THE NINETEENTH CENTURY A MONTHLY REVIEW EDITED BY JAMES KNOWLES VOL. VII. JANUARY-JUNE 1880 LONDON C. KEGAN PAUL & CO., 1 PATERNOSTER SQUARE CONTENTS OF PAGE RUSSIAN NIHILISM. By Fritz Cunliffe-Owen GEORGE CANNING: HIS CHARACTER AND MOTIVES. By the Right Hon. Viscount Stratford de Redcliffe. ATHLETICS IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. By the Hon. Edward Lyttelton PHEDRA AND PHEDRE. By Lionel Tennyson PURCHASE IN THE CHURCH. By John Martineau THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES AND GENERA. By Alfred R. Wallace THE CRIMINAL CODE, 1879. By the Hon. Mr. Justice Stephen ATHEISTIC METHODISM. By W. H. Mallock. WAR CORRESPONDENTS AND THE AUTHORITIES. By Archibald Forbes 185 THE SITUATION IN AFGHANISTAN. By Major-General Sir Henry C. LORD CHELMSFORD AND THE ZULU WAR. By Archibald Forbes AN EYE-WITNESS OF JOHN KEMBLE. By Theodore Martin FREE LAND AND PEASANT PROPRIETORSHIP. By Arthur Arnold RITUALISTS AND ANGLICANS. By the Rev. A. F. Northcote REASONS FOR DOUBT IN THE CHURCH OF ROME: a Reply. By the ENGLAND AS A NAVAL POWER. By Sir Robert Spencer Robinson 389 NEWSPAPER CORRESPONDENTS IN THE FIELD. By Viscount Melgun A ATHEISM AND THE RIGHTS OF MAN. By W. H. Mallock THE DOCILITY OF AN IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT. By the Right Hon. THE COMMON-SENSE OF HOME RULE: a Reply, by E. D. J. Wilson ; THE DEEP SEA AND ITS CONTENTS. By Dr. W. B. Carpenter. A NONCONFORMIST'S VIEW OF THE ELECTION. By the Rev. J. Guin- DAYS IN THE WOODS. By the Right Hon. the Earl of Dunraven BRITISH INTERESTS IN THE EAST. By M. E. Grant Duff THE PRESENT CRISIS AT GUY'S HOSPITAL. By Margaret Lonsdale NATIVE ARMIES OF INDIA. By Lieutenant-General Sir John Adye RELIGION, ACHAIAN AND SEMITIC. By the Right Hon. W. E. Glad- 557 THE CEREMONIAL USE OF FLOWERS: a Sequel. By Miss Agnes THE POUND OF FLESH. By Moncure D. Conway AGNOSTICISM AND WOMEN: a Reply. By Miss J. H. Clapperton A CONSERVATIVE VIEW OF THE ELECTIONS. By T. E. Kebbel ENGLAND AND RUSSIA IN ASIA. By Professor A. Vambéry SOME INDIAN SUGGESTIONS FOR INDIA. By Syed Ameer Ali . THE NINETEENTH CENTURY. No. XXXV.-JANUARY 1880. RUSSIAN NIHILISM. RATIONALISM and radicalism exist to a certain extent in every country of Europe. But the Social Democrats of Germany and Austria and the Communists of France and Spain turn with horror from Russian revolutionists, who consider the programme of the Paris Commune of 1871 condemnably weak, and Felix Pyat, Cluseret, and their companions as little better than Conservatives. The Social Democrats and even the Communists of the rest of Europe have in view aims which, no matter how fantastic, are always of a sufficiently defined nature. They look forward to an entirely democratic form of government, and hope for a reorganisation of the social world, under which all capital and property would be held either by the State or Commune for the equal benefit of everybody. They are levellers, but they are not destroyers. The revolutionary party in Russia, on the other hand, has no definite aims of reorganisation or improvement in view. In its sight, everything as it now exists is rotten, and before anything new and good can be created, all existing institutions must be utterly destroyed. Religion, the State, the family, laws, property, morality-all are equally odious and must be rooted out and abolished. It is because nothing' as it exists at present finds favour in their eyes that they have been called 'Nihilists.' They desire to break up the actual social organisation into mere individualism, with VOL. VII.-No. 35. B |