BY PROF. W. W. GIST.

George Bancroft is the Nestor of American men of letters. Born October 3, 1800, he received his early training at Exeter Academy, and graduated at Harvard in 1817. He is now eighty-four years old, and his life has touched every administration in the history of our nation except Washington’s. What mighty changes have been wrought in the land since George Bancroft, a manly youth, stepped forth from his alma mater a full-fledged graduate! Two generations have passed away and a third is now on the stage of action. Webster, Clay, Calhoun and Benton had not yet reached the zenith of their power. These men have passed away, and another group, equally great, of whom Abraham Lincoln was the central figure, became conspicuous leaders in the most thrilling period of our history, and have passed away likewise. Indeed, there are thousands of voters to-day who were born during the exciting events of Lincoln’s administration. At the time George Bancroft graduated which, in the general acceptation of the term, marked the commencement of his life’s work, Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Arthur, Blaine, Cleveland, and Generals Sherman and Sheridan had not been born. Some of these have won never-fading honors in events that have attracted the attention of the whole world, and are numbered among our heroes. At that time Harvard was a very different institution from what it is now; American literature was in its infancy; Washington Irving had scarcely gained a recognition on the other side of the waters.

Forty-five years ago Bancroft held a government office and secured for Nathaniel Hawthorne an appointment in the Boston Custom House. Hawthorne was then a literary man with some reputation, but his pen did not afford him a livelihood. His great masterpieces were written during the next quarter of a century, and twenty years have passed since the announcement of his death cast a gloom over the literary world, while his friend and benefactor still survives in the full vigor of his intellectual powers.

Macaulay and Bancroft were born in the same year; the former has been dead nearly twenty-five years; the latter is giving finishing touches to his great history, which merits a place with Macaulay’s and Gibbon’s.

George Bancroft’s father was the Rev. Aaron Bancroft, D.D., who as a young man participated in the battles of Lexington and Bunker Hill, and who in later years won an honorable name as a theologian and man of letters, his “Life of Washington” attracting considerable attention in Europe. The son inherited many of the admirable characteristics of the father.

After his graduation at Harvard, George Bancroft spent five years in Europe, receiving a degree from the University of GÖttingen, mastering the principal modern languages, giving special attention to the study of history, visiting the most important nations of the continent, and above all communing with some of the greatest minds of the age. It was his rare privilege to meet, and to enjoy the friendship of, such men as Wolf, the distinguished classic scholar, Wilhelm von Humboldt, Goethe, Cousin, Alexander von Humboldt, Chevalier Bunsen, Niebuhr, and others scarcely less distinguished.

Returning to his native land in 1822, he spent one year as tutor of Greek in Harvard, and afterward assisted in establishing a preparatory school at Northampton. The subject of United States history already absorbed his mind, and the next few years were spent in special study for his great work.

Bancroft has held a number of offices. In 1838 President Van Buren appointed him collector at the port of Boston, and he discharged the duties of the office with marked ability. In 1845 he entered President Polk’s cabinet as Secretary of the Navy. A number of important events of this administration are linked with his name. Through his influence the naval academy at Annapolis was established, and he introduced many needed reforms into the naval service. He ordered the United States fleet to assist Captain Fremont in taking possession of California, and as Acting Secretary of War he issued orders for the United States army to march into Texas at the commencement of the Mexican war. In 1846 he was appointed minister to England, and held the position for three years. While in England unusual courtesies were extended to him, and every facility was granted for carrying on his historical researches, official state papers and many valuable private libraries being accessible. He also visited Paris for the purpose of study, and received valuable assistance from Guizot and Lamartine. In 1867 he was appointed minister to Berlin and remained abroad a number of years, calling forth a special commendation from President Grant for his wise diplomatic services.

Mr. Bancroft has done considerable literary work in addition to writing his “History of the United States.” When a young man he published a volume of poems; he has contributed a great many articles to magazines, and has delivered a number of memorial addresses on prominent Americans. In 1859 he prepared a paper on “Prescott” for the New York Historical Society; also one on “Washington Irving.” In 1860 he delivered an address in Cleveland at the unveiling of the statue of Commodore Oliver H. Perry, and February 12, 1866, he delivered before the two houses of Congress a memorial address on President Lincoln.

Bancroft is known most widely, however, as an historian, and his noble history is a monument more durable than granite. He brought to his task a mind philosophic in character, broad in grasp, impartial in judgment, believing firmly in God’s superintending care, rich in scholarship, and with enough of the imaginative and poetical to quicken and vivify all his intellectual powers. He has bestowed nearly sixty years of conscientious labor on this great historical work, the first volume of which appeared in 1834, fifty years ago.

The historian requires peculiar talent for his work. He must have such patience and energy as will enable him to carry on any research that will throw light on the subject he is investigating; he must weigh all evidence as coolly as the most unprejudiced judge; he must not assume the part of an advocate until he has examined the subject from every standpoint and reached an unbiased conclusion; he must grasp the real ideas and principles that underlie the events and are hastening the progress of civilization; he must have sufficient imagination to see the events as real, and to make his readers see them as such; in addition, he must have a copiousness of illustration and a fluency of language that will enable him to present his subject in an attractive form. In short, he must be a scholar, an explorer, a philosopher, and a rhetorician. Few, if any, have possessed all these qualifications in a preËminent degree; Bancroft certainly possesses them all in no small degree.

Gibbon will doubtless ever hold an honorable place as an historical writer; and yet he attempts to account for the rapid spread of Christianity entirely on human grounds, and refuses to recognize the greatest force then at work in effecting changes among the nations of the world. Macaulay well says of Gibbon: “He writes like a man who had received some personal injury from Christianity and wished to be revenged on it and all its possessors.” No such charge can be made against George Bancroft. He is a firm believer in God, recognizes Christianity as the most powerful factor in the progress of civilization, and continually evinces his unfaltering belief in God’s superintending care over human affairs. The opening paragraph of his address on President Lincoln may be taken as his creed on God in history. Notice how clear his statement and triumphant his faith:

“That God rules in the affairs of men is as certain as any truth of physical science. On the great moving power which is from the beginning hangs the world of the senses and the world of thought and action. Eternal wisdom marshals the great procession of the nations, working in patient continuity through the ages, never halting and never abrupt, encompassing all events in its oversight, and ever effecting its will, though mortals may slumber in apathy or oppose with madness. Kings are lifted up or thrown down, nations come and go, republics flourish and wither, dynasties pass away as a tale that is told; but nothing is by chance, though men, in their ignorance of causes, may think so. The deeds of time are governed, as well as judged, by the decrees of eternity.”

A quotation from his history will show his estimate of Christianity:

“To have asserted clearly the unity of mankind was the distinctive character of the Christian religion. No more were the nations to be severed by the worship of exclusive deities. The world was instructed that all men are of one blood; that for all there is but one divine nature and but one moral law; and the renovating faith taught the singleness of the race, of which it embodied the aspirations and guided the advancement.”[E]

Notice also this noble tribute to Christianity in his history:

“The colonists, including their philosophy in their religion, as the people up to that time had always done, were neither skeptics nor sensualists, but Christians. The school that bows to the senses as the sole interpreter of truth had little share in colonizing our America. The colonists from Maine to Carolina, the adventurous companions of Smith, the proscribed Puritans that freighted the fleet of Winthrop, the Quaker outlaws that fled from jails with a Newgate prisoner as the sovereign—all had faith in God and in the soul. The system which had been revealed in Judea—the system which combines and perfects the symbolic wisdom of the Orient and the reflective genius of Greece—the system, conforming to reason, yet kindling enthusiasm; always hastening reform, yet always conservative; proclaiming absolute equality among men, yet not suddenly abolishing the unequal institutions of society; guaranteeing absolute freedom, yet invoking the inexorable restrictions of duty; in the highest degree theoretical, yet in the highest degree practical; awakening the inner man to a consciousness of his destiny, and yet adapted with exact harmony to the outward world; at once divine and human—this system was professed in every part of our widely extended country, and cradled our freedom. Our fathers were not only Christians; they were, even in Maryland by a vast majority, elsewhere almost unanimously, protestants. Now the Protestant Reformation, considered in its largest influence on politics, was the awakening of the common people to freedom of mind.”[F]

In a recent private letter to Dr. Buckley, of the Christian Advocate, Bancroft uses these words quoted in that paper:

“Certainly our great united commonwealth is the child of Christianity; it may with equal truth be asserted that modern civilization sprung into life with our religion; and faith in its principles is the life-boat on which humanity has at divers times escaped the most threatening perils.”

And again:

“The principles that govern human affairs, extending like a path of light from century to century, become the highest demonstration of the superintending providence of God.”[G]

But it is not necessary to multiply quotations illustrative of his faith in the Deity. Throughout the whole of his writings he manifests a devout, reverential state of mind, and keeps constantly before the reader the idea that God is the great power back of those mighty movements that stir the nations of the world.

The philosophic cast of his mind is clearly revealed in all his discussions of causes and results. He firmly believes that “the problems of politics can not be solved without passing behind transient forms to efficient causes,” and he ever seeks to find the real origin of an event. He dates the American Revolution back to the Reformation under Luther and Calvin, and in relating the events that led to a separation from the mother country he discusses with great clearness and elaborateness three points essential to the proper understanding of the subject: In the first place he speaks of the emancipation of the mind at the Reformation, and the consequent birth of the idea of freedom. In the second place he discusses the growth of this idea of freedom in the nations of Europe and on this continent. In the third place he describes with wonderful fairness the violent discussions that arose in England and in this country when the colonists raised a protest against the tyrannies of the mother country. Referring to the origin of our present liberty, he says explicitly:

“The Reformation was an expression of the right of the human intellect to freedom.”[H]

He thus speaks of the influence of Luther and the Reformation: “At his bidding truth leaped over the cloister walls and challenged every man to make her his guest; aroused every intelligence to acts of private judgment, changed a dependent, recipient people into a reflecting, inquiring people; lifted each human being out of the castes of the middle age, to endow him with individuality, and summoned man to stand forth as man. The world heaved with the fervent conflict of opinion. The people and their guides recognized the dignity of labor; the oppressed peasantry took up arms for liberty; men reverenced and exercised the freedom of the soul. The breath of the new spirit moved over the earth; it revived Poland, animated Germany, swayed the north; and the inquisition of Spain could not silence its whispers among the mountains of the Peninsula. It invaded France; and, though bonfires of heretics, by way of warning, were lighted at the gates of Paris, it infused itself into the French mind, and led to unwonted free discussions. Exile could not quench it. On the banks of the Lake of Geneva, Calvin stood forth the boldest reformer of his day; not personally engaged in political intrigues, yet, by promulgating great ideas, forming the seed-plot of revolution.… Calvinism was revolutionary; wherever it came it created division.… By the side of the eternal mountains and perennial snows and arrowy rivers of Switzerland, it established a religion without a prelate, a government without a king.… It entered Holland, inspiring an industrious nation with heroic enthusiasm; enfranchising and uniting provinces; and making burghers, and weavers, and artisans, victors over the highest orders of Spanish chivalry, the power of the inquisition, and the pretended majesty of kings. It penetrated Scotland, and while its whirlwind bore along persuasion among glens and mountains, it shrunk from no danger, and hesitated at no ambition; it nerved its rugged but hearty envoy to resist the flatteries of the beautiful Queen Mary; it assumed the education of her only son; it divided the nobility; it penetrated the masses, overturned the ancient ecclesiastic establishment, planted free parochial schools, and gave a living energy to the principle of liberty in a people. It infused itself into England, and placed its plebeian sympathies in daring resistance to the courtly hierarchy; dissenting from dissent, longing to introduce the reign of righteousness, it invited every man to read the Bible, and made itself dear to the common mind, by teaching, as a divine revelation, the unity of the race and the natural equality of man.”[I]

It is evident that Bancroft has studied the Reformation, not simply in its outward political aspect, but so as to understand the different shades of theological belief that influenced the minds of the great reformers. His parallel between Luther and Calvin is a fine specimen of composition, noted for its vigorous English, clear, discriminating judgments, and polished style: “Both Luther and Calvin brought the individual immediate relation with God; but Calvin, under a more stern and militant form of doctrine, lifted the individual above pope and prelate, and priest and presbyter, above Catholic church and national church and general synod, above indulgencies, remissions and absolutions from fellow-mortals, and brought him into immediate dependence on God, whose eternal, irreversible choice is made by himself alone, not arbitrarily, but according to his own highest wisdom and justice. Luther spared the altar, and hesitated to deny totally the real presence; Calvin, with superior dialectics, accepted as a commemoration and a seal the rite which the Catholics revered as a sacrifice. Luther favored magnificence in public worship, as an aid to devotion; Calvin, the guide of republics, avoided in their churches all appeals to the senses as a peril to pure religion. Luther condemned the Roman Church for its immorality; Calvin for its idolatry. Luther exposed the folly of superstition, ridiculed the hair shirt and the scourge, the purchased indulgence, and dearly bought, worthless masses for the dead; Calvin shrunk from their criminality with impatient horror. Luther permitted the cross and the taper, pictures and images, as things of indifference; Calvin demanded a spiritual worship in its utmost purity. Luther left the organization of the church to princes and governments; Calvin reformed doctrine, ritual, and practice; and, by establishing ruling elders in each church, and an elective synod, he secured to his policy a representative character, which combined authority with popular rights. Both Luther and Calvin insisted that, for each one, there is and can be no other priest than himself; and, as a consequence, both agreed in the purity of the clergy.”[J]

While the rhetoric of Bancroft is not faultless, it certainly deserves a place in our classic English. In the discussion of grave historical and philosophical questions, his stateliness of expression and his dignity of style challenge our admiration. His descriptions are very fine, and suggest a mind keenly alive to the beautiful and the poetical; but they do not reveal that spontaneity so characteristic of Irving, nor that indefinable symmetry so noticeable in Hawthorne. If his style is sometimes declamatory, I think it is generally in a connection such that the cultivated taste will pronounce it admissible.

Thoroughly versed in the historic lore of this and other countries, broad in his general scholarship, remarkably free from prejudice, an uncompromising American, and yet not an American in a narrow and bigoted sense, careful and systematic in his methods of labor and recreation, unswerving in his belief in the superintending providence of God, George Bancroft justly merits the high place of honor and esteem so willingly accorded to him, and his noble example should be a never-failing source of inspiration.

Going to the Bottom the Only Way to reach the Top.—First go to the bottom of everything which you have to do. Know all its principles. If it be a trade, know not only its rules, but the reasons for them. If it be merchandise in raw materials, or in one or more manufactured articles, be sure to learn the whole process, from the planting of the seed, or the digging of the ore, to the completed fabric. Do this by observation, conversation with the heads of departments, and with workmen in different specialties. This was the plan of the late William E. Dodge.—From Dr. J. M. Buckley’s “Oats or Wild Oats.”