"Pure in the deep recesses of the soul."
At the time of Madame de Staël's death, Lord Byron commented at length on the event in one of his notes to "Childe Harold." After expatiating on her merits as an author, he goes on—
"But the individual will gradually disappear as the author is more distinctly seen: some one, therefore, of all those whom the charms of involuntary wit, and of easy hospitality, attracted within the friendly circles of Coppet, should rescue from oblivion those virtues which, although they are said to love the shade, are, in fact, more frequently chilled than excited by the domestic cares of private life. Some one should be found to portray the unaffected graces with which she adorned those dearer relationships, the performance of whose duties is rather discovered amongst the interior secrets, than seen in the outward management, of family intercourse; and which, indeed, it requires the delicacy of genuine affection to qualify for the eye of an indifferent spectator. Some one should be found, not to celebrate, but to describe, the amiable mistress of an open mansion, the centre of a society, ever varied, and always pleased, the creator of which, divested of the ambition and the arts of public rivalry, shone forth only to give fresh animation to those around her. The mother tenderly affectionate and tenderly beloved, the friend unboundedly generous, but still esteemed, the charitable patroness of all distress, cannot be forgotten by those whom she cherished, and protected, and fed. Her loss will be mourned the most where she was known the best; and, to the sorrows of very many friends and more dependents, may be offered the disinterested regret of a stranger, who, amidst the sublimer scenes of the Leman Lake, received his chief satisfaction from contemplating the engaging qualities of the incomparable Corinna."
In "Modern French Literature," M. de Véricour, the learned and excellent author, gives an exalted place to the works of Madame de Staël, and to the extraordinary and beneficial influence she had exercised by her literary supremacy in overpowering the baneful influence of what he calls "the mocking spirit" of French writings, which had injured morals as well as good taste. He does not, of course, allude to her private character, because no question of its purity had ever been raised. Who, in describing the excellence of Mrs. Hemans' writings, would think of adding that she was a virtuous woman? But, if Mary Wollstonecraft were named, who would not express their regret, at least, that she had sinned? Thus, M. Véricour does when describing the genius of George Sand. The absence of any shadow of reproach in connection with Madame de Staël is proof that no shadow of reproach existed.
To return to the writer in the "International" (we are loth to believe it was written by either of the editors); as he appears, by the place he gives to "George Sand" and "Rachel," to be profoundly ignorant on the subject of the "intellectually greatest women of modern times," we will intimate to him two or three about whom it might be well for him to gain some information, were it only to avoid blunders. We will not be so exacting as to perplex him with Mrs. Somerville, for we are aware it is not every one who can invent a slander whose mind could appreciate "The Connection of the Physical Sciences;" neither will we refer him to Mrs. Barrett Browning, whose "genius," as pronounced by grave and reverend critics, "is of the highest order, strong, deep-seeing, enthusiastic, and loving," because such divine poetry and deep science would be evidently out of his line; but Miss Edgeworth, the author of "Frank" and "Harry and Lucy;" surely he might understand her lessons, if he would read them: these lessons always inculcate truth, are sound, improving, and elevating, and the intellect must have been great that could see moral truths so clearly.
The author of the paragraph appears to consider stage-playing as wonderfully intellectual, and his pattern of this greatness in "modern times" is Rachel. Was there not a certain Mrs. Siddons, whose genius in the histrionic art was superior to that of any living actress, and whose character was unimpeachable? According to the best French critics, men of taste and literary fame, who do not write anonymously, but subscribe their articles with their names, Rachel is only good in one line, which is passion or violence. In tender heroines, they say, she fails, and they seem to consider her powers altogether limited; for these opinions we refer the writer in the "International" to the "Revue des Deux Mondes." Were Rachel the intellectual prodigy he pronounces her to be, still the poor despised child, who sang in the streets and was brought up without law or Gospel, must have fallen into vice rather from the sad want of training than from having a good understanding, as he, in Irish parlance, intimates.
A similar remark is also true of Madame Dudevant: her intellectual greatness did not plunge her into licentiousness; she fell before she ever wrote a book; and though we do not wish to screen her from the odium her reckless course has deserved, yet it should be recorded in pity that her fine powers of mind were misdirected by a false and frivolous education, that the examples and flatteries of the most fascinating but corrupt society on earth have led her on and sustained her; yet she, by the light which her own high intellectuality has developed, is changing her course, if the examples furnished by her writings are true. Her later works are greatly improved in their moral tone; yet there is no diminution, but an increase of mental power.
Among the very extensive catalogue of French women justly famed, the selection by the writer in the "International" proves that he takes his views from what he hears;—if he would but read more, and gossip less, he would be amazed as "knowledge unrolled its ample page before him." We will not trouble him with the Reformers of Port-Royal, who certainly did some things greater than acting plays, for, to appreciate these ladies, requires an acquaintance with the theological and political history of their era. We will pass over the exalted patriot and gifted woman, Madame Roland, whose intellectual greatness, unsurpassed by that of any man of her times, or by any woman now living in France, was based on moral virtue; but it seems a pity he should not know of Madame de Sevigné, because even schoolboys have really heard of her. The wit, learning, true sentiment, and graceful style of Madame de Sevigné have won the approval of critics and moralists; intellectually great, she was a model of domestic virtue. In one of her celebrated letters, she says we must distinguish between "un âne et un ignorant"—one is "ignorant" from want of instruction, âne from want of brains. Would it not be well for the writer in the "International" to heed this distinction? Æsop has a very pertinent fable on the living ass kicking the dead lion.
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To Correspondents.—The following articles are accepted: "My Flowers, my Gem, and my Star," "To Susan," "Halcyon Day," "My Book," "The Coronal," "Perseverance," "My Summer Window," "Reaping," "Sonnet," "The Country Grave-Yard," "To Oliver Perry Allen, U.S.N.," "To Nina," "To Helen at the South."