'worth to the world. A full-formed Man is not only worth nothing to the world, but the world could afford him a round sum 'would he simply engage to go and hang himself. Nevertheless, 'which of the two was the more cunningly-devised article, even as 'an Engine? Good Heavens! A white European Man, stand'ing on his two Legs, with his two five-fingered Hands at his 'shackle-bones, and miraculous Head on his shoulders, is worth, 'I should say, from fifty to a hundred Horses!'

as

'True, thou Gold-Hofrath,' cries the Professor elsewhere: 'too 'crowded indeed! Meanwhile, what portion of this inconsidera'ble terraqueous Globe have ye actually tilled and delved, till it 'will grow no more? How thick stands your Population in the 'Pampas and Savannas of America; round ancient Carthage, and ' in the interior of Africa; on both slopes of the Altaic chain, in 'the central Platform of Asia; in Spain, Greece, Turkey, Crim 'Tartary, the Curragh of Kildare? One man, in one year, I 'have understood it, if you lend him Earth, will feed himself and 'nine others. Alas, where now are the Hengsts and Alarics of 'our still glowing, still expanding Europe; who, when their home 'is grown too narrow, will enlist and, like Fire-pillars, guide on'wards those superfluous masses of indomitable living Valour r; ' equipped, not now with the battle-axe and war-chariot, but with 'the steam-engine and ploughshare? Where are they?-Pre'serving their Game!'

CHAPTER V.

THE PHOENIX.

PUTTING which four singular Chapters together, and alongside of them numerous hints, and even direct utterances, scattered over these Writings of his, we come upon the startling yet not quite unlooked-for conclusion, that Teufelsdröckh is one of those who consider Society, properly so called, to be as good as extinct; and that only the Gregarious feelings, and old inherited habitudes, at this juncture, hold us from Dispersion, and universal national, civil, domestic and personal war! He says expressly: For the last three centuries, above all, for the last three quarters 'of a century, that same Pericardial Nervous Tissue (as we named it) of Religion, where lies the Life-essence of Society, has been 'smote at and perforated, needfully and needlessly; till now it is 'quite rent into shreds; and Society, long pining, diabetic, con'sumptive, can be regarded as defunct; for those spasmodic, gal'vanic sprawlings are not life; neither indeed will they endure, 'galvanise as you may, beyond two days.'

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'Call ye that a Society,' cries he again, 'where there is no 'longer any Social Idea extant; not so much as the Idea of a common Home, but only of a common, over-crowded Lodging'house? Where each, isolated, regardless of his neighbour, ' turned against his neighbour, clutches what he can get, and cries ""Mine!" and calls it Peace, because, in the cut-purse and cut'throat Scramble, no steel knives, but only a far cunninger sort, 'can be employed? Where Friendship, Communion, has become an incredible tradition; and your holiest Sacramental Supper is 'a smoking Tavern Dinner, with Cook for Evangelist? Where 'your Priest has no tongue but for plate-licking and your high 'Guides and Governors cannot guide; but on all hands hear it 'passionately proclaimed: Laissez faire; Leave us alone of your

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'guidance, such light is darker than darkness; eat you your wages, and sleep!

'Thus, too,' continues he, 'does an observant eye discern every'where that saddest spectacle: The Poor perishing, like neglect'ed, foundered Draught-Cattle, of Hunger and Overwork; the 'Rich, still more wretchedly, of Idleness, Satiety, and Over'growth. The Highest in rank, at length, without honour from 'the Lowest scarcely, with a little mouth-honour, as from tavern'waiters who expect to put it in the bill. Once sacred Symbols 'fluttering as empty Pageants, whereof men grudge even the 'expense; a World becoming dismantled: in one word, the 'CHURCH fallen speechless, from obesity and apoplexy; the 'STATE shrunken into a Police-Office, straitened to get its pay!'

We might ask, are there many 'observant eyes,' belonging to Practical men, in England or elsewhere, which have descried these phenomena; or is it only from the mystic elevation of a German Wahngasse that such wonders are visible? Teufelsdröckh contends that the aspect of a 'deceased or expiring Society' fronts us everywhere, so that whoso runs may read. 'What, for example,' says he, 'is the universally-arrogated Vir'tue, almost the sole remaining Catholic Virtue, of these days? 'For some half century, it has been the thing you name, “Inde'pendence." Suspicion of "Servility," of reverence for Superiors 'the very dogleech is anxious to disavow. Fools! Were your 6 Superiors worthy to govern, and you worthy to obey, reverence 'for them were even your only possible freedom. Independence, ' in all kinds, is rebellion; if unjust rebellion, why parade it, and 'everywhere prescribe it?'

But what then? Are we returning, as Rousseau prayed, to the state of Nature? The Soul Politic having departed,' says Teufelsdröckh, 'what can follow but that the Body Politic be decently interred, to avoid putrescence? Liberals, Economists, 'Utilitarians enough I see marching with its bier, and chaunting 'loud paans, towards the funeral-pile, where, amid wailings from 'some, and saturnalian revelries from the most, the venerab Corpse is to be burnt. Or, in plain words, threading this 'Liberals, Utilitarians, or whatsoever they are and downwards 'mately carry their point, and dissever and destro figure it has

'Institutions of Society, seems a thing which has some time ago 'ceased to be doubtful.

van.

'Do we not see a little subdivision of the grand Utilitarian 'Armament come to light even in insulated England? A living 'nucleus, that will attract and grow, does at length appear there 'also; and under curious phasis; properly as the inconsiderable 'fag-end, and so far in the rear of the others as to fancy itself the Our European Mechanisers are a sect of boundless diffu'sion, activity, and cooperative spirit: has not Utilitarianism 'flourished in high places of Thought, here among ourselves, and ' in every European country, at some time or other, within the last fifty years? If now in all countries, except perhaps Eng'land, it has ceased to flourish, or indeed to exist, among Thinkers, and sunk to Journalists and the popular mass, who sees 'not that, as hereby it no longer preaches, so the reason is, it now 'needs no Preaching, but is in full universal Action, the doctrine ' everywhere known, and enthusiastically laid to heart? The fit 'pabulum, in these times, for a certain rugged workshop-intellect and heart, nowise without their corresponding workshop-strength ' and ferocity, it requires but to be stated in such scenes to make 'proselytes enough.-Admirably calculated for destroying, only 'not for rebuilding! It spreads like a sort of Dog-madness; till 'the whole World-kennel will be rabid then woe to the Hunts'men, with or without their whips! They should have given the 'quadrupeds water,' adds he; the water, namely, of Knowledge 'and of Life, while it was yet time.'

Thus, if Professor Teufelsdröckh can be relied on, we are at this hour in a most critical condition; beleaguered by that boundless' Armament of Mechanisers' and Unbelievers, threatening to strip us bare! 'The World,' says he, 'as it needs must, is 'under a process of devastation and waste, which, whether by 'silent assiduous corrosion, or open quicker combustion, as the เ case chances, will effectually enough annihilate the past Forms ' of Society; replace them with what it may. For the present, 'it is contemplated that when man's whole Spiritual Interests are 'your' rted, these innumerable stript-off Garments shall mostly Guides and the sounder Rags among them be quilted toge'passionately huge Irish watch-coat for the defence of the

Body only!'-This, we think, is but Job's news to the humane reader.

'Nevertheless,' cries Teufelsdröckh, 'who can hinder it; who 'is there that can clutch into the wheel-spokes of Destiny, and say to the Spirit of the Time: Turn back, I command thee?'Wiser were it that we yielded to the Inevitable and Inexorable, ' and accounted even this the best.'

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Nay, might not an attentive Editor, drawing his own inferences from what stands written, conjecture that Teufelsdröckh individually had yielded to this same Inevitable and Inexorable' heartily enough; and now sat waiting the issue, with his natural diabolico-angelical Indifference, if not even Placidity? Did we not hear him complain that the World was a huge Ragfair,' and the 'rags and tatters of old Symbols' were raining down everywhere, like to drift him in, and suffocate him? What with those 'unhunted Helots' of his; and the uneven sic-vos-non-vobis pressure, and hard-crashing collision he is pleased to discern in existing things; what with the so hateful 'empty Masks,' full of beetles and spiders, yet glaring out on him, from their glass-eyes, 'with a ghastly affectation of life,'-we feel entitled to conclude him even willing that much should be thrown to the Devil, so it were but done gently! Safe himself in that 'Pinnacle of Weissnichtwo,' he would consent, with a tragic solemnity, that the monster UTILITARIA, held back, indeed, and moderated by nose-rings, halters, foot-shackles, and every conceivable modification of rope, should go forth to do her work;-to tread down old ruinous Palaces and Temples, with her broad hoof, till the whole were trodden down, that new and better might be built! Remarkable in this point of view are the following sentences.

'Society,' says he, 'is not dead: that Carcass, which you call 'dead Society, is but her mortal coil which she has shuffled off, to 'assume a nobler; she herself, through perpetual metamorphoses, ' in fairer and fairer development, has to live till Time also merge in Eternity. Wheresoever two or three Living Men are ga'thered together, there is Society; or there it will be, with its cun'ning mechanisms and stupendous structures, overspreading this 'little Globe, and reaching upwards to Heaven and downwards 'to Gehenna for always, under one or the other figure it has