Alas, poor Yorick! Ten times a day has Yorick's ghost the consolation to hear his monumental inscription read over with such a variety of plaintive tones, as denote a general pity and esteem for him:-a foot-way crossing the churchyard close by his grave,-not a passenger goes by, without stopping to cast a look upon it,-and sighing as he walks on, Alas, poor Yorick! Sterne. THE CHARACTER OF ALEXANDER POPE. Pope, in conversation, was below himself; he was seldom easy and natural, and seemed afraid that the man should degrade the poet, which made him always attempt wit and humour, often unsuccessfully, and too often unseasonably. I have been with him a week at a time at his house at Twickenham where I necessarily saw his mind in its undress, when he was both an agreeable and instructive companion. His moral character has been warmly attacked, and but weakly defended; the natural consequence of his shining turn to satire, of which many felt, and all feared the smart. It must be owned that he was the most irritable of all the genus irritabile vatum, offended with trifles, and never forgetting or forgiving them; but in this I really think that the poet was more in fault than the man. He was as great an instance as any he quotes, of the contrarieties and inconsistencies of human nature; for, notwithstanding the malignancy of his satires, and some blameable passages of his life, he was charitable to his power, active in doing good offices, and piously attentive to an old bed-ridden mother, who died but a little time before him. His poor, crazy, deformed body was a mere Pandora's box, containing all the physical ills that ever afflicted humanity. This, perhaps, whetted the edge of his satire, and may in some degree excuse it. I will say nothing of his works, they speak sufficiently for themselves; they will live as long as letters and taste shall remain in this country, and be more and more admired, as envy and resentment subside. But I will venture this piece of classical blasphemy, which is, that however he may be supposed to be obliged to Horace, Horace is more obliged to him. Chesterfield. THE HEBREW RACE. 'You never observe a great intellectual movement in Europe in which the Jews do not greatly participate. The first Jesuits were Jews: that mysterious Russian diplomacy which so alarms Western Europe is organised and principally carried on by Jews; that mighty revolution which is at this moment preparing in Germany, and which will be, in fact, a second and greater reformation, and of which so little is as yet known in England, is entirely developing under the auspices of Jews, who almost monopolise the professorial chairs of Germany. Neander, the founder of spiritual Christianity, and who is regius professor of divinity in the university of Berlin, is a Jew. Benary, equally famous, and in the same university, is a Jew. Wehl, the Arabic professor of Heidelberg, is a Jew. Years ago, when I was in Palestine, I met a German student who was accumulating materials for the history of Christianity, and studying the genius of the place; a modest and learned man. It was Wehl-then unknown, since become the first Arabic scholar of the day, and the author of the life of Mohammed. But for the German professors of this race, their name is Legion. I think there are more than ten at Berlin alone. I told you just now that I was going up to town to-morrow, because I always made it a rule to interpose when affairs of state were on the carpet. Otherwise, I never interfere. I hear of peace and war in newspapers, but I am never alarmed, except when I am informed that the sovereigns want treasure; then I know that monarchs are serious. A few years back we were applied to by Russia. Now, there has been no friendship between the court of St. Petersburg and my family. It has Dutch connections which have generally supplied it, and our representations in favour of the Polish Hebrews, a numerous race, but the most suffering and degraded of all the tribes, have not been very agreeable to the czar. However, circumstances drew to all approximation between the Romanoffs and the Sidonias. I resolved to go myself to St. Petersburg. I had on my arrival an interview with the Russian minister of finances, Count Cancrin; I beheld the son of a Lithuanian Jew.. The loan was connected with the affairs of Spain. I resolved on repairing to Spain from Russia. I travelled without intermission. I had an audience immediately on my arrival with the Spanish minister, Senor Mendizabel; I beheld one like myself, the son of a Nuovo Christiano, a Jew of Aragon. In consequence of what transpired at Madrid, I went straight to Paris, to consult the president of the French council; I beheld the son of a French Jew, a hero, an imperial marshal, and very properly so, for who should be military heroes if not those who worship the Lord of hosts?' 'And is Soult a Hebrew?' 'Yes, and several of the French marshals, and the most famous: Massena, for examplehis real name was Manasseh. But to my anecdote. The consequence of our consultations was, that some northern power should be applied to in a friendly and mediative capacity. We fixed on Prussia, and the president of the council made an application to the Prussian minister, who attended a few days after our conference. Count Arnim entered the cabinet, and I beheld a Prussian Jew. So you see, my dear Coningsby, that the world is governed by very different personages to what is imagined by those who are not behind the scenes. Favoured by nature and by nature's God, we produced the lyre of David; we gave you Isaiah and Ezekiel; they are our Olynthians, our Philippics. Favoured by nature we still remain; but in exact proportion as we have been favoured by nature, we have been persecuted by man. After a thousand struggles- after acts of heroic courage that Rome has never equalled-deeds of divine patriotism that Athens, and Sparta, and Carthage have never excelled-we have endured fifteen hundred years of supernatural slavery; during which, every device that can degrade or destroy man has been the destiny that we have sustained and baffled. The Hebrew child has entered adolescence only to learn that he was the Pariah of that ungrateful Europe that owes to him the best part of its laws, a fine portion of its literature, all its religion. Great poets require a public; we have been content with the immortal melodies that we sang more than two thousand years ago by the waters of Babylon and wept. They record our triumphs; they solace our affliction. Great orators are the creatures of popular assemblies; we were permitted only by stealth to meet even in our temples. And as for great writers, the catalogue is not blank. What are all the schoolmen, Aquinas himself, to Maimonides? and as for modern philosophy, all springs from Spinoza! But the passionate and creative genius that is the nearest link to divinity, and which no human tyranny can destroy, though it can divert it; that should have stirred the hearts of nations by its inspired sympathy, or governed senates by its burning eloquence, has found a medium for its expression, to which, in spite of your prejudices, and your evil passions, you have been obliged to bow. The ear, the voice, the fancy teeming with combinationsthe imagination fervent with picture and emotion, that came from Caucasus, and which we have preserved unpolluted-have endowed us with almost exclusive privilege of music; that science of harmonious sounds which the ancients recognised as most divine, and deified in the person of their most beautiful creation. I speak not of the past, though were I to enter into the history of the lords of melody, you would find it the annals of Hebrew genius. But at this moment even, musical Europe is ours. There is not a company of singers, not an orchestra in a single capital, that are not crowded with our children, under the feigned names which they adopt to conciliate the dark aversion which your posterity will some day disclaim with shame and disgust. Almost every great composer, skilled musician, almost every voice that ravishes you with its transporting strains, spring from our tribes. The catalogue is too vast to enumerate-too illustrious to dwell for a moment on secondary names, however eminent. Enough for us that the three great creative minds, to whose exquisite inventions all nations at this moment yield-Rossini, Meyerbeer, Mendelssohn-are of Hebrew race; and little do your men of fashion, your "Muscadins" of Paris, and your dandies of London, as they thrill into raptures at the notes of a Pasta or a Grisi, little, do they suspect that they are offering homage to the sweet singers of Israel.' Benjamin D'Israeli. BOYISH SCENES AND RECOLLECTIONS. After living within a few hundreds of yards of Westminster Hall, and the Abbey Church, and the Bridge, and looking from my own windows into St. James's Park, all other buildings and spots appear mean and insignificant. I went to-day to see the house I formerly occupied. How small! It is always thus: the words large and small are carried about with us in our minds, and we forget real dimensions. The idea, such as it was received, remains during our absence from the object. When I returned to England in 1800, after an absence from the country parts of it of sixteen years, the trees, the hedges, even the parks and woods, seemed so small! It made me laugh to hear little gutters, that I could jump over, called rivers! The Thames was but a 'creek!' But when, in about a month after my arrival in London, I went to Farnham, the place of my birth, what was my surprise! Everything was become so pitifully small! I had to cross in my |