Is he gone so
quickly?
Warner - World's Best Literature - v06 to v10 - Cal to Fro
3064 (#22) ############################################
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LIST OF PORTRAITS
IN VOL. VI
Pedro Calderon
John Caldwell Calhoun
John Calvin
Luiz Vaz de Camoens
Thomas Campbell
George Canning
Emilia Flygare-Carlén
Thomas Carlyle
Bliss Carman
Jacob Cats
Catullus
Bartolomeo de las Casas
Baldassare Castiglione
Benvenuto Cellini
Cervantes
Adelbert von Chamisso
William Ellery Channing
George Chapman
François René Auguste Châteaubriand
Thomas Chatterton
Geoffrey Chaucer
André Chénier
Victor Cherbuliez
Lord Chesterfield
Confucius
Rufus Choate
Full page
Full pape
Full page
Full page
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Vignette
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CALDERON
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31
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## p. 3070 (#28) ############################################
FOLL
1
## p. 3071 (#29) ############################################
3071
PEDRO CALDERON
(1600-1681)
BY MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN
HE reputation of Pedro Calderon de la Barca has suffered in
the minds of English-speaking people from the injudicious
comparisons of critics, as well as from lack of knowledge of
his works. To put Calderon, a master of invention, beside Shake-
speare, the master of character, and to show by analogies that the
author of 'Othello' was far superior to the writer of The Physician
of His Own Honor,' is unjust to Calderon; and it is as futile as are
the ecstasies of Schultze to the coldness of Sismondi. Schultze com-
pares Dante with him, and the French critics have only recently for-
given him for being less classical in form than Corneille, who in
'Le Cid' gave them all the Spanish poetry they wanted! Fortu-
nately the student of Calderon need not take opinions. Good editions
of Calderon are easily attainable. The best known are Heil's (Leip-
zig, 1827), and that by Harzenbusch (Madrid, 1848). The first
edition, with forewords by Vera Tassis de Villareal, appeared at
Madrid (nine volumes) in 1682-91. Commentaries and translations are
numerous in German and in English; the translations by Denis
Florence MacCarthy are the most satisfactory, Edward Fitzgerald's
being too paraphrastic. Dean Trench added much to our knowledge
of Calderon's best work; George Ticknor in the History of Spanish
Literature,' and George Henry Lewes in The Spanish Drama,' left
us clear estimates of Lope de Vega's great successor. Shelley's
scenes from 'El Magico Prodigioso' are superb.
No analyses can do justice to the dramas, or to the religious
plays, called "autos," of Calderon. They must be read; and thanks to
the late Mr. MacCarthy's sympathy and zeal, the finest are easily
attainable. As he left seventy-three autos and one hundred and
eight dramas, it is lucky that the work of sifting the best from the
mass of varying merit has been carefully done. Mr. Ticknor men-
tions the fact that Calderon collaborated with other authors in the
writing of fourteen other plays.
Calderon was not "the Spanish Shakespeare. " "The Spanish Ben
Jonson" would be a happier title, if one feels obliged to compare
everything with something else. But Calderon is as far above Ben
Jonson in splendor of imagery as he is below Shakespeare in his
## p. 3072 (#30) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3072
knowledge of the heart, and in that vitality which makes Hamlet
and Orlando, Lady Macbeth and Perdita, men and women of all
time. They live; Calderon's people, like Ben Jonson's, move. There
is a resemblance between the autos of Calderon and the masques of
Jonson. Jonson's are lyrical; Calderon's less lyrical than splendid,
ethical, grandiose. They were both court poets; they both made
court spectacles; they both assisted in the decay of the drama; they
reflected the tastes of their time; but Calderon is the more noble,
the more splendid in imagination, the more intense in his devotion
to nature in all her moods. If one wanted to carry the habit of
comparison into music, Mozart might well represent the spirit of
Calderon. M. Philarète Chasles is right when he says that 'El
Mágico Prodigioso' should be presented in a cathedral. Calderon's
genius had the cast of the soldier and the priest, and he was both
soldier and priest. His comedias and autos are of Spain, Spanish. To
know Calderon is to know the mind of the Spain of the seventeenth
century; to know Cervantes is to know its heart.
The Church had opposed the secularization of the drama, at the
end of the fifteenth century, for two reasons.
The dramatic specta-
cle fostered for religious purposes had become, until Lope de Vega
rescued it, a medium for that "naturalism" which some of us fancy
to be a discovery of M. Zola and M. Catulle Mendès; it had escaped
from the control of the Church and had become a mere diversion.
Calderon was the one man who could unite the spirit of religion to
the form of the drama which the secular renaissance imperiously
demanded. He knew the philosophy of Aristotle and the theology of
the 'Summa' of St. Thomas as well as any cleric in Spain, though
he did not take orders until late in life; and in those religious spec-
tacles called autos sacramentales he showed this knowledge wonder-
fully. His last auto was unfinished when he died, on May 25th, 1681,
-sixty-five years after the death of Shakespeare, -and Don Melchior
de Leon completed it, probably in time for the feast of Corpus
Christi.
The auto was an elaboration of the older miracle-play, and a spec-
tacle as much in keeping with the temper of the Spanish court and
people as Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream' or Ben Jonson's
'Fortunate Isles' was in accord with the tastes of the English. And
Calderon, of all Spanish poets, best pleased his people. He was the
favorite poet of the court under Philip IV. , and director of the the-
atre in the palace of the Buen Retiro. The skill in the art of con-
struction which he had begun to acquire when he wrote The
Devotion of the Cross' at the age of nineteen, was turned to stage
management at the age of thirty-five, when he produced his gorgeous
pageant of Circe' on the pond of the Buen Retiro. How elaborate
## p. 3073 (#31) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3073
this spectacle was, the directions for the prelude of the greater
splendor to come will show. They read in this way:-
―
"In the midst of this island will be situated a very lofty mountain of
rugged ascent, with precipices and caverns, surrounded by a thick and dark-
some wood of tall trees, some of which will be seen to exhibit the appearance
of the human form, covered with a rough bark, from the heads and arms of
which will issue green boughs and branches, having suspended from them
various trophies of war and of the chase: the theatre during the opening of
the scene being scantily lit with concealed lights; and to make a beginning
of the festival, a murmuring and a rippling noise of water having been heard,
a great and magnificent car will be seen to advance along the pond, plated
over with silver, and drawn by two monstrous fishes, from whose mouth will
continually issue great jets of water, the light of the theatre increasing ac-
cording as they advance; and on the summit of it will be seen seated in
great pomp and majesty the goddess Aqua, from whose head and curious
vesture will issue an infinite abundance of little conduits of water; and at the
same time will be seen another great supply flowing from an urn which the
goddess will hold reversed, and which, filled with a variety of fishes leaping
and playing in the torrent as it descends and gliding over all the car, will
fall into the pond. "
This Circe was allegorical and mythological; it was
one of
those soulless shows which marked the transition of the Spanish
drama from maturity to decay. It is gone and forgotten with thou-
sands of its kind. Calderon will be remembered not as the director
of such vain pomps, but as the author of the sublime and tender
'Wonderful Magician,' the weird 'Purgatory of St. Patrick,' 'The
Constant Prince,' 'The Secret in Words,' and 'The Physician of His
Own Honor. ' The scrupulous student of the Spanish drama will
demand more; but for him who would love Calderon without making
a deep study of his works, these are sufficiently characteristic of his
genius at its highest. The reader in search of wider vistas should
add to these 'Los Encantos de la Culpa' (The Sorceries of Sin), and
'The Great Theatre of the World,' the theme of which is that of
Jacques's famous speech in As You Like It':-
"En el teatro del mundo
Todos son representados. »
("All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players. ")
On the principal feasts of the Church autos were played in the
streets, generally in front of some great house. Giants and grotesque
figures called tarascas gamboled about; and the auto, which was more
like our operas than any other composition of the Spanish stage, was
begun by a loa, written or sung. After this came the play, then an
VI-193
## p. 3074 (#32) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3074
amusing interlude, followed by music and sometimes by a dance of
gipsies.
Calderon boldly mingles pagan gods and Christ's mysteries in
these autos, which are essentially of his time and his people. But the
mixture is not so shocking as it is with the lesser poet, the Portu-
guese Camoens. Whether Calderon depicts The True God Pan,'
'Love the Greatest Enchantment,' or 'The Sheaves of Ruth,' he is
forceful, dramatic, and even at times he has the awful gravity of
Dante. His view of life and his philosophy are the view of life and
the philosophy of Dante. To many of us, these simple and original
productions of the Spanish temperament and genius may lack what
we call "human interest. " Let us remember that they represented
truthfully the faith and the hope, the spiritual knowledge of a
nation, as well as the personal and national view of that knowledge.
In the Spain of Calderon, the personal view was the national view.
Calderon was born on January 17th, 1600, according to his own
statement quoted by his friend Vera Tassis, at Madrid, of noble
parents. He was partly educated at the University of Salamanca.
Like Cervantes and Garcilaso, he served in the army.
The great
Lope, in 1630, acknowledged him as a poet and his friend. Later,
his transition from the army to the priesthood made little change in
his views of time and eternity.
On May 25th, 1881, occurred the second centenary of his death,
and the civilized world-whose theatre owes more to Calderon than
it has ever acknowledged - celebrated with Spain the anniversary
at Madrid, where as he said,
"Spain's proud heart swelleth. »
The selections have been chosen from Shelley's 'Scenes,' and
from Mr. MacCarthy's translation of The Secret in Words. ' 'The
Secret in Words' is light comedy of intricate plot. Fabio is an
example of the attendant gracioso, half servant, half confidant, who
appears often in the Spanish drama. The Spanish playwright did
not confine himself to one form of verse; and Mr. MacCarthy, in his
adequate translation, has followed the various forms of Calderon,
only not attempting the assonant vowel, so hard to escape in
Spanish, and still harder to reproduce in English. These selections
give no impression of the amazing invention of Calderon. This can
only be appreciated through reading The Constant Prince,' 'The
Physician of His Own Honor,' or a comedy like The Secret in
Words. '
nammi
Francis Egan
――――
―――
-
## p. 3075 (#33) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
F
Fabio
[Flerida, the Duchess of Parma, is in love with her secretary Frederick.
He loves her lady, Laura. Both Frederick and Laura are trying to keep
their secret from the Duchess. ]
'REDERICK — Has Flerida questioned you
Aught about my love?
Fabio-
Frederick-
Fabio-
Frederick-
Frederick-Said she something, then, about me?
Ay, enough.
Fabio-
THE LOVERS
From The Secret in Words>
Frederick-
Fabio-
Fabio-
But I have made up my mind
That you are the prince of dunces,
Not to understand her wish.
Frederick-What?
No, surely;
Thou liest, knave!
Wouldst thou make me think her beauty,
Proud and gentle though it be,
Which might soar e'en like the heron
To the sovereign sun itself,
Could descend with coward pinions
At a lowly falcon's call?
Well, my lord, just make the trial
For a day or two; pretend
That you love her, and-
Supposing
That there were the slightest ground
For this false, malicious fancy
You have formed, there's not a chink
In my heart where it might enter,-
Since a love, if not more blest,
Far more equal than the other
Holds entire possession there.
Then you never loved this woman
At one time?
No!
Then avow
That you were very lazy.
Frederick-That is falsehood, and not love.
Fabio- The more the merrier!
Frederick
In two places
How could one man love?
3075
## p. 3076 (#34) ############################################
3076
PEDRO CALDERON
Fabio-
Fabio-
Why, thus:
Near the town of Ratisbon
Two conspicuous hamlets lay,-
One of them called Ageré,
The other called Mascárandón.
These two villages one priest,
An humble man of God, 'tis stated,
Served; and therefore celebrated
Mass in each on every feast.
And so one day it came to pass,
A native of Mascárandón
Who to Ageré had gone
About the middle of the mass,
Heard the priest in solemn tone
Say, as he the Preface read,
"Gratias ageré," but said
Nothing of Mascárandón.
To the priest this worthy made
His angry plaint without delay:
"You give best thanks for Ageré,
As if your tithes we had not paid! "
When this sapient reason reached
The noble Mascárandónese,
They stopped their hopeless pastor's fees,
Nor paid for what he prayed or preached;
He asked his sacristan the cause,
Who told him wherefore and because.
From that day forth when he would sing
The Preface, he took care t'intone,
Not in a smothered or weak way,
"Tibi semper et ubique
Gratias-Mascárandón! »
If from love, that god so blind,-
Two parishes thou holdest, you
Are bound to gratify the two;
And after a few days you'll find,
If you do so, soon upon
You and me will fall good things,
When your Lordship sweetly sings
Flerída et Mascárandón.
Frederick-Think you I have heard your folly?
If you listened, why not so?
Frederick-No: my mind can only know
Its one call of melancholy.
## p. 3077 (#35) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3077
Fabio
--
Since you stick to Ageré
And reject Mascárandón,
Every hope, I fear, is gone,
That love his generous dues will pay.
S
Translation of Denis Florence MacCarthy.
CYPRIAN'S BARGAIN
From The Wonderful Magician ›
[The Demon, angered by Cyprian's victory in defending the existence of
God, swears vengeance. He resolves that Cyprian shall lose his soul for
Justina, who rejects his love. Cyprian says: -]
O BITTER is the life I live,
That, hear me hell, I now would give
To thy most detested spirit
My soul forever to inherit,
To suffer punishment and pine,
So this woman may be mine.
[The Demon accepts his soul and hastens to Justina.
Justina-'Tis that enamored nightingale
Who gives me the reply:
He ever tells the same soft tale
Of passion and of constancy
To his mate, who, rapt and fond,
Listening sits, a bough beyond.
Be silent, Nightingale! - No more
Make me think, in hearing thee
Thus tenderly thy love deplore,
If a bird can feel his so,
What a man would feel for me.
And, voluptuous vine, O thou
Who seekest most when least pursuing,-
To the trunk thou interlacest
Art the verdure which embracest
And the weight which is its ruin,-
No more, with green embraces, vine,
Make me think on what thou lovest;
For while thou thus thy boughs entwine,
I fear lest thou shouldst teach me, sophist,
How arms might be entangled too.
Light-enchanted sunflower, thou
## p. 3078 (#36) ############################################
3078
PEDRO CALDERON
All-
Who gazest ever true and tender
On the sun's revolving splendor,
Follow not his faithless glance
With thy faded countenance,
Nor teach my beating heart to fear
If leaves can mourn without a tear,
How eyes must weep! O Nightingale.
Cease from thy enamored tale,-
Leafy vine, unwreath thy bower,
Restless sunflower, cease to move-
Or tell me all, what poisonous power
Ye use against me-
Love! love! love!
Justina-It cannot be! Whom have I ever loved?
Trophies of my oblivion and disdain,
Floro and Lelio did I not reject?
And Cyprian? -
-
[She becomes troubled at the name of Cyprian.
Did I not requite him
With such severity that he has fled
Where none has ever heard of him again? —
Alas! I now begin to fear that this
May be the occasion whence desire grows bold,
As if there were no danger. From the moment
That I pronounced to my own listening heart,
"Cyprian is absent, O miserable me! »
I know not what I feel!
[More calmly.
It must be pity,
To think that such a man, whom all the world
Admired, should be forgot by all the world,
And I the cause.
[She again becomes troubled.
And yet if it were pity,
Floro and Lelio might have equal share,
For they are both imprisoned for my sake.
Alas! what reasonings are these? It is
Enough I pity him, and that in vain,
Without this ceremonious subtlety,
And woe is me! I know not where to find him now,
Even should I seek him through this wide world!
Enter Demon.
Demon-Follow, and I will lead thee where he is.
[Calmly.
## p. 3079 (#37) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3079
Justina And who art thou, who hast found entrance hither
Into my chamber through the doors and locks?
Art thou a monstrous shadow which my madness
Has formed in the idle air?
Demon
No. I am one
Called by the thought which tyrannizes thee
From his eternal dwelling-who this day
Is pledged to bear thee unto Cyprian.
Justina - So shall thy promise fail. This agony
Of passion which afflicts my heart and soul
May sweep imagination in its storm,-
The will is firm.
Demon-
Already half is done.
In the imagination of an act.
The sin incurred, the pleasure then remains:
Let not the will stop half-way on the road.
Justina - I will not be discouraged, nor despair,
Although I thought it, and although 'tis true
That thought is but a prelude to the deed:
Thought is not in my power, but action is:
I will not move my foot to follow thee!
But a far mightier wisdom than thine own
Exerts itself within thee, with such power
Compelling thee to that which it inclines
That it shall force thy step; how wilt thou then
Resist, Justina?
By my free will.
Demon-
-
Justina-
Demon
Justina-
Must force thy will.
It is invincible;
It were not free if thou hadst power upon it.
I
Demon Come, where a pleasure waits thee.
Justina-
Too dear.
[He draws, but cannot move her.
It were bought
Demon
'Twill soothe thy heart to softest peace.
Justina 'Tis dread captivity.
Demon-
'Tis joy, 'tis glory.
Justina - 'Tis shame, 'tis torment, 'tis despair.
Demon-
But how
Canst thou defend thyself from that or me,
If my power drags thee onward?
## p. 3080 (#38) ############################################
3080
PEDRO CALDERON
Justina-
Demon
Justina-
Consists in God.
[He vainly endeavors to force her, and at last releases her.
Woman, thou hast subdued me
Only by not owning thyself subdued.
But since thou thus findest defense in God,
I will assume a feignèd form, and thus
Make thee a victim of my baffled rage.
For I will mask a spirit in thy form
Who will betray thy name to infamy,
And doubly shall I triumph in thy loss,
First by dishonoring thee, and then by turning
False pleasure to true ignominy.
My defense
I
Appeal to Heaven against thee; so that Heaven
May scatter thy delusions, and the blot
Upon my fame vanish in idle thought,
Even as flame dies in the envious air,
And as the flow'ret wanes at morning frost,
And thou shouldst never— - But alas! to whom
Do I still speak? — Did not a man but now
Stand here before me? —No, I am alone,
And yet I saw him.
Is he gone so quickly?
Or can the heated mind engender shapes
From its own fear? Some terrible and strange
Peril is near. Lisander! father! lord!
Livia!
Enter Lisander and Livia.
Lisander-O my daughter! what?
Livia-
Justina-
Lisander-
Justina Have you not seen him?
Livia-
Justina I saw him.
Lisander-
What?
Saw you
A man go forth from my apartment now?
I scarce sustain myself!
A man here!
No, lady.
'Tis impossible; the doors
Which led to this apartment were all locked.
Livia [aside]—I dare say it was Moscon whom she saw,
For he was locked up in my room.
[Exit.
## p. 3081 (#39) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3081
Lisander-
――
Livia
Justina-
-
Lisander-
Justina
It must
ave been some image of thy phantasy.
Such melancholy as thou feedest is
Skillful in forming such in the vain air
Out of the motes and atoms of the day.
My master's in the right.
Oh, would it were
Delusion; but I fear some greater ill.
I feel as if out of my bleeding bosom
My heart was torn in fragments; ay,
Some mortal spell is wrought against my frame.
So potent was the charm, that had not God
Shielded my humble innocence from wrong,
I should have sought my sorrow and my shame
With willing steps. Livia, quick, bring my cloak,
For I must seek refuge from these extremes
Even in the temple of the highest God
Which secretly the faithful worship.
Livia-
Here.
Justina [putting on her cloak]-In this, as in a shroud of snow, may I
Quench the consuming fire in which I burn,
Wasting away!
Lisander-
And I will go with thee!
Livia [aside]-When I once see them safe out of the house,
I shall breathe freely.
Justina-
So do I confide
In thy just favor, Heaven!
Let us go.
Thine is the cause, great God! Turn, for my sake
And for thine own, mercifully to me!
Translation of Shelley.
## p. 3082 (#40) ############################################
3082
PEDRO CALDERON
DREAMS AND REALITIES
From Such Stuff as Dreams are Made Of,' Edward Fitzgerald's version of
'La Vida Es Sueno
[The scene is a tower. Clotaldo is persuading Segismund that his expe-
riences have not been real, but dreams, and discusses the possible relation of
existence to a state of dreaming. The play itself is based on the familiar
motif of which Christopher Sly furnishes a ready example. ]
Clotaldo
Segismund-
Clotaldo-
Segismund-
Clotaldo
RINCES and princesses and counselors,
P
----
Fluster'd to right and left-my life made at -
But that was nothing-
Even the white-hair'd, venerable King
Seized on- Indeed, you made wild work of it;
And so discover'd in your outward action,
Flinging your arms about you in your sleep,
Grinding your teeth and, as I now remember,
Woke mouthing out judgment and execution,
On those about you.
Ay, I did indeed.
Ev'n your eyes stare wild; your hair stands up—
Your pulses throb and flutter, reeling still
Under the storm of such a dream-
That seem'd as swearable reality
As what I wake in now.
A dream!
Ay wondrous how
Imagination in a sleeping brain
Out of the uncontingent senses draws
Sensations strong as from the real touch;
That we not only laugh aloud, and drench
With tears our pillow; but in the agony
Of some imaginary conflict, fight
And struggle-ev'n as you did; some, 'tis thought
Under the dreamt-of stroke of death have died.
―――
Segismund― And what so very strange, too—in that world
Where place as well as people all was strange,
Ev'n I almost as strange unto myself,
You only, you, Clotaldo-you, as much
And palpably yourself as now you are,
Came in this very garb you ever wore;
By such a token of the past, you said,
To assure me of that seeming present.
## p. 3083 (#41) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3083
Clotaldo
Ay?
Segismund — Ay; and even told me of the very stars
You tell me hereof - how in spite of them,
I was enlarged to all that glory.
Clotaldo-
Ay,
By the false spirits' nice contrivance, thus
A little truth oft leavens all the false,
The better to delude us.
For you know
'Tis nothing but a dream?
Nay, you yourself
Know best how lately you awoke from that
You know you went to sleep on. —
Why, have you never dreamt the like before?
Segismund-Never, to such reality.
Segismund-
Clotaldo-
Clotaldo-
Such dreams
Are oftentimes the sleeping exhalations
Of that ambition that lies smoldering
Under the ashes of the lowest fortune:
By which, when reason slumbers, or has lost
The reins of sensible comparison,
We fly at something higher than we are—
Scarce ever dive to lower- to be kings
Or conquerors, crown'd with laurel or with gold;
Nay, mounting heav'n itself on eagle wings,-
Which, by the way, now that I think of it,
May furnish us the key to this high flight —
That royal Eagle we were watching, and
Talking of as you went to sleep last night.
Segismund - Last night? Last night?
Clotaldo
Clotaldo-
Ay; do you not remember
Envying his immunity of flight,
As, rising from his throne of rock, he sail'd
Above the mountains far into the west,
That burned about him, while with poising wings
He darkled in it as a burning brand
Is seen to smolder in the fire it feeds?
Segismund - Last night-last night -Oh, what a day was that
Between that last night and this sad to-day !
And yet perhaps
Only some few dark moments, into which
Imagination, once lit up within
And unconditional of time and space,
Can pour infinities.
## p. 3084 (#42) ############################################
3084
PEDRO CALDERON
Segismund-
Clotaldo
Clotaldo
Segismund-Would that it had been on the verge of death
That knows no waking-
Clotaldo
Segismund-
And I remember
How the old man they call'd the King, who wore
The crown of gold about his silver hair,
And a mysterious girdle round his waist,
Just when my rage was roaring at its height,
And after which it all was dark again,
Bade me beware lest all should be a dream.
Ay-there another specialty of dreams,
That once the dreamer 'gins to dream he dreams,
His foot is on the very verge of waking.
Segismund-Who meant me! -me! their Prince,
Chain'd like a felon -
Clotaldo-
Lifting me up to glory, to fall back,
Stunned, crippled - wretcheder than ev'n before.
Yet not so glorious, Segismund, if you
Your visionary honor wore so ill
As to work murder and revenge on those
Who meant you well.
Stay, stay- Not so fast.
You dream'd the Prince, remember.
Revenged it only.
True. But as they say
Dreams are rough copies of the waking soul
Yet uncorrected of the higher Will,
So that men sometimes in their dream confess
Then in dream
An unsuspected or forgotten self;
One must beware to check-ay, if one may,
Stifle ere born, such passion in ourselves
As makes, we see, such havoc with our sleep,
And ill reacts upon the waking day.
And, by the by, for one test, Segismund,
Between such swearable realities-
Since dreaming, madness, passion, are akin
In missing each that salutary rein
Of reason, and the guiding will of man:
One test, I think, of waking sanity
Shall be that conscious power of self-control
To curb all passion, but much, most of all,
That evil and vindictive, that ill squares
With human, and with holy canon less,
Which bids us pardon ev'n our enemies,
## p. 3085 (#43) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3085
And much more those who, out of no ill-will,
Mistakenly have taken up the rod.
Which Heaven, they think, has put into their hands.
Segismund- I think I soon shall have to try again-
Sleep has not yet done with me.
Clotaldo
Such a sleep!
Take my advice-'tis early yet-the sun
Scarce up above the mountain; go within,
And if the night deceived you, try anew
With morning; morning dreams they say come true.
Segismund - Oh, rather pray for me a sleep so fast
As shall obliterate dream and waking too.
Clotaldo-
[Exit into the tower.
So sleep; sleep fast: and sleep away those two
Night-potions, and the waking dream between,
Which dream thou must believe; and if to see
Again, poor Segismund! that dream must be. -
And yet - and yet-in these our ghostly lives,
Half night, half day, half sleeping, half awake,
How if our waking life, like that of sleep,
Be all a dream in that eternal life
To which we wake not till we sleep in death?
How if, I say, the senses we now trust
For date of sensible comparison,—
Ay, ev'n the Reason's self that dates with them,
Should be in essence of intensity
Hereafter so transcended, and awoke
To a perceptive subtlety so keen
As to confess themselves befool'd before,
In all that now they will avouch for most?
One man like this-but only so much longer
As life is longer than a summer's day,
Believed himself a king upon his throne,
And play'd at hazard with his fellows' lives,
Who cheaply dream'd away their lives to him.
The sailor dream'd of tossing on the flood:
The soldier of his laurels grown in blood:
The lover of the beauty that he knew
Must yet dissolve to dusty residue:
The merchant and the miser of his bags
Of finger'd gold; the beggar of his rags:
And all this stage of earth on which we seem
Such busy actors, and the parts we play'd
Substantial as the shadow of a shade,
And Dreaming but a dream within a dream!
## p. 3086 (#44) ############################################
3086
PEDRO CALDERON
THE DREAM CALLED LIFE
Segismund's Speech Closing the Vida Es Sueno': Fitzgerald's Version.
DREAM it was in which I thought myself,
A
And you that hailed me now, then hailed me king,
In a brave palace that was all my own,
Within, and all without it, mine; until,
Drunk with excess of majesty and pride,
Methought I towered so high and swelled so wide
That of myself I burst the glittering bubble
That my ambition had about me blown,
And all again was darkness. Such a dream
As this, in which I may be walking now;
Dispensing solemn justice to you shadows,
Who make believe to listen; but anon,
With all your glittering arms and equipage,
Kings, princes, captains, warriors, plume and steel,
Ay, even with all your airy theatre,
May fit into the air you seem to rend
With acclamations, leaving me to wake
In the dark tower; or dreaming that I wake
From this, that waking is; or this and that
Both waking or both dreaming;—such a doubt
Confounds and clouds our mortal life about.
And whether wake or dreaming, this I know,-
How dreamwise human glories come and go;
Whose momentary tenure not to break,
Walking as one who knows he soon may wake,
So fairly carry the full cup, so well
Disordered insolence and passion quell,
That there be nothing after to upbraid
Dreamer or doer in the part he played,-
Whether to-morrow's dawn shall break the spell,
Or the last trumpet of the eternal Day,
When dreaming with the night shall pass away.
## p. 3086 (#45) ############################################
## p. 3086 (#46) ############################################
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## p. 3086 (#47) ############################################
## p. 3086 (#48) ############################################
## p. 3087 (#49) ############################################
3087
JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN
(1782-1850)
BY W. P. TRENT
OHN C. CALHOUN's importance as a statesman has naturally
stood in the way of his recognition as a writer, and in like
manner his reputation as an orator has overshadowed his
just claims to be considered our most original political thinker. The
six volumes of his collected works, which unfortunately do not em-
brace his still inaccessible private correspondence, are certainly not
exhilarating or attractive reading; but they are unique in the litera-
ture of America, if not of the world, as models of passionless logical
analysis. Whether passionless logical analysis is ever an essential
quality of true literature, is a matter on which opinions will differ;
but until the question is settled in the negative, Calhoun's claims to
be considered a writer of marked force and originality cannot be
ignored. It is true that circumstances have invalidated much of his
political teaching, and that it was always negative and destructive
rather than positive and constructive; it is true also that much of
the interest attaching to his works is historical rather than literary
in character: but when all allowances are made, it will be found that
the Disquisition on Government' must still be regarded as the most
remarkable political treatise our country has produced, and that the
position of its author as the head of a school of political thought is
commanding, and in a way unassailable.
The precise character of Calhoun's political philosophy, the key-
note of which was the necessity and means of defending the rights
of minorities, cannot be understood without a brief glance at his
political career. His birth in 1782 just after the Revolution, and in
South Carolina, gave him the opportunity to share in the victory
that the West and the far South won over the Virginians, headed by
Madison. His training at Yale gave a nationalistic bias to his early
career, and determined that search for the via media between con-
solidation and anarchy which resulted in the doctrine of nullification.
His service in Congress and as Secretary of War under Monroe gave
him a practical training in affairs that was not without influence in
qualifying his tendency to indulge in doctrinaire speculation. His
service as Vice-President afforded the leisure and his break with
Jackson the occasion, for his close study of the Constitution, to dis-
cover how the South might preserve slavery and yet continue in the
## p. 3088 (#50) ############################################
3088
JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN
Union. Finally, his position as a non-aristocratic leader of a body
of aristocrats, and his Scotch-Irish birth and training, gave a pecu-
liar strenuousness to his support of slavery, which is of course the
corner-stone of his political philosophy; and determined his reliance
upon logic rather than upon an appeal to the passions as the best
means of inculcating his teaching and of establishing his policy. His
political treatises, A Discourse on Government' and 'On the Consti-
tution and Government of the United States,' written just before his
death in 1850; his pamphlets like the South Carolina Exposition'
and the Address to the People of South Carolina'; and the great
speeches delivered in the Senate from 1832 to the end of his term,
especially those in which he defended against Webster the doctrine
of nullification, could have emanated only from an up-country South-
Carolinian who had inherited the mantle of Jefferson, and had sat at
the feet of John Taylor of Carolina and of John Randolph of Roa-
noke. Calhoun was, then, the logical outcome of his environment and
his training; he was the fearless and honest representative of his
people and section; and he was the master from whom rash disciples
like Jefferson Davis broke away, when they found that logical analy-
sis of the Constitution was a poor prop for slavery against the rising
tide of civilization.
As a thinker Calhoun is remarkable for great powers of analysis
and exposition. As a writer he is chiefly noted for the even dignity
and general serviceableness of his style. He writes well, but rather
like a logician than like an inspired orator. He has not the stateli-
ness of Webster, and is devoid of the power of arousing enthusiasm.
The splendor of Burke's imagination is utterly beyond him, as is
also the epigrammatic brilliance of John Randolph, from whom,
however, he took not a few lessons in constitutional interpretation.
Indeed, it must be confessed that for all his clearness and subtlety
of intellect as a thinker, Calhoun is as a writer distinctly heavy.
In this as in many other respects he reminds us of the Romans, to
whom he was continually referring. Like them he is conspicuous
for strength of practical intellect; like them he is lacking in sub-
limity, charm, and nobility. It follows then that Calhoun will rarely
be resorted to as a model of eloquence, but that he will continue to
be read both on account of the substantial additions he made to
political philosophy, and of the interesting exposition he gave of
theories and ideas once potent in the nation's history.
Notwithstanding the bitterness of accusation brought against him,
he was not a traitor nor a man given over to selfish ambition, as
Dr. von Holst, his most competent biographer and critic, has clearly
shown. Calhoun believed both in slavery and in the Union, and
tried to maintain a balance between the two, because he thought
-- -
## p. 3089 (#51) ############################################
JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN
3089
that only in this way could his section maintain its prestige or even
its existence. He failed, as any other man would have done; and
we find him, like Cassandra, a prophet whom we cannot love. But
he did prophesy truly as to the fate of the South; and in the course
of his strenuous labors to divert the ruin he saw impending, he gave
to the world the most masterly analysis of the rights of the minority
and of the best methods of securing them that has yet come from
the pen of a publicist.
W. P. Hand. -
MR
REMARKS ON THE RIGHT OF PETITION
DELIVERED IN THE SENATE, FEBRUARY 13TH, 1840
R. CALHOUN said he rose to
express the pleasure he felt at
the evidence which the remarks of the Senator from
Kentucky furnished, of the progress of truth on the sub-
ject of abolition. He had spoken with strong approbation of the
principle laid down in a recent pamphlet, that two races of dif-
ferent character and origin could not coexist in the same coun-
try without the subordination of the one to the other.
He was
gratified to hear the Senator give assent to so important a prin-
ciple in application to the condition of the South. He had
himself, several years since, stated the same in more specific
terms: that it was impossible for two races, so dissimilar in
every respect as the European and African that inhabit the
southern portion of this Union, to exist together in nearly equal
numbers in any other relation than that which existed there.
He also added that experience had shown that they could so
exist in peace and happiness there, certainly to the great bene-
fit of the inferior race; and that to destroy it was to doom the
latter to destruction. But he uttered these important truths
then in vain, as far as the side to which the Senator belongs is
concerned.
He trusted the progress of truth would not, however, stop at
the point to which it has arrived with the Senator, and that it
will make some progress in regard to what is called the right of
petition. Never was a right so much mystified and magnified.
To listen to the discussion, here and elsewhere, you would sup-
pose it to be the most essential and important right: so far
VI-194
## p. 3090 (#52) ############################################
3090
JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN
from it, he undertook to aver that under our free and popular
system it was among the least of all our political rights. It
had been superseded in a great degree by the far higher right
of general suffrage, and by the practice, now so common, of
instruction. There could be no local grievance but what could
be reached by these, except it might be the grievance affecting
a minority, which could be no more redressed by petition than
by them. The truth is, that the right of petition could scarcely
be said to be the right of a freeman. It belongs to despotic
governments more properly, and might be said to be the last
right of slaves. Who ever heard of petition in the free States
of antiquity? We had borrowed our notions in regard to it from
our British ancestors, with whom it had a value for their imper-
fect representation far greater than it has with us; and it is
owing to that that it has a place at all in our Constitution. The
truth is, that the right has been so far superseded in a political
point of view, that it has ceased to be what the Constitution
contemplated it to be,-a shield to protect against wrongs; and
has been perverted into a sword to attack the rights of others-
to cause a grievance instead of the means of redressing griev
ances, as in the case of abolition petitions. The Senator from
Ohio [Mr. Tappan] has viewed this subject in its proper light,
and has taken a truly patriotic and constitutional stand in refus-
ing to present these firebrands, for which I heartily thank him
in the name of my State. Had the Senator from Kentucky fol-
lowed the example, he would have rendered inestimable service
to the country.
It is useless to attempt concealment. The presentation of
these incendiary petitions is itself an infraction of the Consti-
tution. All acknowledge- the Senator himself - that the prop-
erty which they are presented to destroy is guaranteed by the
Constitution. Now I ask: If we have the right under the Con-
stitution to hold the property (which none question), have we
not also the right to hold it under the same sacred instrument
in peace and quiet? Is it not a direct infraction then of the
Constitution, to present petitions here in the common council of
the Union, and to us, the agents appointed to carry its pro-
visions into effect and to guard the rights it secures, the
professed aim of which is to destroy the property guaranteed by
the instrument? There can be but one answer to these questions
on the part of those who present such petitions: that the right
## p. 3091 (#53) ############################################
JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN
3091
of such petition is higher and more sacred than the Constitution.
and our oaths to preserve and to defend it. To such monstrous
results does the doctrine lead.
Sir, I understand this whole question. The great mass of
both parties to the North are opposed to abolition: the Demo-
crats almost exclusively; the Whigs less so. Very few are to
be found in the ranks of the former; but many in those of the
latter. The only importance that the abolitionists have is to be
found in the fact that their weight may be felt in elections; and
this is no small advantage. The one party is unwilling to lose
their weight, but at the same time unwilling to be blended with
them on the main question; and hence is made this false,
absurd, unconstitutional, and dangerous collateral issue on the
right of petition. Here is the whole secret. They are willing
to play the political game at our hazard, and that of the Consti-
tution and the Union, for the sake of victory at the elections.
But to show still more clearly how little foundation there is in
the character of our government for the extravagant impor-
tance attached to this right, I ask the Senator what is the true
relation between the government and the people, according to
our American conception? Which is principal and which agent?
which the master and which the servant? which the sovereign
and which the subject? There can be no answer. We are but
the agents- the servants. We are not the sovereign. The
sovereignty resides in the people of the States. How little
applicable, then, is this boasted right of petition, under our
system, to political questions? Who ever heard of the principal
petitioning his agent-of the master, his servant-or of the
sovereign, his subject? The very essence of a petition implies a
request from an inferior to a superior. It is not in fact a natural
growth of our system. It was copied from the British Bill of
Rights, and grew up among a people whose representation was
very imperfect, and where the sovereignty of the people was not
recognized at all. And yet even there, this right so much
insisted on here as being boundless as space, was restricted
from the beginning by the very men who adopted it in the
British system, in the very manner which has been done in the
other branch, this session; and to an extent far beyond. The
two Houses of Parliament have again and again passed resolu-
tions against receiving petitions even to repeal taxes; and this,
those who formed our Constitution well knew, and yet adopted
## p. 3092 (#54) ############################################
3092
JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN
the provision almost identically contained in the British Bill of
Rights, without guarding against the practice under it. Is not
the conclusion irresistible, that they did not deem it inconsistent
with the right of "the citizens peaceably to assemble and peti-
tion for a redress of grievance," as secured in the Constitution?
The thing is clear. It is time that the truth should be known,
and this cant about petition, not to redress the grievances of
the petitioners, but to create a grievance elsewhere, be put
down.
I know this question to the bottom. I have viewed it under
every possible aspect. There is no safety but in prompt, deter-
mined, and uncompromising defense of our rights-to meet the
danger on the frontier. There all rights are strongest, and
more especially this. The moral is like the physical world.
Nature has incrusted the exterior of all organic life, for its
safety. Let that be broken through, and it is all weakness
within. So in the moral and political world. It is on the
extreme limits of right that all wrong and encroachments are
the most sensibly felt and easily resisted. I have acted on this
principle throughout in this great contest. I took my lessons
from the patriots of the Revolution.
## p. 3065 (#23) ############################################
LIST OF PORTRAITS
IN VOL. VI
Pedro Calderon
John Caldwell Calhoun
John Calvin
Luiz Vaz de Camoens
Thomas Campbell
George Canning
Emilia Flygare-Carlén
Thomas Carlyle
Bliss Carman
Jacob Cats
Catullus
Bartolomeo de las Casas
Baldassare Castiglione
Benvenuto Cellini
Cervantes
Adelbert von Chamisso
William Ellery Channing
George Chapman
François René Auguste Châteaubriand
Thomas Chatterton
Geoffrey Chaucer
André Chénier
Victor Cherbuliez
Lord Chesterfield
Confucius
Rufus Choate
Full page
Full pape
Full page
Full page
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Full page
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Full page
Full page
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Full page
Vignette
Vignette
Full page
Vignette
Vignette
## p. 3066 (#24) ############################################
## p. 3067 (#25) ############################################
## p. 3068 (#26) ############################################
CALDERON
## p. 3069 (#27) ############################################
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## p. 3070 (#28) ############################################
FOLL
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## p. 3071 (#29) ############################################
3071
PEDRO CALDERON
(1600-1681)
BY MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN
HE reputation of Pedro Calderon de la Barca has suffered in
the minds of English-speaking people from the injudicious
comparisons of critics, as well as from lack of knowledge of
his works. To put Calderon, a master of invention, beside Shake-
speare, the master of character, and to show by analogies that the
author of 'Othello' was far superior to the writer of The Physician
of His Own Honor,' is unjust to Calderon; and it is as futile as are
the ecstasies of Schultze to the coldness of Sismondi. Schultze com-
pares Dante with him, and the French critics have only recently for-
given him for being less classical in form than Corneille, who in
'Le Cid' gave them all the Spanish poetry they wanted! Fortu-
nately the student of Calderon need not take opinions. Good editions
of Calderon are easily attainable. The best known are Heil's (Leip-
zig, 1827), and that by Harzenbusch (Madrid, 1848). The first
edition, with forewords by Vera Tassis de Villareal, appeared at
Madrid (nine volumes) in 1682-91. Commentaries and translations are
numerous in German and in English; the translations by Denis
Florence MacCarthy are the most satisfactory, Edward Fitzgerald's
being too paraphrastic. Dean Trench added much to our knowledge
of Calderon's best work; George Ticknor in the History of Spanish
Literature,' and George Henry Lewes in The Spanish Drama,' left
us clear estimates of Lope de Vega's great successor. Shelley's
scenes from 'El Magico Prodigioso' are superb.
No analyses can do justice to the dramas, or to the religious
plays, called "autos," of Calderon. They must be read; and thanks to
the late Mr. MacCarthy's sympathy and zeal, the finest are easily
attainable. As he left seventy-three autos and one hundred and
eight dramas, it is lucky that the work of sifting the best from the
mass of varying merit has been carefully done. Mr. Ticknor men-
tions the fact that Calderon collaborated with other authors in the
writing of fourteen other plays.
Calderon was not "the Spanish Shakespeare. " "The Spanish Ben
Jonson" would be a happier title, if one feels obliged to compare
everything with something else. But Calderon is as far above Ben
Jonson in splendor of imagery as he is below Shakespeare in his
## p. 3072 (#30) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3072
knowledge of the heart, and in that vitality which makes Hamlet
and Orlando, Lady Macbeth and Perdita, men and women of all
time. They live; Calderon's people, like Ben Jonson's, move. There
is a resemblance between the autos of Calderon and the masques of
Jonson. Jonson's are lyrical; Calderon's less lyrical than splendid,
ethical, grandiose. They were both court poets; they both made
court spectacles; they both assisted in the decay of the drama; they
reflected the tastes of their time; but Calderon is the more noble,
the more splendid in imagination, the more intense in his devotion
to nature in all her moods. If one wanted to carry the habit of
comparison into music, Mozart might well represent the spirit of
Calderon. M. Philarète Chasles is right when he says that 'El
Mágico Prodigioso' should be presented in a cathedral. Calderon's
genius had the cast of the soldier and the priest, and he was both
soldier and priest. His comedias and autos are of Spain, Spanish. To
know Calderon is to know the mind of the Spain of the seventeenth
century; to know Cervantes is to know its heart.
The Church had opposed the secularization of the drama, at the
end of the fifteenth century, for two reasons.
The dramatic specta-
cle fostered for religious purposes had become, until Lope de Vega
rescued it, a medium for that "naturalism" which some of us fancy
to be a discovery of M. Zola and M. Catulle Mendès; it had escaped
from the control of the Church and had become a mere diversion.
Calderon was the one man who could unite the spirit of religion to
the form of the drama which the secular renaissance imperiously
demanded. He knew the philosophy of Aristotle and the theology of
the 'Summa' of St. Thomas as well as any cleric in Spain, though
he did not take orders until late in life; and in those religious spec-
tacles called autos sacramentales he showed this knowledge wonder-
fully. His last auto was unfinished when he died, on May 25th, 1681,
-sixty-five years after the death of Shakespeare, -and Don Melchior
de Leon completed it, probably in time for the feast of Corpus
Christi.
The auto was an elaboration of the older miracle-play, and a spec-
tacle as much in keeping with the temper of the Spanish court and
people as Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream' or Ben Jonson's
'Fortunate Isles' was in accord with the tastes of the English. And
Calderon, of all Spanish poets, best pleased his people. He was the
favorite poet of the court under Philip IV. , and director of the the-
atre in the palace of the Buen Retiro. The skill in the art of con-
struction which he had begun to acquire when he wrote The
Devotion of the Cross' at the age of nineteen, was turned to stage
management at the age of thirty-five, when he produced his gorgeous
pageant of Circe' on the pond of the Buen Retiro. How elaborate
## p. 3073 (#31) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3073
this spectacle was, the directions for the prelude of the greater
splendor to come will show. They read in this way:-
―
"In the midst of this island will be situated a very lofty mountain of
rugged ascent, with precipices and caverns, surrounded by a thick and dark-
some wood of tall trees, some of which will be seen to exhibit the appearance
of the human form, covered with a rough bark, from the heads and arms of
which will issue green boughs and branches, having suspended from them
various trophies of war and of the chase: the theatre during the opening of
the scene being scantily lit with concealed lights; and to make a beginning
of the festival, a murmuring and a rippling noise of water having been heard,
a great and magnificent car will be seen to advance along the pond, plated
over with silver, and drawn by two monstrous fishes, from whose mouth will
continually issue great jets of water, the light of the theatre increasing ac-
cording as they advance; and on the summit of it will be seen seated in
great pomp and majesty the goddess Aqua, from whose head and curious
vesture will issue an infinite abundance of little conduits of water; and at the
same time will be seen another great supply flowing from an urn which the
goddess will hold reversed, and which, filled with a variety of fishes leaping
and playing in the torrent as it descends and gliding over all the car, will
fall into the pond. "
This Circe was allegorical and mythological; it was
one of
those soulless shows which marked the transition of the Spanish
drama from maturity to decay. It is gone and forgotten with thou-
sands of its kind. Calderon will be remembered not as the director
of such vain pomps, but as the author of the sublime and tender
'Wonderful Magician,' the weird 'Purgatory of St. Patrick,' 'The
Constant Prince,' 'The Secret in Words,' and 'The Physician of His
Own Honor. ' The scrupulous student of the Spanish drama will
demand more; but for him who would love Calderon without making
a deep study of his works, these are sufficiently characteristic of his
genius at its highest. The reader in search of wider vistas should
add to these 'Los Encantos de la Culpa' (The Sorceries of Sin), and
'The Great Theatre of the World,' the theme of which is that of
Jacques's famous speech in As You Like It':-
"En el teatro del mundo
Todos son representados. »
("All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players. ")
On the principal feasts of the Church autos were played in the
streets, generally in front of some great house. Giants and grotesque
figures called tarascas gamboled about; and the auto, which was more
like our operas than any other composition of the Spanish stage, was
begun by a loa, written or sung. After this came the play, then an
VI-193
## p. 3074 (#32) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3074
amusing interlude, followed by music and sometimes by a dance of
gipsies.
Calderon boldly mingles pagan gods and Christ's mysteries in
these autos, which are essentially of his time and his people. But the
mixture is not so shocking as it is with the lesser poet, the Portu-
guese Camoens. Whether Calderon depicts The True God Pan,'
'Love the Greatest Enchantment,' or 'The Sheaves of Ruth,' he is
forceful, dramatic, and even at times he has the awful gravity of
Dante. His view of life and his philosophy are the view of life and
the philosophy of Dante. To many of us, these simple and original
productions of the Spanish temperament and genius may lack what
we call "human interest. " Let us remember that they represented
truthfully the faith and the hope, the spiritual knowledge of a
nation, as well as the personal and national view of that knowledge.
In the Spain of Calderon, the personal view was the national view.
Calderon was born on January 17th, 1600, according to his own
statement quoted by his friend Vera Tassis, at Madrid, of noble
parents. He was partly educated at the University of Salamanca.
Like Cervantes and Garcilaso, he served in the army.
The great
Lope, in 1630, acknowledged him as a poet and his friend. Later,
his transition from the army to the priesthood made little change in
his views of time and eternity.
On May 25th, 1881, occurred the second centenary of his death,
and the civilized world-whose theatre owes more to Calderon than
it has ever acknowledged - celebrated with Spain the anniversary
at Madrid, where as he said,
"Spain's proud heart swelleth. »
The selections have been chosen from Shelley's 'Scenes,' and
from Mr. MacCarthy's translation of The Secret in Words. ' 'The
Secret in Words' is light comedy of intricate plot. Fabio is an
example of the attendant gracioso, half servant, half confidant, who
appears often in the Spanish drama. The Spanish playwright did
not confine himself to one form of verse; and Mr. MacCarthy, in his
adequate translation, has followed the various forms of Calderon,
only not attempting the assonant vowel, so hard to escape in
Spanish, and still harder to reproduce in English. These selections
give no impression of the amazing invention of Calderon. This can
only be appreciated through reading The Constant Prince,' 'The
Physician of His Own Honor,' or a comedy like The Secret in
Words. '
nammi
Francis Egan
――――
―――
-
## p. 3075 (#33) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
F
Fabio
[Flerida, the Duchess of Parma, is in love with her secretary Frederick.
He loves her lady, Laura. Both Frederick and Laura are trying to keep
their secret from the Duchess. ]
'REDERICK — Has Flerida questioned you
Aught about my love?
Fabio-
Frederick-
Fabio-
Frederick-
Frederick-Said she something, then, about me?
Ay, enough.
Fabio-
THE LOVERS
From The Secret in Words>
Frederick-
Fabio-
Fabio-
But I have made up my mind
That you are the prince of dunces,
Not to understand her wish.
Frederick-What?
No, surely;
Thou liest, knave!
Wouldst thou make me think her beauty,
Proud and gentle though it be,
Which might soar e'en like the heron
To the sovereign sun itself,
Could descend with coward pinions
At a lowly falcon's call?
Well, my lord, just make the trial
For a day or two; pretend
That you love her, and-
Supposing
That there were the slightest ground
For this false, malicious fancy
You have formed, there's not a chink
In my heart where it might enter,-
Since a love, if not more blest,
Far more equal than the other
Holds entire possession there.
Then you never loved this woman
At one time?
No!
Then avow
That you were very lazy.
Frederick-That is falsehood, and not love.
Fabio- The more the merrier!
Frederick
In two places
How could one man love?
3075
## p. 3076 (#34) ############################################
3076
PEDRO CALDERON
Fabio-
Fabio-
Why, thus:
Near the town of Ratisbon
Two conspicuous hamlets lay,-
One of them called Ageré,
The other called Mascárandón.
These two villages one priest,
An humble man of God, 'tis stated,
Served; and therefore celebrated
Mass in each on every feast.
And so one day it came to pass,
A native of Mascárandón
Who to Ageré had gone
About the middle of the mass,
Heard the priest in solemn tone
Say, as he the Preface read,
"Gratias ageré," but said
Nothing of Mascárandón.
To the priest this worthy made
His angry plaint without delay:
"You give best thanks for Ageré,
As if your tithes we had not paid! "
When this sapient reason reached
The noble Mascárandónese,
They stopped their hopeless pastor's fees,
Nor paid for what he prayed or preached;
He asked his sacristan the cause,
Who told him wherefore and because.
From that day forth when he would sing
The Preface, he took care t'intone,
Not in a smothered or weak way,
"Tibi semper et ubique
Gratias-Mascárandón! »
If from love, that god so blind,-
Two parishes thou holdest, you
Are bound to gratify the two;
And after a few days you'll find,
If you do so, soon upon
You and me will fall good things,
When your Lordship sweetly sings
Flerída et Mascárandón.
Frederick-Think you I have heard your folly?
If you listened, why not so?
Frederick-No: my mind can only know
Its one call of melancholy.
## p. 3077 (#35) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3077
Fabio
--
Since you stick to Ageré
And reject Mascárandón,
Every hope, I fear, is gone,
That love his generous dues will pay.
S
Translation of Denis Florence MacCarthy.
CYPRIAN'S BARGAIN
From The Wonderful Magician ›
[The Demon, angered by Cyprian's victory in defending the existence of
God, swears vengeance. He resolves that Cyprian shall lose his soul for
Justina, who rejects his love. Cyprian says: -]
O BITTER is the life I live,
That, hear me hell, I now would give
To thy most detested spirit
My soul forever to inherit,
To suffer punishment and pine,
So this woman may be mine.
[The Demon accepts his soul and hastens to Justina.
Justina-'Tis that enamored nightingale
Who gives me the reply:
He ever tells the same soft tale
Of passion and of constancy
To his mate, who, rapt and fond,
Listening sits, a bough beyond.
Be silent, Nightingale! - No more
Make me think, in hearing thee
Thus tenderly thy love deplore,
If a bird can feel his so,
What a man would feel for me.
And, voluptuous vine, O thou
Who seekest most when least pursuing,-
To the trunk thou interlacest
Art the verdure which embracest
And the weight which is its ruin,-
No more, with green embraces, vine,
Make me think on what thou lovest;
For while thou thus thy boughs entwine,
I fear lest thou shouldst teach me, sophist,
How arms might be entangled too.
Light-enchanted sunflower, thou
## p. 3078 (#36) ############################################
3078
PEDRO CALDERON
All-
Who gazest ever true and tender
On the sun's revolving splendor,
Follow not his faithless glance
With thy faded countenance,
Nor teach my beating heart to fear
If leaves can mourn without a tear,
How eyes must weep! O Nightingale.
Cease from thy enamored tale,-
Leafy vine, unwreath thy bower,
Restless sunflower, cease to move-
Or tell me all, what poisonous power
Ye use against me-
Love! love! love!
Justina-It cannot be! Whom have I ever loved?
Trophies of my oblivion and disdain,
Floro and Lelio did I not reject?
And Cyprian? -
-
[She becomes troubled at the name of Cyprian.
Did I not requite him
With such severity that he has fled
Where none has ever heard of him again? —
Alas! I now begin to fear that this
May be the occasion whence desire grows bold,
As if there were no danger. From the moment
That I pronounced to my own listening heart,
"Cyprian is absent, O miserable me! »
I know not what I feel!
[More calmly.
It must be pity,
To think that such a man, whom all the world
Admired, should be forgot by all the world,
And I the cause.
[She again becomes troubled.
And yet if it were pity,
Floro and Lelio might have equal share,
For they are both imprisoned for my sake.
Alas! what reasonings are these? It is
Enough I pity him, and that in vain,
Without this ceremonious subtlety,
And woe is me! I know not where to find him now,
Even should I seek him through this wide world!
Enter Demon.
Demon-Follow, and I will lead thee where he is.
[Calmly.
## p. 3079 (#37) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3079
Justina And who art thou, who hast found entrance hither
Into my chamber through the doors and locks?
Art thou a monstrous shadow which my madness
Has formed in the idle air?
Demon
No. I am one
Called by the thought which tyrannizes thee
From his eternal dwelling-who this day
Is pledged to bear thee unto Cyprian.
Justina - So shall thy promise fail. This agony
Of passion which afflicts my heart and soul
May sweep imagination in its storm,-
The will is firm.
Demon-
Already half is done.
In the imagination of an act.
The sin incurred, the pleasure then remains:
Let not the will stop half-way on the road.
Justina - I will not be discouraged, nor despair,
Although I thought it, and although 'tis true
That thought is but a prelude to the deed:
Thought is not in my power, but action is:
I will not move my foot to follow thee!
But a far mightier wisdom than thine own
Exerts itself within thee, with such power
Compelling thee to that which it inclines
That it shall force thy step; how wilt thou then
Resist, Justina?
By my free will.
Demon-
-
Justina-
Demon
Justina-
Must force thy will.
It is invincible;
It were not free if thou hadst power upon it.
I
Demon Come, where a pleasure waits thee.
Justina-
Too dear.
[He draws, but cannot move her.
It were bought
Demon
'Twill soothe thy heart to softest peace.
Justina 'Tis dread captivity.
Demon-
'Tis joy, 'tis glory.
Justina - 'Tis shame, 'tis torment, 'tis despair.
Demon-
But how
Canst thou defend thyself from that or me,
If my power drags thee onward?
## p. 3080 (#38) ############################################
3080
PEDRO CALDERON
Justina-
Demon
Justina-
Consists in God.
[He vainly endeavors to force her, and at last releases her.
Woman, thou hast subdued me
Only by not owning thyself subdued.
But since thou thus findest defense in God,
I will assume a feignèd form, and thus
Make thee a victim of my baffled rage.
For I will mask a spirit in thy form
Who will betray thy name to infamy,
And doubly shall I triumph in thy loss,
First by dishonoring thee, and then by turning
False pleasure to true ignominy.
My defense
I
Appeal to Heaven against thee; so that Heaven
May scatter thy delusions, and the blot
Upon my fame vanish in idle thought,
Even as flame dies in the envious air,
And as the flow'ret wanes at morning frost,
And thou shouldst never— - But alas! to whom
Do I still speak? — Did not a man but now
Stand here before me? —No, I am alone,
And yet I saw him.
Is he gone so quickly?
Or can the heated mind engender shapes
From its own fear? Some terrible and strange
Peril is near. Lisander! father! lord!
Livia!
Enter Lisander and Livia.
Lisander-O my daughter! what?
Livia-
Justina-
Lisander-
Justina Have you not seen him?
Livia-
Justina I saw him.
Lisander-
What?
Saw you
A man go forth from my apartment now?
I scarce sustain myself!
A man here!
No, lady.
'Tis impossible; the doors
Which led to this apartment were all locked.
Livia [aside]—I dare say it was Moscon whom she saw,
For he was locked up in my room.
[Exit.
## p. 3081 (#39) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3081
Lisander-
――
Livia
Justina-
-
Lisander-
Justina
It must
ave been some image of thy phantasy.
Such melancholy as thou feedest is
Skillful in forming such in the vain air
Out of the motes and atoms of the day.
My master's in the right.
Oh, would it were
Delusion; but I fear some greater ill.
I feel as if out of my bleeding bosom
My heart was torn in fragments; ay,
Some mortal spell is wrought against my frame.
So potent was the charm, that had not God
Shielded my humble innocence from wrong,
I should have sought my sorrow and my shame
With willing steps. Livia, quick, bring my cloak,
For I must seek refuge from these extremes
Even in the temple of the highest God
Which secretly the faithful worship.
Livia-
Here.
Justina [putting on her cloak]-In this, as in a shroud of snow, may I
Quench the consuming fire in which I burn,
Wasting away!
Lisander-
And I will go with thee!
Livia [aside]-When I once see them safe out of the house,
I shall breathe freely.
Justina-
So do I confide
In thy just favor, Heaven!
Let us go.
Thine is the cause, great God! Turn, for my sake
And for thine own, mercifully to me!
Translation of Shelley.
## p. 3082 (#40) ############################################
3082
PEDRO CALDERON
DREAMS AND REALITIES
From Such Stuff as Dreams are Made Of,' Edward Fitzgerald's version of
'La Vida Es Sueno
[The scene is a tower. Clotaldo is persuading Segismund that his expe-
riences have not been real, but dreams, and discusses the possible relation of
existence to a state of dreaming. The play itself is based on the familiar
motif of which Christopher Sly furnishes a ready example. ]
Clotaldo
Segismund-
Clotaldo-
Segismund-
Clotaldo
RINCES and princesses and counselors,
P
----
Fluster'd to right and left-my life made at -
But that was nothing-
Even the white-hair'd, venerable King
Seized on- Indeed, you made wild work of it;
And so discover'd in your outward action,
Flinging your arms about you in your sleep,
Grinding your teeth and, as I now remember,
Woke mouthing out judgment and execution,
On those about you.
Ay, I did indeed.
Ev'n your eyes stare wild; your hair stands up—
Your pulses throb and flutter, reeling still
Under the storm of such a dream-
That seem'd as swearable reality
As what I wake in now.
A dream!
Ay wondrous how
Imagination in a sleeping brain
Out of the uncontingent senses draws
Sensations strong as from the real touch;
That we not only laugh aloud, and drench
With tears our pillow; but in the agony
Of some imaginary conflict, fight
And struggle-ev'n as you did; some, 'tis thought
Under the dreamt-of stroke of death have died.
―――
Segismund― And what so very strange, too—in that world
Where place as well as people all was strange,
Ev'n I almost as strange unto myself,
You only, you, Clotaldo-you, as much
And palpably yourself as now you are,
Came in this very garb you ever wore;
By such a token of the past, you said,
To assure me of that seeming present.
## p. 3083 (#41) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3083
Clotaldo
Ay?
Segismund — Ay; and even told me of the very stars
You tell me hereof - how in spite of them,
I was enlarged to all that glory.
Clotaldo-
Ay,
By the false spirits' nice contrivance, thus
A little truth oft leavens all the false,
The better to delude us.
For you know
'Tis nothing but a dream?
Nay, you yourself
Know best how lately you awoke from that
You know you went to sleep on. —
Why, have you never dreamt the like before?
Segismund-Never, to such reality.
Segismund-
Clotaldo-
Clotaldo-
Such dreams
Are oftentimes the sleeping exhalations
Of that ambition that lies smoldering
Under the ashes of the lowest fortune:
By which, when reason slumbers, or has lost
The reins of sensible comparison,
We fly at something higher than we are—
Scarce ever dive to lower- to be kings
Or conquerors, crown'd with laurel or with gold;
Nay, mounting heav'n itself on eagle wings,-
Which, by the way, now that I think of it,
May furnish us the key to this high flight —
That royal Eagle we were watching, and
Talking of as you went to sleep last night.
Segismund - Last night? Last night?
Clotaldo
Clotaldo-
Ay; do you not remember
Envying his immunity of flight,
As, rising from his throne of rock, he sail'd
Above the mountains far into the west,
That burned about him, while with poising wings
He darkled in it as a burning brand
Is seen to smolder in the fire it feeds?
Segismund - Last night-last night -Oh, what a day was that
Between that last night and this sad to-day !
And yet perhaps
Only some few dark moments, into which
Imagination, once lit up within
And unconditional of time and space,
Can pour infinities.
## p. 3084 (#42) ############################################
3084
PEDRO CALDERON
Segismund-
Clotaldo
Clotaldo
Segismund-Would that it had been on the verge of death
That knows no waking-
Clotaldo
Segismund-
And I remember
How the old man they call'd the King, who wore
The crown of gold about his silver hair,
And a mysterious girdle round his waist,
Just when my rage was roaring at its height,
And after which it all was dark again,
Bade me beware lest all should be a dream.
Ay-there another specialty of dreams,
That once the dreamer 'gins to dream he dreams,
His foot is on the very verge of waking.
Segismund-Who meant me! -me! their Prince,
Chain'd like a felon -
Clotaldo-
Lifting me up to glory, to fall back,
Stunned, crippled - wretcheder than ev'n before.
Yet not so glorious, Segismund, if you
Your visionary honor wore so ill
As to work murder and revenge on those
Who meant you well.
Stay, stay- Not so fast.
You dream'd the Prince, remember.
Revenged it only.
True. But as they say
Dreams are rough copies of the waking soul
Yet uncorrected of the higher Will,
So that men sometimes in their dream confess
Then in dream
An unsuspected or forgotten self;
One must beware to check-ay, if one may,
Stifle ere born, such passion in ourselves
As makes, we see, such havoc with our sleep,
And ill reacts upon the waking day.
And, by the by, for one test, Segismund,
Between such swearable realities-
Since dreaming, madness, passion, are akin
In missing each that salutary rein
Of reason, and the guiding will of man:
One test, I think, of waking sanity
Shall be that conscious power of self-control
To curb all passion, but much, most of all,
That evil and vindictive, that ill squares
With human, and with holy canon less,
Which bids us pardon ev'n our enemies,
## p. 3085 (#43) ############################################
PEDRO CALDERON
3085
And much more those who, out of no ill-will,
Mistakenly have taken up the rod.
Which Heaven, they think, has put into their hands.
Segismund- I think I soon shall have to try again-
Sleep has not yet done with me.
Clotaldo
Such a sleep!
Take my advice-'tis early yet-the sun
Scarce up above the mountain; go within,
And if the night deceived you, try anew
With morning; morning dreams they say come true.
Segismund - Oh, rather pray for me a sleep so fast
As shall obliterate dream and waking too.
Clotaldo-
[Exit into the tower.
So sleep; sleep fast: and sleep away those two
Night-potions, and the waking dream between,
Which dream thou must believe; and if to see
Again, poor Segismund! that dream must be. -
And yet - and yet-in these our ghostly lives,
Half night, half day, half sleeping, half awake,
How if our waking life, like that of sleep,
Be all a dream in that eternal life
To which we wake not till we sleep in death?
How if, I say, the senses we now trust
For date of sensible comparison,—
Ay, ev'n the Reason's self that dates with them,
Should be in essence of intensity
Hereafter so transcended, and awoke
To a perceptive subtlety so keen
As to confess themselves befool'd before,
In all that now they will avouch for most?
One man like this-but only so much longer
As life is longer than a summer's day,
Believed himself a king upon his throne,
And play'd at hazard with his fellows' lives,
Who cheaply dream'd away their lives to him.
The sailor dream'd of tossing on the flood:
The soldier of his laurels grown in blood:
The lover of the beauty that he knew
Must yet dissolve to dusty residue:
The merchant and the miser of his bags
Of finger'd gold; the beggar of his rags:
And all this stage of earth on which we seem
Such busy actors, and the parts we play'd
Substantial as the shadow of a shade,
And Dreaming but a dream within a dream!
## p. 3086 (#44) ############################################
3086
PEDRO CALDERON
THE DREAM CALLED LIFE
Segismund's Speech Closing the Vida Es Sueno': Fitzgerald's Version.
DREAM it was in which I thought myself,
A
And you that hailed me now, then hailed me king,
In a brave palace that was all my own,
Within, and all without it, mine; until,
Drunk with excess of majesty and pride,
Methought I towered so high and swelled so wide
That of myself I burst the glittering bubble
That my ambition had about me blown,
And all again was darkness. Such a dream
As this, in which I may be walking now;
Dispensing solemn justice to you shadows,
Who make believe to listen; but anon,
With all your glittering arms and equipage,
Kings, princes, captains, warriors, plume and steel,
Ay, even with all your airy theatre,
May fit into the air you seem to rend
With acclamations, leaving me to wake
In the dark tower; or dreaming that I wake
From this, that waking is; or this and that
Both waking or both dreaming;—such a doubt
Confounds and clouds our mortal life about.
And whether wake or dreaming, this I know,-
How dreamwise human glories come and go;
Whose momentary tenure not to break,
Walking as one who knows he soon may wake,
So fairly carry the full cup, so well
Disordered insolence and passion quell,
That there be nothing after to upbraid
Dreamer or doer in the part he played,-
Whether to-morrow's dawn shall break the spell,
Or the last trumpet of the eternal Day,
When dreaming with the night shall pass away.
## p. 3086 (#45) ############################################
## p. 3086 (#46) ############################################
Olalla
60000
@
Grzch
00000001
J. C. CALHOUN.
000000000000
е
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OnOS0
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CHOE
110110112OOG
DHOI
## p. 3086 (#47) ############################################
## p. 3086 (#48) ############################################
## p. 3087 (#49) ############################################
3087
JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN
(1782-1850)
BY W. P. TRENT
OHN C. CALHOUN's importance as a statesman has naturally
stood in the way of his recognition as a writer, and in like
manner his reputation as an orator has overshadowed his
just claims to be considered our most original political thinker. The
six volumes of his collected works, which unfortunately do not em-
brace his still inaccessible private correspondence, are certainly not
exhilarating or attractive reading; but they are unique in the litera-
ture of America, if not of the world, as models of passionless logical
analysis. Whether passionless logical analysis is ever an essential
quality of true literature, is a matter on which opinions will differ;
but until the question is settled in the negative, Calhoun's claims to
be considered a writer of marked force and originality cannot be
ignored. It is true that circumstances have invalidated much of his
political teaching, and that it was always negative and destructive
rather than positive and constructive; it is true also that much of
the interest attaching to his works is historical rather than literary
in character: but when all allowances are made, it will be found that
the Disquisition on Government' must still be regarded as the most
remarkable political treatise our country has produced, and that the
position of its author as the head of a school of political thought is
commanding, and in a way unassailable.
The precise character of Calhoun's political philosophy, the key-
note of which was the necessity and means of defending the rights
of minorities, cannot be understood without a brief glance at his
political career. His birth in 1782 just after the Revolution, and in
South Carolina, gave him the opportunity to share in the victory
that the West and the far South won over the Virginians, headed by
Madison. His training at Yale gave a nationalistic bias to his early
career, and determined that search for the via media between con-
solidation and anarchy which resulted in the doctrine of nullification.
His service in Congress and as Secretary of War under Monroe gave
him a practical training in affairs that was not without influence in
qualifying his tendency to indulge in doctrinaire speculation. His
service as Vice-President afforded the leisure and his break with
Jackson the occasion, for his close study of the Constitution, to dis-
cover how the South might preserve slavery and yet continue in the
## p. 3088 (#50) ############################################
3088
JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN
Union. Finally, his position as a non-aristocratic leader of a body
of aristocrats, and his Scotch-Irish birth and training, gave a pecu-
liar strenuousness to his support of slavery, which is of course the
corner-stone of his political philosophy; and determined his reliance
upon logic rather than upon an appeal to the passions as the best
means of inculcating his teaching and of establishing his policy. His
political treatises, A Discourse on Government' and 'On the Consti-
tution and Government of the United States,' written just before his
death in 1850; his pamphlets like the South Carolina Exposition'
and the Address to the People of South Carolina'; and the great
speeches delivered in the Senate from 1832 to the end of his term,
especially those in which he defended against Webster the doctrine
of nullification, could have emanated only from an up-country South-
Carolinian who had inherited the mantle of Jefferson, and had sat at
the feet of John Taylor of Carolina and of John Randolph of Roa-
noke. Calhoun was, then, the logical outcome of his environment and
his training; he was the fearless and honest representative of his
people and section; and he was the master from whom rash disciples
like Jefferson Davis broke away, when they found that logical analy-
sis of the Constitution was a poor prop for slavery against the rising
tide of civilization.
As a thinker Calhoun is remarkable for great powers of analysis
and exposition. As a writer he is chiefly noted for the even dignity
and general serviceableness of his style. He writes well, but rather
like a logician than like an inspired orator. He has not the stateli-
ness of Webster, and is devoid of the power of arousing enthusiasm.
The splendor of Burke's imagination is utterly beyond him, as is
also the epigrammatic brilliance of John Randolph, from whom,
however, he took not a few lessons in constitutional interpretation.
Indeed, it must be confessed that for all his clearness and subtlety
of intellect as a thinker, Calhoun is as a writer distinctly heavy.
In this as in many other respects he reminds us of the Romans, to
whom he was continually referring. Like them he is conspicuous
for strength of practical intellect; like them he is lacking in sub-
limity, charm, and nobility. It follows then that Calhoun will rarely
be resorted to as a model of eloquence, but that he will continue to
be read both on account of the substantial additions he made to
political philosophy, and of the interesting exposition he gave of
theories and ideas once potent in the nation's history.
Notwithstanding the bitterness of accusation brought against him,
he was not a traitor nor a man given over to selfish ambition, as
Dr. von Holst, his most competent biographer and critic, has clearly
shown. Calhoun believed both in slavery and in the Union, and
tried to maintain a balance between the two, because he thought
-- -
## p. 3089 (#51) ############################################
JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN
3089
that only in this way could his section maintain its prestige or even
its existence. He failed, as any other man would have done; and
we find him, like Cassandra, a prophet whom we cannot love. But
he did prophesy truly as to the fate of the South; and in the course
of his strenuous labors to divert the ruin he saw impending, he gave
to the world the most masterly analysis of the rights of the minority
and of the best methods of securing them that has yet come from
the pen of a publicist.
W. P. Hand. -
MR
REMARKS ON THE RIGHT OF PETITION
DELIVERED IN THE SENATE, FEBRUARY 13TH, 1840
R. CALHOUN said he rose to
express the pleasure he felt at
the evidence which the remarks of the Senator from
Kentucky furnished, of the progress of truth on the sub-
ject of abolition. He had spoken with strong approbation of the
principle laid down in a recent pamphlet, that two races of dif-
ferent character and origin could not coexist in the same coun-
try without the subordination of the one to the other.
He was
gratified to hear the Senator give assent to so important a prin-
ciple in application to the condition of the South. He had
himself, several years since, stated the same in more specific
terms: that it was impossible for two races, so dissimilar in
every respect as the European and African that inhabit the
southern portion of this Union, to exist together in nearly equal
numbers in any other relation than that which existed there.
He also added that experience had shown that they could so
exist in peace and happiness there, certainly to the great bene-
fit of the inferior race; and that to destroy it was to doom the
latter to destruction. But he uttered these important truths
then in vain, as far as the side to which the Senator belongs is
concerned.
He trusted the progress of truth would not, however, stop at
the point to which it has arrived with the Senator, and that it
will make some progress in regard to what is called the right of
petition. Never was a right so much mystified and magnified.
To listen to the discussion, here and elsewhere, you would sup-
pose it to be the most essential and important right: so far
VI-194
## p. 3090 (#52) ############################################
3090
JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN
from it, he undertook to aver that under our free and popular
system it was among the least of all our political rights. It
had been superseded in a great degree by the far higher right
of general suffrage, and by the practice, now so common, of
instruction. There could be no local grievance but what could
be reached by these, except it might be the grievance affecting
a minority, which could be no more redressed by petition than
by them. The truth is, that the right of petition could scarcely
be said to be the right of a freeman. It belongs to despotic
governments more properly, and might be said to be the last
right of slaves. Who ever heard of petition in the free States
of antiquity? We had borrowed our notions in regard to it from
our British ancestors, with whom it had a value for their imper-
fect representation far greater than it has with us; and it is
owing to that that it has a place at all in our Constitution. The
truth is, that the right has been so far superseded in a political
point of view, that it has ceased to be what the Constitution
contemplated it to be,-a shield to protect against wrongs; and
has been perverted into a sword to attack the rights of others-
to cause a grievance instead of the means of redressing griev
ances, as in the case of abolition petitions. The Senator from
Ohio [Mr. Tappan] has viewed this subject in its proper light,
and has taken a truly patriotic and constitutional stand in refus-
ing to present these firebrands, for which I heartily thank him
in the name of my State. Had the Senator from Kentucky fol-
lowed the example, he would have rendered inestimable service
to the country.
It is useless to attempt concealment. The presentation of
these incendiary petitions is itself an infraction of the Consti-
tution. All acknowledge- the Senator himself - that the prop-
erty which they are presented to destroy is guaranteed by the
Constitution. Now I ask: If we have the right under the Con-
stitution to hold the property (which none question), have we
not also the right to hold it under the same sacred instrument
in peace and quiet? Is it not a direct infraction then of the
Constitution, to present petitions here in the common council of
the Union, and to us, the agents appointed to carry its pro-
visions into effect and to guard the rights it secures, the
professed aim of which is to destroy the property guaranteed by
the instrument? There can be but one answer to these questions
on the part of those who present such petitions: that the right
## p. 3091 (#53) ############################################
JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN
3091
of such petition is higher and more sacred than the Constitution.
and our oaths to preserve and to defend it. To such monstrous
results does the doctrine lead.
Sir, I understand this whole question. The great mass of
both parties to the North are opposed to abolition: the Demo-
crats almost exclusively; the Whigs less so. Very few are to
be found in the ranks of the former; but many in those of the
latter. The only importance that the abolitionists have is to be
found in the fact that their weight may be felt in elections; and
this is no small advantage. The one party is unwilling to lose
their weight, but at the same time unwilling to be blended with
them on the main question; and hence is made this false,
absurd, unconstitutional, and dangerous collateral issue on the
right of petition. Here is the whole secret. They are willing
to play the political game at our hazard, and that of the Consti-
tution and the Union, for the sake of victory at the elections.
But to show still more clearly how little foundation there is in
the character of our government for the extravagant impor-
tance attached to this right, I ask the Senator what is the true
relation between the government and the people, according to
our American conception? Which is principal and which agent?
which the master and which the servant? which the sovereign
and which the subject? There can be no answer. We are but
the agents- the servants. We are not the sovereign. The
sovereignty resides in the people of the States. How little
applicable, then, is this boasted right of petition, under our
system, to political questions? Who ever heard of the principal
petitioning his agent-of the master, his servant-or of the
sovereign, his subject? The very essence of a petition implies a
request from an inferior to a superior. It is not in fact a natural
growth of our system. It was copied from the British Bill of
Rights, and grew up among a people whose representation was
very imperfect, and where the sovereignty of the people was not
recognized at all. And yet even there, this right so much
insisted on here as being boundless as space, was restricted
from the beginning by the very men who adopted it in the
British system, in the very manner which has been done in the
other branch, this session; and to an extent far beyond. The
two Houses of Parliament have again and again passed resolu-
tions against receiving petitions even to repeal taxes; and this,
those who formed our Constitution well knew, and yet adopted
## p. 3092 (#54) ############################################
3092
JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN
the provision almost identically contained in the British Bill of
Rights, without guarding against the practice under it. Is not
the conclusion irresistible, that they did not deem it inconsistent
with the right of "the citizens peaceably to assemble and peti-
tion for a redress of grievance," as secured in the Constitution?
The thing is clear. It is time that the truth should be known,
and this cant about petition, not to redress the grievances of
the petitioners, but to create a grievance elsewhere, be put
down.
I know this question to the bottom. I have viewed it under
every possible aspect. There is no safety but in prompt, deter-
mined, and uncompromising defense of our rights-to meet the
danger on the frontier. There all rights are strongest, and
more especially this. The moral is like the physical world.
Nature has incrusted the exterior of all organic life, for its
safety. Let that be broken through, and it is all weakness
within. So in the moral and political world. It is on the
extreme limits of right that all wrong and encroachments are
the most sensibly felt and easily resisted. I have acted on this
principle throughout in this great contest. I took my lessons
from the patriots of the Revolution.
