No More Learning

Hо can interpret and measure what is passing within me?
WHO I am happy now in remembrance of the past, which I
To my
scarcely was when that past was the present.
sensitive heart the surprise of being with thee, the coming and
going and returning in a few blessed days-this was all like
clouds flitting across my heaven; through my too near presence I
feared it might be darkened by my shadow, as it is ever darker
when it nears the earth; now, in the distance, it is mild and
lofty and ever clear.
I would fain press thy dear hand with both of mine to my
bosom, and say to thee, "How peace and content have come to
me since I have known thee! "
I know that the evening has not come when life's twilight
gathers in my heart: oh, would it were so! Would that I had
lived out my days, that my wishes and joys were fulfilled, and
that they could all be heaped upon thee, that thou mightst be
therewith decked and crowned as with evergreen bays.
When I was alone with thee on that evening I could not
comprehend thee: thou didst smile at me because I was moved,
and laughed at me because I wept; but why? And yet it was
thy laughter, the tone of thy laughter, which moved me to tears;
and I am content, and see, under the cloak of this riddle, roses
burst forth which spring alike from sadness and joy. Yes, thou
art right, prophet: I shall yet with light heart struggle up
through jest and mirth; I shall weary myself with struggling as
I did in my childhood (ah, it seems as if it were but yester-
day! ) when with the exuberance of joy I wandered through the
blossoming fields, pulling up the flowers by the roots and throw-
ing them into the water. But I wish to seek rest in a warm,
firm earnestness, and there at hand standest
hand standest thou, smiling.
prophet!
I say to thee yet once more: Whoever in this wide world
understands what is passing within me, who am so restful in
thee, so silent, so unwavering in my feeling? I could, like the
mountains, bear nights and days in the past without disturbing
thee in thy reflections. And yet when at times the wind bears


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ELISABETH BRENTANO
2352
the fragrance and the germs together from the blossoming world
up to the mountain heights, they will be intoxicated with delight
as I was yesterday. Then I loved the world, then I was as glad
as a gushing, murmuring spring in which the sun for the first
time shines.
Farewell, sublime one who blindest and intimidatest me!
From this steep rock upon which my love has in life-danger
ventured, I cannot clamber down. I cannot think of descending,
for I should break my neck in the attempt.
BETTINA'S LAST MEETING WITH GOETHE
From a Letter to her Niece in 1824, first published in 1896
N THE evening I was alone again with Goethe. Had any one
observed us, he would have had something to tell to poster-
ity. Goethe's peculiarities were exhibited to the full: first he
would growl at me, then to make it all up again he would caress
me, with the most flattering words. His bottle of wine he kept
in the adjoining room, because I had reproached him for his
drinking the night before: on some pretext or other he disap-
peared from the scene half a dozen times in order to drink a
glass. I pretended to notice nothing; but at parting I told him
that twelve glasses of wine wouldn't hurt him, and that he had
had only six. "How do you know that so positively? " he said.
"I heard the gurgle of the bottle in the next room, and I heard
you drinking, and then you have betrayed yourself to me, as
Solomon in the Song of Songs betrayed himself to his beloved,
by your breath. "
"You are an arrant rogue," he said; "now
take yourself off," and he brought the candle to light me out.
But I sprang in front of him and knelt upon the threshold of
the room.
"Now I shall see if I can shut you in, and whether
you are a good spirit or an evil one, like the rat in Faust; I
kiss this threshold and bless it, for over it daily passes the most
glorious human spirit and my best friend. " "Over you and your
love I shall never pass," he answered, "it is too dear to me; and
around your spirit I creep so" (and he carefully paced around
the spot where I was kneeling), "for you are too artful, and it
is better to keep on good terms with you. " And so he dismissed
me with tears in his eyes. I remained standing in the dark
before his door, to gulp down my emotion. I was thinking that


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ELISABETH BRENTANO
2353
this door, which I had closed with my own hand, had separated
me from him in all probability forever. Whoever comes near
him must confess that his genius has partly passed into good-
ness; the fiery sun of his spirit is transformed at its setting into
a soft purple light.
IN GOETHE'S GARDEN
FROM this hillock all my world survey!
Yon vale, bedecked by nature's fairy fingers,
Where the still by-road picturesquely lingers,
The cottage white whose quaint charms grace the way-
These are the scenes that o'er my heart hold sway.
I from this hillock all my world survey!
Though I ascend to heights fair lands dividing,
Where stately ships I see the ocean riding,
While cities gird the view in proud array,
Naught prompts my heart's impulses to obey.
I from this hillock all my world survey!
And could I stand while Paradise descrying,
Still for these verdant meads should I be sighing,
Where thy dear roof-peaks skirt the verdant way:
Beyond these bounds my heart longs not to stray.
IV-148
―――――


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2354
JOHN BRIGHT
(1811-1889)
OHN BRIGHT was the modern representative of the ancient
Tribunes of the people or Demagogues (in the original and
perfectly honorable sense); and a full comparison of his
work and position with those of the Cleons or the Gracchi would
almost be an outline of the respective peoples, polities, and problems.
He was a higher type of man and politician than Cleon, -largely
because the English aristocracy is not an unpatriotic and unprincipled
clique like the Athenian, ready to use any weapon from murder down
or to make their country a province of a
foreign empire rather than give up their
class monopoly of power; but like his pro-
totype he was a democrat by nature as well
as profession, the welfare of the common
people at once his passion and his political
livelihood, full of faith that popular in-
stincts are both morally right and intellect-
ually sound, and all his own instincts and
most of his labors antagonistic to those of
the aristocracy. It is a phase of the same
fact to say that he also represented the
active force of religious feeling in politics,
as opposed to pure secular statesmanship.
The son of a Quaker manufacturer of Rochdale, England, and
born near that place November 16th, 1811, he began his public career
when a mere boy as a stirring and effective temperance orator, his
ready eloquence and intense earnestness prevailing over an ungrace-
ful manner and a bad delivery; he wrought all his life for popular
education and for the widest extension of the franchise; and being a
Quaker and a member of the Peace Society, he opposed all war on
principle, fighting the Crimean War bitterly, and leaving the Glad-
stone Cabinet in 1882 on account of the bombardment of Alexandria.
He was retired from the service of the public for some time on
account of his opposition to the Crimean War; but Mr. Gladstone,
who differed from him on this point, calls it the action of his life
most worthy of honor. He was perhaps the most warlike opponent
of war ever high in public life; the pugnacious and aggressive agita-
tor, pouring out floods of fiery oratory to the effect that nobody ought
to fight anybody, was a curious paradox.
JOHN BRIGHT



## p. 2355 (#553) ###########################################

JOHN BRIGHT
2355
He was by far the most influential English friend of the North in
the Civil War, and the magic of his eloquence and his name was a
force of perhaps decisive potency in keeping the working classes on
the same side; so that mass meetings of unemployed laborers with
half-starving families resolved that they would rather starve alto-
gether than help to perpetuate slavery in America. He shares with
Richard Cobden the credit of having obtained free trade for Eng-
land: Bright's thrilling oratory was second only to Cobden's organ-
izing power in winning the victory, and both had the immense
weight of manufacturers opposing their own class. That he opposed
the game laws and favored electoral reform is a matter of course.
Mr. Bright entered on an active political career in 1839, when he
joined the Anti-Corn-Law League. He first became a member of
Parliament in 1843, and illustrates a most valuable feature of English
political practice. When a change of feeling in one place prevented.
his re-election, he selected another which was glad to honor itself by
having a great man represent it, so that the country was not robbed
of a statesman by a village faction; and there being no spoils sys-
tem, he did not have to waste his time in office-jobbing to keep his
seat. He sat first for Durham, then for Manchester, and finally for
Birmingham, remaining in public life over forty years; and never
had to make a "deal" or get any one an office in all that period.
He was in Mr. Gladstone's Cabinet from 1868 to 1870, and again
from 1873 to 1882. On the Home Rule question the two old friends.
and long co-workers divided; Mr. Bright, with more than half the
oldest and sincerest friends of liberty and haters of oppression in
England, holding the step to be political suicide for the British
Empire.
As an orator, Mr. Bright stood in a sense alone. He was direct
and logical; he carefully collected and massed his facts, and used
strong, homely Saxon English, and short crisp words; he was a
master of telling epigram whose force lay in its truth as much as in
its humor. Several volumes of his speeches have been published:
'On Public Affairs'; 'On Parliamentary Reform'; 'On Questions of
Public Policy'; 'On the American Question,' etc. His life has been
written by Gilchrist, Smith, Robertson, and others. He died March
27th, 1889.


## p. 2356 (#554) ###########################################

2356
JOHN BRIGHT
FROM THE SPEECH ON THE CORN LAWS (1843)
IT
T MUST not be supposed, because I wish to represent the inter-
est of the many, that I am hostile to the interest of the few.
But is it not perfectly certain that if the foundation of the
most magnificent building be destroyed and undermined, the
whole fabric itself is in danger? Is it not certain, also, that
the vast body of the people who form the foundation of the
social fabric, if they are suffering, if they are trampled upon, if
they are degraded, if they are discontented, if "their hands are
against every man, and every man's hands are against them," if
they do not flourish as well, reasonably speaking, as the classes
who are above them because they are richer and more power-
ful, --then are those classes as much in danger as the working
classes themselves?
There never was a revolution in any country which destroyed
the great body of the people. There have been convulsions of
a most dire character which have overturned old-established mon-
archies and have hurled thrones and sceptres to the dust. There
have been revolutions which have brought down most powerful
aristocracies, and swept them from the face of the earth forever,
but never was there a revolution yet which destroyed the people.
And whatever may come as a consequence of the state of things
in this country, of this we may rest assured: that the common
people, that the great bulk of our countrymen will remain and
survive the shock, though it may be that the Crown and the
aristocracy and the Church may be leveled with the dust, and
rise no more. In seeking to represent the working classes, and
in standing up for their rights and liberties, I hold that I am
also defending the rights and liberties of the middle and richer
classes of society. Doing justice to one class cannot inflict
injustice on any other class, and "justice and impartiality to all"
is what we all have a right to from government. And we have
a right to clamor; and so long as I have breath, so long will I
clamor against the oppression which I see to exist, and in favor
of the rights of the great body of the people.
What is the condition in which we are? I have already
spoken of Ireland. You know that hundreds of thousands meet
there, week after week, in various parts of the country, to pro-
claim to all the world the tyranny under which they suffer.
·


## p. 2357 (#555) ###########################################

JOHN BRIGHT
2357
You know that in South Wales, at this moment, there is an
insurrection of the most extraordinary character going on, and
that the Government is sending, day after day, soldiers and
artillery amongst the innocent inhabitants of that mountainous
country for the purpose of putting down the insurrection thereby
raised and carried on. You know that in the Staffordshire iron-
works almost all the workmen are now out and in want of
wages, from want of employment and from attempting to resist
the inevitable reduction of wages which must follow restriction
upon trade.
You know that in August last, Lancashire and
Yorkshire rose in peaceful insurrection to proclaim to the world,
and in face of Heaven, the wrongs of an insulted and oppressed
people. I know that my own neighborhood is unsettled and
uncomfortable. I know that in your own city your families are
suffering. Yes, I have been to your cottages and seen their
condition. Thanks to my canvass of Durham, I have been able
to see the condition of many honest and independent—or ought-
to-be-independent and industrious artisans. I have seen even
freemen of your city sitting, looking disconsolate and sad. Their
hands were ready to labor; their skill was ready to produce all
that their trade demanded. They were as honest and industrious
as any man in this assembly, but no man hired them. They
were in a state of involuntary idleness, and were driving fast to
the point of pauperism. I have seen their wives, too, with three
or four children about them- -one in the cradle, one at the
breast. I have seen their countenances, and I have seen the
signs of their sufferings. I have seen the emblems and symbols
of affliction such as I did not expect to see in this city. Ay!
and I have seen those little children who at not a distant day
will be the men and women of this city of Durham; I have
seen their poor little wan faces and anxious looks, as if the fur-
rows of old age were coming upon them before they had escaped
from the age of childhood. I have seen all this in this city, and
I have seen far more in the neighborhood from which I have
come. You have seen, in all probability, people from my neigh-
borhood walking your streets and begging for that bread which
the Corn Laws would not allow them to earn.
-
"Bread-taxed weaver, all can see
What the tax hath done for thee,
And thy children, vilely led,


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2358
JOHN BRIGHT
Singing hymns for shameful bread,
Till the stones of every street
Know their little naked feet. "
This is what the Corn Law does for the weavers of my neigh-
borhood, and for the weavers and artisans of yours.
FROM THE SPEECH ON INCENDIARISM IN IRELAND (1844)
HE great and all-present evil of the rural districts is this-
you have too many people for the work to be done, and you,
the landed proprietors, are alone responsible for this state
of things; and to speak honestly, I believe many of you know
it. I have been charged with saying out-of-doors that this House
is a club of land-owners legislating for land-owners. If I had
not said it, the public must long ago have found out that fact.
My honorable friend the member for Stockport on one occasion
proposed that before you passed a law to raise the price of bread,
you should consider how far you had the power to raise the rates
of wages. What did you say to that? You said that the laborers
did not understand political economy, or they would not apply to
Parliament to raise wages; that Parliament could not raise wages.
And yet the very next thing you did was to pass a law to raise
the price of produce of your own land, at the expense of the very
class whose wages you confessed your inability to increase.
What is the condition of the county of Suffolk? Is it not
notorious that the rents are as high as they were fifty years ago,
and probably much higher? But the return for the farmer's cap-
ital is much lower, and the condition of the laborer is very much
worse.
The farmers are subject to the law of competition, and
rents are thereby raised from time to time so as to keep their
profits down to the lowest point, and the laborers by the compe-
tition amongst them are reduced to the point below which life
cannot be maintained. Your tenants and laborers are being de-
voured by this excessive competition, whilst you, their magnani-
mous landlords, shelter yourselves from all competition by the
Corn Law yourselves have passed, and make the competition of
all other classes serve still more to swell your rentals. It was
for this object the Corn Law was passed, and yet in the face of
your countrymen you dare to call it a law for the protection of
native industry.


## p. 2359 (#557) ###########################################

JOHN BRIGHT
2359
Again, a rural police is kept up by the gentry; the far-
mers say for the sole use of watching game and frightening poach.
ers, for which formerly they had to pay watchers. Is this true,
or is it not? I say, then, you care everything for the rights-
and for something beyond the rights of your own property,
but you are oblivious to its duties. How many lives have been
sacrificed during the past year to the childish infatuation of pre-
serving game? The noble lord, the member for North Lan-
cashire, could tell of a gamekeeper killed in an affray on his
father's estate in that county. For the offense one man was
hanged, and four men are now on their way to penal colo-
nies. Six families are thus deprived of husband and father, that
this wretched system of game-preserving may be continued in a
country densely peopled as this is. The Marquis of Normanby's
gamekeeper has been murdered also, and the poacher who shot
him only escaped death by the intervention of the Home Secre-
tary. At Godalming, in Surrey, a gamekeeper has been mur-
dered; and at Buckhill, in Buckinghamshire, a person has recently
been killed in a poaching affray. This insane system is the cause
of a fearful loss of life; it tends to the ruin of your tenantry,
and is the fruitful cause of the demoralization of the peasantry.
But you are caring for the rights of property; for its most
obvious duties you have no concern. With such a policy, what
can you expect but that which is now passing before you?
It is the remark of a beautiful writer that "to have known
nothing but misery is the most portentous condition under which
human nature can start on its course. >> Has your agricultural
laborer ever known anything but misery? He is born in a
miserable hovel, which in mockery is termed a house or a home;
he is reared in penury; he passes a life of hopeless and unre-
quited toil, and the jail or the union house is before him as the
only asylum on this side of the pauper's grave. Is this the
result of your protection to native industry? Have you cared for
the laborer till, from a home of comfort, he has but a hovel for
shelter? and have you cherished him into starvation and rags? I
tell you what your boasted protection is—it is a protection of
native idleness at the expense of the impoverishment of native
industry.


## p. 2360 (#558) ###########################################

2360
JOHN BRIGHT
FROM THE SPEECH ON NON-RECOGNITION OF THE SOUTHERN
CONFEDERACY (1861)
I
ADVISE you, and I advise the people of England, to abstain
from applying to the United States doctrines and principles
which we never apply to our own case. At any rate, they
[the Americans] have never fought "for the balance of power »
in Europe. They have never fought to keep up a decaying
empire. They have never squandered the money of their people
in such a phantom expedition as we have been engaged in. And
now, at this moment, when you are told that they are going to
be ruined by their vast expenditure,-why, the sum that they
are going to raise in the great emergency of this grievous war
is not greater than what we raise every year during a time of
peace.
They say they are not going to liberate slaves. No; the
object of the Washington government is to maintain their own
Constitution and to act legally, as it permits and requires. No
man is more in favor of peace than I am; no man has
denounced war more than I have, probably, in this country;
few men in their public life have suffered more obloquy-I
had almost said, more indignity-in consequence of it. But I
cannot for the life of me see, upon any of those principles upon
which States are governed now,-I say nothing of the literal
word of the New Testament,-I cannot see how the state of
affairs in America, with regard to the United States government,
could have been different from what it is at this moment. We
had a Heptarchy in this country, and it was thought to be a
good thing to get rid of it, and have a united nation. If the
thirty-three or thirty-four States of the American Union can
break off whenever they like, I can see nothing but disaster and
confusion throughout the whole of that continent. I say that
the war, be it successful or not, be it Christian or not, be it
wise or not, is a war to sustain the government and to sustain
the authority of a great nation; and that the people of England,
if they are true to their own sympathies, to their own history,
and to their own great act of 1834, to which reference has
already been made, will have no sympathy with those who wish
to build up a great empire on the perpetual bondage of millions
of their fellow-men.


## p. 2361 (#559) ###########################################

JOHN BRIGHT
2361
FROM THE SPEECH ON THE STATE OF IRELAND (1866)
I
THINK I was told in 1849, as I stood in the burial ground at
Skibbereen, that at least four hundred people who had died
of famine were buried within the quarter of an
acre of
ground on which I was then looking. It is a country, too, from
which there has been a greater emigration by sea within a given
time than has been known at any time from any other country
in the world. It is a country where there has been, for genera-
tions past, a general sense of wrong, out of which has grown a
chronic state of insurrection; and at this very moment when I
speak, the general safeguard of constitutional liberty is with-
drawn, and we meet in this hall, and I speak here to-night,
rather by the forbearance and permission of the Irish executive
than under the protection of the common safeguards of the rights
and liberties of the people of the United Kingdom.
I venture to say that this is a miserable and a humiliating pict-
ure to draw of this country. Bear in mind that I am not speak-
ing of Poland suffering under the conquest of Russia. There is
a gentleman, now a candidate for an Irish county, who is very
great upon the wrongs of Poland; but I have found him always
in the House of Commons taking sides with that great party
which has systematically supported the wrongs of Ireland. I am
not speaking of Hungary, or of Venice as she was under the rule
of Austria, or of the Greeks under the dominion of the Turk;
but I am speaking of Ireland-part of the United Kingdom-
part of that which boasts itself to be the most civilized and the
most Christian nation in the world. I took the liberty recently,
at a meeting in Glasgow, to say that I believed it was impossible
for a class to govern a great nation wisely and justly. Now, in
Ireland there has been a field in which all the principles of the
Tory party have had their complete experiment and development.
You have had the country gentleman in all his power. You
have had any number of Acts of Parliament which the ancient
Parliament of Ireland or the Parliament of the United Kingdom
could give him. You have had the Established Church supported
by the law, even to the extent, not many years ago, of collecting
its revenues by the aid of military force. In point of fact, I
believe it would be impossible to imagine a state of things in
which the Tory party should have a more entire and complete
T


## p. 2362 (#560) ###########################################

2362
JOHN BRIGHT
opportunity for their trial than they have had within the limits.
of this island. And yet what has happened? This, surely: that
the kingdom has been continually weakened, that the harmony
of the empire has been disturbed, and that the mischief has
not been confined to the United Kingdom, but has spread to the
colonies.
I am told-you can answer it if I am wrong—that it is not
common in Ireland now to give leases to tenants, especially to
Catholic tenants. If that be so, then the security for the property
rests only upon the good feeling and favor of the owner of the
land; for the laws, as we
we know, have been made by the land-
owners, and many propositions for the advantage of the tenants
have unfortunately been too little considered by Parliament.
The result is that you have bad farming, bad dwelling-houses,
bad temper, and everything bad connected with the occupation
and cultivation of land in Ireland. One of the results-a result
the most appalling-is this, that your population is fleeing your
country and seeking refuge in a distant land. On this point I
wish to refer to a letter which I received a few days ago from a
most esteemed citizen of Dublin. He told me that he believed
that a very large portion of what he called the poor, amongst
Irishmen, sympathized with any scheme or any proposition that
was adverse to the Imperial Government. He said further that the
people here are rather in the country than of it, and that they
are looking more to America than they are looking to England.
I think there is a good deal in that. When we consider how many
Irishmen have found a refuge in America, I do not know how we
can wonder at that statement. You will recollect that when the
ancient Hebrew prophet prayed in his captivity, he prayed with
his window open towards Jerusalem. You know that the fol-
lowers of Mohammed, when they pray, turn their faces towards
Mecca. When the Irish peasant asks for food and freedom and
blessing, his eye follows the setting sun, the aspirations of his
heart reach beyond the wide Atlantic, and in spirit he grasps
hands with the great Republic of the West. If this be so, I say
then that the disease is not only serious, but it is desperate; but
desperate as it is, I believe there is a certain remedy for it if
the people and Parliament of the United Kingdom are willing to
apply it. .
I believe that at the root of a general discontent there is in
all countries a general grievance and general suffering. The


## p. 2363 (#561) ###########################################

JOHN BRIGHT
2363
surface of society is not incessantly disturbed without a cause.
I recollect in the poem of the greatest of Italian poets, he tells
us that as he saw in vision the Stygian lake, and stood upon its
banks, he observed the constant commotion upon the surface of
the pool, and his good instructor and guide explained to him the
cause of it:
--
"This, too, for certain know, that underneath
The water dwells a multitude, whose sighs
Into these bubbles make the surface heave,
As thine eye tells thee wheresoe'er it turn. "
And I say that in Ireland, for generations back, the misery
and the wrongs of the people have made their sign, and have
found a voice in constant insurrection and disorder. I have said
that Ireland is a country of many wrongs and of many sorrows.
Her past lies almost in shadow. Her present is full of anxiety
and peril. Her future depends on the power of her people to
substitute equality and justice for supremacy, and a generous
patriotism for the spirit of faction. In the effort now making
in Great Britain to create a free representation of the people you
have the deepest interest. The people never wish to suffer, and
they never wish to inflict injustice. They have no sympathy with
the wrong-doer, whether in Great Britain or in Ireland; and when
they are fairly represented in the Imperial Parliament, as I hope
they will one day be, they will speedily give an effective and
final answer to that old question of the Parliament of Kilkenny-
"How comes it to pass that the King has never been the richer
for Ireland? »
FROM THE SPEECH ON THE IRISH ESTABLISHED CHURCH
(1868)
I
AM one of those who do not believe that the Established
Church of Ireland-of which I am not a member-would
go to absolute ruin, in the manner of which many of its
friends are now so fearful.
There was a paper sent to me this
morning, called 'An Address from the Protestants of Ireland to
their Protestant Brethren of Great Britain. ' It is dated «< 5,
Dawson Street," and is signed by "John Trant Hamilton, T. A.
Lefroy, and R. W. Gamble. " The paper is written in a fair and


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2364
JOHN BRIGHT
mild, and I would even say,- for persons who have these opin-
ions, in a kindly and just spirit. But they have been alarmed,
and I would wish, if I can, to offer them consolation. They say
they have no interest in protecting any abuses of the Established
Church, but they protest against their being now deprived of the
Church of their fathers. Now, I am quite of opinion that it
would be a most monstrous thing to deprive the Protestants of
the Church of their fathers; and there is no man in the world
who would more strenuously resist even any step in that direc-
tion than I would, unless it were Mr. Gladstone, the author of
the famous resolutions. The next sentence goes on to say, "We
ask for no ascendancy. " Having read that sentence, I think
that we must come to the conclusion that these gentlemen are
in a better frame of mind than we thought them to be in. I
can understand easily that these gentlemen are very sorry and
doubtful as to the depths into which they are to be plunged;
but I disagree with them in this- that I think there would still
be a Protestant Church in Ireland when all is done that Parlia-
ment has proposed to do. The only difference will be, that it
will not then be an establishment - that it will have no special
favor or grant from the State-that it will stand in relation to
the State just as your Church does, and just as the churches of
the majority of the people of Great Britain at this moment stand.
There will then be no Protestant bishops from Ireland to sit in
the House of Lords; but he must be the most enthusiastic Prot-
estant and Churchman who believes that there can be any ad-
vantage to his Church and to Protestantism generally in Ireland
from such a phenomenon.
-


## p. 2365 (#563) ###########################################

2365
BRILLAT-SAVARIN
(1755-1826)
B
RILLAT-SAVARIN was a French magistrate and legislator, whose
reputation as man of letters rests mainly upon a single
volume, his inimitable Physiologie du Goût. ' Although
writing in the present century, he was essentially a Frenchman of
the old régime, having been born in 1755 at Belley, almost on the
border-line of Savoy, where he afterwards gained distinction as an
advocate. In later life he regretted his native province chiefly for
its figpeckers, superior in his opinion to ortolans or robins, and for the
cuisine of the innkeeper Genin, where "the
old-timers of Belley used to gather to eat
chestnuts and drink the new white wine
known as vin bourru. »

After holding various minor offices in
his department, Savarin became mayor of
Belley in 1793; but the Reign of Terror
soon forced him to flee to Switzerland and
join the colony of French refugees at Lau-
sanne. Souvenirs of this period are fre-
quent in his 'Physiologie du Goût,' all
eminently gastronomic, as befits his sub-
ject-matter, but full of interest, as showing
his unfailing cheerfulness amidst the vicis-
situdes and privations of exile. He fled first to Dôle, to "obtain
from the Representative Prôt a safe-conduct, which was to save me
from going to prison and thence probably to the scaffold," and which
he ultimately owed to Madame Prôt, with whom he spent the even-
ing playing duets, and who declared, "Citizen, any one who cultivates
the fine arts as you do cannot betray his country! " It was not the
safe-conduct, however, but an unexpected dinner which he enjoyed
on his route, that made this a red-letter day to Savarin:-"What a
good dinner! -I will not give the details, but an honorable mention
is due to a fricassée of chicken, of the first order, such as cannot be
found except in the provinces, and so richly dowered with truffles
that there were enough to put new life into old Tithonus himself. "
The whole episode is told in Savarin's happiest vein, and well-
nigh justifies his somewhat complacent conclusion that "any one
who, with a revolutionary committee at his heels, could so conduct
himself, assuredly has the head and the heart of a Frenchman! "
BRILLAT-SAVARIN


## p. 2366 (#564) ###########################################

2366
BRILLAT-SAVARIN
Natural scenery did not appeal to Savarin; to him Switzerland
meant the restaurant of the Lion d'Argent, at Lausanne, where
<<< for
only 15 batz we passed in review three complete courses;" the table
d'hôte of the Rue de Rosny; and the little village of Moudon, where
the cheese fondue was so good. Circumstances, however, soon neces-
sitated his departure for the United States, which he always grate-
fully remembered as having afforded him "an asylum, employment,
and tranquillity. " For three years he supported himself in New
York, giving French lessons and at night playing in a theatre
orchestra. "I was so comfortable there," he writes, "that in the
moment of emotion which preceded departure, all that I asked of
Heaven (a prayer which it has granted) was never to know greater
sorrow in the Old World than I had known in the New. " Returning
to France in 1796, Savarin settled in Paris, and after holding several
offices under the Directory, became a Judge in the Cour de Cassation,
the French court of last resort, where he remained until his death in
1826.
-
Although an able and conscientious magistrate, Savarin was better
adapted to play the kindly friend and cordial host than the stern and
impartial judge. He was convivial soul, a lover of good cheer and
free-handed hospitality; and to-day, while almost forgotten as a jur-
ist, his name has become immortalized as the representative of gastro-
nomic excellence.
(
His Physiologie du Goût'-"that olla podrida
which defies analysis," as Balzac calls it belongs, like Walton's
'Compleat Angler,' or White's 'Selborne,' among those unique gems
of literature, too rare in any age, which owe their subtle and imper-
ishable charm primarily to the author's own delightful personality.
Savarin spent many years of loving care in polishing his manuscript,
often carrying it to court with him, where it was one day mislaid,
but luckily for future generations of epicures was afterward
recovered. The book is a charming badinage, a bizarre ragoût of
gastronomic precepts and spicy anecdote, doubly piquant for its pre-
vailing tone of mock seriousness and intentional grandiloquence.
In emulation of the poet Lamartine, Savarin divided his subject
into 'Meditations,' of which the seventh is consecrated to the
'Theory of Frying,' and the twenty-first to 'Corpulence. ' In the
familiar aphorism, "Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what
you are," he strikes his key-note; man's true superiority lies in his
palate! "The pleasure of eating we have in common with the ani-
mals; the pleasure of the table is peculiar to the human species. "
Gastronomy he proclaims the chief of all sciences: "It rules life in
its entirety; for the tears of the new-born infant summon the breast
of its nurse, and the dying man still receives with some pleasure the
final potion, which, alas, he is not destined to digest. " Occasionally
―――


## p. 2367 (#565) ###########################################

BRILLAT-SAVARIN
2367
he affects an epic strain, invoking Gasteria, "the tenth muse, who
presides over the pleasures of taste. " "It is the fairest of the Muses
who inspires me: I will be clearer than an oracle, and my precepts
will traverse the centuries. " Beneath his pen, soup, "the first con-
solation of the needy stomach," assumes fresh dignity; and even the
humble fowl becomes to the cook "what the canvas is to the painter,
or the cap of Fortunatus to the charlatan. " But like the worthy
epicure that he was, Savarin reserved his highest flights of eloquence
for such rare and toothsome viands as the Poularde fine de Bresse,
the pheasant, "an enigma of which the key-word is known only to
the adepts," a sauté of truffles, "the diamonds of the kitchen," or,
best of all, truffled turkeys, "whose reputation and price are ever on
the increase! Benign stars, whose apparition renders the gourmands
of every category sparkling, radiant, and quivering! " But the true
charm of the book lies in Savarin's endless fund of piquant anec-
dotes, reminiscences of bygone feasts, over which the reader's mouth
waters. Who can read without a covetous pang his account of 'The
Day at Home with the Bernadins,' or of his entertainment of the
Dubois brothers, of the Rue du Bac, "a bonbon which I have put
into the reader's mouth to recompense him for his kindness in hav-
ing read me with pleasure » ?
'Physiologie du Goût' was not published until 1825, and then
anonymously, presumably because he thought its tone inconsistent
with his dignity as magistrate. It would almost seem that he had a
presentiment of impending death, for in the midst of his brightest
'Variétés he has incongruously inserted a dolorous little poem, the
burden of each verse being "Je vais mourir. " The Physiologie du
Goût' is now accessible to English readers in the versions of R. E.
Anderson (London, 1877), and in a later one published in New York;
but there is a subtle flavor to the original which defies translation.
FROM THE PHYSIOLOGY OF TASTE
THE PRIVATIONS
F
IRST parents of the human species, whose gormandizing is
historic, you who fell for the sake of an apple, what would
you not have done for a turkey with truffles? But there
were in the terrestrial Paradise neither cooks nor confectioners.
How I pity you!
Mighty kings, who laid proud Troy in ruins, your valor will
be handed down from age to age; but your table was poor. Re-
duced to a rump of beef and a chine of pork, you were ever


## p. 2368 (#566) ###########################################

2368
BRILLAT-SAVARIN
ignorant of the charms of the matelote and the delights of a
fricassée of chicken.
*
How I pity you!
Aspasia, Chloe, and all of you whose forms the chisel of the
Greeks immortalized, to the despair of the belles of to-day, never
did your charming mouths enjoy the smoothness of a meringue
à la vanille or à la rose; hardly did you rise to the height of a
spice-cake.
How I pity you!
Gentle priestesses of Vesta, at one and the same time bur-
dened with so many honors and menaced with such horrible
punishments, would that you might at least have tasted those
agreeable syrups which refresh the soul, those candied fruits
which brave the seasons, those perfumed creams, the marvel of
our day!
How I pity you!
Roman financiers, who made the whole known universe pay
tribute, never did your far-famed banquet-halls witness the ap-
pearance of those succulent jellies, the delight of the indolent,
nor those varied ices whose cold would brave the torrid zone.
How I pity you!
Invincible paladins, celebrated by flattering minstrels, when
you had cleft in twain the giants, set free the ladies, and ex-
terminated armies, never, alas! never did a dark-eyed captive
offer you the sparkling champagne, the malmsey of Madeira, the
liqueurs, creation of this great century: you were reduced to ale
or to some cheap herb-flavored wine.
How I pity you!
Crosiered and mitred abbots, dispensers of the favors of
heaven; and you, terrible Templars, who donned your armor for
the extermination of the Saracens, -you knew not the sweetness
of chocolate which restores, nor the Arabian bean which pro-
motes thought.
-
How I pity you!
Superb châtelaines, who during the loneliness of the Crusades
raised into highest favor your chaplains and your pages, you
never could share with them the charms of the biscuit and the
delights of the macaroon.
How I pity you!
And lastly you, gastronomers of 1825, who already find satiety
in the lap of abundance. and dream of new preparations, you


## p. 2369 (#567) ###########################################

BRILLAT-SAVARIN
2369
will not enjoy those discoveries which the sciences have in store
for the year 1900, such as esculent minerals and liqueurs result-
ing from a pressure of a hundred atmospheres; you will not
behold the importations which travelers yet unborn shall cause to
arrive from that half of the globe which still remains to be dis-
covered or explored.
How I pity you!
ON THE LOVE OF GOOD LIVING
I
HAVE Consulted the dictionaries under the word gourmandise,
and am by no means satisfied with what I find. The love
of good living seems to be constantly confounded with glut-
tony and voracity; whence I infer that our lexicographers, how-
ever otherwise estimable, are not to be classed with those good
fellows amongst learned men who can put away gracefully a
wing of partridge, and then, by raising the little finger, wash
it down with a glass of Lafitte or Clos-Vougeot.
They have utterly forgot that social love of good eating
which combines in one, Athenian elegance, Roman luxury, and
Parisian refinement. It implies discretion to arrange, skill to
prepare; it appreciates energetically, and judges profoundly.
is a precious quality, almost deserving to rank as a virtue, and
is very certainly the source of much unqualified enjoyment.
It
Gourmandise, or the love of good living, is an impassioned,
rational, and habitual preference for whatever flatters the sense
of taste. It is opposed to excess; therefore every man who eats
to indigestion, or makes himself drunk, runs the risk of being
erased from the list of its votaries. Gourmandise also comprises
a love for dainties or tit-bits; which is merely an analogous
preference, limited to light, delicate, or small dishes, to pastry,
and so forth. It is a modification allowed in favor of the
women, or men of feminine tastes.
Regarded from any point of view, the love of good living
deserves nothing but praise and encouragement. Physically, it
is the result and proof of the digestive organs being healthy and
perfect. Morally, it shows implicit resignation to the commands
of Nature, who, in ordering man to eat that he may live, gives
him appetite to invite, flavor to encourage, and pleasure to
reward.
IV-149


## p. 2370 (#568) ###########################################

2370
BRILLAT-SAVARIN
From the political economist's point of view, the love of good
living is a tie between nations, uniting them by the interchange
of various articles of food which are in constant use. Hence the
voyage from Pole to Pole of wines, sugars, fruits, and so forth.
What else sustains the hope and emulation of that crowd of
fishermen, huntsmen, gardeners, and others, who daily stock the
most sumptuous larders with the results of their skill and labor?
What else supports the industrious army of cooks, pastry-cooks,
confectioners, and many other food-preparers, with all their vari-
ous assistants? These various branches of industry derive their
support in a great measure from the largest incomes, but they
also rely upon the daily wants of all classes.
As society is at present constituted, it is almost impossible to
conceive of a race living solely on bread and vegetables. Such
a nation would infallibly be conquered by the armies of some
flesh-eating race (like the Hindoos, who have been the prey of
all those, one after another, who cared to attack them), or else
it would be converted by the cooking of the neighboring nations,
as ancient history records of the Boeotians, who acquired a love
for good living after the battle of Leuctra.
Good living opens out great resources for replenishing the
public purse: it brings contributions to town-dues, to the custom-
house, and other indirect contributions. Everything we eat is
taxed, and there is no exchequer that is not substantially sup-
ported by lovers of good living. Shall we speak of that swarm
of cooks who have for ages been annually leaving France, to
improve foreign nations in the art of good living? Most of them
succeed; and in obedience to an instinct which never dies in a
Frenchman's heart, bring back to their country the fruits of their
economy. The sum thus imported is greater than might be sup-
posed, and therefore they, like the others, will be honored by
posterity.
But if nations were grateful, then Frenchmen, above all other
races, ought to raise a temple and altars to "Gourmandise. " By
the treaty of November, 1815, the allies imposed upon France
the condition of paying thirty millions sterling in three years,
besides claims for compensation and various requisitions, amount-
ing to nearly as much more. The apprehension, or rather cer-
tainty, became general that a national bankruptcy must ensue,
more especially as the money was to be paid in specie.


## p. 2371 (#569) ###########################################

BRILLAT-SAVARIN
2371
"Alas! " said all who had anything to lose, as they saw the
fatal tumbril pass to be filled in the Rue Vivienne, "there is our
money emigrating in a lump; next year we shall fall on our
knees before a crown-piece; we are about to fall into the condi-
tion of a ruined man; speculations of every kind will fail; it will
be impossible to borrow; there will be nothing but weakness,
exhaustion, civil death. "
These terrors were proved false by the result; and to the
great astonishment of all engaged in financial matters, the pay-
ments were made without difficulty, credit rose, loans were
eagerly caught at, and during all the time this "superpurgation »
lasted, the balance of exchange was in favor of France. In other
words, more money came into the country than went out of it.
What is the power that came to our assistance? Who is the
divinity that worked this miracle? The love of good living.
When the Britons, Germans, Teutons, Cimmerians, and Scyth-
ians made their irruption into France, they brought a rare
voracity, and stomachs of no ordinary capacity. They did not
long remain satisfied with the official cheer which a forced hos-
pitality had to supply them with. They aspired to enjoyments
of greater refinement; and soon the Queen City was nothing
but a huge refectory. Everywhere they were seen eating, those
intruders in the restaurants, the eating-houses, the inns, the
taverns, the stalls, and even in the streets. They gorged them-
selves with flesh, fish, game, truffles, pastry, and especially with
fruit. They drank with an avidity equal to their appetite, and
always ordered the most expensive wines, in the hope of finding
in them some enjoyment hitherto unknown, and seemed quite
astonished when they were disappointed. Superficial observers
did not know what to think of this menagerie without bounds or
limits; but your genuine Parisian laughed and rubbed his hands.
"We have them now! " said he; "and to-night they'll have paid
us back more than was counted out to them this morning from
the public treasury! "
―――――――
That was a lucky time for those who provide for the enjoy、
ments of the sense of taste. Véry made his fortune; Achard laid
the foundation of his; Beauvilliers made a third; and Madame
Sullot, whose shop in the Palais Royal was a mere box of a
place, sold as many as twelve thousand tarts a day.
The effect still lasts. Foreigners flow in from all quarters of
Europe to renew during peace the delightful habits which they


## p. 2372 (#570) ###########################################

2372
BRILLAT-SAVARIN
contracted during the war. They must come to Paris, and when
they are there, they must be regaled at any price. If our funds
are in favor, it is due not so much to the higher interest they
pay, as to the instinctive confidence which foreigners cannot help
placing in a people amongst whom every lover of good living
finds so much happiness.
Love of good living is by no means unbecoming in women.
It agrees with the delicacy of their organization, and serves as a
compensation for some pleasures which they are obliged to abstain
from, and for some hardships to which nature seems to have
condemned them. There is no more pleasant sight than a pretty
gourmande under arms. Her napkin is nicely adjusted; one of
her hands rests on the table, the other carries to her mouth little
morsels artistically carved, or the wing of a partridge which must
be picked. Her eyes sparkle, her lips are glossy, her talk is cheer-
ful, all her movements graceful; nor is there lacking some spice
of the coquetry which accompanies all that women do. With so
many advantages, she is irresistible, and Cato the Censor himself
could not help yielding to the influence.
The love of good living is in some sort instinctive in women,
because it is favorable to beauty. It has been proved, by a series
of rigorously exact observations, that by a succulent, delicate, and
choice regimen, the external appearances of age are kept away
for a long time. It gives more brilliancy to the eye, more fresh-
ness to the skin, more support to the muscles; and as it is certain
in physiology that wrinkles, those formidable enemies of beauty,
are caused by the depression of muscle, it is equally true that,
other things being equal, those who understand eating are com-
paratively four years younger than those ignorant of that science.
Painters and sculptors are deeply impenetrated with this truth;
for in representing those who practice abstinence by choice or
duty as misers or anchorites, they always give them the pallor
of disease, the leanness of misery, and the wrinkles of decrepitude.
Good living is one of the main links of society, by gradually
extending that spirit of conviviality by which different classes are
daily brought closer together and welded into one whole; by
animating the conversation, and rounding off the angles of con-
ventional inequality. To the same cause we can also ascribe all
the efforts a host makes to receive his guests properly, as well as
their gratitude for his pains so well bestowed. What disgrace
should ever be heaped upon those senseless feeders who, with


## p. 2373 (#571) ###########################################

BRILLAT-SAVARIN
2373
unpardonable indifference, swallow down morsels of the rarest
quality, or gulp with unrighteous carelessness some fine-flavored
and sparkling wine.
As a general maxim: Whoever shows a desire to please will
be certain of having a delicate compliment paid him by every
well-bred man.
Again, when shared, the love of good living has the most
marked influence on the happiness of the conjugal state. A
wedded pair with this taste in common have once a day at
least a pleasant opportunity of meeting. For even when they
sleep apart (and a great many do so), they at least eat at the
same table, they have a subject of conversation which is ever
new, they speak not only of what they are eating, but also of
what they have eaten or will eat, of dishes which are in vogue,
of novelties, etc. Everybody knows that a familiar chat is
delightful.
Music, no doubt, has powerful attractions for those who are
fond of it, but one must set about it—it is an exertion. Be-
sides, one sometimes has a cold, the music is mislaid, the instru-
ments are out of tune, one has a fit of the blues, or it is a
forbidden day. Whereas, in the other case, a common want
summons the spouses to table, the same inclination keeps them
there; they naturally show each other these little attentions as a
proof of their wish to oblige, and the mode of conducting their
meals has a great share in the happiness of their lives.
This observation, though new in France, has not escaped the
notice of Richardson, the English moralist. He has worked out
the idea in his novel 'Pamela,' by painting the different manner
in which two married couples finish their day. The first husband
is a lord, an eldest son, and therefore heir to all the family prop-
erty; the second is his younger brother, the husband of Pamela,
who has been disinherited on account of his marriage, and lives
on half-pay in a state but little removed from abject poverty.
The lord and lady enter their dining-room by different doors,
and salute each other coldly, though they have not met the whole
day before. Sitting down at a table which is magnificently cov-
ered, surrounded by lackeys in brilliant liveries, they help them-
selves in silence, and eat without pleasure. As soon, however,
as the servants have withdrawn, a sort of conversation is begun
between the pair, which quickly shows a bitter tone, passing into
a regular fight, and they rise from the table in a fury of anger,


## p. 2374 (#572) ###########################################

2374
BRILLAT-SAVARIN
and go off to their separate apartments to reflect upon the pleas-
ures of a single life.
The younger brother, on the contrary, is, on reaching his
unpretentious home, received with a gentle, loving heartiness and
the fondest caresses. He sits down to a frugal meal, but every-
thing he eats is excellent; and how could it be otherwise? It is
Pamela herself who has prepared it all. They eat with enjoy-
ment, talking of their affairs, their plans, their love for each
other. A half-bottle of Madeira serves to prolong their repast
and conversation, and soon after they retire together, to forget
in sleep their present hardships, and to dream of a better future.
All honor to the love of good living, such as it is the pur-
pose of this book to describe, so long as it does not come
between men and their occupations or duties! For, as all the
debaucheries of a Sardanapalus cannot bring disrespect upon
womankind in general, so the excesses of a Vitellius need not
make us turn our backs upon a well-appointed banquet. Should
the love of good living pass into gluttony, voracity, intemper-
ance, it then loses its name and advantages, escapes from our
jurisdiction, and falls within that of the moralist to ply it with
good counsel, or of the physician who will cure it by his
remedies.
ON PEOPLE FOND OF GOOD LIVING
THERE are individuals to whom nature has denied a refine-
ment of organs, or a continuity of attention, without which the
most succulent dishes pass unobserved. Physiology has already
recognized the first of these varieties, by showing us the tongue
of these unhappy ones, badly furnished with nerves for inhaling
and appreciating flavors. These excite in them but an obtuse
sentiment; such persons are, with regard to objects of taste, what
the blind are with regard to light. The second class are the
absent-minded, chatterboxes, persons engrossed in business or
ambition, and others who seek to occupy themselves with two
things at once, and eat only to be filled. Such, for example,
was Napoleon; he was irregular in his meals, and ate fast and
badly. But there again was to be traced that absolute will which
he carried into everything he did. The moment appetite was
felt, it was necessary that it should be satisfied; and his estab-
lishment was so arranged that, in any place and at any hour,
chicken, cutlets, and coffee might be forthcoming at a word.


## p. 2375 (#573) ###########################################

BRILLAT-SAVARIN
2375
There is a privileged class of persons who are summoned to
the enjoyments of taste by a physical and organic predisposition.
I have always believed in physiognomy and phrenology. Men
have inborn tendencies; and since there are some who come into
the world seeing, hearing, and walking badly, because they are
short-sighted, deaf, or crippled, why should there not be others.
who are specially predisposed to experience a certain series of
sensations? Moreover, even an ordinary observer will constantly
discover faces which bear the unmistakable imprint of a ruling
passion such as superciliousness, self-satisfaction, misanthropy,
sensuality, and many others. Sometimes, no doubt, we meet
with a face that expresses nothing; but when the physiognomy
has a marked stamp it is almost always a true index. The pas-
sions act upon the muscles, and frequently, although a man says
nothing, the various feelings by which he is moved can be read
in his face. By this tension, if in the slightest degree habitual,
perceptible traces are at last left, and the physiognomy thus
assumes its permanent and recognizable characteristics.
-
Those predisposed to epicurism are for the most part of mid-
dling height. They are broad-faced, and have bright eyes,
small forehead, short nose, fleshy lips, and rounded chin. The
women are plump, chubby, pretty rather than beautiful, with a
slight tendency to fullness of figure. It is under such an exterior
that we must look for agreeable guests. They accept all that is
offered them, eat without hurry, and taste with discrimination.
They never make any haste to get away from houses where they
have been well treated, but stay for the evening, because they
know all the games and other after-dinner amusements.
Those, on the contrary, to whom nature has denied an apti-
tude for the enjoyments of taste, are long-faced, long-nosed, and
long-eyed: whatever their stature, they have something lanky
about them. They have dark, lanky hair, and are never in good
condition. It was one of them who invented trousers. The
women whom nature has afflicted with the same misfortune are
angular, feel themselves bored at table, and live on cards and
scandal.
This theory of mine can be verified by each reader from his
own personal observation. I shall give an instance from my own
personal experience:-
Sitting one day at a grand banquet, I had opposite me a
very pretty neighbor, whose face showed the predisposition I


## p. 2376 (#574) ###########################################

2376
BRILLAT-SAVARIN
have described. Leaning to the guest beside me, I said quietly
that from her physiognomy, the young lady on the other side of
the table must be fond of good eating. "You must be mad! "
he answered; "she is but fifteen at most, which is certainly not
the age for such a thing. However, let us watch.