Delphi Complete Works of Nathaniel Hawthorne (Illustrated) (872 page)

II.

The theme referred to in Chapter III. is given in full below. After the
earlier portion of the present essay had been stereotyped, an article by
Professor G. T. Packard, on Bowdoin College, was published in
“Scribner's Monthly,” which contains this mention of Hawthorne: —

“The author's college life was prophetic of the after years, when he so dwelt apart from the mass of men, and yet stirred so deeply the world's sensibilities and delighted its fancy. His themes were written in the sustained, finished style that gives to his mature productions an inimitable charm. The late Professor Newman, his instructor in rhetoric, was so impressed with Hawthorne's powers as a writer, that he not infrequently summoned the family circle to share in the enjoyment of reading his compositions. The recollection is very distinct of Hawthorne's reluctant step and averted look, when he presented himself at the Professor's study, and with girlish diffidence submitted a composition which no man in his class could equal…. When the class was graduated, Hawthorne could not be persuaded to join them in having their profiles cut in paper, the only class picture of the time; nor did he take part in the Commencement exercises. His classmates understood that he intended to be a writer of romance, but none anticipated his remarkable development and enduring fame. It seems strange that among his admirers no one has offered him a fitting tribute by founding the Hawthorne Professorship of English Literature in the college where, under the tutelage of the accomplished and appreciative Professor Newman, he was stimulated to cultivate his native gift.”

DE PATRIS CONSCRIPTIS ROMANORUM.

Senatum Romanorum jam primum institutum, simplicem siniul atquo praestantissimuni fuisse sentiant onmes.
Imperium fint, quod populo aec avaritis nee luxuria vitiato optimum videretar.
Lecti fuerunt senatores, non qui ambitiose potestatem eupiere, sesl qui senectute, qui sapientia, qui virtute bellica vel privata insigues, in republica plurimam pollebant. Hominum consiliis virtute tam singulari praeditorum paruit populus libenter atque senatores at patres civilius venerati. Studium illis paternum adhibuere. Nulla unquam respublica, quam turn Romana, nec sanctior nec beatior t'uit; iis temporibus etenim solum in publicum commodum principes administrabant; fidemque principibus populi habetant. Sed virtute prisca reipublierc perdita, inimicitus mutuis patres plebesque flagrare coeperunt, alienaque prosequi. Senatus in populum tyrannice saeviit, atque hostem se monstravit potiue quam custodem reipubliere. Concitatur vulgus studio libertatis repetendre, alque per multa secula patrum plebisque contentiones historia Romana memorat; patribus pristinam auctoriratem servare conatis, liccentiaque plebis omnia jura spernante. Hoc modo usque ad Panieum bellum, res se habebant. Tun pericula externa discordiam domesticam superabant, reipublicaeque studium priscam patribus sapientiam, priscam populis reverentiam redundit. Hae aetate omnibus virtutibus cnituit Roma. Senatus, jure omnium consensu facto, opes suas prope ad inopiam plebis aequavit; patriaeque solum amore gloria quaesita, pecunia niluii habita est.
Sed quuam Carthaginem reformidavit non diutius Roma, rediit respublica ad vitia pristina.
Patres luxuria solum populis praestiterunt, et vestigia eorum populi secuti sunt. Senatus auctoritatem, ex illo ipso tempore, annus unusquisque diminuit, donce in aerate Angasti interitus nobilium humiliumque delectus omnino fere dignitatem conficerunt.
Augustus equidem antiquam magnificentiam patribus reddidit, sed fulgor tantum liut sine fervore. Nunquam in republica senatoribus potestates recuperatae. Postremum species etiam amissa est.

HATHORNE.

THE ROMAN SENATE.

Every one perceives that the Roman Senate, as it was originally constituted, was a no less simple than illustrious body. It was a sovereignty which appeared most desirable to a populace vitiated neither by avarice nor luxury. The senators were chosen, not from those who were ambitious of power, but those who wielded the largest influence in the Republic through wisdom and warlike valor or private virtue. The citizens bowed willingly to the counsels of men endowed with such singular worth, and venerated the senators as fathers. The latter exercised a paternal care. No republic ever was holier or more blessed than that of Rome at this time; for in those days the rulers administered for the public convenience alone, and the people had faith in their rulers. But, the pristine virtue of the Republic lost, the fathers and the commonalty began to blaze forth with mutual hostilities, and to seek after the possessions of others. The Senate vented its wrath savagely upon the people, and showed itself rather the enemy than the guardian of the Republic. The multitude was aroused by the desire of recovering liberty, and through a very long period Roman history recounts the contentions of the fathers and the commonalty; the fathers attempting to preserve their old authority, and the license of the commons scorning every law. Affairs remained in this condition until the Punic War. Then foreign perils prevailed over domestic discord, and love of the Republic restored to the fathers their early wisdom, to the people their reverence. At this period, Rome shone with every virtue. The Senate, through the rightfully obtained consent of all parties, nearly equalized its power with the powerlessness of the commonalty; and glory being sought solely through love of the fatherland, wealth was regarded as of no account. But when Rome no longer dreaded Carthage, the commonwealth returned to its former vices. The fathers were superior to the populace only in luxury, and the populace followed in their footsteps. From that very time, every year diminished the authority of the Senate, until in the age of Augustus the death of the nobles and the selection of insignificant men almost wholly destroyed its dignity. Augustus, to be sure, restored to the fathers their ancient magnificence, but, great as was the fire (so to speak), it was without real heat. Never was the power of the senators recovered. At last even the appearance of it vanished.

III.

The lists of books referred to in Chapter IV. were recorded by different hands, or in different ways at various dates, so that they have not been made out quite satisfactorily. Some of the authors named below were taken out a great many times, but the number of the volume is given in only a few cases. It would seem, for example, that Voltaire's complete works were examined by Hawthorne, if we judge by his frequent application for some part of them, and the considerable number of volumes actually mentioned. In this and in other cases, the same volume is sometimes called for more than once. To make the matter clearer here, I have reduced the entries to a simple list of the authors read, without attempting to show how often a particular one was taken up. Few or none of them were read consecutively, and the magazines placed together at the end of my list were taken out at short intervals throughout the different years.

1830.

Oeuvres de Voltaire.
Mémoire de Litérature.
Liancourt.
Oeuvres de Rousseau.
Mass.
Historical Collections.
Trial and Triumph of Faith.
Oeuvres de Pascal.
Varenius' Geography.
Mickle's Lucian.
Dictionnaire des Sciences.
Pamela. (Vols. I., II.)
Life of Baxter.
Tournefort's Voyage.
Swift's Works.
Hitt on Fruit-Trees.
Bibliotheca Americana.
Ames's Antiquities.
Hamilton's Works.
Gifford's Juvenal.
Allen's Biographical Dictionary.
Fénélon.
Académie Royale des Inscriptions.
Mather's Apology.
Vertol's History of Sweden.
Taylor's Sermons.
Life of Luckington.
L'an 2440.
Montague's Letters.
English Botany. (3 vols.)
Gay's Poems.
Inchbald's Theatre.
Sowerby's English Botany.
Crabbe's Borough.
Crabbe's Bibliographical Dictionary.
Collection of Voyages (Hakluyt's?).
Lives of the Admirals.
British Zoölogy.

1831

Los Eruditos.
Connoisseur.
Camilla.
Gifford's Persius.
Bartram's Travels.
Humphrey's Works.
Voltaire.
Pennant's British Zoology.
Mandeville's Travels.
Rehearsal Transposed.
Gay's Poems.
Pompey the Little.
Shaw's General Zoology.
Philip's Poems.
Sowerby's English Botany.
Racine.
Corneille.
Wilkinson's Memoirs and Atlas.
History of the Shakers.
The Confessional.
Calamy's Life of Baxter.
Académie Royale des Inscripts.
Essais de Montaigne. (Vols. I., II., III., IV.)
Cadell's Journey through Italy and Carniola.
Cobbet's Rule in France.
Temple's Works. (Vols. I., II., III.)
Asiatic Researches.
Cochran's Tour in Siberia.
Chardin's Travels.
Brandt's History of the Reformation.
Russell's Natural History.
Aleppo. (Vol. I.)
Answer to the Fable of the Bees.
Hanway's Travels.
Memoirs of C. J. Fox.
Bayle's Critical Dictionary. (Vols. II., V., VI.)
State Trials. (Vols. I., II., IV., V., VI.)
Tales of a Traveller.
Dictionnaire des Sciences. (Vol. XVII.)
Bacon's Works. (Vol. II.)
Gordon's Tacitus.
Colquhoun on the Police.
Cheyne on Health.
Pope's Homer. (Vol I.)
Letters: De Maintenon. (Vol. IX.)
Reichard's Germany.
Oeuvres de Rousseau.
Notes on the West Indies by Prichard.
Crishull's Travels in Turkey.

1832-33.

Clarendon's Tracts.
History of England.
Prose Works of Walter Scott. (Vols. III., V., VI.)
Feltham's Resolves.
Roscoe's Sovereigns.
Histoire de l'Académie.
South America.
Savages of New Zealand.
Stackhouse's History of the Bible.
Dryden's Poems.
Tucker's Light of Nature.
History of South Carolina.
Poinsett's Notes on Mexico.
Brace's Travels.
Browne's Jamaica.
Collins's New South Wales.
Broughton's Dictionary.
Seminole War.
Shaw's Zoology.
Reverie.
Gifford's Pitt.
Curiosities of Literature.
Massinger.
Literary Recollections.
Coleridge's Aids to Reflection.
Coleridge, Shelley, and Keats.
Paris and Fonblanque.
Elia.
Gardens and Menagerie.
Medical Jurisprudence.
History of Paris.
Scott's Prose Works.
Kittell's Specimens American Poetry.
Lister's Journey.
Annals of Salem.
Library of Old English Prose Writers.
Memoirs of Canning.
Miscellaneous Works of Scott.
Jefferson's Writings.
History of Andover.
Good's Book of Nature.
History of Haverhill.
Madden's Travels. (Vols. I., II.)
Riedesel's Memoirs.
Boston Newspapers (1736, 1739, 1754, 1762, 1771, 1783).
Drake's Mornings in Spring.
Drake's Evenings in Autumn.
Anecdotes of Bowyer.
Gouverneur Morris. (Vols. I., II.)
Bryan Walton's Memoirs.
Moses Mendelssohn.
Collingwood.
Felt's Annals.
Strutt's Sports and Pastimes.
Schiller.
Mrs. Jameson. (2 vols.)
Thatcher's Medical Biography.
History of Plymouth.
Crabbe's Universal Dictionary.
Lewis's History of Lynn.
A Year in Spain, by a Young American. (Vols. I., II.)
Croker's Boswell.
Deane's History of Scituate.
Diplomatic Correspondence. (Vols. I., II.)
Temple's Travels. (Vol. II.)
Fuller's Holy State.
Remarkables of Increase Mather.
History of Portland. (Vols. I., II.)
Practical Tourist.
Elements of Technology.
Heber's Life, by Taylor.
Ductor Substantium.
Heber's Travels in India. (Vols. I., II.)
Byron's Works.
Travels in Brazil and Buenos Ayres.
History of Spain.
Franklin's Works.
Mental Cultivation.

1835.

Life of Gouverneur Morris.
Hamilton's Progress of Society.
Twiner's Sacred History.
Encyclopaedia.
Life of Arthur Lee.
Life of Sir Humphry Davy.
Coleridge, Shelley, and Keats.
Prior's Poems. (Vol. I.)
Jefferson's Writings. (Vols. I., II.)
Memoirs of the Tower of London.
History of King's Chapel.
Memoirs of Dr. Burney.
Hone's Every Day Book. (Vols. I, II., III.)
Life of Livingstone.

1836.

Life of Hamilton. (Vol. I.)
Debates in Parliament. (Vol. I.)
Curiosities of Literature (Vol. I.)
Combe on the Constitution of Man.
Babbage on Economy of Machinery.
Eulogies on Jefferson and Adams.
Hone's Every Day Book. (Vols. I., III.)
Dunlap's History of the Arts of Design. (Vols. I., II.)
Mende's Guide to Observation of Nature.
Cobbett's Cottage Economy.
Douglas's Summary. (Vol. I.)
Practical Tourist. (Vols. I., II.)
Dick on Improvement of Society.
Bush's Life of Mohammed.
Temple's Travels in Peru. (Vol. I.)
Gay's Poems.
Pliny's Natural History.
Coleridge's Table-Talk.
Letters from Constantinople. (Vols. I., II.)
Reynolds's Voyages.
Adventures on Columbia River, by Ross Cox.
Baine's History of Cotton Manufacture.
History of Nantucket.
Travels in South America.
Müller's Universal History.
Antar. A Bedoueen Romance.
Lives of the Philosophers. (Vols. I., II.)
Description of Trades.
Colman's Visit to England.
Ludolph's History of Ethiopia.
Griffin's Remains.
McCree's Life of Knox.
Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy.
Voyage de la mer du Sud an Nord.
Biographia Literaria.
The Stranger in America.
Raumer's England in 1835.
Random Recollections of the House of Lords.
The German Student.
Sparks's American Biography.
Brewster's Natural Magic.
Prior's Life of Goldsmith.
Sparks's Washington.
Walter Scott's Demonology and Witchcraft.
Scott's Life of Bonaparte. (3 vols.)

1837.

Washington's Writings.
Martineau's Miscellany.
Wraxall's Memoirs.
Bancroft's United States History.
Rush, on the Human Voice.
Drake's Indian Biography.
Wordsworth's Poetical Works.
Clarendon's History of the Rebellion.
Reliques of Ancient English Poetry.
Bayle's Historical Memoirs of Plymouth County.
Life of Jefferson, by Tucker.
Random Recollections of the House of Commons.
Specimens of American Poetry.

1838.

Life of Jefferson.
Brown's Novels.
Parr's Works.
Select Comedies.
Froissart's Ancient Chronology.
Byron's Works.
Plutarch's Lives.
London Encyclopedia of Architecture.
Gentleman's Magazine.
Monthly Magazine.
Monthly Review.
European Magazine.
Christian Examiner.
Edinburgh Magazine.
Annual Register.
Quarterly Review.
Southern Review.
Worcester's Magazine.
North American Review.
United States Service Journal.
Court Magazine.
Museum of Literature and Science.
Westminster Review.
London Monthly Magazine.
Eclectic Review.
Foreign Quarterly Review.
Blackwood's Magazine.
Metropolitan Magazine.
New England Magazine.
British Critic.
American Encyclopaedia.
Rees's Cyclopaedia.
Gifford's Juvenal.