JOHN FISKE.
DISTINGUISHED LECTURER AND HISTORIAN.
T may be doubted whether even Macaulay exhibited more precocious ability than did the man who for thirty years has held a foremost place among the philosophers and historians of our country. The boy who read Cæsar and Rollin and Josephus at seven, who translated Greek at twelve by the aid of a dictionary which gave only the Latin equivalents of Greek words, who at seventeen had read the whole of Virgil, Horace, Tacitus, Sallust, Suetonius, and much of Livy, Cicero, Ovid, Catullus, and Juvenal, and at the same time knew his mathematics up to and including much of the work of the sophomore year in college, could read the Greek of Plato and Herodotus at sight, kept a diary in Spanish, and read German, French, Italian and Portuguese easily, surely this was one of the boys remarkable in the history of the world. Not only was John Fiske able to work for twelve hours a day and for twelve months in the year at his studies, but in spite of this strenuous application he was able to maintain vigorous health and to enter with enthusiasm into outdoor life.
Mr. Fiske was born in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1842. His original name was Edmund Fiske Green, but when his widowed mother became the wife of Edwin W. Stoughton, he took the name of one of his maternal ancestors and was henceforth known as John Fiske. Until he entered Harvard in 1860 he was an inmate of his grandmother’s home in Middletown, Connecticut. But since that time he has lived almost continuously in Cambridge. After being graduated from Harvard College he spent two years in the law school and opened an office in Boston. He never devoted much attention to the practice of law, however, and used his office mainly as a convenient literary workshop. He had been married while in the law school, and from the first his family depended for support upon his diligence and success as a writer.
His literary work has taken two main directions, his most noted books being studies in evolutionary philosophy and treatises upon special features of American history. For a number of years he was connected with the faculty at Harvard, as lecturer or instructor, and he was for seven years Assistant Librarian, but since 1879 he has only been associated with the University as a member of its Board of Overseers. Thirty-five lectures on the Doctrine of Evolution, delivered at Harvard in 1871, were afterwards expanded and published under the title of “Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy.” Two of his most notable papers are “The Destiny of Man” and “The Idea of God,” but Mr. Fiske is best known for the fresh and vigorous delightful and philosophical way in which he has written of American history. His principal books in this department are “The Beginnings of New England;” “The American Revolution;” “The Discovery of America,” and “The Critical Period of American History.” He has written somewhat for young people, notably “The War of Independence,” and perhaps has conferred no greater favor on his youthful countrymen than in the preparation of two school books, “Civil Government in the United States” and “A History of the United States.” Certainly there could be no more delightful innovation than the way in which he introduces his young student to the philosophy of government. He tells a lively story of the siege and final surrender of a mediæval town, and how the citizen delegated to make the capitulation, a lean, lank, half-starved stuttering fellow, replied to the question of why they had rebelled, with the significant phrase, “Tut-tut-tut-too much taxes.”
The boy who reads this at the opening of his text-book is not likely to imagine that his subject is a dry and uninteresting one, and is ready to accept the author’s definition of government as the power that lays taxes. These books of Mr. Fiske’s, with his numerous contributions to periodicals and his lectures before large audiences in many cities, have done more than perhaps is due to any other one man to make the study of American history popular, and to spread among our people sound ideas on the theory of our government. With his vigorous health and wonderful activity it would seem that very much more is still to be expected from a man who has already done so much, and it is entirely safe to predict that the name of John Fiske will stand in the literary history of this time as one of the most remarkable, most fertile, and most useful men of his age.
LAND DISCOVERED.[¹]
FROM “THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA.”
[¹] Copyright, Houghton, Mifflin & Co.
Y September 25th, the Admiral’s chief difficulty had come to be the impatience of his crews at not finding land. On that day there was a mirage, or some such illusion, which Columbus and all hands supposed to be a coast in front of them, and hymns of praise were sung, but at dawn next day they were cruelly undeceived. Flights of strange birds and other signs of land kept raising hopes which were presently dashed again, and the men passed through alternately hot and cold fits of exultation and dejection. Such mockery seemed to show that they were entering a realm of enchantment. Somebody, perhaps one of the released jail-birds, hinted that if a stealthy thrust should happen some night to push the Admiral overboard, it could be plausibly said that he had slipped and fallen while star-gazing. His situation grew daily more perilous, and the fact that he was an Italian commanding Spaniards did not help him. Perhaps what saved him was their vague belief in his superior knowledge; they may have felt that they should need him in going back....
At daybreak the boats were lowered and Columbus, with a large part of his company, went ashore. Upon every side were trees of unknown kinds, and the landscape seemed exceedingly beautiful. Confident that they must have attained the object for which they set sail, the crews were wild with exultation. Their heads were dazed with fancies of princely fortunes close at hand. The officers embraced Columbus or kissed his hands, while the sailors threw themselves at his feet, craving pardon and favor.
These proceedings were watched with unutterable amazement and awe by a multitude of men, women and children of cinnamon hue, different from any kind of people the Spaniards had ever seen. All were stark naked and most of them were more or less greased and painted. They thought that the ships were sea-monsters and the white men supernatural creatures descended from the sky. At first they fled in terror as these formidable beings came ashore, but presently, as they found themselves unmolested, curiosity began to overcome fear, and they slowly approached the Spaniards, stopping at every few paces to prostrate themselves in adoration. After a time, as the Spaniards received them with encouraging nods and smiles, they waxed bold enough to come close to the visitors and pass their hands over them, doubtless to make sure that all this marvel was reality and not a mere vision. Experiences in Africa had revealed the eagerness of barbarians to trade off their possessions for trinkets, and now the Spaniards began exchanging glass beads and hawks’ bells for cotton yarn, tame parrots, and small gold ornaments.
Some sort of conversation in dumb show went on, and Columbus naturally interpreted everything in such wise as to fit his theories. Whether the natives understood him or not when he asked them where they got their gold, at any rate they pointed to the south, and thus confirmed Columbus in his suspicion that he had come to some island a little to the north of the opulent Cipango. He soon found that it was a small island, and he understood the name of it to be Guanahani. He took formal possession of it for Castile, just as the discoverers of the Cape Verde islands and the Guinea coasts had taken possession of those places for Portugal; and he gave it a Christian name, San Salvador.
THE FEDERAL CONVENTION.[¹]
FROM “THE CRITICAL PERIOD OF AMERICAN HISTORY.”
[¹] Copyright, Houghton, Mifflin & Co.
HE Federal Convention did wisely in withholding its debates from the knowledge of the people. It was felt that discussion would be more untrammeled, and that its result ought to go before the country as the collective and unanimous voice of the convention.
There was likely to be wrangling enough among themselves; but should their scheme be unfolded, bit by bit, before its parts could be viewed in their mutual relations, popular excitement would become intense, there might be riots, and an end would be put to that attitude of mental repose so necessary for the constructive work that was to be done. It was thought best that the scheme should be put forth as a completed whole, and that for several years, even, until the new system of government should have had a fair trial, the traces of the individual theories and preferences concerned in its formation should not be revealed.
For it was generally assumed that a system of government new in some important respects would be proposed by the convention, and while the people awaited the result the wildest speculations and rumors were current. A few hoped, and many feared, that some scheme of monarchy would be established. Such surmises found their way across the ocean, and hopes were expressed in England that, should a king be chosen, it might be a younger son of George III. It was even hinted, with alarm, that, through gratitude to our recent allies, we might be persuaded to offer the crown to some member of the royal family of France. No such thoughts were entertained, however, by any person present in the convention. Some of the delegates came with the design of simply amending the articles of confederation by taking away from the States the power of regulating commerce, and intrusting this power to Congress. Others felt that if the work were not done thoroughly now another chance might never be offered; and these men thought it necessary to abolish the confederation and establish a federal republic, in which the general government should act directly upon the people. The difficult problem was how to frame a plan of this sort which people could be made to understand and adopt. At the very outset some of the delegates began to exhibit symptoms of that peculiar kind of moral cowardice which is wont to afflict free governments, and of which American history furnishes many instructive examples. It was suggested that palliatives and half-measures would be far more likely to find favor with the people than any thoroughgoing reform, when Washington suddenly interposed with a brief but immortal speech, which ought to be blazoned in letters of gold and posted on the wall of every American assembly that shall meet to nominate a candidate, or declare a policy, or pass a law, so long as the weakness of human nature endures. Rising from his President’s chair, his tall figure drawn up to its full height, he exclaimed in tones unwontedly solemn with suppressed emotion: “It is too probable that no plan we propose will be adopted. Perhaps another dreadful conflict is to be sustained. If, to please the people, we offer what we ourselves disapprove, how can we afterward defend our work? Let us raise a standard to which the wise and the honest can repair; the event is in the hand of God.”
This outburst of noble eloquence carried conviction to every one, and henceforth we do not hear that any attempt was avowedly made to avoid the issues as they came up. It was a most wholesome tonic. It braced up the convention to high resolves, and impressed upon all the delegates that they were in a situation where faltering and trifling were both wicked and dangerous. From that moment the mood in which they worked caught something from the glorious spirit of Washington. There was need of such high purpose, for two plans were presently laid before the meeting, which, for a moment, brought out one of the chief elements of antagonism existing between the States, and which at first seemed irreconcilable. It was the happy compromise which united and harmonized these two plans that smoothed the further work of the convention, and made it possible for a stable and powerful government to be constructed.
