated beforehand, like a fiction, the winding up of which it moral. Life itself is conceived in quite a poetical manner; for it is not, in general, because the guilty man is punished and the virtuous man rewarded that it makes a moral impression upon us; it is because it develops in the mind indignation. against the guilty, and enthusiasm for the virtuous.

The Germans do not, according to the common notion, consider the imitation of nature as the principal object of art; it is ideal beauty which appears to them the principle of all masterpieces, and their poetical theory accords, in this respect, with their philosophy. The impression made on us by the fine arts has nothing whatever in common with the pleasure we feel from any imitation; man has in his soul innate sentiments which real objects will never satisfy, and it is to these sentiments that the imagination of painters and poets gives form and life. Of what is music, the first of all arts, an imitation And yet, of all the gifts of the Divinity, it is the most noble

for it may be said to be a superfluous one. The sun gives us light, we breathe the air of a serene atmosphere, all the beauties of nature are, in some way, serviceable to man; music alone has a noble inutility, and it is for this reason that affects is so deeply; the more it is without an object, the nearer it pproaches to that inward source of our thoughts, which application to any object whatever checks in its course.

The literary theory of the Germans differs from all others in not subjecting writers to customs, nor to tyrannical restrictions. It is a creative theory, a philosophy of the fine arts, which, instead of confining them, seeks, like Prometheus, to steal fire from heaven to give it to the poets. Did Homer, Dante, or Shakspeare, I shall be asked, know any thing of all this? Did they stand in need of all this metaphysical reasoning to be great writers? Nature, undoubtedly, has not waited for philosophy, which means only, that the fact preceded the observation of the fact; but, as we have reached the epoch of theories, should we not be on our guard against those which may stifle talent?

It must, however, be allowed, that many essential inconveniences result from the application of these systems of philosophy to literature. German readers, accustomed to peruse Kant, Fichte, etc., consider a less degree of obscurity as clearness itself; and writers do not always give to works of art that striking clearness which is so necessary to them. Constant attention may, nay, ought to be exacted where abstract ideas are the subject; but emotions are involuntary. In the enjoyment of the arts, indulgence, effort, and reflection can have no place: what we have to deal with there is pleasure, and not reasoning; philosophy may require attentive examination, but poetical talent ought to carry us away with it.

Ingenious ideas, derived from theories, cause illusion as to the real nature of talent. They prove, with wit, that such or such a piece ought not to have pleased, but still it did please; and then they begin to despise those who like it. They prove that another piece, composed according to certain principles, ought to interest, and yet, when they would have it performed,

when they say to it, Arise, and walk, the piece does not go off; and then they despise those who are not amused with a work composed according to the laws of the ideal and the real. People are generally wrong when they find fault with th judgment of the public in the arts, for popular impressions ar more philosophical than even philosophy itself; and when the ideas of men of information do not agree with this impression. it is not because they are too profound, but rather because they are not deep enough.

It appears to me, however, infinitely better for the literature of a country that its poetical system should be founded upon philosophical notions, even if they are a little abstract, than upon simple external rules; for these rules are only barriers to prevent children from falling.

In their imitation of the ancients, the Germans have taken quite a different direction from the rest of Europe. The conscientious character, from which they never depart, has prevented their mixing together modern and ancient genius: they treat fiction in some respects like truth, for they find means to be scrupulous even in regard to that; they apply the same disposition to acquire an exact and thorough knowledge of the monuments which are left us of past ages. In Germany, the study of antiquity, like that of the sciences and of philosophy, unites the scattered branches of the human mind.

Heyne, with a wonderful quickness of apprehension, embraces every thing that relates to literature, to history, and to the fine arts. From the most refined observations Wolf draws the boldest inferences, and, disdaining all submission to authority, adopts an opinion of his own of the worth and authenticity of the writings of the Greeks. In a late composition by M. Ch. de Villers, whom I have already mentioned with the high esteem he deserves, it may be seen what immense works are published every year in Germany on the classical authors. The Germans believe themselves called in every thing to act the part of observers; and it may be said that they are not of he age they live in, so much do their reflections and inclinaions turn towards another epoch of the world.

It may be that the best time for poetry was during the age of ignorance, and that the youth of the human race is gone forever; but, in the writings of the Germans, we seem to feel a new youth again reviving and springing up from the noble choice which may be made by those to whom every thing is known. The age of light has its innocence as well as the golden age, and if man, during his infancy, believes only in his soul, he returns, when he has learnt every thing, to confide in nothing else.

CHAPTER X.

INFLUENCE OF THE NEW PHILOSOPHY ON THE SCIENCES.

THERE is no doubt that the ideal philosophy leads to the augmentation of knowledge, and by disposing the mind to turn back upon itself, increases its penetration and perseverance in intellectual labor. But is this philosophy equally favorable to the sciences, which consist in the observation of nature? It is for the examination of this question that the following reflections are designed.

The progress of the sciences in the last century has generally been attributed to the experimental philosophy, and as the observation is of great importance to this subject, men have been thought more certain of attaining to scientific truths in proportion as they attached more importance to external objects; yet the country of Kepler and Leibnitz is not to be despised for science. The principal modern discoveries, gunpow der and the art of printing, have been made by the Germans; and, nevertheless, men's minds in Germany have always tended towards idealism.

Bacon compared speculative philosophy to the lark, that mounts to the sky, and descends again without bringing any thing back from her flight; and experimental philosophy to the falcon, that soars as high, but returns with his prey.

Perhaps in our days Bacon would have felt the inconveniences of the purely experimental philosophy; it has turned thought into sensation, morality into self-interest, and nature into mechanism; for it tends to degrade all things. The Germans have combated its influence in the physical sciences, as well as in science of a higher order; and while they submit Nature to the fullest observation, they consider her phenomena, in general, in a vast and animated manner: the empire of an opinion over the imagination always affords a presumption in its favor; for every thing tells us, that the beautiful, in the sublime conception of the universe, is also the true.

The new philosophy has already exerted its influence, in many respects, over the physical sciences in Germany. In the first place, the same spirit of universality, which I have remarked in literary men and philosophers, also discovers itself among the men of science. Humboldt' relates, like an accu

"Frederick Henry Alexander von Humboldt was born in Berlin, September 14, 1769. His father, Major von Humboldt, held the office of Chamberlain to Frederick the Great, and the early years of the son were passed under the tuition of Campe, on the paternal estate at Tegel, near Berlin. In 1786, when in his sixteenth year, Alexander entered the University of Frankfort-on-the-Oder, with his brother William; remained in that institution for two years, and was then transferred to the University of Göttingen. In the latter, he made the acquaintance of the naturalists Blumenbach and Forster, and through the friendship of those distinguished men, was enabled to cultivate his natural tastes for scientific study. The brothers quitted college in 1789. William had conceived a fancy for political life, and departed for Paris. Alexander, whose education had been especially directed with a view to employment in the government mines, followed the bent of his inclinations for travel and discovery, and, in company with Forster, made his first scientific journey to the Rhine, through Holland, and to England, early in the ensuing year. His first literary production, Mineralogical Observations on some Basaltic Formations of the Rhine, was the fruit of this journey. Returning home, he was sent to Hamburg to acquire a knowledge of commercial affairs, studied book-keeping at an Institute, afterwards removed to Freeburg, and became a student in the Mining Academy, where he remained until 1792. In that year, at the age of twenty-three years, he was appointed Superintendent of Mines in Franronia, an office which he held for three years. During this period, he zealously prosecuted his mineralogical and botanical studies, and made various experiments on the physical and chemical laws of metallurgy. Ir 1795, he resigned his office, in order to devote himself to the subjects oʻ