Life and Letters of William Ballantyne Hodgson, LL.D.: Late Professor of Economic Science in the ...

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Preface

As in the lives of most men who have given themselves to thought and study, there were in the life of Dr. Hodgson very few events. But he touched so many different spheres of thought and practice; knew so many persons prominent in the world of literature, of education, of politics, and of religion ; influenced so many persons and was influenced by so many, that it has been thought fitting to give to the public some memorial of a life so full of activity, of sympathy, and of enthusiasm.

The present biographer has, in the main, restricted his efforts to an endeavour to make such a selection from Dr. Hodgson's correspondence as will give to the public a just idea of his mind and character. He has tried to build up an intellectual portrait in mosaic of the man, from his letters at different periods of his life. He has himself stood aside as much as possible, and has tried to show the complete intellectual integrity and consistency of Dr. Hodgson's mental life, from first iv PREFACE.

to last That, indeed, was his most striking characteristic. Whatever might be done or said or thought by the party or persons with whom he was wont to act, Dr. Hodgson was always perfectly true to himself and to his principles.

The fear of the biographer is that these pages will not give the general reader that vivid conception of Dr. Hodgson's intellect — ^brilliant, just, alert, and energetic — and of his powerful personality, which all his friends cherish. Indeed, that has been the present Editor's despair almost all through his task. If he could have reproduced for the public the earnest and intense presence, the quick thought, the steady judgment, the powerful eye that flashed at sense of smallest Wrong ; the clear, vivid, and firmly-knit speech ; the argument that seemed to develop itself as by an innate necessity, the glowing eloquence that caught fire as it went on, and kindled fire in the listeners, — the readers of this book would have been able to take into their minds as strong a presentation of Dr. Hodgson as the Editor retains in his own memory. But that has been impossible. Speech is always more living than written words — conversation and interchange of thought more vivid than any letters ; and that was pre-eminently the case

PBEFAOE, with Dr. Hodgson. Both private friends and pupils keep in their minds — many in their heart of hearts — a keen recollection of that rare speech, which combined brilliance with justice, wit and humour with the calmest and most solid argument, and a power of illustration that seemed to lay the whole world of thought and fact under contribution with an abiding love of truth.

The readers of the present book will readily understand that the Editor cannot make himself responsible for the opinions on politics and religion that are to be found in its pages. His own convictions on these subjects generally differ very widely from those expressed here. But he felt all along that his duty was to be a faithful reporter; and that his own opinions had no place or standing in the Memoir.

The Editor begs to thank very heartily those friends who have given him aid in a task which he has found longer and more laborious than he at first thought

J. M. D. M.

St. Andrews,

Septembtr jraT, 1883,

Contents

PAQB

Chapter I. — School and College 1 11. — Lecturing and Editing 12

III. — Liverpool 24

IV.— Thomas Hodgson 62

V . — JeLANCHESTER ... ... ... 70

I

VI. — In Paris during the Coup d'Etat 85

„ VII. — Wandering and Learning 108

„ VIII.— Life in Edinburgh 129

IX. — The Assistant Commissionership... 136

XL— University College, London ... 151

XII.— BONALY 158

XIIL— The Chair of Economic Science... 166

XIV.— His Death 197

XV.— Religion 201

XVI.— Education 239

XVII.— Politics 300

XVIIL— The Encourager 337

XIX. — Glimpses op Places, Boors, Friends,

AND Acquaintances 361

Appendix: Prayers op Dr. Hodgson 391

The Portrait proflzed has been engraved from a photograph by

Mr. Tuhkt, Edinbtuigh.

LIFE AND LETTERS.

Chapter I.

SCHOOL AND COLLEGE.

IX/'ILLIAM BALLANTYNE HODGSON was bom on the 6th of October, 1815, the great Waterloo year. He was bom at 23, Gardner's Crescent, Edinburgh, then a pleasant street in the west end of that city, looking out on the large masses of the Pentland Hills. He spent his earliest years in sight of these hills ; and he passed his latest years in the heart of them, enjoying nothing so much as a ramble on their wide, sloping sides.

A short, broad, square-headed little boy — ^with strong clear brown eyes, that could kindle quickly into flame, or melt into softest tenderness — with rapid altemation of gaiety and gloom, given to moods and moodiness — ^he was the cause of more trouble to his parents than most boys, with his perpetual questioning, his strong desire to know, and his imperfect ideas of order and discipline. From both sides of his house he inherited a powerful

2 MBMOIR OF DM. E0DG80N.

intellect, extreme sensitiveness of temperament, and almost volcanic passions — which he learned to subdue, but which often in their repression wounded and pained himself even to agony. His mother was a remarkable woman, whom her son William would often speak of as a second Mrs. Poyser, so quaint and terse was she in all her sayings. She possessed a most ardent temperament, and lively feelings ; but she had neither the judgment nor the character that would have fitted her to train a child of powers and passions so strong and so pronounced. His father was a man of the old order of Calvinists — Calvinist in temper and feelings, if not in creed. In a remarkable letter written by the son at the age of four-and-twenty he says : —

My father was a man of a most powerful intellect, and passions of tremendous energy and depth. . . . His voice stmok us with terror ; the sound of his foot was enough to quell our noisiest sports ; bis countenance, when angry, was terrific, but the results were either short-lived or for eviL In him there was no sympathy, no entering into the heart of boyhood ; ... we habitually avoided him ; and this vexed him and increased his severity.

He had a half-sister on the mother's side, but she was far from being able to exert a useful or kindly influence on the mind of the growing boy. Besides his sister, he had a brother, some four years younger than himself, whom he loved with all the intense and passionate ardour of his nature. With the rapidity of young Hodgson's development, four years made an enormous difference ; and William was much more the patron and protector of

SCHOOL AND COLLEGE. S

young Tom than the friend or companion. Thus he was a solitary child — solitary in his joys and in his sorrows.

From a very early age he was an omnivorous reader ; and the strong passion and love of his nature, thrown back upon themselves, drove him into literature — made him plunge into a sea of miscellaneous reading even in his earliest boyhood. Such entries as this occur frequently in his diary — the diary of a boy of fourteen : —

Monday, 8rd May, 1880. Very fatigued at night, being up as ufinal at five, and going to bed at eleven.

This long day of eighteen hours was a common thing with him in boyhood, manhood, and middle age ; and it was mostly spent in reading. Even when he was past sixty, he frequently sat up till two or three in the morning, devouring the newest French or German or Italian books. One or two more extracts from the abovementioned letter, written when he was four-and-twenty, will show how he looked back upon his earlier days : —

Liverpool, 6th October, 1839.

BOYHOOD SEEN THBOUOH GLOOM.

. . • On this day twenty-four years ago came I into the world, and a strange and chequered life I have led since. No reward could induce me to go through the same period again, for the retrospect is gloomy, relieved though it has been by some bright flashes of enjoyment. And yet, I am but young ; a youth, a boy as some would say ; young indeed in years, but old in thought and feeling, and experience of various conditions of life and classes of society, and, worst of all, old in health — prematurely, miserably old. ^ Soon ripe, soon rotten" is a homely but never-failing

MEMOIR OF DR, HODGSON.

proverb. At fourteen I was a man, for the thoughtlessness and baoyanoy of youth were necessarily superseded by too early an acquaintance with the darkest side of things ; I was forced to think long before the powers of thought would naturally have been developed ; I was forced to act by becoming my own master when I should have still relied on the guidance of others, or if I was controlled it was by the power of violence, which I spurned and defied, not by the melting and yet strengthening authority of affection. I learned to swim by being thrown into deep water, but the lesion chilled me ; I gained confidence in my own powers, but it was by their lavish waste ; I acquired knowledge of others' nature, but it was by the injury of my own ; I learned to understand the sources of human folly, and weakness, and sin, and to feel pity for their victims, and to hope for their recovery, but it was by the humiliating consciousness of the mingling of good and evil in myself, and of the mighty power of circumstances to develop either ; I learned to judge others by having first lost my own way. • • •

BVBBTTHINO IN EXCESS.

All that I learned at school I acquired in spite of myself; at home my time was occupied in reading novels, memoirs, books of any and every sort ; my memory was naturally tenacious, and in this way, as years flew on, my knowledge of authors became as extensive and to many as surprising as my knowledge of the world (as it is commonly called). I once enjoyed a glorious constitution, and what would I not give to have it restored ? I yet remember with faint recollection how active and impetuous and indefatigable I used to be ; how vigorously all my pulses beat, and how ready the hand was to second the purpose of the head. But I was allowed to grow up in total ignorance of the principles of my own bodily as well as mental structure ; the idea of sickness

SCHOOL AND COLLSGS,

I conld not comprehend; I felt as if disease could never touch me. Seldom, I believe, was a human being blest with a more robust and compact frame than I was. Everything that I did was done in excess ; study, exercise, and every other pursuit were carried to the utmost limits of endurance. For two months at a time have I stayed in the house without once stirring out, buried in the prosecution of various studies. Cricket I have played from morning to dusk in the hot summer weather day after day, till my limbs ached, and palpitation of the heart was induced, from which I suffered for many years, and from which I am not yet entirely tree. One winter when I was in an office from ten in the morning till ten at night, with two hours' interval, I used to hear my brother repeat his lessons till twelve, then I read till three, and rose again at six in the morning, when I studied French till nine. On one occasion I walked, for the purpose of seeing a cricket match, so far that after I reached home I slept seventeen hours without stirring.

He was sent to the High School of Edinburgh at the age of eight. Here he rapidly distinguished himself, and in course of time joined the Rector's class. The Rector was at that time Dr. Carson — a careful, thoughtful scholar, and one of the gentlest, mildest, and kindest of human beings. He was in Dr. Carson's class for three years. In a diary, dated July, 1 831, he says: —

I at last entered the Bector*8 class, a new era in my existence ; from that time I date the commencement of my love of learning, from that time mihi vero dulces ante omnia Musa. ... I sincerely loved and respected Dr. Oarson, and I would have gone through fire and water to serve

him How it chanced I do not know, but I was a

kind of favourite of his ; his preference did not lead him to any undue partiality, but when I did well I was highly praised, whioh of course incited me to further endeavoursy and when I did wrong I was more hurt by the firm kindness of his rebukes than I would have been by all the anger of any petty tyrant.

Hodgson entered the University of Edinburgh in November, 1829, just after reaching his fourteenth year. Here he made his mark, especially in the Latin class. Mr. Pillans was then Professor of Latin — or, as it is called in Scotland, Humanity (littercs kumaniores), Mr. Pillans was a bom teacher and organiser, and in 1829 was at his best — in the prime of his rare and fascinating powers, with a talent for illustration and explanation in teaching rivalled only by that of Dr. Hodgson himself, and an "attractive kind of grace" about him which made him an object of devotion and almost worship to most of his pupils. He deposited in young Hodgson's mind many of the germs that afterwards grew to strong power in his maturer life; and one of these was a belief that the processes of teaching must be steadily examined in the light of all that is thoroughly ascertained in physiology and psychology, and constantly compared with what is best and noblest in Literature.

When young Hodgson entered college, he soon became the subject of that theological fermentation which goes on in the minds of so many young Scotchmen, and which often dwarfs their intellectual and moral growth. The Shorter Catechism then reigned in despotic power over the prostrate intellects of little Scottish children. Hodgson's step-sister combined her influence

SCHOOL AND COLLEGE.

with that of the Shorter Catechism to make him confound theology with religion, and to detest both for a time. He says in a diary of July, 1831 : — t | , / ^

She was a truly good Christian, but unfortunately was inclined to push matters too far. Her mind was naturally gloomy, and the melancholy with which the thoughts of religion inspired her tended to increase my dislike to everything in the least connected with religion. Well do I recollect poring over the Shorter Catechism, of which I did not well comprehend a single sentence. The abhorrence which I then learned to entertain towards that excellent (pro excellent lege detestable^ Dec. 6th, 1885,) work has not been overcome in spite of all my endeavours ; and I have never even seen a Catechism for the last twelve years. ... I have since traced a close resemblance between the religious education of Dr. Chalmers and myself, and the dreadful consequences it entailed upon both. One remark of his particularly appUes to my feelings at this time, viz., that he was within an ace of becoming an infidel.

The entering upon a profession had, the year before this, been forced upon the young Hodgsons by their not too judicious parents. William was to be a lawyer, and Tom a dentist. Tom burst into tears and refused. William says, "The law was a business to which, from a very early period, I had entertained a strong aversion." The father had unhappily fixed on the very two professions to which the tastes and intellectual habits of both his sons were diametrically opposed. William was, however, placed in a lawyer's office, and remained there a short time. "My parents overcame my resistance."

He succeeded, however, as we have seen, in finding his way to the College of Edinburgh, and joined several of the classes.

In the long summer vacations of six months which the Arts students of a Scottish University are left to spend as they will, Hodgson was an ardent and hardworking reader. Mr. Pillans drew up a plan of study for him ; he was much interrupted and interfered with, but he went on with his work when he could. " It is impossible," he says, " to describe the unceasing ardour with which I was animated in the pursuit of knowledge." . . . '' I am an ardent and a sincere admirer of the ancients, whether they be poets, historians, philosophers, or orators."

Religious melancholy, somewhat like Cowper's, attacked him at this time. He was in the depths of despair. "I am abandoned by God and every good thing. I have not prayed for a fortnight, nor read the Bible. I dare not pray ; but I will read the Scriptures, and seek there the consolation and support against temptation I so much require." ... In another part of his diary he says : " I went into the drawing-room. In the dark I employed myself in repeating paraphrases, etc. I felt the flame of devotion kindled within me; and after an internal struggle, I dared to pray. . . . My mind felt and still feels relieved."

These, however, were but passing clouds of theologic gloom. At the age of sixteen, he took a keen interest in politics ; and his hopes and wishes all rushed to the side of the coming Liberalism of the century. "There was a report," he says in his diary of October 7, 1831, "that

SCHOOL AITD COLLKOS. 9

the Reform Bill had passed ; and Mr. B., who is a keen reformer, made them all come to dinner — produced his best wine — interiore notd Falemi — and made them drink bumper after bumper to Earl Grey, Lord John Russell, etc., etc. After all, the Reform Bill had not passed, and none durst tell Mr. B. of it, for he would be in such a rage." Those were the pre-telegraphic days, when the people in great cities got their news only on Saturdays, and the worthy minister of St Kilda — an unconscious "Papist" — ^kept praying for George the Fourth six months after he was dead.

Hodgson was not happy at home. Mary Anne, his step-sister, gave him much trouble. "Had a violent quarrel with M. and my mother at night When will these quarrels cease?"

It is odd to read his comments upon politics — the comments of a boy who is half a child and half a man. "I am rather opposed to the Reform Bill," he writes 1 2th October, 1831, "but I do not know much about the matter, so I am quite cool ; and, though I take much interest in the matter, I am no way violent." The fact is, Hodgson never was and could not be a partisan. He was all his life an ardent enthusiast for the spread of knowledge and culture, for freedom in politics and religion, for the breaking down of privileges, for the lifting of the poor out of the fearful slough of bad habits and drunkenness ; but he knew too much, he saw too much of both sides to believe at any time that only one party in politics was in possession of the whole truth.

10 MBMOIR OF DB, HODGSON.

He had his passing love-fits, too ; and the presence of beauty brightened even the lengthy Sahara of a Scotch Calvinistic sermon. With naive self-revelation, he enters in his diary of i6th October, 1831 : —

I never saw her look so beantifuL Had a very excellent sermon. . . . Went to church in the afternoon. The ladies were not thera Had a most wretched sermon.

Glimpses at the same time of his higher nature asserting itself appear : —

Mbm. — ^Never to sneer at what any one says, even though it be absurd ; but always to pay respect to the opinions of everyone, especially of those older than myself, and to examine calmly their arguments and reasons.

And, later on, when approaching his nineteenth year, the ecstasy of intellectual insight and appreciation rises up in strong morning light : —

Mr. S. gave a most magnificent lecture on "The Importance of Intellectual Oulture." The admiration I felt at different parts was so intense that the tears started from my eyes. My delight was inexpressible. I sat on the left of

Miss ... I forgot her presence in the depth of

my attention.

These powerful admonitions of Nature to love and society he does his utmost to check and to repress. "It is my desire," he says, 26th Jan., 1834, "to live in the world by myself as much as possible, keep my affections disengaged, for my nature is too violent and turbulent for my happiness, if exposed to exciting circumstances."

SCHOOL AND COLLEGE. 11

In a letter of the date of 185 1, to his friend Ireland,* he says : —

The worst features of my character are due to my never having known, as others do, the feelings which make home and the family dear. My poor brother Tom was the only one to whom I clung with real and strong affection. Before and after his loss, it is to you I owe it that I am not wholly a misanthrope.

* Mr. Alexander Ireland, of Manoheiter, Aathor of " Ralph Waldo EmerK>n, Hie Lift, Oenlof, and Writinge : a Biograpbioal Sketch, with Pexaonal Reoollections, &a ;" '" The Book-LoTer*! Enohirfdion : Selected Thoughte on the Solace and CompanioDahip •of fiooke :" *' Bibliogfaphical LUt of the Writings of ^llllam Haslitt and Leigh Hunt, including a Fiaper on Charles and Mary Lamb ;** Ac., Ac.

Chapter II. LECTURING AND EDITING

For a few years after leaving college, young Hodgson was chiefly engaged in lecturing on literature, education^ and phrenology ; and he was for a few months at work on a newspaper as editor. His lecturing and editing^ were, however, confined chiefly to the county of Fife, where he made many useful and valuable friendships, which he retained throughout his life. His lectures were always well attended, and they were always of a kind ta stimulate new thought, and to set his hearers asking new questions of themselves. He sowed seed, too, that lived and bore fruit in the minds of many friends and disciples for long years after. His views on education are amply set forth in the letters printed in the subsequent chapters of this book ; his opinions on phrenology gradually underwent a modification. What he came to believe regarding phrenology is shown in the following three letters, which belong to the middle and later periods or his active life : —

6, Blenheim Place, N.W.

. . • I am very careful not to mix up phrenology with my physiological teaching, the former being generally rejected in words by high authorities, few of whom, however, have ever cared to examine the question in the only true way — i,e.j by multiplied observations. After twenty-two years of

LECTUBING AND EDITING. 18

observation I am convinoed of the truth, not of all the details, bat of the leading principles. To this extent there is a general agreement even among the professed antagonists of phrenology, and its nomenclature and philosophy have penetrated current literature and conversation. But I should be sorry that what is certain (more or less) and universally admitted (more or less) in physiology, should suffer from connection with what is much disputed and strongly opposed. I am well content to turn my own phrenological knowledge quietly to account in my judgment of all with whom I come in contact. But quite apart from skill in measuring individual character, a knowledge of the general principles modifies and guides one's views on very many important subjects Of Dr. Andrew Combe's physiology, even if phrenology be disproved in most or all of its details, and of Mr. George Combe's "Constitution of Man," the same thing may be said. But neither books would ever have been written had the writers not been phrenologists, and no two men have done nearly so much to influence the thought and conduct of their fellows in modem times. If you have not read the '< Constitution of Man," I think you would do well to do so. I have met at least a score of persons who have told me that the reading of it was an era in their lives. . . .

Edinburgh, 4, Momlngmde Plaoe,

26th October, 1878.

. • • Your and Dean Goulboume's statement as to the real nature of the connection between speech power and the brain is just what all people, not materialists, say of the mind and the brain generally — that the latter is merely an instrument for the working and outward manifestation of the former. But, admitting this freely and fully, we are not relieved from the difficulty of accounting for perfect speech power where the brain has been seriously injured. If, further, it be admitted that you have by such cases disproved the special oonnection of language with this or that part of the hrain, language may still be so connected with some other part of the brain that you have not explored or experimented upon. This is Dr. Chalmers* argument against the Atheist, that unless he has explored the whole universe in the vain search for God he is not, whatever his mental power, entitled to deny the existence of God. I affirm nothing in the matter of cerebral location. I merely look and strive for lighi I have read through the latter half of your book, and I am now engaged in the earlier portion.

Dr. Bftteman.

Edinburgh, 4, Momingnde PUoe,

29th October, 1873.

. i . It has doubtless occurred to you that the alleged cases of more or less complete destruction of the anterior lobes militate not only against the favourite localisation of the powers of language, but also against the almost universal admission that the intellectual faculties generally, of reflection as well as of observation, are connected with, and, for manifestation at least, are dependent on these lobes. If without them, or with them in a thoroughly diseased state, one can perceive, and reason, and speak, the question arises — Of what use, then, is the brain ? This difficulty presses on immaterialists almost, if not quite, as much as materialists ; for if the connection of brain and mind mean anything, it is that soundness of organ is indispensable for soundness of function ; and that, though there may be functional disorder without organic disease, there cannot be organic disease without fanctional disorder. It is important in the interests of immaterialism to be able to throw the blame of mental disorders on cerebral derangement; and the connection of mind and brain on this side is discredited, if not disproved, by the concurrence of diseased brain and sound mind, which is the other side of the question.

Dr. Bftteman.

LECTURING AND EDITING. 15

Just before leaving Scotland for a permanent position in Liverpool, he addressed the following letter to his friend Mr. Wotherspoon, of Kirkcaldy ; and it is a fair specimen of the kind of questions that were discussed by the two friends, and of the strong grasp upon difficult problems that Hodgson — ^then only twenty-three — had already taken. The sentences at the close strike the key-note of all his action through life : —

29th May, 1839.

TBADB AND GtTLTUBE.

. . . Yon err greatly in supposing that all the benefit of our intercourse has been on one side, not to mention the pleasure which I have at all times derived from your society, and which has rendered me so frequent in my visits. From you, more than from almost any other of my acquaintances, have I learned that trade is by no means incompatible with the development of the highest powers of feeling and thought, with expanded benevolence and unstained integrity. Such an instance as yourself proves the possibility of kindness, honour, and reflection amid the drudgery of business ; and the rarity of such a combination proves that there is something faulty either in the constitution of man himself, or more probably in the system of education to which he is subjected.

FAIBT TALES AND MOBALITT.

The study of fairy tales forms as good a training for morality as much that is called religious and moral instruction, for the object of both is to direct men's attention to an unseen, if not unreal and unattainable state of existence, instead of fixing their minds on the arena in which their struggle is appointed and their prize prepared. The general who should direct his soldiers, when marching to battle, to abstract their minds from worldly conoems, and fis their

eyes on the clouds instead of on the enemy or their own

weapons, would not act more absurdly than do onr moralists

and divines.

hsbb!

Here is the combat, for here is the enemy, and here are the rewards ; if there be a future state it is well, but it can be but a continuation of this ; the principles on which it is controlled must be the same ; our nature will not be changed though it may be improved. The reward of virtue is virtue, and the punishment of vice is vice ; and so it is here, and so it will be hereafter or not. It is so here, and why should not this mighty truth be known and taught ?