MR. AND MRS. HOPLEY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume II, Issue 322, 23 November 1864, Page 4

MR. AND MRS. HOPLEY.

It has been re served for the late convict lloplev to exhaust, in more ton ties than one, a tluorv. This is not given to every mail. As far as we re member, Aschani, I.ocke, and Kou.-seau had no opportunities of airing their visie>nary views en educatien. 'J be inimitable satirist Arbuthnot, in his Mrmoirx uf Miirliiivs Hrrih/rntx, reduced the thce.rv to an absurdity as far as the education of the infant anel adeleseent mind was concerned ; and the author of I.mi/i, whet tailed like l an angel, lelt his own childien to the mercies of a foundling hospital. 31 r. Day. the author of rt/tl .)/r/ /on y thatdivarv manual of

high-Hying education, was m seme l-espects lloplev's prototype, for he also cmleavouied to educate a model

as well as a model boy. Hut D.iv began at tin beginning, and selecteel his future wife in the nursery.

The complications nii.-iiig from educating a wife up t<> an ideal standard lmvc not been neglected l.y recent fiction. But fact is generally more lively tlum liction, and the history of Mr. mid M is. llupley's connubial experience is as interesting, and twicu'as painful, as a novel. lloplev, it will be reincmbeird, is the Eastbourne f-chcolmaMer who, in the summer of ISGO, beat a semi-idiotic pupil named Chancellor to death, on high " educational," moral, and religious grounds, and was in consequence tried, convicted, and sentenced to lour vcais' penal servitude. Wo mention the matter in this rough unsentimental way because we observe that the Judge-Ordinary— in summing up and charging the jury on the suit* for a judicial serration, on. the-ground of cruelty, promoted by Mrs. lloplev against her husband—speaks of this very aggravated manslaughter. and the persons who committed it, in bomewhat euphemistic language, lie characterises it as "some act which brought the husband within the grasp of the law, and very heavilv the hand of the law tell upon him and lie goes 011 to describe Ilopley as 14 a man of education and refinemenf, of great natural ability, and with a great many noble though visionary aspirations," and also adverts with evident admiration to his " warm-heart-edness nnrl kindness to his wile," and "his warm aH'eetion and proper religious feelings." Js'ow we happen to have a pretty accurate mapping out of Uopley's character. it. is presented to us ally by the evidence produced on the trial for the manslaughter of the boy Chancellor in ISfiO, but more fully in Jlopley's own account of himself contained in the pamphlet entitled, I'tuls l>rai in>j on thf Ijculh oj J!ri/ii>ni'/ C. Chainii'/or. In ibis pamphlet lloplev had the hardihood, while awaiting ),i s ti-inl, to beg for contributions from the credulous to set up a I " Model Educational Establishment," with himself as the model Christian master, and his wife specially trained by him to " aim at becoming the model Christian mistress." Our notion of the man's character is completed by the dclcnce which he conducted in person before the Divorce Court. It came to this. Mr. Uopley had a theory about wives and education generally. Possibly he entertained it seriously | possibly he did not. "Possibly ho mi-ht be a sineeie Visionary; possibly lie might be a miro fjuuck ami mountebank. His view—whether be entertained it sincerely or not—was that all extant education was wrong, and that,it was in him so to mana"e a wile and family that his family should be a model family and his children "second Christs." .And, moreover', he was ot opinion that it was in hint ho to brim' r l ' , antl i ? rin ° out b0 >' !i ' °" U)l ' L ocke and Jacob Abbott principle — in which, combined wi!/i the occasional use of a rope aiid "a good thick stick," " affection is the great moving power" — that "with sincere and persevering toaii sto benefit tnem, and at the sacrifice of time" feeling, and energy," he could always either beat obstinacy s out of them or beat them to death. A Veil, he bait an opportunity ol testing his theories, lie did, us a matter of met, beat one of his pupils to death ; and he did, as a-matter of fact, in commencing the education of one oi his "second Christs," his Jirst-boni child, thrash it when a fortnight old, carry it out. in a fish hamper when five days old, and within a month of its birth shut it. up in a dark room to cure its bad temper. 1 his "second Christ" which was to be he lvdueed to hopeless ldiotey ; and his model wife he modelled into the mother of future Christs by repeatedly striking her on the head, whilst pregnant, for not knowing certain lessons and sums which he set her by lucking her and spitting at her, and calliii" her ' beast, fool, and This is the lloplev oHaet, . and on the trial for manslaughter the jury decided ] that they believed him to be a liar as well as a man- I sluyer. Ho pretended that he had left his victim ' happy and contented" overnight, whereas, as it was proved, lights were seen in toe house at an unaccountably late hour, footsteps were heard in the slaughtered boy's room after he was left " happy and contented," ineffectual attempts luul been made to

efface tho too palpable marks of blood, and the clothes of the boy had been partly washed; and. lastly, he attempted to palm off on the country reporters an absolutely fiilse account of the whole bloody deed. Tho man lloplev, it is proved, did a pupil to death, reduced his own first-born child to idiotey by striking it with his hand when a fortnight old, and habitually beat, kicked, and spat, on his own wife. To ho sure he ditl nil this in the interested)' high education and true religion. He prayed with the hoy he slew, in the intervals of rope's-ending him nnd jobbing a stick into his limbs ; and he composed an admirable manual of the most pious east, a manual of self-examination and prayer for his beloved wife. that is, for the lienst, fool, and whom he was in the hahid of thrashing and spitt intr upon. And lloplev was, moreover, so tender-hearted that be forbade his pupils " ever to indict unnecessary pain, even on the smallest insect"; and his sympathies were so universal that in his model play-room he would " reserve a space of oak-hoards plant d to it smooth surface, on which tho peg-tops could be thrown without injuring their pegs."

The (|ucstion. then, is whether it is quite rijrht for the .luilfj-c-fhilinarv to describe a fellow of this sort us possessed with " noble aspirations." and as one " of whom no one could say that lie was wanting in warm a fleet ion and in prupn- reliyious feelintrs." There is a certain authority that tay.s "By their fruits ye shall know tbctn," ;ind that warns reliuioiis professors jrojicrallv, " Not every one thatsaith unto me, I,ord, Lord !" &c. That is to say, tin) yreat and only Christ— not one of the llopley regeneration, the second Christs—emphatically teaches that there is only one reliable tiling, which is not extravagant reliirious professions, hut justice, mercy, and truth. However piously a man prays, however s- lriiinlv ho adjures by the holiest motives, however passionate may 1 ><> his appeals, however sacred and lofty his system, however pious his pretensions, he is no(hin<.' but a hypocrite and impostor—that is to suv, lie no really lofty aspirations, and is utterly deficient, in warm a/lection and proper religious feelings—if he iloirs a boy ti> death. beats his own infant into idiotrv, and tbrashes his wife upon Ibe highest religious motives, because, while pregnant, slut breaks down in a spelling lessen. Society, we think, bus some right to complain when a Judge-Ordinarv thus confuses right and wrong, and scents to lay down that noh'e aspirations and proper religious f» cling* are compatibly with crimes of this sort. "Wean- nut asserting I'm a single moment that, in the suit for a judicial separation, poor Mrs. llopley had, us they say, a sinj.de to stami on. doubt of it. her condonation of her husband's cruelty was complete and c»rta.n. r i lie man is unquestionably a man of will as strong as his rid ripht hand, lie bat! complete 1 ;, mastered bis wife. was. while under iiis itiIhjencc, as iJionmulilv fascinatcd and possessed a - the biul is by the sf ipcnt. "We are prepared to admit that all along—before the tiial. a'ter tiic trial, ami up to a very recent period—she believed in betorturer, and was ready to walk with him 41 erect and unsubdued before the malice of his enemies and panting to fulfil his sacred mission," as, even in prison, he loftily anticipated bis future career. '1 here can be little doubt that poor Mrs. lloplev was nrired — and urged not improperly, except in a h ual sense to prosecute the suit by her own family, and (hat llopley i> quite right in saying that, in appearing in Court, .-he scarcely acted as a fiee agent. Ytt, at the same lime, we must admit flint this influence is at end if, as is asserted, Mrs. llopley has of her own free will left Kngland since the suit was decided against her, rather than run the risk of those happier days which the ,!udge-Ordirarv,not for the first time v/nn )tu mihtfi.st juruhitJ. forecast* for erring wives anil cruel husbands uh se connubitd bonds he declines to relax. 3hit this is not our point. "We are not so much commenting on the case as on what werejiard as a social misfortune.that HopltVs real character ami crimes should le treated by high authority in this veiy lenient and apologetic way. There is no crime which may not be justitied, aft«*r a fashion, upon ] rimiple. It was, in its way, a noble aspiration when a murderer, m»t long ago, treated a young wnjujm to whom he was entrantd as }iis property, and in all l"ve and sinc< rity. and in the exercise of "warm a fleet ion." as lie would teim it, cut her throat, lint do not hi!_*h aspirations cease to be not lc when manslaughter is their legitimate logical result Included in Hopley'.s noble aspirations was tin- enmietiou tha 1 , when once it came to be a question of mastery between himself unda boy, whom he chose to consider obstinate, bul who Mas in fact halt an idiot, it was his dutv "tu carry his point whatever blown if cost," as his master J..hii 1 .ocke has it. The fact that In- killed the boy. and kill* d him on principle, disposes, we think, of tipnobleness of his aspirations. .And so en in the othei case. Hopley is well up in religious language : he is a truly pious man-sbner and an entiieiy convened wife-torturer. lie beats hi- own infant a span b-ng into idiotcy, for high moral and educat imiiil purposes ; and he tortuies a pregnant woman for the good of her soul and the improvement id* her mind, fie licks her into proficiency in godliness and the rule of three. 11u engages in piayir and indites edityinir tracts on i-elf examination, whilst be slays the imbecile, maltreats the w> ak, and chastises the helpless and unconscious baby < f two weeks old. N

Mieli a man's loving spirit, to ho styled 44 proper religions lee'ings r" It is not a phasan't, peihapsuot quite a proper thing, to urge comparisons ; but in reviewing the pr< sent administtation of the IHvoiee Court, we cannot, quitn foiget the munories of a and a ( reswcll, wlio estimate d sentimentalisin at its proper value, and who always discouraged, tin certainly novel talked, nonsense.