The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 08, No. 45, July, 1861: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and PoliticsVarious
General
The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 08, No. 45, July, 1861: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics
Various
American periodicals
with all his might. "I desire of you, my Lords, in your humane
frenzy, to show some humanity to the whites as well as to the
negroes",--illustrating this remark by a picture of the sufferings of an
English trader who had risked thirty thousand pounds on the slave-trade
that year. When an entering wedge was attempted for the improvement of
the bloody code of criminal law, Thurlow opposed it with passion. The
particular clause selected by the reformers was one which demanded that
women who had been connected with any treasonable movements should be
burnt alive. It was proposed to reduce their punishment to the same
scale as men's. Thurlow made it his duty to defend the ancient practice.
He was, in short, mixed up with every effort of his time, which we now
consider disgraceful, for arresting the gradual progress of reform.
Now that Thurlow's wine-cellar is a college-chapel, that young men study
arithmetic in the room the Great Seal was stolen from, that Mr. Ruskin
teaches water-color drawing in Thurlow's bed-chamber, that Tom Brown,
_alias_ Mr. Hughes, presides over a weekly tea-party in the three-pair
back, and drills the awkward squad of the working-men's battalion in the
garden, it seems worth while to show that at least some places in the
world have improved in eighty years, whether the world itself is to
be given up as a mistake or not. We will let Lord Thurlow go, as Lord
Campbell does, with this charitable wish:--"I have not learned," he
says, "any particulars of his end, but I will hope that it was a
good one. I trust, that, conscious of the approaching change, having
sincerely repented of his violence of temper, of the errors into which
he had been led by worldly ambition, and of the irregularities of his
private life, he had seen the worthlessness of the objects by which he
had been allured; that, having gained the frame of mind which his awful
situation required, he received the consolations of religion; and that,
in charity with mankind, he tenderly bade a long and last adieu to the
relations and friends who surrounded him." There is not an atom of fact
known on which to found Lord Campbell's hope. But I, also, will leave
Lord Thurlow with this charitable wish, and I will now ask the readers
of the "Atlantic," who may be enough interested in social reform and a
mutual education, to see what has happened between his wine-cellar and
ridge-pole since the "London Working-Men's College" was established
there.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account