When anything had to be done, in my power to do, I was at his command. I had numerous letters from him. His errorless manuscript had the appearance of Greek writing. Two letters "t" and "s," such as no other man formed, were the signs of his hand and interpreters of his words. Of all the communications I ever received from him or saw, none had date or address, save one letter which had both. Many sought for conversation, if by chance they were near him, or by letter, or interview—for ends of their own. But no one elicited any information he did not intend to give. His mind was a fortress into which no man could enter, unless he opened the door.
Kossuth astonished us by his knowledge of English, but he knew little of the English people. Louis Blanc knew much; but Mazzini knew more than any foreigner I have conversed with. Mazzini made no mistake about us. He understood the English better than they understood themselves—their frankness, truth, courage, impulse, pride, passions, prejudice, inconsistency, and limitation of view. Mazzini knew them all.
His address to the Republicans of the United States (November, 1855) is an example of his knowledge of nations, whose characteristics were as familiar to him as those of individuals are to their associates, or as parties are known to politicians in their own country. There may be seen his wise way of looking all round an argument in stating it. No man of a nature so intense had so vigilant an outside mind.
He knew theories as he knew men, and he saw the theories as they would be in action. There was no analysis so masterly of the popular schools—political and socialist—as that which Mazzini contributed to the People's Journal, His criticisms of the writings of Carlyle, published in the Westminster Review, explained the excellencies and the pernicious tendencies—political and moral—of Carlyle's writing, which no other critic ever did. But Mazzini wrote upon art, music, literature, poetry, and the drama. To this day the public think of him merely as a political writer—a sort of Italian Cobbett with a genius for conspiracy.
The list of his works fills nearly ten pages of the catalogue of the British Museum.
Under other circumstances his pen would have brought him ample subsistence, if not affluence. Much was written without payment, as a means of obtaining attention to Italy. It was thus he won his first friends in England.
No one could say of Mazzini that he was a foreigner and did not understand us, or that the case he put was defective through not understanding our language. The Saturday Review, which agreed with nobody, said, on reading Mazzini's "Letter to Louis Napoleon," which was written in English, "The man can write." The finest State papers seen in Europe for generations were those which Mazzini, when a Triumvir in Rome, wrote—notably those to De Tocqueville. De Tocqueville had a great name for political literature, but his icy mystifications melted away under Mazzini's fiery pen of principle, passion, and truth. This wandering, homeless, penniless, obscure refugee was a match for kings.
Some day a publisher of insight will bring out a cheap edition of the five volumes of his works, issued by S. King and Co., 1867, and "dedicated to the working classes" by P. A. Taylor, which cost him £500, few then caring for them. Mrs. Emilie Ashurst Venturi was the translator of the five volumes, which were all revised by Mazzini. The reader therefore can trust the text.
Mazzini did me the honour of presenting to me his volume on the "Duties of Man," with this inscription of reserve: "To my friend, G. J. Holyoake, with a very faint hope." Words delicate, self-respecting and suggestive. It was hard for me, with my convictions, to accept his great formula, "God and the People." It was a great regret to me that I could not use the words. They were honest on the lips of Mazzini. But I had seen that in human danger Providence procrastinates. No peril stirs it, no prayer quickens its action. Men perish as they supplicate. In danger the people must trust in themselves.
Thinking as I did, I could not say or pretend otherwise.