British Quarterly Review, American Edition, Vol. LIV July and October, 1871 (part 2 of 3)

British Quarterly Review, American Edition, Vol. LIV July and October, 1871 (part 2 of 3)

A Manual of Systematic History. By Dr. MARTIN REED. Containing, I., Chronological, Genealogical, and Statistical Tables of Modern History; II., the Biography of Modern History; III., the Facts of English History, Military, Diplomatic, Constitutional, and Social. Jarrold and Sons.

It is impossible to do more than describe this stout and useful volume, which is one of those admirable manuals for the library, desk, or school which enable a ready reference to the facts of history, biography, and social economy that constantly turn up in the work of the student.

In the first part, a series of chronological tables present the memorable facts of British and general history in divisions of centuries, with the names of sovereigns and the date of their accession, of statesmen, authors, artists, &c., together with genealogies and full statistical tables, especially of the cost of different wars in money and men. The second part is a brief biographical dictionary brought down to the present day. The third part is a synopsis and chronology of the principal facts of British history, military, constitutional, institutional, and social--a cyclopædia, indeed, of useful information. Of course we have attempted no verifications of dates, but assuming accuracy, Dr. Reed has furnished a very valuable manual for every literary man's desk.

_The Life of John Milton, narrated in connection with the Political, Ecclesiastical, and Literary History of his time._ By DAVID MASSON, M.A., LL.D. Vol. II. Macmillan and Co.

Professor Masson has not convinced us of the excellence of his method by his formal defence of it, in which he urges, first, his deliberate purpose, and next his disregard of preconceived ideas of literary form. The former simply affirms that his book has not drifted by accident into its present shape; in the latter every writer is to be judged solely by success. There is, moreover, a strong presumption in favour of a 'combination of a biography with a contemporary history.' Every biography is a necessary part of contemporary history, and the question is simply one of degree. Whether a method such as Professor Masson's is justified, depends solely upon the degree in which the hero of the biography contributes to the history with which his name is associated, and in which he can say, quorum pars magna fuit. Concerning Cromwell, for instance, there could scarcely be a doubt as to its propriety. Mr. Christie is justified in adopting the same method in his biography of the first Earl of Shaftesbury; both were men whose lives entered greatly into the history of their time, not only in the sense of being identified with it, in all that made them notable, but in the sense of moulding and constituting it; so that without them--the former especially--the history itself would have been very different. Milton scarcely played such a part in the history of the Commonwealth; although the most illustrious man in it, the sphere of his especial greatness was not of it. It is difficult to suppose that the course and character of the Commonwealth would in any important particular have been essentially different had he not existed. As Cromwell's secretary, and still more as a vigorous pamphleteer, he doubtless contributed powerfully to the idea and defence of the Commonwealth, especially of its ecclesiastical polity; but only as Dryden and Swift contributed to the polity of their day. In the period which this volume comprises--1638-1643--we are almost ludicrously impressed with the insignificant relations of Milton to the events that it narrates. In the huge sandwich which the volume constitutes, the biographical chapters are not even the thinnest slices of meat, they are at the most the mustard. Professor Masson has not been able to avoid in history the solecism in geography of the renowned minister of the lesser Cumbrae. It is a study of the individual man in his relations to the universe. It is, therefore, neither a perfectly detailed history, nor an independent biography; while the biography is full and perfect, such portions of the history only are narrated as are supposed to relate to the life and thought of Milton, but of necessity this is an arbitrary and fluctuating quantity. There is a sense of disproportion and of artificiality throughout which disturbs our enjoyment of the scholarly and vigorous qualities of the book; for Professor Masson is justly entitled to take his place among the few genuine historians of the day. Every page bears witness to his unwearied labour, his great learning, his original research, and his perfect conscientiousness; both as a historian and a biographer, he is equally able and trustworthy. It is, as he affirms, 'a work of independent research and method from first to last.' Much of his labour was done before the State papers relating to the period were calendared. 'There is not a single domestic document extant of those that used to be in the State Paper Office which I have not passed through my hands and scrutinized.' His book, therefore, both in its facts and in its judgments, is an independent and valuable contribution to history. There is about the style a little squaring of the elbows, and what might not irreverently be called a little fussiness, which makes some parts unnecessarily diffuse; but with this qualification, the work is vigorous in expression, noble in sentiment, and elevated in its judicial fairness. It is full of vivid portraits and pictures of the men and of the times, and, better still, it is inspired with noble sympathies for the great principles of political and religious freedom which were so grandly contested. The present volume opens with a narration of the Presbyterian revolt in Scotland and the two 'Bishops' Wars,' which Professor Masson thinks have hardly had attached to them sufficient relative importance. Between the first and the second, the Short Parliament lived its little life; after the second, the Long Parliament was called, a detailed account of the composition of which is given by Professor Masson. After nine months of general legislation, the movement for the reform of the English Church took shape, the chief question being the exclusion of the bishops from Parliament; which, after long debate, fluctuating opinion, and abortive reaction, was effected in February, 1642, chiefly at the moment through the blind blunder of Archbishop Williams in engaging the bishops to a protest against all laws, &c., passed in their absence from the House of Peers. 'The bishops,' said Lord Falkland, 'had been the destruction of unity under pretence of uniformity.' They had been some of them so 'absolutely, directly, and cordially Papists, that it is all that fifteen hundred pounds a year can do to keep them from confessing it.'

The relation of Milton to public affairs at this time was solely that of a pamphleteer. The Church question was uppermost, both in Scotland and in England. Milton is supposed to have aided the Smectymnuans in the composition of their famous pamphlet. The word was made up of the initials of the writers, Stephen Marshall, Edmund Calamy, Thomas Young, Matthew Newcomen, and William Spurstow. It was a reply to Bishop Hall's 'Humble Remonstrance,' and to his 'Episcopacy by Divine Right.' Soon after, Milton began to publish his anti-Episcopal pamphlets, of five of which Professor Masson gives an account. These were directed against Hall, Bishop of Exeter, afterwards of Norwich, so often belauded for his moderation and spirituality, but of whose scholarship and conduct Milton had not a very exalted estimate, in which Professor Masson agrees with him. 'I have seen,' says Professor Masson, 'disagreeable private letters of information written by him to Laud respecting nests of sectaries in London whom it would be well to extirpate; and my distinct impression is, that in his conduct generally, and even in his writings, when carefully examined, there will be found a meaner element than our literary dilettanti and antiquaries have been able to discover in so celebrated a bishop.' No reader of Milton's prose works needs to be told that, while their arguments are cogent, their fierce and terrific declamation is simply overwhelming; indeed, the coarse vituperation of both sides is hardly conceivable to those who have not read the controversy. We may commend the arguments, as, indeed, the public questions that were debated, and the course of events, to the consideration of Church parties of the present day. Those too who are so enthusiastic about 'our incomparable liturgy,' may with advantage read Milton's incisive criticisms thereupon. An ominous parallel--happily, however, not in spirit--might be traced between the questions of that day and our own. The secular claims of bishops, and the implication in secular politics of the Established Church, have from that time to this been a fruitful source of political and social embarrassment and evil.

Professor Masson traces the way in which the nation drifted into civil war, and makes a valuable contribution to history by giving a detailed statistical and personal account of the forces and leaders on both sides. The history is a thrilling one. Both Mr. Christie and Professor Masson give us new recitals of it. It cannot be told too often, if told in the spirit of conscientious fidelity and generous sympathy of these writers. The greatest lesson that Englishmen can learn, the seeds of the noblest things they can realize, were contained in it. All that is to be said of Milton is, that he was not in the army, which Professor Masson regrets for his own sake, and that about this time he married Mary Powell.

The volume concludes with a most able and valuable account of English Presbyterianism and English Independency, introduced by a biographical analysis of the Westminster Assembly.

Professor Masson, in a very masterly way, traces the rise and history of English Independency from the first Brownists of 1580; gives an account of the Separatists in Holland from 1592 to 1640; of the Separatist congregations in London from 1610 to 1632; of the New England Pilgrims and their Church from 1620 to 1640; of the persistency, reinvigoration, and growth of Independency in England from 1632 to 1643; and closes his volume by representing the array of Presbyterianism and Independency in July, 1643, and their prospects in the Westminster Assembly, which met on the first day of that month, and which, as Professor Masson justly observes, 'for more than five years and a half is to be borne in mind as a power or institution in the English realm, existing side by side with the Long Parliament, and in constant conference and co-operation with it. The number of its sittings during these five years and a half was 1,163 in all, which is at the rate of about four sittings every week for the whole time. The earliest years of the Assembly were the most important. All in all, it was an Assembly which left remarkable and permanent effects in the British Islands, and the history of which ought to be more interesting, in some homely respects, to Britons now, than the history of the Council of Basel, the Council of Trent, or any other of the great ecclesiastical councils, more ancient and oecumenical, about which we hear so much.' We can neither condense nor criticise here the very able and impartial narrative of this section of Professor Masson's history. We may at a future time return to it. We simply commend it to the attention of both Churchmen and Nonconformists, as a very masterly sketch of a historic movement which both should be familiar with, which the former is too apt to speak of with a sneer which only ignorance could render possible, and which is destined to produce great ecclesiastical and national results.

A Life of Anthony Ashley Cooper, First Earl of Shaftesbury, 1621-1683. By W. D. CHRISTIE. Macmillan and Co.

Mr. Christie's qualities as an historian are critical rather than philosophical, scholarly rather than pictorial. He laudably prides himself upon scrupulous accuracy, and has the patient industry and conscientious truthfulness which deem no labour too great, no minuteness too trivial, for the achievement of this result. His work, therefore, is a critical rather than a constructive work: or, rather, he constructs by a critical process of vindication. The first Earl of Shaftesbury has fared badly at the hands of history. 'He lived in times of violent party fury, and calumny, which fiercely assailed him living, pursued him in his grave, and still darkens his name. He lived in times when the public had little or no authentic information about the proceedings of members of the Government or of Parliament, when errors in judging public men were more easy than now, and when venal pamphleteers, poets, and play-writers drove a profitable trade in libels on public men.' Shaftesbury not only fell into the hands of political enemies, but his political tergiversations rendered his vindication difficult for his friends. A young man of twenty-one at the commencement of the Civil War, his life ran parallel with the events of that eventful period; he lived through the Restoration to within five years of the Revolution of 1688, and was closely connected with political affairs through the greater part of his life. A Royalist in early life, he became an ardent Parliamentarian; a Royalist again, he played an important part with Monk in bringing back Charles II.; and the problem which Mr. Christie has set himself is to vindicate his honour in these convenient changes; and with the array of great names against him, including even those of Hallam and Macaulay, an arduous task it is; the invective of Macaulay is almost as terrible as that of Dryden. Of course such a career affords rich material for writers on both sides. Dryden, whose unscrupulous pen is no condemnation, unmercifully consigned Shaftesbury to infamy in the judgment of the multitude who read poetry, and know nothing of political history, by making him the Achitophel of his great satire, published just a week before Shaftesbury's trial for high treason, and by lampooning him in 'The Medal,' referring to the medal which Shaftesbury's friends had struck on his acquittal. Hume, again, by the power of his literary genius, for a long time brought popular condemnation upon all Whigs and Whiggery, and until his Tory proclivities for the Stuarts were counteracted by recent and more careful historians, made the worse appear the better reason. These falsehoods of detraction, as Mr. Christie justly observed, 'produced counter-falsehoods of excuse and eulogy, and the result has been a greater agglomeration of errors.' In his old age, Shaftesbury began an autobiography, doubtless with a view of self-vindication, but proceeded only so far as his twenty-first year. Locke, who resided in Shaftesbury's house many years as his physician and friend, meditated a biography, but only collected a few materials for it. The fourth Earl, the son of the author of the 'Characteristics,' placed all the materials he possessed in the hands of a Mr. Benjamin Martin, for the purpose of a biography, which he began in 1734, but he was unfitted for the task, and the result was unsatisfactory. The MS., in 1766, was put, for improvement, into the hands of Dr. Sharpe, Master of the Temple; then into those of Dr. Kippis, editor of the 'Biographia Britannica,' after which it was printed, but the fifth Earl was so dissatisfied with it that the whole impression was destroyed, with the exception of two copies. Mr. Bentley republished it in 1836, edited--incompetently, Mr. Christie says--by Mr. George Wingrove Cooke. Stringer, Shaftesbury's solicitor, seems to have furnished Locke with information, fragments of which, in MS., in Locke's handwriting, are among the Shaftesbury papers at St. Giles's; but Stringer is inaccurate and confused. With these materials, and, of course, access to all the family papers, Mr. Christie has constructed his history--or, rather, his vindication--for his book has, throughout, the character of a polemic. It would have been more interesting, and more generally valuable, had Mr. Christie written an affirmative history relegating to appendices or footnotes the polemical discussions which different points demanded. As it is, he has furnished material and sifted it, for the use of the historian proper, and he has done this with rare acuteness and scrupulous fairness.

The entire history of the Great Revolution, the Commonwealth, and the Restoration, passes under review before us, and it could not be examined by a more competent critic.

Anthony Ashley Cooper was of good Hampshire blood on both sides. His father, John Cooper, of Rockborne, was made a baronet the year after his son's birth. His mother was the only daughter of Sir Anthony Ashley, Knt., who was also made a baronet the day before Mr. Cooper; the order of baronets having been created by James I. ten years before; it was to be limited to two hundred. Every baronet paid £1,095 for the honour, and had to be possessed of £1,000 per annum clear of all incumbrances. It was imperative, too, that he should have had a grandfather who had borne arms. Anthony was a little, fragile fellow, but of great abilities, and his family connections gave him a good standing in Oxford, where he became a reformer of abuses. Against one savage and stupid custom, 'tucking freshmen,' he led a successful resistance. The seniors made the freshmen 'hold out their chin, and they, with the nail of their right thumb left long for the purpose, grate off all the skin from the lip to the chin, and then cause them to drink a beer glass of water and salt.' Senators of the House of Commons were then chosen young; some being only sixteen. Cooper was the champion of the Tewkesbury yeomen against a bullying squire at a civic feast, and was rewarded by being sent, at the age of nineteen, as their representative to the House of Commons. Henceforth his life is part of the history of the county. Cooper was with King Charles at Nottingham, and gallantly stormed Wareham; but he soon after, and, as we think Mr. Christie has proved, honourably, went over to the side of the Parliament, and became one of Cromwell's privy counsellors. The motives of neither of his great changes are very clear, but Mr. Christie has shown that they were at least disinterested and unsuspected. He was an intriguer, like most of the men of his time, but his sympathies were uniformly liberal, and he resisted oppressive measures--the Act of Uniformity for instance--at much risk to his own interests. As a reward for his part in the Restoration of Charles, he was made Baron Ashley. He became Lord of the Treasury, and Lord Chancellor. He was one of the notorious Cabal ministry, but Mr. Christie has succeeded in proving that he opposed, though unsuccessfully, the worst measures of that miserable clique, especially the notorious 'Stop of the Exchequer.' The most suspicious thing about him is that he continued in Charles's favour, who made him his Lord Chancellor and created him Earl of Shaftesbury. It seems odd to us that a man without special legal knowledge should have been made the head of the legal profession. In this capacity he is included in Lord Campbell's 'Lives of the Chancellors,' from whose inaccurate criticism Mr. Christie has to rescue him. Charles is said to have justified his choice by saying that Shaftesbury had more law than all his judges, and more religion than all his bishops. Charles's bishops may have been doubtful, but Sir Matthew Hale was one of his judges. He gave general satisfaction to suitors during his year of office, which is saying much. His dismission probably influenced his politics, for he joined the Whig Opposition. His closing years were characterized by fierce conflict with the king, and he was twice sent a prisoner to the Tower, accused of high treason; his acquittal was celebrated by great public rejoicings. At length he concocted, with Russell and Monmouth, a rising against the King, and had to escape to Holland, where, in 1683, just before James II. came to the throne, he died. He was a man of brilliant genius, and a great statesman. He played a not ignoble part in the greatest drama of our English history. He was frail in health, but courageous and high-minded, and an uncompromising champion of liberty. By no means immaculate, either in political principles or personal morals, he has yet, beyond all question, been grossly calumniated. Mr. Christie's volumes throw much interesting light upon not only the political events, but the manners and morals of the times. There are few more melancholy chapters in English history than the reign of Charles II. Political venality, patriotic dishonour, and personal vice vie with each other. Mr. Christie's volumes abundantly justify the conclusions which have at length been reached by Liberals in politics and by Nonconformists in ecclesiastical matters. We earnestly commend them to all students of history as scholarly, acute, and just.

The Life and Times of Henry Lord Brougham, written by himself. Vol. II. Blackwood and Co.

Reserving until the completion of this work the more ample consideration and criticism to which The Life and Character of Lord Brougham are entitled, we simply report concerning this second volume that it covers the eventful period between 1808-1828, and narrates Brougham's strenuous and successful struggle for the repeal of the Orders in Council, which he terms 'my greatest achievement'--ultimately achieved under the excitement caused by the assassination of Spencer Perceval. Even Horner described Brougham's exertions as 'unexampled in the modern history of Parliament.' Also, his costly and unsuccessful struggle for the representation of Liverpool, which cost the Liberals £8,000 and the Tories £20,000, during which Brougham made 160 speeches, two or three persons were killed, others severely wounded, and votes were bought at £30 apiece. 'All who knew Liverpool formerly say nothing was ever seen so quiet at an election there.' There were five candidates. Canning beat Brougham by some 200 votes. Such were the good old times. The description of the election is very racy. The chief interest of the volume, however, centres in its detailed account of the family feuds of George III., the relations of the Prince and Princess of Wales, and the trial of the Queen. In 1810, Brougham became the legal adviser of the Princess, and from that time took an active part on her side in the vicissitudes of this dirty and ignominious history. Brougham most strongly affirms, in contradiction of much gossip to the contrary, that he and all the legal advisers of the Queen had a clear and unhesitating conviction of her innocence. The narrative throws a clearer light than has hitherto been thrown upon the whole history, clears away many misconceptions, and solves some mysteries.

In an explanatory note, the editor informs us that Lord Brougham, then in his eighty-fourth year, began his account of the trial, after examining his letters and papers, on the 8th of October, 1861. In September, 1862, he began the political part. In November, 1863, he began the account of his early life. In his search for materials he found the manuscript of 'Memnon.' This he marked in pencil, on the first page, thus--'At B----m (Brougham), 1792.' He believed he had 'composed it, entirely forgetting that it was only a translation--probably a task set him by his tutor--a very pardonable mistake, after a lapse of seventy years.' No doubt; but is not the responsibility the editor's, and not Brougham's?

There is, of course, a great deal of characteristic egotism in the narrative; but it is amusing rather than offensive, and is, perhaps, not much in excess of the necessary consciousness of a man who has played a prominent part in life.

Francis of Assisi. By MRS. OLIPHANT. Macmillan & Co. (Sunday Library.)

Almost the whole of Mrs. Oliphant's story may be read in the charming gossip of 'Alban Butler;' but here the hand of a true artist has arranged the dramatic material furnished by the celebrated biographer of St. Francis. An almost faultless piece of literary work, a cabinet portrait of exceeding beauty and grace, is the result. The authorities on which Mrs. Oliphant relies for her facts are unimpeachably good. The biographies of De Celano and Bonaventura are suffused and interpenetrated with exceeding reverence for the founder of the Friars Minor. They can hardly, indeed, be acquitted of an admiration akin to worship for the hero of their pious romance, and they often leave us in some perplexity as to the respective limits of fact and fiction in this strange and wonderful life. Mrs. Oliphant, however, holds the balance very fairly. Every visitor to Assisi who has tried to drink in the spirit of the scene, or to understand the historic reality that underlies the mythic splendour of the tomb of the great apostle of poverty, must have felt it difficult to free his mind from strange reveries as to the power of the human will not only to compel the obedience of other minds, but to evolve a whole world of facts out of its moral consciousness. Francis was a devout son of the Roman Church, scrupulously obedient to sacerdotal authority, and profoundly anxious to secure the authentication of his 'Order' from the Holy See; and yet his career is a striking illustration of the triumph of the prophetic rather than of the sacramental or priestly power. He was the founder of a religion, the originator of a society, the fashioner and for many years the master of a rule and organization which were absolutely at war with all the passions of the flesh, all the current tendencies of society, and the whole spirit of the so-called Christian world.

Mrs. Oliphant has thrown much light upon the condition of Italy in the thirteenth century, and has used her historic imagination to great effect in portraying the scenes in the early life of her hero, the grand crises of his career, and the extremes of poverty and self-abnegation to which he submitted. She devotes considerable space to the beautiful romance which led to the foundation of his second Order for women, and to the circumstances which induced him to frame a rule for those in secular life who wished to aim at the counsels of perfection. His visit to the East and the attempt he made to convert the Sultan to Christianity by the offer of the ordeal of fire, as well as by other urgent appeals, are told with dramatic force. The history of the success which attended his labours, and the sketch of some of the 'Chapters' of his Order which assembled at his bidding for conference and prayer, bear strong resemblance to some of the legends of Sakya-Mouni Buddha.

The enthusiasm shown by Francis for the beauties of nature, his sense of brotherhood to all created things, his fellowship with birds and beasts and creeping things, atone for the touch of fanaticism with which he addressed even the fire that was to be applied to his own flesh in medical cautery, as Frater Ignis. With deep pathos Mrs. Oliphant tells the 'legend' of the origination of the 'stigmata' of the Lord Jesus in the hands, feet, and side of Francis. She shows the strength of the evidence for the existence of these mysterious marks on the emaciated frame of the pious enthusiast; but she also indicates the silence of any satisfactory eye-witness for the astounding miracle, and proves that, though his disciples assert the fact, they do not say they saw this portentous sign of resemblance to the Saviour of sinners. That St. Francis--in virtue of this supposed imitation in his body of the 'marks' of the Christ--has received an idolatrous reverence, will hardly be denied; but that St. Francis ever called the smallest attention to such a marvel, or mentioned the mysterious circumstance to his dearest friend, cannot be proved. The story is improbable, and to some extent sickening, yet it appears to us the coarse and exaggerated expression which his less spiritual disciples gave to that 'supernatural rapture of love to God in which his history culminates.' Mrs. Oliphant says very justly and beautifully--'The distinction between the active servant of God, who gives up all things to serve Him, and the mystic, who gives up the privilege of serving him in the deeper joy of beholding, is to a great extent a difference of temperament, but in St. Francis occurs the unusual spectacle of the two combined.... No man ever kept his eyes more open to the wants of common humanity, and yet few mystics can show so strange a chapter of absolute communion with the Almighty.' We almost wonder that our author has not given even more ample specimens of the poetic enthusiasm of the great prophet of Assisi. The Italian canticles said to have been written by him, which were published by Wadding in 1623, are full of wild, holy rapture. The closing lines (in Butler's translation) of one may express the true significance of the mysterious stigmata:--

"Grant one request of dying love-- Grant, oh! my God, who diest for me-- I, sinful wretch, may die for thee Of love's deep wounds; love to embrace-- To swim in its sweet sea! Thy face To see; then joined with Thee above, Shall I myself pass into love."

The Life of Hernando Cortes. By ARTHUR HELPS. Bell and Daldy.

Conversations on War and General Culture. By the Author of 'Friends in Council.' Smith and Elder.

Mr. Helps is rendering a substantial service to history and to popular literature, by this re-cast and republication of biographies from his greater work on the 'Spanish Conquest of America.' As he proceeds his interest in his work deepens. So far from this life of Cortes being the carving out of a journeyman, under Mr. Helps' superintendence, it is practically a new work, upon which much patient thought and loving labour has been expended. While Mr. Helps has properly enough made use of that part of his history which relates to the conquest of Mexico, he has, he tells us, gone 'carefully over every sentence quoted from that history, to see whether, by the aid of additional knowledge, he could correct or improve it.' He has also added much new material, especially to those parts which relate to the private life of Cortes. Mr. Helps has the great gift of succinctness. He never wearies us, but often makes us wish that his canvas was filled in with more detail. His style, as readers of 'Friends in Council' know, is dignified, easy, archaic, and sententious. His narrative abounds in sage reflections and wise apothegms--he has a knack of condensing a philosophy into an epigram. A common-place book might be greatly enriched by choice sentences from these volumes. Mr. Helps' impartiality is very rigid, and his summaries of character and of the moral quality of actions severe. His narrative does not flow into glowing descriptions or romantic enthusiasm. He is always calmly, we might say coldly, master of himself. He has a dread of brilliant writing, but he attains to archaic picturesqueness, and arrests the interest of his readers while he satisfies the judgment of his critics. Not Hallam himself is more scrupulously accurate.

Mr. Helps is as unlike Prescott as any two writers of history can be: but his minute accuracy, if it does not produce broad effects, determines exact relations, and with enough of literary skill to make the result very pleasing. The noble virtues and the signal faults of the great soldier are admirably discriminated. On the whole, we admire more than we blame. Cortes was a great-minded, generous-hearted, religious-souled man. Nothing in history could be more unjustifiable than the siege of Mexico, and the massacre of its brave inhabitants, of whom 50,000 were slain--nearly the number estimated as killed in the recent horrors of Paris; but we must not try him by the notions of our nineteenth century. The civilized splendour of the Mexicans almost provokes incredulity. Mr. Helps has to assure even Mr. Carlyle of it; and the evidence abundantly establishes it. We heartily thank Mr. Helps for his book, and trust he will complete his series after its model.

The Conversations on War and General Culture were suggested by the early victories of the Germans over the French last summer. They are miscellaneous in character--general, rather than specific in aim. They vindicate no doctrine, elaborate no themes; they are what they profess to be, conversations, and not sermons or lectures. Unlike 'Friends in Council,' the conversations are not appendages to essays; only one essay is introduced. They wander about in the pleasant but more vagrant places of conversation, and do not escape the garrulousness and inconsequence to which their literary form tempts. They are, however, full of thoughtful suggestions, wise teachings, and apt illustrations. They are transparent and simple--often ingenious and striking. They are indeed, with a difference, a new series of 'Friends in Council,' although inferior in freshness and force. They are to be read as we read such books, by bits. Their gentle wisdom and benign humour will not greatly excite us, but they will instruct and interest us. We should say that the characters of 'Friends in Council' are reproduced. There is neither table of contents, chapter headings, nor index. The reader, therefore, may open where he likes, taking his chance of what he may find; but whether it be woman's place and culture, competitive examinations, or the war, he will certainly find much subtle wisdom, genial feeling, and literary beauty.

Memoir of the Rev. Thomas Madge, late Minister of Essex-street Chapel, London. By the Rev. WILLIAM JAMES. Longmans, Green, and Co.

Mr. Madge was one of the older school of Unitarians, who hold fast by the supernatural, and believe in the special Divine mission of Jesus. He was originally a member of the Church of England, but early embraced Unitarian views, and gave himself to the Unitarian ministry. He was an intelligent, devout man, and a clear, spiritual, and effective preacher. The successor of Belsham at Essex-street, he sustained a pastorate there of thirty years, retired a few years ago, esteemed and beloved by all who knew him, and died in August last year, at the advanced age of eighty-three.

Mr. Madge did not publish much--chiefly separate sermons, the publication of which was requested. He was a clear thinker, moderate in sentiment, devout in feeling, and elegant and eloquent in expression. His ministry attracted persons of culture, and some of high rank. Few men have been more highly, universally, and deservedly esteemed in the circle in which they have moved. In his relations to men differing from himself he was catholic-hearted and generous. His distinctive opinions were not permitted to check his sympathies, or to hinder his joining in worship with all who love Jesus Christ. Mr. James has prepared his memoir with great good taste and skill.

_An Earnest Pastorate: Memorials of the Rev. Alexander Leitch, M.A., Minister of South Church, Stirling._ By the Rev. NORMAN L. WALKER. Edinburgh: Andrew Elliott.

The simplicity, evangelical fervour, methodical and well-sustained zeal of a holy man are well portrayed in this volume. The plans of an earnest pastor, the secret of his practical success, the spirit of a saintly and laborious life, are always worthy of attentive consideration by those who are trying to do similar work. Mr. Leitch, early in life, began ministerial work in the Kirk of Scotland; passed through the agony of the disruption with unfaltering courage, and left behind him a name which will long be had in remembrance.

Life of Ambrose Bonwicke. By his FATHER. Edited by JOHN E. B. MAYOR, M.A. Cambridge: Deighton, Bell and Co.

Ambrose Bonwicke, whose father was a non-juror, the ejected Head Master of Merchant Taylors' School, was a student at Cambridge in the beginning of the last century, and died of hemorrhage on the lungs at twenty-three. He was what would now be called an Anglican of the purest water, and we cannot help a feeling of regret and pity at the ritual forms which his piety took; but the piety itself was very beautiful. Ambrose was a model of gentleness, goodness, and self-denial; a saintly youth, reminding one more of the old ascetic monks than of a young English gentleman. The memoir throws a little light, but not much, upon the manners and customs of Cambridge a century and a-half ago. Incidentally we learn that the students had to write Latin verses in eulogy of Dr. Gower on the very day that he died, and that college chums sometimes slept in the same bed.

The notes, which make up almost half the volume, are rather in excess of their occasion, but they are instructive and amusing. Mr. Mayor is an indefatigable and learned antiquary.

Scrambles Among the Alps, in the Years 1860-1869. By EDWARD WHYMPER. John Murray.

Mr. Whymper has written the history of the conquest of the Matterhorn quorum pars magna fuit, and his book is a worthy record of a great achievement. Making a not unreasonable allowance for the difficulties of a writer who is the hero of his own story, and for the necessary conflict between his modesty and his fidelity, and with the single remark that the former is not unduly sacrificed to the latter, we may commend to our readers a most interesting and exciting narrative, written with lucidity and skill, terseness and pertinence, and illustrated by Mr. Whymper himself, whose pencil, he tells us, has been employed upon the work for the greater part of the last six years. The illustrations are very numerous and effective, and, generally speaking, all of a high artistic quality; with the letterpress, they make a really sumptuous Alpine volume. From the very nature of some of the subjects, some little has been supplied by the imagination. For instance, the flying fragments in the 'Cannonade on the Matterhorn' are not all of them in the line of any conceivable projectile force; and certainly the 'Fall of Reynaud,' as represented p. 229, could have had, for him, but one issue, and that not of a kind to produce 'roars of laughter' from his companions. Had Mr. Whymper fallen, as pictorially represented p. 120, he would never have written his book save, indeed, with the assistance of Mr. Home. His survival is, indeed, a miracle. He fell, he tells us, 200 feet 'in seven or eight bounds--ten feet more would have taken me, in one gigantic leap of 800 feet, on to the glacier below.' He describes his sensations as by no means unpleasant, and thinks that death by a fall from a great height is painless. Hardly, again, should we have fancied the suicidal position of Croz cutting away the cornice on the summit of the Monning Pass. Photographs, had such been possible, would, we imagine, have presented some striking divergencies from these imaginary positions. But, making allowance for pictorial effect in these two or three instances, the illustrations appear to have been done with great care, as well as with great spirit. Some excellent maps are also furnished; two are transferred from the plates of the Dufour Map; two, a map of the chain of Mont Blanc, based upon the Government maps of France and Switzerland, and the survey of Mr. Reilly, and a map of the Matterhorn and its glaciers, being an enlargement, with corrections, from the Dufour Map, are original. The fifth is a general route map.

Mr. Whymper's first escalade in the Alps was the ascent of Mont Pelvoux in Dauphiné, the account of which is reprinted from 'Peaks, Passes, and Glaciers.' Sundry other subordinate, and yet novel and arduous ascents are recounted; with interspersed dissertations on Alpine climbing, on glaciers, on mountain lakes, &c., with criticisms on the erosion theories of Professors Tyndall and Ramsay. But the book, as we have said, is a history of the conquest of the Matterhorn. Between the years 1861-1865, Mr. Whymper made seven unsuccessful attempts to ascend the Matterhorn--four or five attempts having also been made by others; two by Professor Tyndall in 1860 and 1862, who, on the latter occasion, reached within 600 feet of the summit. These attempts were made on the south-west ridge. Mr. Whymper's successful attempt was made on the east face, which, from the Gorner Grat, is so familiar to tourists, and looks like the side of an obelisk; its profile, however, shows the angle to be less than 45°, and the ascent is comparatively easy. Some of the most experienced guides had given up the Matterhorn as inaccessible. Almer decidedly declined it. 'Anything but the Matterhorn,' said he, thinking it hopeless. The two Cassels proved treacherous, and finessed with Mr. Whymper, while completing arrangements with Signor Giordano, who started up the south-west side from Breil, on July 11, 1865. On the 12th, Mr. Whymper crossed the St. Theodule, for Zermatt, having been joined by Lord Francis Douglas and Peter Taugwalder the younger; at Zermatt he found Michael Croz, who had been engaged by the Rev. Charles Hudson and his friend, Mr. Hadow, to attempt the Matterhorn. The two parties united, and started on the 13th at half-past five, four tourists and four guides; by twelve o'clock they had easily ascended 11,000 feet; they halted for the day, and pitched their tent. At 9.55 on the 14th they had reached the height of 14,000 feet, at the base of what, from the Riffell, seems the overhanging summit. They then crossed the ridge to the northern side, the general slope of the mountain being less than 40°. Only one part, of about 400 feet, was really difficult; it was surmounted, and 200 feet of easy snow brought them to the summit at 1.40. The party from Breil had been four days on the mountain; they were seen at an immense distance below; the shouts of Mr. Whymper's party, and some stones which they rolled down to attract attention, frightened them. 'The Italians turned and fled,' but whether from superstition, as Mr. Whymper implies, or from fear of the stone avalanche, so ominously directed upon them, we are not told. The fatal accident on the descent, when five out of the eight perished--three travellers and two guides--seems, like the accident on the Col du Géant two or three years before, to have been caused by no special difficulty. Mr. Hadow's foot slipped; he fell against one of the guides, and knocked him down; the party was roped together, and but for the providential breaking of the rope the three who were saved must have been precipitated with the rest 4,000 feet, down to the Matterhorngletscher. Some sixteen ascents of the Matterhorn have been subsequently made, but it must ever be an arduous and perilous expedition, save to the best trained and most experienced cragsmen.

At Last: A Christmas in the West Indies. By CHARLES KINGSLEY. Macmillan and Co.

Readers of 'Westward Ho!' will remember the singular vividness with which Mr. Kingsley described West Indian scenery. It was difficult to believe that he had not seen it, and that his minute and glowing pictures were productions of the artistic and pictorial imagination purely. 'At last,' he has actually visited the region about which he has read and dreamed and written for forty years, and the result is a book of luxuriant and gorgeous description, such as nobody but Mr. Kingsley could have written, and no one can read without catching something of his enthusiasm. He fairly revels in West Indian fauna and flora. Wherever he goes he sees some insect, or shell, or plant, or flower, or forest-tree, or geological phenomenon worth noting. His knowledge as a naturalist--his imagination as a poet--his skill as a literary artist--all combine to produce a book which is a naturalistic romance, gorgeous with colour, and riotous with enthusiasm on every page. It would be difficult to find a stronger illustration of the difference between 'Eyes and no eyes,' or of the wealth of beauty and æsthetic and devout stimulus that an instructed eye can command. Mr. Kingsley discovers nature for us as well as interprets it, and clothes the earth with a glory that duller eyes only dimly observe. It is difficult to imagine a better preparation for such a journey, or a finer combination of qualifications for describing it. Mr. Hugh Macmillan has great gifts of this character, but he must yield the palm to Mr. Kingsley. Every footstep is on fairyland. His touch opens our eyes, and we see mountain and forest, cliff and glade, shore and sea, full of the chariots and horses of God. If the book is for criticism at all, it is to be criticised as we criticise a picture. From the first departure from Hurst Castle to the return to it, Mr. Kingsley has some unthought-of thing to say, or some undiscovered beauty to point out in common things; the phosphorescent sea suffices for the prelude to his grand prose poem, and the gorgeous vegetation of the West Indian islands furnishes inexhaustible material for its substance. The book is not without its details of personal incident, its snatches of historical reminiscence and of superstitious legend, its sketches of negro life and of romantic adventure, its touches of social and political disquisition; these are skilfully woven together as only Mr. Kingsley could weave them, but they are entirely subordinate to the visions and revels of the rapturous naturalist, his pictures of tropical forests, pitch lakes, mangrove swamps, volcanic mountains, and cultured gardens. Mr. Kingsley spent seven weeks in the island of Trinidad, only glancing at other West Indian islands as the touches of the steamer enabled. His descriptions are therefore almost limited to that island. We are sorely tempted to cull some of the racy anecdotes that Mr. Kingsley tells, and to reproduce some of the superb pictures that he has painted, but we must forbear. We will say only that his science is simply the framework of popular descriptions, that his book is for the multitude, and not so much for natural philosophers, and that from beginning to end it is simply a gorgeous series of pictures, a fairyland of colour and form and wonderful adaptation, a psalm not of life but of nature, a prolonged 'Benedicite,' a companion-book to 'Glaucus,' and to the 'Essay in a Chalk Pit;' only richer in detail, more novel in phenomena, and more gorgeous in colour. The world was as beautiful when he found it, but he has made it more beautiful to our apprehension. His book has excited our enthusiasm almost as much as the scenes which it describes excited his.

To Sinai and Syene and back, in 1860-61. By WILLIAM BEAUMONT, Esq. Smith and Elder.

A very fairly written narrative of the author's journey, having the drawback that the writer is slightly given to bad jokes--thus, 'Suli-man, the boy of our party,' 'the cam-els are coming,' &c.

The route to Sinai from the wells of Moses was the more eastern one, taken by Robinson, whereby the writer missed the fine Wady Feiran, the Bedouin Paradise, which, however, he afterwards visited on his return. He was admitted to the convent of Sinai by the looped chain; more fortunate than the writer of this notice, who, arriving after sunset, had to sleep at the door in the open air, the archbishop's letter notwithstanding, but was afterwards admitted at sunrise through the postern. Surely Mr. Beaumont is wrong in saying that Tischendorf found his famous Codex at Cairo, and not at Sinai.

We can only say concerning Mr. Beaumont's book, that it is one of those painstaking records of travel which gather together round each locality, most of the important things done, and interesting things said concerning it. It has not grown, it has been made; but it is written with intelligence and commendable accuracy.

Peeps at the Far East: a Familiar Account of a Visit to India. By NORMAN MACLEOD, D.D. Strahan and Co.

India is almost as well travelled as Palestine, and a cursory traveller must have great gifts of suggestive imagination and of description to interest us in a book about it. Dr. Macleod does interest us: in addition to the gifts we have named, he has an unfailing geniality and an indomitable optimism, which give a glow of kindly interest to his pages. He went to India on official business in connection with the Missions of the Church of Scotland. Elsewhere he has reported concerning them. In this volume he only incidentally refers to them, chiefly in relation to the genial brotherhood of Christian Ministers and members of all Churches which he experienced. It is a melancholy reflection upon our home religious life that such a sensation of relief and enjoyment in this particular is realized by the traveller in America or India. We hardly know in what a bitter sectarian element we live until we get out of it. Dr. Macleod's broad, healthy, human soul heartily rejoiced in deliverance from it.

Dr. Macleod tells us about Bombay, Madras, and Calcutta--places that we have heard about as often as about Jerusalem. He describes peculiarities of Hindoo life, features of Indian scenery, and the ordinary incidents of Eastern travel; but with an observation so alert, a geniality so bright, a humour so rich, and descriptive powers so lively, that his book has a very pleasant charm; the reader's interest never flags. Bombay is less eastern than Cairo, which Dr. Macleod justly thinks is the most picturesquely oriental of all cities. European insolence to natives, which has borne such bitter fruits, is greatly diminished in India; the Mussulman is, in moral virtue and general tone, superior to the Hindoo; Hindoo villages surpass in poverty and squalor the worst specimens of Irish; English education is doing great things for India--Dr. Macleod was frequently surprised by the familiarity of the natives with our English literature; the Brahmo Somaj lacks an objective basis, and can never, therefore, firmly cohere, or make real progress. A genuine reform movement it must ever be, changing and breaking up, gaining, and losing what it gains; it wants the positive cohesive power which Christianity would give it. Dr. Macleod recounts again, with great power of description and pathos, the story of the Mutiny. In short, this book, which is elegantly got up and profusely illustrated, is full of the manifold charms of high intelligence, generous sympathy, and easy, yet brilliant description. A pleasanter book has not often fallen into our hands.

The Nile without a Dragoman. By FREDERICK EDEN. Henry S. King and Co.

Egypt is by no means an economical country to travel in for Europeans, and a Nile dahabeah, which costs from £100 to £200 per month, is an expensive luxury. Dragomans covenant to supply travellers with everything at so much per diem, according to numbers. We have known £4 paid, and we have travelled for £1 10s. Mr. Eden determined to dispense with a dragoman, hire a dahabeah of a friend, paying, however, the advertised price demanded, and he accomplished a pleasant voyage of more than four months at a cost of £60 per month. This bright and clever little book tells us how he did it. It does not deal much in antiquities or descriptions, it chiefly narrates experiences; tells us the things that Murray does not tell us. A dragoman is a very pleasant luxury, relieving the traveller of all care and many difficulties, which Mr. Eden had to overcome; but this is the final cause of difficulties, which Mr. Eden proved, although he evinces his utter ignorance of the customs and prejudices of his motley crew. For his racy descriptions of his very pleasant life, and for innumerable touches and impressions of Nile life, we must refer our readers to the volume; it is enough to say, that it scarcely suffers by comparison with that of Lady Duff Gordon.

POLITICS, SCIENCE, AND ART.

Pauperism: Its Causes and Remedies. By HENRY FAWCETT, Fellow of Trinity Hall, and Professor of Political Economy in the University of Cambridge. Macmillan and Co.

In this very timely book Mr. Fawcett commences the discussion of his subject by depicting, in somewhat gloomy colours, the pauperized state of a large class of our population. This debased condition, he believes, is not a dismal necessity which admits of no remedy, but the fruit of unwise legislation, which has produced and still encourages a disregard of those social virtues of prudence and self-restraint which can alone permanently raise and maintain the social condition of any class in the community. He proceeds to show how powerful was the influence upon our population exerted by the old Poor-law, which was in operation until 1834. The evil results which flow from bad legislation, at that time reached a height which threatened the dissolution of society, and this was averted only by the new Poor-law, which yet has failed to provide a perfect remedy, and in some of its provisions has even a tendency to discourage in our people those qualities from which we may hope for the extinction of pauperism. The practice of outdoor relief to able-bodied paupers is shown to be pernicious, and indeed ruinous in its tendency; and a very shrewd suggestion is made, or rather hinted at, for its abatement. The relief of the poor is now, it is well known, a common charge upon a union of parishes which is under the charge of a board of guardians. Permit this to continue in the case of indoor relief, but provide that outdoor relief should be a charge upon the parish in which the pauper resides. This would no doubt soon lessen the amount of outdoor relief, and would secure its administration only in cases of real and pressing necessity. Against the modern practice of boarding out pauper children, which has been recommended by many kindly and philanthropic persons, a very heavy indictment is drawn, and grave doubt is shown to exist as to its practical operation. Broadly, it may be said, that Mr. Fawcett judges of the administration of relief to the poor mainly according to its ultimate moral effects upon the class to which they belong; because he holds that the existence of a high standard of prudence and self-restraint is the only means by which any class can attain and keep a high social and physical condition. If the working classes of England are taught by the Poor-law and by misdirected charity to abandon providence and self-restraint, no power on earth can permanently improve their position, and every temporary amelioration must be soon lost in a still larger class depressed to the low level existing before the benefit was received. If, on the other hand, the virtues of providence and self-restraint be but sufficiently cultivated, it is difficult to say how high may be the standard of comfort reached by the working classes of our country.

The views we have thus slightly sketched are expanded and enforced with great clearness in the first three chapters of this book, and in the postscript, on the boarding out of pauper children. We should be glad indeed if all our legislators could be compelled to pass an examination in the first half of Mr. Fawcett's little volume, and should hope for the best results from their study of his vigorous and thoughtful sentences. In the remaining four chapters the probable effects upon the condition of the working classes of national education, co-partnership, and co-operation, and an improved land tenure, are carefully examined, and many valuable suggestions are made; but it must be obvious, on Mr. Fawcett's own principles, that except these remedial measures have a direct tendency to produce prudence and self-restraint, they can only afford temporary relief, to be followed by a depression to the previous low condition. This is the great lesson taught by the learned professor, and taught with abundant illustration and convincing argument; and we hold that it is a lesson which our people greatly need to learn.

At the present time, probably, the greatest hindrance to a real improvement in the condition of the working classes is the feeble sentimentality which prevails so widely in modern society, and which finds its natural expression in that maudlin pity which doles out relief alike to idle and industrious, to the vicious and the unfortunate. By this practice, so common both in public and private charity, and which is far more deleterious in systematic and public charity than in private gifts, all the springs of care and prudence are weakened, and even that degree of providence which is admitted as needful to the middle classes, to enable them to maintain their position, is scouted as unnatural and cruel, when urged upon the working classes. Mr. Fawcett is an advanced Liberal, and one of the ablest leaders of the most democratic party in our country. We think it greatly to his honour that he has the courage and honesty so fearlessly to proclaim the true causes of most of the pauperism which exists among us; and we trust his words will be received with all the weight they deserve by that great body of working people who are especially his clients, and whose cause he is ever ready to plead.

Mr. Fawcett's book is written with great clearness and force, and we can hardly fancy any one finding political economy dull in his company. Sometimes, perhaps, the strength of his convictions seems to lead to statements so strong and unqualified as to need some correction, but we fully concur in the main drift of his argument, and recommend his book to the careful study of all interested in the investigation of the causes of pauperism.

General Outline of the Organization of the Animal Kingdom, and Manual of Comparative Anatomy. By THOMAS RYMER JONES, F.R.S. John Van Voorst

The fourth edition of Professor T. R. Jones's 'Outline' may be taken as an evidence that his work is still in demand, notwithstanding the formidable rivalry of Professor Rolleston's recent work on the same subject addressed to the same class of readers. Perhaps the less formal and technical style of treatment may be an attraction to some students of comparative anatomy. Men who give themselves to the study of what are called the descriptive sciences, have often had their attention directed to them in the first instance by their pictorial attractions, and they retain a certain license in dealing with these branches of learning which neither instructors nor students of the more exact sciences would permit themselves. Professor R. Jones has taken his full poetical license, and the parts of the work which display it in the highest degree are peculiarly his own. There is no objection to this mode of treatment so long as it does not take off the attention of the learners from the more general and harder parts of the subject. But the comparative anatomy of the whole animal kingdom is so vast that if the author allows himself to run after the descriptions which are of most interest, his presentation of the whole subject is likely to be fragmentary and imperfect.

The previous editions of this work have stood almost alone as popular elementary manuals, and this edition contains very few additions to the former ones--such only, in fact, as have been forced on the author. He has designedly hung in the rearward of the science, and is a collator rather than a critic or an investigator. Thus he cannot resist the claims of the Cælenerata to be ranked as a sub-kingdom, and the adoption of Free and Leuckart's classification has compelled him to transpose the positions of the Anthozoa and Hydrozoa. This, however, is almost his only classificatory innovation. By a convenient conservation he still retains the Cirrepedia as a distinct class, while the Rotifera are placed under the Crustacea. The Brachiopoda are still interposed between the Conchifera and Gasteropoda. The Amphibians are not separated from the Reptilia. These antiquated ideas of classification are to be regretted; but inasmuch as the object of the volume is to describe, rather than to classify, they need not be condemned as erroneous. When treating of the vertebrate classes, the author becomes little more than the interpreter of Professor R. Owen, and we deplore that a theory of the elements of a vertebra which has never been generally adopted by the scientific world should be introduced into a student's book without criticism or comment.

The principal additions which appear in this edition are pictorial, and the new pictures are, for the most part, illustrative of natural history rather than of anatomy. An exception to this is, however, found in the introduction of Mr. Albany Harcock's very instructive delineation of Waldheimia Australis.

An absence of dogmatism in dealing with the natural sciences is, for some reasons, commendable, but all instructional works must be dogmatic. To place two quite contradictory descriptions taken from two authors side by side, without aiding the student to determine in any way which is the truthful one, is quite inexcusable, and yet this is precisely what is done with regard to Dugè's and Dr. Williams's descriptions and theories of the functions of the organs of the earth-worm. Old errors are still retained in this new edition. Thus the description of the generative system of the common snail is repeated word for word from the old edition, although the views there taken are certainly wrong.

We have freely remarked on the shortcomings of the work, but with all its faults it has been long known as a very interesting and popular treatise on a subject which is very difficult to treat as a whole, and we do not doubt it will retain its popularity in its present form.

Wonders of the Human Body. From the French of A. Le Pileur. Blackie and Son.

This is a work on human anatomy and physiology so treated as to form an easy, familiar, and interesting book of study for the public of both sexes. It is not of any special 'wonders,' but of the whole structure of the body, minus those parts of anatomy which are unfit for the young, of which the book treats. No doubt the whole body is a world of wonder, and therefore the title is allowable, and was meant to be attractive, but it is a little liable to mislead. This is, indeed, a painstaking and systematic description of the structure and functions of all the anatomical elements and complex organs throughout the body, illustrated by good clear diagrammatic drawings. It is by no means so charming in its style as Professor Huxley's little volume on the same subject, but it is more equable in the attention it bestows on the several parts of the body, and so far is better suited for the kind of general school instruction for which we assume it is intended.

POETRY, FICTION, AND BELLES LETTRES.

The Coming Race. William Blackwood and Sons.

The author of 'The Coming Race' treads in the steps of the author of 'Gulliver,' haud passibus æquis, indeed, but with an individuality and a power that are altogether his own, and with a geniality in the delicate and subdued irony of his satire that makes his book as pleasant as it is clever. In competent hands, no form of allegory so lends itself to the castigation of the follies of an age, or to the embodiment of previsions and prognostications. It constitutes a little literature of its own, which boasts of some remarkable productions.

'The Coming Race' inhabit a subterranean world, into which the author was precipitated while at the bottom of a mine; and in the inhabitants thereof we are led to contemplate the good and evil of certain social theories and scientific speculations realized in actual result. There is no savage castigation of vices, nor cynical delineation of abortions, but a quiet, keen, playful exhibition of possible good and probable evil; of things to be desired and of things to be shunned. The author is too serious for ridicule, and too sly for gravity. His tone is that of a good-natured optimism, with just a touch of banter. Probably, he himself would find it difficult to balance the exact gain or loss of the changes he conceives. It is difficult, indeed, to determine when he is indulging in day-dreams, when in subtle satire. He is a citizen of the American Republic, and as such is in the best subjective condition for appreciating the unconventional. In this also there is a touch of sly satire. He realizes in his pallid world what Brother Jonathan boasts so much about, the actual apotheosis of republican liberalism, social equality, and religious and scientific knowledge. We cannot even indicate the vast variety of problems that in these several departments find their solution. We can only, in a loose way, mention a few of the phenomena of life in the nether world. Deprived of solar light, it is compensated by science, and innumerable lamps constitute perpetual day, but of a pale hue. Its strange flora and fauna are described. Its inhabitants are a giant race, perfected through long processes of natural selection, and advanced to unthought-of possibilities of scientific culture. They have attained to a perfect practical knowledge of mesmeric force or 'vril;' a tube in the hands of a child is charged with an agency so terrible that it would annihilate an army, and yet so delicate and subtle that it soothes a nervous impatience--a force so perfect that it cannot be used in strife. Absolute equality, social harmony, and tranquil happiness are not only the privileges, they are necessary conditions of social existence; leisurely enjoyment, consummate knowledge, virtue cultured into an instinct, are its natural causes. Mechanism has been so perfected that automaton figures render all necessary domestic service, and locomotion is equally facile on the earth, in the water, or through the air. Of course, their laws are perfect; government is a high social duty from which men shrink, save as moral obligation constrains, self-seeking being annihilated. Wise provision against over-population is made by regulations for emigration. The women are bigger and cleverer than the men, having greater power over the mysterious 'vril;' and in love matters have men's privilege of 'speaking first,' love being of more importance to women than to men. Democratic government--the government, that is, of the most ignorant--is denounced as superlative folly--Koom-Posh; and the utmost scorn is poured upon our legislation, war, and social habits, as the absurdities of a barbarous age and people. Learned disquisitions on language, literature, and the arts suffice to show, at any rate, the accomplishments of the writer: and the tender susceptibilities of which the hero was the victim from the Vril-ya women supply a pleasant touch of humanity. The people, in short, have attained a development which is as far ahead of ours, as ours is of our anthropoid ancestors. They have penetrated the chief secrets of nature, and almost got rid of all human ills. Theirs is a paradise of physical, scientific, social, and moral perfection; wealth is disliked, power is shunned, crime is unknown, and force is unnecessary. But somehow the general result is unsatisfactory and melancholy. The book is an able and remarkable one. Much wisdom, as well as much learning, is veiled under its ingenious allegory; the reductio ad absurdum is suggested with exquisite subtlety. It is one of the cleverest satires of its class.

The Songstresses of Scotland. By SARAH TYTLER and J. L. WATSON. Strahan and Co.

Notwithstanding some slight tendency in two or three of these sketches to attempt a story when there is no story to tell, this is as charming a book of its class as we remember to have read. A single ballad sometimes gives fame, as, for example, the 'Werena my Heart Licht' of Lady Grisell Baillie; but then all that we care to know about its author may be told in a paragraph. With others, however, it is different. Song-writers like Mrs. Cockburn, Lady Ann Barnard, and the Countess of Nairn, are so much more than song-writers that they amply deserve the separate biography which has already been produced of the latter, and which, we are glad to learn, is being prepared of the former. Scotch ballads, like Scotch whisky, have their own peculiar flavour, and it has a special charm for Englishmen. We should be ashamed to have to confess how many mediocre verses in poetry, and dialogues in novels, delight us simply in virtue of their Scottish dialect. There are Scotch ballads, however, that, in virtue of their intrinsic merits, will live for aye. The biographies which the industry and skill of Miss Tytler and Miss Watson have here supplied are those of Lady Grisell Baillie (1665-1746), author of 'Werena my Heart Licht,' immortal chiefly in virtue of its single refrain, 'And werena my heart licht I wad dee;' Jean Adam (1710-1765), author of 'There is nae Luck about the House,' who was a pedlar; Mrs. Cockburn (1712-1794), author of 'The Flowers of the Forest;' Miss Jean Elliot (1727-1805), author of another 'The Flowers of the Forest;' Miss Susanna Blamire (1747-1794), author of 'What ails this Heart of Mine,' and 'Ye shall walk in silk attire,' &c.; Jean Glover (1758-1801), author of 'O'er the Muir among the Heather;' Mrs. Elizabeth Hamilton (1758-1816), author of 'My ain Fireside;' Lady Ann Barnard (1750-1825), author of 'Auld Robin Gray;' Baroness Nairne (1762-1851), author of 'The Land o' the Leal,' 'Caller Herring,' 'The Laird o' Cockpen,' &c.; and Joanna Baillie (1762-1851), author of 'Woo'd and Married and a',' 'Saw ye Johnny Comin,' &c. A more charming miscellany of gentle thought and lyric sweetness it would be difficult to find. As might be expected with woman's songs, there is but little of the national and political fierceness that inspires so many of the Scotch ballads of the other sex. Even the Jacobite songs of Lady Nairne are so gentle and winsome that the stoutest old Hanoverian Whig might easily sing them. But the chief charm of the book is the sketch of the delicious old lady, Mrs. Cockburn, the friend of Allan Ramsay, Burns, and Scott, and surely the most vivacious, witty, and optimist octogenarian that ever lived. She was one of the queens of Edinburgh society, and the authoresses have had access to her letters, which Walter Scott so highly prized, and which for gossiping fulness, vivacious interest, intellectual sparkle, and versatile cleverness, can hardly be surpassed. She was the life and soul of the social life which she helped to mould. We are glad to learn that a biography of this clever and beautiful old lady is in preparation. Meanwhile we commend the 'Songstresses of Scotland' as a delightful book. Everything that Miss Tytler touches she adorns, and she has here hit upon a genial and interesting theme.

Arber's English. Reprints.--Tottel's Miscellany, 1550; Thomas Lever's Sermons, 1550; William Webbe's Discourse of English Poetrie, 1587; The First Printed English New Testament. Translated by WILLIAM TYNDALE. Photo-lithographed from the Unique Fragment now in the Grenville Collection, British Museum. London: 5 Queen-square, Bloomsbury.

Mr. Arber continues his munificent and inestimable work with increasing efficiency, and we infer with increasing encouragement. Certainly no attempt to bring the curiosities and treasures of our early English literature within the reach of the very poorest student and the common reader is at all comparable to it. For a shilling may be purchased copies of precious treasures which wealth could not buy.

'Tottel's Miscellany' is the first known collection of English verse, the progenitor of the countless volumes which now load our drawing-room tables, and defy criticism. Tottel's collection includes poems by the Earl of Surrey, Sir Thomas Wyatt, Nicholas Grimald, and ninety-five by 'uncertain authors.' Either our forefathers three centuries ago had very contracted ideas about literature, or it was more affluent than we suppose--for we find William Webbe, in his 'Discourse of English Poetrie,' thus complaining of a tribulation which we thought was peculiar to modern reviewers. 'Among the innumerable sortes of Englyshe bookes, and infinite fardles of printed pamphlets, wherewith thys Countrey is pestered, all shoppes stuffed, and euery study furnished; the greatest part, I thinke in any one kinde, are such as are either meere Poeticall, or which tende in some respecte (as either in matter or forme) to Poetry.' Mr. Arber has the genuine bibliophilist's afflatus: the patience with which he picks up bits of bibliographical information, and the caution and skill with which he uses it, are perfect. 'Tottel's Miscellany' was very popular in its day.

Lever was Fellow, Preacher, and Master of St. John's College, Cambridge; Pastor in exile of the English Church at Aarau; Prebend of Durham Cathedral, and Master of Sherburn Hospital. He was, as Mr. Arber terms him, one of the 'spiritual children' of the Reformation, the associate of Latimer, Bradford, and Knox. These three sermons, after the manner of the times, deal with public and passing topics, manners, and customs, and are valuable not only as part of the religious but as part of the domestic history of their day. Lever was a man of Latimer's type--superlatively faithful and fearless.

Webbe's 'Discourse of English Poetrie' is a reprint of a very rare book, only two copies of it being known to exist. Webbe was a Cambridge graduate, and a very accomplished, modest, and able man. Singularly his critique on English poetry was almost synchronous with the greater work of Puttenham, on 'the Arte of English Poesie,' which Mr. Arber has already reprinted in this series. Webbe's discourse contains a good deal of shrewd penetrating criticism. He was well acquainted with the classical poets, and made experiments in translation, with a view of naturalizing classical feet.

The facsimile of the fragment of Tyndale's 'First Printed English New Testament' is a great literary, as well as religious curiosity. Well may Mr. Arber speak of the reverence, almost the awe, with which he offers the 'photographic likeness of a priceless gem in English literature,' the progenitor of the millions of English Scriptures. Mr. Arber accompanies the work with a very extensive and multifarious bibliography, giving an account of Tyndale and Roy, and of the first two editions of the English New Testament; and discussing the question whether Tyndale's quarto was a translation of Luther's German version. It is a perfect luxury to read the scholarly, modest, and painstaking bibliography of Mr. Arber. We earnestly direct attention to his invaluable labours.

The Novels and Novelists of the Eighteenth Century. By WILLIAM FORSYTH, M.A., Q.C. John Murray.

Mr. Forsyth's book hardly falls within the scope of criticism. Gossip is scarcely amenable to the laws of art, and Mr. Forsyth's research is not wide enough, nor are his reflections profound enough to deserve any other description. It is, however, very pleasant gossip, and will both amuse and instruct, even if it amuses rather more than it instructs. The eighteenth century has now passed into the region of history, and we study it with the same merely historical interest with which we study the fifteenth. We read the books of the eighteenth century as we read the classics--not as we read the authors who reflect our own ideas, and manners. Fielding is perhaps now less read than at any other time, and chiefly by literary men in the way of their profession, or by historical students. We would forgive Mr. Forsyth the admitted defects of his book, if it did anything to arrest the progress of this classical oblivion. That, however, does not seem to be Mr. Forsyth's intention. He seems to have been a good deal surprised when he found, in the course of his studies, that he had got into such disreputable company, and was correspondingly disgusted. Much of the book is accordingly occupied with criticism, in which the author is very hard on the immoral novelists, who only aimed at describing the times as they were. Mr. Forsyth does not maintain that they were unfaithful to the reality, and therefore criticises the age rather than the books which mirrored it. But that kind of criticism belongs to an almost extinct school.

The Life and Writings of Joseph Mazzini. Vol. VI. Critical and Literary. Smith, Elder, and Co.

The critical and literary writings of Mr. Mazzini are not purely literary, and their criticism is not disinterested. The prophetic function and the critical are not quite compatible, and Mr. Mazzini is a prophet of the Old Testament order, though unhappily with the fate of Cassandra. The political passion burns too hotly in him to admit of the coexistence of that pure critical instinct which has no enthusiasms, and which maintains its impartiality by holding aloof from affairs. Accordingly the objects of his admiration belong to the militant class in literature; he subordinates Homer to Dante, Goethe to Byron, and, we suppose, Fielding to George Sand. If he would not exactly define genius as the spirit of revolt, he would say that sympathy with the active movements of humanity is an essential constituent of it. An organ for apprehending thought as such, ideas apart from their application, he does not seem to possess. The purely spiritual side of life, the purely metaphysical side of thought, are blanks to him; yet in even the most imperfect state of society, and the most urgently needing reformation, these will always form a large part of the total life of humanity. He is, in short, the high-priest of the revolution, and grants absolution only to votaries at that shrine. The essays in the present volume are conceived in this spirit, and are less criticisms than impassioned orations, delivered with crusading fervour. That on George Sand is a discourse on the 'life of Genius,' its sorrows, aspirations, and ineradicable melancholy. That on Goethe is a denunciation of political inaction and the worship of indifference; while the greatness of Lamennais is recognised only when he ceased to be a thinker, and took to abortive action. Putting aside their absence of critical disinterestedness, and therefore of critical value, these essays are full of eloquence and genuine enthusiasm. They may be called the evangel of that section of the party of action which aspires to a great democracy of the future--a transformation that shall be more than political, more than social, that shall be almost theocratic.

The Orations of Cicero against Catiline; with Notes, &c. Translated from the German of Karl Halm, with many additions. By A. S. WILKINS, M.A. Macmillan and Co. 1871.

A Complete Dictionary to Cæsar's Gallic War. By A. CREAK, M.A. Hodder and Stoughton. 1870.

The first-mentioned of these works is, we think, the best school-book that has ever come under our notice. The excellence of the original is sufficiently guaranteed, by its appearing in Haupt and Sauppe's series, and its practical usefulness fully established by the sale of seven editions in the course of a few years. But we do not hesitate to affirm that the English edition is rendered far superior to the original by the extensive additions of Professor Wilkins, which bear ample testimony, not simply to his varied critical and literary acquirements, but also to the correctness of his judgment respecting the difficulties and wants of the generality of students. There is scarcely a note in the original to which important additions have not been made by the editor. Among the most valuable helps to the English student are the constant reference to 'Mommsen's History,' 'Ramsay's Antiquities,' and 'Madvig's Grammar.' The etymological notes by the translator often contain, within a narrow compass, the substance of the views of Curtius, Schleicher, or Corsen on the subject. More advanced students are directed for further information to the works of Bekker, Drumann, Nägelsbach, Arnold, Niebuhr, Merivale, and Forsyth. In fact, no source of illustration has escaped the editor, not even essays in the Rheinisches Museum and the Fortnightly Review. Not the least valuable contribution is the excellent analysis of the four orations, enabling the student to follow the argument at every step. We cannot speak too highly of this little volume. It is our candid opinion that here the junior student will lack nothing, and that the mature scholar may learn much. We have the greatest satisfaction in recommending it to all in search of an efficient help in studying the Catiline Orations.

The second book is quite an elementary work, somewhat on the plan of our Teutonic neighbours. The author's aim is twofold; to provide the youthful learner with a better dictionary for the reading of Cæsar, by delivering him from the bewilderment of a large one and the meagreness of a small one, and to secure from the very commencement idiomatic modes of translation. The latter is kept in view all through the work, and is the sole object of the two appendices, the first of which contains 116 idiomatic phrases, with their English equivalents; and the second, hints on translation into English. Mr. Creak very rightly maintains that a lesson in Latin translation should also be one in English composition. This work, though small and elementary, is not unimportant. It aims at correcting one great defect of most of the current school-books, and exhibits the ability of a scholar, combined with the experience of a teacher. We heartily wish the author success in his effort to shorten the tedious and cumbrous modes of instruction prevalent in our best institutions.

Homer--Odyssey. Books I--XII. By W. W. MERRY, M.A. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

School-books, in almost every department of literature, seem to be making their appearance in battalions. There are at present several rival series, which travel over exactly the same classical ground. The volume before us belongs to the Clarendon Press series, and is the precursor of a larger work on the same subject. This will probably account for the disappointing brevity of the notes and illustrations. The materials for a good edition of the 'Odyssey' are abundant, consisting of elaborate works treating of every topic connected with this ancient poem, as well as of excellent commentaries. The notes given by Mr. Merry are so brief and elementary as to convey but little idea of the labours of his predecessors. We do not believe in a school-book being overladen with explanatory matter or piled up with references to authorities, which the schoolboy will be probably unable and certainly unwilling to consult; but we do think that every annotated classical book should contain ample references to our best elementary books on grammar, antiquities, and history; the absence of which is in our opinion a serious drawback to the present edition. Mr. Merry has followed in the main the text of La Roche. The brief but excellent introduction is adapted from the pamphlet of Thomaszewski. The illustrated matter contains a sketch of the principal Homeric forms, the metre of Homer, Homeric syntax, and notes for which the commentaries of Nitzsch, Ameis, and Crusius have been consulted. The notes, as far as they go, are clear, precise, pertinent, judicious, and seem to be on the same plan, and scarcely more extensive than those on the first six books of the Iliad, in the 'Annotated Oxford Pocket Classics.'

The Georgics of Virgil. Translated by P. D. BLACKMORE, M.A. Sampson Low, Son, and Marston.

Mr. Blackmore is not only one of the best of novelists and gardeners, he is also a complete scholar and a charming poet. This translation of the 'Georgics' is a most remarkable achievement; the full significance of Virgil's words is almost always perceptible in the rendering, notwithstanding the exigencies of rhyme. We are by no means of opinion that the decasyllabic couplet is a fit metre for Virgil; that elegant Roman was as nearly as possible a Tennyson, and his tricks of versification can be admirably echoed in Tennysonian blank verse. Mr. Blackmore has more force and a stronger idiosyncrasy than Virgil had; hence, in the translation we think more of the English than of the Roman poet. To such a style of translation we do not object; we read our Virgil with a difference, with a new flavour, in fact. Just in the same way did Dryden turn Horace into a nobler form when he wrote,

'Not heaven itself upon the past has power, But what has been has been, and I have had my hour.'

If we mistake not, Mr. Blackmore himself remarks somewhere, that the meaning of the New Testament comes out better in English than it possibly could in Greek; similarly, we prefer Blackmore's 'Georgics' to Virgil's. As we have here no space for anything like critical discussion, we prefer to quote the beautiful lines with which the translator apologises for his temerity.

'Indulgence have ye for a gardener's dream (A man with native melody unblest)! How patient toil and love that does its best, Clouds though they be, may follow the sunbeam.

'And in this waning of poetic day, With all so misty, moonlit, and grotesque, 'Tis sweet to quit that medley picturesque, And chase the sunset of a clearer ray.

'Too well I know, by fruitless error taught, How latent beauty hath fallacious clues, How difficult to catch, how quick to lose The mirage of imaginative thought.

'And harder still to make that vision bear The loose refraction of a modern tongue, To render sight to hearing, old to young, And fix my purview on an English ear.

'Too well I know, by gardener's hopes misled, How cheap are things which long have cost me dear; And though I fail to graft the poet here, No wilding branches may I flaunt instead.

'But yonder, lo, my amethysts and gold, So please you--grapes and apricots--constrain These more accustomed hands; unless ye deign To tend with me the kine and beeves of old.'

The pregnant felicity of this prelude will show better than any criticism Mr. Blackmore's poetic capacity.

Ancient Classics for English Readers. The Commentaries of Cæsar. By ANTHONY TROLLOPE. Horace. By THEODORE MARTIN. Æschylus. By REGINALD S. COPLESTON. Xenophon. By Sir ALEXANDER GRANT. Edited by Rev. W. LUCAS COLLINS, M.A. Blackwood and Sons.

This is a brilliant idea of Mr. Collins; and his collaborateurs have well discharged their duty. It is not only the English reader who will be thankful to Messrs. Trollope, Martin, Swayne, Grant, and Collins, but all young students, who may now grapple with portions of those great classics with more zest and profit after thus obtaining a comprehensive view of the whole works which they are compelled often to nibble at in sublime unconsciousness of their general purport or spirit. Mr. Trollope has told the wondrous story of Cæsar as far as his Commentaries reveal it, and has illustrated it throughout with geographical exposition, historical parallel, and realistic art. Bright, stirring bits of description, curt despatches, stunning condensations of campaigns into a few pages or sentences, are given in the mighty Cæsar's own words, and the story is told with grace and simplicity in nervous clear English by one of the most popular writers of the day. Mr. Martin has graduated with high honour in the school of Classical Translation before attempting this difficult task. We must confess to great satisfaction with his dainty and delicate work. He has given us a sketch of the career of Horace, and by skilful quotation has made him tell the story of his youth, of his high military career, of his relation to Mæcenas, of his health, and his tastes, of his love-passages, of his friendships, and of his religious ideas. Mr. Martin has gracefully introduced Professor Conington's translations where he preferred them to his own. Lord Lytton has not met with equal favour at his hand, though his criticisms are not unfrequently referred to.

If our readers will try and conceive what 'Hamlet' or the 'Revolt of Islam' would look like if described to some younger civilization in some language of the future, they will have an idea of the difficulty of reproducing the dramas of the ancient tragedians in the shape of a mere account of them in prose. It is not only that the exquisite art of the originals evaporates in the process, but the poetry goes, and only the great conceptions remain; even the beliefs of the ancient world lose their simplicity in transmission. But it was hardly necessary for Mr. Reginald Copleston to be so misleading as to speak of the 'gloomy deities which belong to the sphere of conscience and moral responsibility,' or to find in the Greek mythology such lessons as the 'deep and dreadful responsibility of man, the possibility of restoration from sin to purity, and the overruling providence of a supreme Creator.' Some of these truths are the offspring of Roman law, others are the growth of Christianity, but they are all modern. Aristotle certainly knew nothing of them, and anyone who carried such associations into his reading of the 'Prometheus' would find his ideas of it vitiated by a fundamental misconception. Except that Mr. Copleston's sentences are mostly halting and broken-backed, his account of the plays is otherwise good and accurate.

'Xenophon' is the father of military history, of romance, and of Boswelliana. He is less appreciated than 'Herodotus,' but is equally vivacious and interesting. We do not think, therefore, that his 'chief service to modern readers consists in the amount of information he has preserved.' There is more in his pictures of contemporary life than this. Sir A. Grant has done his work well, and 'Xenophon' ought thereby to be more attractive to English readers than he has been. We could have wished for a somewhat fuller picture of his life and times, but the exigencies of space are imperative.

The Works of Virgil, rendered into English Prose. By JAMES LONSDALE, M.A., and SAMUEL LEE, M.A. Macmillan and Co.

A prose translation of 'Virgil' is of course unreadable. We presume this is meant as a 'crib.' Davidson certainly left room for improvement, and may now be considered to be superseded by the excellent translation of Messrs. Lonsdale and Lee. The introductions are full of matter, though they are written in a pedantically antique style which was probably suggested by a not quite accurate sense of congruity.

Ralph the Heir. By ANTHONY TROLLOPE. Hurst and Blackett.

Mr. Trollope's novels contribute a distinct element to English fiction. He is the creator, almost perfect, of commonplace. If we limit his genius, it is not because it so embodies itself, for it demands genius as great to create the commonplace as the heroic or the grotesque. Extremes are always easy, they are the fault of all undisciplined force; only well-balanced and practised power can avoid them. The artistic defect of Mr. Trollope is that he never does anything else. He is a Paganini among novel writers; he fiddles exquisitely, but always upon one string. He has no situations of passion; his characters are not conceived so as to render development into passion possible. What heroics can be got out of the Bishop of Barchester or his wife, or 'Ralph the Heir'? Within his range, Mr. Trollope has wonderful variety, but before opening a new work of his we may always predicate, if not the species, yet the genus of his characters; no one would ascribe to him many-sidedness. 'Ralph the Heir' is essentially commonplace--not wicked, nor good--not weak, nor strong--in any distinctive way. A young man with a few hundreds a year, the heir-presumptive of his uncle, he has simply gone the way of many young men who ultimately settle down, as he does, into respectable country gentlemen, magistrates, and fathers. He has given himself to horse-racing, hunting, and betting, with their belongings, and has got embarrassed, his only chance of extrication being the reversion of the estate, the possession of which, however, his uncle seems likely to retain for many years. Out of these circumstances, such being his characters, the entanglements of the tale are wrought. Ralph, who is as weak in love as he is in moral habit, commits himself to a virtual declaration of affection for Clarissa, the daughter of his guardian, Sir Thomas Underwood; his pecuniary necessities press hard upon him, and drive him to the extremity of a proposal to Polly Neefit, the daughter of a wealthy breeches-maker; a brilliant cousin of Clarissa's--Mary Bonner--comes from the West Indies, with whom everybody falls in love; delivered from old Neefit by the accidental death of his uncle, Ralph proposes to her and is refused, then again to Clarissa and is refused, and at last is married by Lady Eardham to her daughter Augusta. The peculiar triumph of Mr. Trollope is that he carries his hero and the ladies through all this without a single feeling of disgust. None of the characters have much in them except Mary, who shadows a fine conception, but they are all redeemed from contempt. Pooly Neefit is vulgar, but she has strong common sense and true-hearted honesty, and knows what she is; Clarissa is a coquette, but she has tenderness and faithfulness, if not depth of feeling; the Eardhams are the Eardhams, types of scores of common-place families, who, if they think about affections at all, clearly regard them as troublesome superfluities; the viciousness and vulgar ambition of old Neefit are redeemed by a certain generosity and kindliness of social and domestic feeling. Everybody interests, nobody excites; everybody is tolerable, and commonplace. Indeed, so conscious of this is Mr. Trollope, that he devotes two or three pages at the conclusion of his novel to an apology for it, showing us how undesirable it is that every man should be a Henry Esmond, and every woman a Jeannie Deans. True: but the only hope for mean, selfish, common-place people is for literary artists to paint ideal excellence. Mere portrait-painting is not the final cause of poetry and fiction; while life-like, it must be life-idealized. Jeannie Deans has touched myriads of common-place hearts, and made them nobler. Why does not Mr. Trollope try to give us a Jeannie Deans occasionally? What good to anybody is it to paint only Ralph Newtons, except, perhaps, to excite a tolerance for common-place, an allowance for the defective men and women one meets with every day--an end important, no doubt; but why not delineate virtues and vices--nobilities and meannesses--so as to do something to excite the emulation of Ralph Newtons themselves, as well as our charity towards them?

Mr. Trollope's masterpiece in this novel is Sir Thomas Underwood, a barrister, living in chambers, with two daughters at Putney, who has been Solicitor-General, and who has been all his life purposing to write a life of Bacon--a conception, again, of a respectable form of a somewhat selfish and irresolute character, but admirably portrayed. So is Ontario Moggs, the son of Ralph's bootmaker, his rival in the affections of Polly Neefit, a red-hot Communist orator, and the working man's candidate in the Percycross election. In the description of this election, at which Sir Thomas was returned and then unseated on petition, Mr. Trollope has excelled himself. Contested elections have often been described; Thackeray, Dickens, and George Eliot especially, have found them as fruitful in humour as Hogarth did. George Eliot excepted, we doubt if any living writer could approach the skill and power with which the election of Percycross, the tactics of its candidates, and the characteristics of its free and independent electors are described; happily, it is now disfranchised for bribery.

Mr. Trollope's selection of types of characters and his successful delineation of them are equal even to his best work. Sir Thomas and old Neefit are not surpassed by Mrs. Proudie and Archdeacon Grantley. Every portrait is characteristic, and is most carefully finished. There are few things in fiction finer than the subtle admixture of excellencies and defects in Sir Thomas. We do not care much for 'Ralph the Heir;' we feel neither great indignation at his sins nor great satisfaction with his virtues. He will be as happy as a nature like his can be. Old Neefit is, in his way, as distinctive in drawing and indelible in impression as Pickwick himself, only, of course, far less agreeable.

Mr. Trollope is a Dutch artist, and paints with the fidelity of a Teniers and the power of a Paul Potter. It is not the highest school of art, but Mr. Trollope is a master in it, and 'Ralph the Heir' is one of his greatest pictures. If one word may designate it, it is a novel of selfishness exhibited in various striking types, not pleasant, but unquestionably powerful, and likely to live when many things that Mr. Trollope has done are dead and forgotten.

Joshua Marvel. By B. L. FARJEON. Tinsley Brothers.

The promise which we recognised in Mr. Farjeon's 'Grif' is more than fulfilled in 'Joshua Marvel.' The author, with a rapidity which is really surprising, has acquired a mastery of delineation and a delicacy of touch, that give him high rank among brothers of his craft. The opening chapters, which delineate the boyish friendship of Joe and Dan, and the bird-fancying of the poor little cripple, are as full of delicate beauty and pathos as anything that we have for a long time read. Indeed, the entire history of the friendship of the two lads is exquisitely conceived and wrought out. In its unselfishness, tenderness, truthfulness, and moral beauty, it is like the love of David and Jonathan. Like the author of 'Episodes from an Obscure Life,' Mr. Farjeon's strength lies in his descriptions of East-end life. Like him, too, he idealizes it by the delineation of noble thoughts and faithful love. The old sailor--Mr. Meddler--the Lascar--Minnie--Ellen--as well as Joe and Dan, are all portrayed in a very masterly manner; while all is idealized, nothing is exaggerated. Joe is a very noble character. The shipwreck, and the experiences in the Australian forests, which Mr. Farjeon's colonial life qualify him for describing with great truthfulness and power of colouring and incident, are narrated in a very powerful way. The quiet beauty and pathos of the story have greatly charmed and moved us. It is a pure, wholesome book, carefully and skilfully written, the precursor, we hope, of many more.

Tales of the North Riding. By STEPHEN YORKE. Smith, Elder, and Co.

The title of this book led us to expect that 'Stephen Yorke' had attempted to do for Yorkshire what the author of 'Lorna Doone' has so admirably done for Devonshire, or what, in his 'Wenderholme,' Mr. Hammerton has done for the Yorkshire and Lancashire borders. We are disappointed. 'Stephen Yorke' is not the impersonation of a genius loci, although there is no reason to deny that she may be a Yorkshire-woman; nor have the four stories any very distinctive local colouring. Neither the descriptions of natural scenery nor the reproduction of the vernacular is characteristic enough to necessitate a Yorkshire locale rather than a Devonshire one. It might be an imperfect representation of either, save, indeed, that the items of natural configuration catalogued are more true of Scarborough than they are of Lynton. The forte of the authoress certainly does not lie in description. We can, however, speak much more favourably concerning her powers of portraiture. The characters of her four stories are well conceived and delicately discriminated. The tone is artistic and tender, and the treatment skilful; a quiet and acute observation of the gentler sorrows of human life, sometimes, however, as in Lizzie--the heroine of Thorpe House Farm--developing into sad domestic tragedy, and considerable power in daguerreotyping it, are the writer's forte. Thorpe House Farm is the best story of the four, and is very pathetic; when the authoress attempts stronger positions she becomes sensational, as in the quarrel of 'Squire Hasildene and his Son,' and the rough winter experiences of the latter in Danesborough. There is much that is natural and touching in the delineation of Mrs. Wynburn and her daughter; the yearnings of the mother, and the breaking down of the cold reserve of the daughter after the not very original mishap which befel her. Sophia Wynburn is a very clever creation. The book is not great, but there is a certain something in it which indicates a power of character-painting which itself has not adequately realized, and which may, when it has shaken off what 'A. K. H. B.' would call a little of the 'vealy,' and when it has acquired the confidence and skill of practised writing, develope into a distinctive gift. The stories are very pleasant reading--that is, they are admirable in tone and interesting in execution.

For Lack of Gold: A Novel. By CHARLES GIBBON. Blackie and Sons.

Success has produced upon Mr. Gibbon the effect that it always does produce upon true men: it has animated him to painstaking effort. 'For Lack of Gold' is a piece of very genuine workmanship, and its effect upon us is that we have to restrain our strong inclination to eulogize instead of criticize. The defect of the story is that the painful tension is too great; it wants the relief of quiet scenes and composed feelings. Angus and Annie are in a chronic agony. Shakespeare understood the tragic art better; strong passions can be only occasional, and 'Lear' without the fool would be too painful. This, however, is almost the only fault we have to find. The writing is good, and the little descriptive bits evince the keen and careful eye as well as the skilful hand of an artist. The beautiful and tender touches with which the work is inlaid--the genuine pathos of even the most intense feeling is very powerful; the well-regulated freedom of the artist's hand--the carefully-studied tone of the dialogue--the constructive skill of the plot--the fine moral atmosphere of the whole--even the humour of the mere Scottish dialect--all are accessories essential to the best work, but in one or more of which even very good work is sometimes lacking. But the prime quality of every novel is its characterization, and in this Mr. Gibbon has been eminently successful. The conception of Annie's character, and of the blind instinct of noble, self-sacrificing love that always guides her rightly even when she seems to be acting most fatally, are very able and beautiful. Angus, again, in another way exhibits the same characteristics, the difference being chiefly that between man and woman, for in love it is true that the superiority is with the woman. Angus's mother is after the type of Robert Falconer's mother,--a fine Scottish matron, full of Calvinism and stern tenderness. Annie's father, and Dalquherrie, the evil geniuses of the piece, are also well conceived; they exhibit two natural, types of selfishness. Nor must we omit to mention that strange compound of incontinence, soldierliness, eccentricity, and fidelity,--the Deil--a creation worthy of Scott.

Altogether we congratulate Mr. Gibbon on a second very marked success, which bids fair to place him, as a describer of Scottish forms of our common humanity, at no very great distance from George Macdonald.

The Beautiful Miss Harrington. By HOLME LEE, Author of 'Basil Godfrey's Caprice,' &c. Smith, Elder, and Co.

The accomplished writer who passes by the pseudonym of Holme Lee has added to her reputation by this novel. It is written with great care and felicitousness of style, with perfect taste, and much delicacy of conception. As might be expected, it is pure as the driven snow, and very life-like in delineation. It professes to be written by one of the principal actors in the tragic story, the wife of the rector of the parish in which the history developes itself, and every complication of event and thought, and all the balancings of motive reach the reader through the heart and mind of this one individual. She is a nimble, strong-minded little woman, with an abhorrence of shams, and an outspokenness at times quite astonishing. This old, old story of love arrested by family pride and selfishness, and ending in cruel disappointment and perverse conjugal relations, in a semblance of madness, in cruel suspicions, fever, and death, has often been told, but not often from the standpoint of a sympathetic, loving spectator and intimate friend of the suffering heroine. The only drawback is, that we are never admitted to the secret heart of any masculine actor in the drama; we are never introduced into the privacy of the lover, or the father, or the grasping heir-at-law of the 'beautiful Miss Barrington.' The presumed biographer is always present, or quoting extracts from Felicia Barrington's letters, or relating the gossip of her friends or her enemies. We question whether poetical justice is altogether done, either to the selfish father, the long-suffering husband, or to the sneaking, hypocritical reptile who is the marplot of Felicia's happiness. There are so many ways in which the machinations of her enemies might have easily been disappointed, that it is evident that Holme Lee repudiates the position of being 'privy councillor to Providence,' to use one of her own expressions. Felicia does conquer world, flesh, and devil after a fashion, and her cruelly-used, high-minded, but intolerably blundering lover, notwithstanding his gentleness and his Victoria Cross, his forbearance and patience, deserves his fate; but then, after he has intentionally broken the tender heart of the heroine, he provokingly consoles himself with another love. We are not sure that a ward in Chancery and heiress of entailed estates could have conferred on her husband such powers as the wife and daughter of Mr. Barrington successively entrusted to him; but let that pass. We thank Holme Lee for her fascinating story, the moral of which is,--let young lovers be true to their plighted word, though fathers, guardians, duennas, family dignity, titled suitors, death's heads and cross-bones all demand instant and precipitate repudiation.

In that State of Life. By HAMILTON AÏDÉ. Smith, Elder, and Co.

There is not much to be said about Hamilton Aïdé's little story. The plot is slight. Maud, the stepdaughter of Sir Andrew Herriesson, a pompous, irascible, narrow-minded baronet, is goaded into clandestinely leaving his house, after refusing a wealthy match upon which he was beset. She answers an advertisement, and becomes an under lady's maid, with a stipend of twenty pounds a year, to Mrs. Cataret, whose son falls in love with her, and, after a due amount of difficulty and fuming, marries her. The story is told in a simple, straightforward way, and the characters are well delineated, especially that of the vivacious half-French Mrs. Cataret, and of noble-hearted John Miles, the curate. If the story does not encourage ill-used baronets' stepdaughters to run away, it may, harmlessly enough, fill up an idle hour.

Squire Arden. By Mrs. OLIPHANT. Hurst and Blackett.

Mrs. Oliphant has won such a position among our lady novelists--second only among living writers to that of George Eliot--that it is almost enough to announce a new story from her pen: certainly it is superfluous to speak of her characteristics as a writer; they are as well known as those of Anthony Trollope. Like other writers, however, her productions are not all of equal excellence, and although there are in 'Squire Arden' elements of literary skill and imaginative power which would arrest the attention and excite the interest of any critic, it cannot be designated one of her best works. The story is not a cheerful one. Its plot is very simple. Edgar Arden, a young man whom his father has hated and kept abroad, finds himself, soon after attaining his majority, the Lord of Arden, with an only sister, between whom and himself there exists a strong affection. Clare has the Arden blood in her; with much that is excellent derived from her mother, she has the imperious temper of her father. The redeeming feature of her character is her love for Edgar. The new experiences of the heir are described. A few of the village characters are introduced, notably Dr. Somers, the village doctor, a bon vivant, clever and good at heart, but somewhat cynical; his sister, Miss Somers, a very clever creation, a kind of pious Mrs. Nickleby; Mr. Fielding, the gentle, kindly rector, and some of the peasants. At the house of one of them a Scotchwoman, Mrs. Murray, and her granddaughter, Jeannie, come to lodge. The Pimpernels, Liverpool merchants, come on the stage, but little comes of it; so do the aristocratic neighbours, the Thornleighs. A cousin, Arthur Arden, a half worn-out and penniless man about town, turns up, and schemes to marry Clare, to the great distress of everybody who knows her.

The chief interest centres in Arden. Some letters are discovered in a bureau proving that Edgar is not an Arden, but an adopted child, the old Squire having been at enmity with his heir. Edgar at once makes known the discovery, and surrenders the estate to Arthur Arden, the true heir, whose coarse, servile selfishness comes out. Edgar proves to be the grandson of Mrs. Murray. The three volumes are occupied with the simple development of this. The fault of the story is its prolixity; it doesn't get on. Chapter after chapter is filled with analyses of everybody's feelings and reflections, and with details of everybody's movements, until the reader is really wearied. The burthen of three volumes lies heavily upon both writer and reader. Like every story that Mrs. Oliphant writes, the book is full of good sense and clever things, but she should either have put into it more subordinate and varied incidents, or have made it shorter. It is altogether melancholy. We pity the villagers who have Arthur Arden for their Squire; we pity Edgar, who goes forth almost penniless; but most of all we pity Clare, whose defects hardly deserved such a retribution as Arthur for a husband.

A Snapt Gold Ring. By FREDERICK WEDMORE. Smith, Elder, and Co.

A story of ill-consorted marriage and of the evil that comes of it. The point of contrast is between gifts and goodness--the power of intellect and the greatness of love. Madeline, the simple, loving wife, is well delineated; so is her cousin Kate, the sempstress and actress. The writer has no great depth, but is well acquainted with places and people, and with artist-life, and he tells his story and points its moral fairly well.

Shoemakers' Village. By HENRY HOLBEACH. Two vols. Strahan and Co.

Mr. Henry Holbeach cannot write without saying many clever things. He has an eye for the humours of men and the oddities of religious persuasion. From an outside standpoint he can see the incongruities of strongly marked religious profession with the common affairs of life and business. If Serene Highnesses or great ecclesiastics were represented with their feet in hot water, and with bowls of toddy at their side, and seen to be intent on expelling the results of superfluous rheum from their systems, or if Prime Ministers were honestly painted at their sport or personal business, the incongruities of their great professions and their positive actual doings would seem as laughable as the toy-shop and bill-discounting and mutton pies of 'cumbersome Christians.'

There are many scenes and bits of description in these volumes which are almost worthy of Robert Browning, or Mrs. Oliphant; but Mr. Holbeach seems often to be trying to produce a droll or a weird effect, in which he never quite succeeds. For our part, we laughed when he clearly meant us to weep, and we failed to see anything ludicrous in the incongruities and weaknesses which he so painfully depicts. As to plot or scheme in 'Shoemakers' Village,' there is scarcely the apology for one. A few mysteries, of no earthly interest, are supposed to be lying under our feet, or huddled up in dark corners, ready to break forth upon the hum-drum life of the principal characters, but they vanish away, without conferring any interest on the narrative. The character of Cherry White, alias Tomboy, is freshly and vividly drawn; and the simple sweetness of her life, just opening to the significance of love, and making her the confidante of everybody in 'Shoemakers' Village,' redeems the story from absolute insipidity; but why she should have been drowned in a horse-pond, in the attempt to save the life of a 'malignant epilept,' who was her only enemy, baffles our philosophy; and we feel that the ugly splash she must have made, when she was dragged into the muddy pool, disfigures the entire story with uncanny stains. However, the separate characterizations of the 'Shoemakers' Village' reveal a touch of real power. We would respectfully advise Henry Holbeach to keep to those higher walks of literature, where he has won for himself so just a reputation.

Historical Narratives. From the Russian. By H. C. ROMANOFF. Rivingtons.

Madame Romanoff has translated six Russian tales or sketches--three by S. N. Shoubinsky and three by V. Andrèeff. She has, she tells us, taken great liberties with Mr. Andrèeff's original narrative, which is extremely disorderly and rambling. She has curtailed it; and from its parts or chapters has compiled one continuous narrative. The result is not very satisfactory. The stories of Catherine the Great and the Emperor Paul are very timidly told--either from the cautiousness of the original or the courtliness of the translator. Strange romances are possible under a despotism, and few nations have more tragic or wonderful court tales to tell than the semi-oriental, semi-barbarous despotism of Russia; but whether it be autocrat or favourite, it is necessary that the story should be told fearlessly and fully. Neither concerning the venal favourites about whom Shoubinsky tells us, nor the scandalous monarchs upon whom Andrèeff employs his pen, do we get this. We have read the stories with a certain interest; but we have felt in doing so that 'the half was not told us.' Ugly facts are covered over with gentle euphuisms, and manifest barbarians are decently clothed. It is the shadow of history that falls upon the disc, not history itself.

Restored. By the Author of 'Son and Heir.' Hurst and Blackett.

'Restored' is a very conscientious and clever novel, and deserves a much fuller description and criticism than we can bestow upon it. It is a piece of very honest, painstaking work; its plot and characters are fresh, and escape the conventional type of novel-writers; its descriptions indicate a close study of nature, an eye to observe, and a considerable power of reproduction; while its narrations and dialogues are inlaid with thoughtful observations and vivacious disquisitions on men and things. The writer has made her book a repertory for much of her philosophy of life. It would, for instance, be possible to glean from it something like a complete theory of the 'Woman's Right' question; and we must do the authoress the justice to say that her views are generally just and her remarks sensible. The book, in short, is full of sterling stuff, and will bear more than one perusal. Evidently, it has been a labour of love, written with literary care and pride, and with a purpose much higher than that of mere amusement. The writer's aim is high, and it has achieved a signal success. Mr. Malreward, of Malreward Park, in Somersetshire, a handsome, almost unmitigated scoundrel, had married the sister of the Rev. Arthur Byrne, rector of Tintagel--we beg pardon, Trevalga--on the northern coast of Cornwall. He soon breaks her heart; and her two children, Victor and Frederica, become the charge of the rector, until Harry, Mr. Malreward's eldest son by a former wife, is killed by being thrown from his horse, and Victor becomes the heir, and has to reside at Malreward Park. The story turns on his temptations there, under the bad influence of his father, who is brute as well as devil, and once almost kills him. Strong in noble principle, Victor is faithful, aided by Deverell, the head-keeper, a striking character, an illegitimate son of Mr. Malreward. Deverell is accused of Mr. Malreward's death, and Victor is suspected of implication in it. After a few years, during which, under most disheartening conditions, Victor redeems the estate and regenerates its peasantry, he dies of fever, after a deed of noble heroism. Freddy, his sister, has married Stansfield Erle, a cold, selfish, self-willed lawyer, whose conversion is the most improbable thing in the story--almost a psychological impossibility, we think--and her son inherits the estate. Three or four of the characters--Victor's own--Arthur Byrne, the noble-hearted rector--Deverell's, and Freddy's--are almost original in their conception, and are developed with admirable vigour, truth, and skill. The drawbacks are that Victor is too hysterical, and Stansfield Erle too much of a brute. Throughout, indeed, the agony is piled on a little too much, but there are great power, deep truth, and a wholesome moral in this really remarkable novel.

Emmanuel Church: A Chapter in the Ecclesiastical History of the Present Century. By R. THOMAS. Hamilton, Adams and Co.

A very well-written and pleasant sketch of Nonconformist church life, exhibiting the influence which a good and wise pastor will always gather, and the impotence of mere faction and folly seriously to damage it. There is great good sense in the conception of the sketch, and considerable skill in the execution of it.

Checkmate. By J. SHERIDAN LE FANU. Hurst and Blackett.

Mr. Le Fanu occupies a distinctly original position among novel writers. He is a master of what it has become the fashion to call 'sensation,' yet does not attain his ends by the ordinary methods. The stereotype characters of such stories do not appear on his pages. Never do we encounter the lovely female fiend whose first type was 'Miladi' in the 'Three Musketeers' of Dumas the inexhaustible, and who has since committed bigamies and murders (the murders of best husbands by preference) in the works of popular authors whom we need not name. Again, Mr. Le Fanu is great at a mysterious plot, but his mysteries have the immense advantage of being not entirely translucent; and in the novel now under notice we think the readers of most experience in such matters may reach the middle of the third volume without penetrating the mystery which surrounds Longcluse. It is a real puzzle, based upon an original contrivance which it would be unfair to reveal. Mr. Le Fanu has also a strongly penetrative imagination, whereby he lights up luridly the strange scenes that he describes, producing an effect like a picture by Rembrandt, or like that observable when the electric flame through a lighthouse lens falls upon some scene in utter darkness. This power of giving intense reality to description makes every chapter of our author's work worth reading. The story of 'Checkmate' we shall leave untold; it has a curious fascination about it, and will pretty surely be finished by any one who commences it. Its characters are definite and varied. Longcluse, hero and villain, successful for a long time, yet checkmated at last, is an admirable portrait. The Arden baronets, father and son, might almost be identified in Lodge or Debrett. The ladies, especially Grace Maubray and Lady May Penrose, are choice studies of patrician life; and as to Baron Vanboeren, that wonderful patron and protector of scoundrels, he is one of the most original conceptions in modern romance. Critics who question the existence of romantic brilliancy may be referred to the Times newspaper, which has daily to record events that no novelist dare imagine. Therefore we shall decline to inquire whether a Vanboeren exists or has existed--whether, indeed, his vocation is possible,--and shall simply say that he is an entirely new and strangely powerful character in the world of bizarre romance.

The Mad War-Planet. By WILLIAM HOWITT. Longmans.

Muriel, and other Poems. By E. T. WEATHERLY. Whittaker and Co.

Avenele, Desmond, and other Poems. Two vols. By SOPHIA A. CAULFEILD. Longmans.

With some distrust of our critical infallibility, we have selected these four volumes of poems out of some two dozen that lie on our table. The difference between one volume of minor poetry and another is generally infinitesimal, and we are far from meaning to imply that the volumes left unnoticed are much below the level of the others. We presume that minor poetry is written chiefly for a few congenial minds in whom similar associations produce susceptibility to similar impressions and emotions. But the critic must judge from a quasi absolute point of view, and take his stand, as it were, on the elementary passions of the mind and the cardinal facts of nature. We notice Mr. Howitt's volume not because we think it contains anything even resembling poetry, but from respect for his name, and for the sincerity of his convictions. 'The Mad War-Planet' is, unhappily, an epic, and, still more unhappily, an epic with a theory. Mr. Howitt believes the earth to be a spherical lunatic asylum, in which the thousand million lunatics are unfortunately not under restraint. The theory is, of course, not new, but the working out of it is less original and interesting than we should have expected. 'Muriel, the Sea King's Daughter,' is musical with the tones and tinged with the hues of the youngest school of poetry. But the art of it is delicate and finished, and proves a real poetic gift, apart from the echoes of Tennyson and Morris which ring through the poem. The majority of Miss Caulfeild's poems are the manifestations of an evidently unaffected piety. The poetry of them lies chiefly in a certain completeness of presentation, a severity of limitation by which the ragged edges of an emotion are made to fall off, and the mood to crystallize into a defined and beautiful form.

Pilgrim Songs in Cloud and Sunshine. By NEWMAN HALL, LL.B. Hamilton and Adams.

Few things in modern literature are much more significant than the extraordinary diffusion of the author's first publication, 'Come to Jesus.' The spirit of that musical and soothing refrain pervades these 'Pilgrim Songs,' and offers a loving rebuke to the cold and cynical criticism which it is fashionable to pronounce on Evangelical Christianity. These songs of the pilgrim are full of hope and exultation; they all seem singable on the border-land between earth and heaven. They reveal great sensitiveness to beauty, and show the kind of chord that has been struck in the heart of the writer by the loveliness of earth as well as by the deepest realities of life. There is in them a triumphant faith, born of a deep experience--a faith which does not battle with scientific speculation nor modern mysticism. It knows and does not prove, it rests and does not fret. The key-note of the volume is struck in a hymn of universal praise. The tenderness, strength, and good cheer of many of the personal meditations are helpful. A motto appropriate to the volume would be, 'Thy statutes have been my songs in the house of my pilgrimage.'

Parish Musings, or Devotional Poems. By JOHN S. R. MONSELL, LL.D. Rivingtons.

A new and neat edition of one of Dr. Monsell's volumes of exquisite sacred poems. Next to Keble and to Dr. Bonar, there is no hymn-writer of this generation to whom the Church of God owes so much. Like them, he is intensely subjective, spiritual, and tender. Many of his hymns have passed into the use of all sections of the Church, and minister richly to the best forms of devotional feeling.

THEOLOGY, PHILOSOPHY, AND PHILOLOGY.

The Doctrine of Holy Scripture respecting the Atonement. By THOMAS J. CRAWFORD, Professor of Divinity in the University of Edinburgh. Blackwood and Sons. 1871.

When Dr. Crawford published his treatise on 'the Fatherhood of God, considered in its general and special aspects, and particularly in relation to the Atonement,' we called the attention of our readers (B. Q. vol. xlvi., p. 272) to the great ability and admirable temper with which he brought various modern theories of the Atonement to the following test:--'How far do these theories represent the sufferings of Christ as a manifestation altogether unparalleled of the fatherly love of God towards all mankind.' In our opinion, he showed triumphantly that they were lamentably defective in this prime article of their alleged strength. The substance of these criticisms is introduced into the present volume, and much of the able review of the theories of Messrs. Maurice, M'Leod Campbell, Robertson, Young, and Bushnell is here repeated, with a broader reference to the whole question of the Atonement. The powerful argumentum ad hominem is, however, omitted, and the author's views of the limited extent of the Atonement are so far hinted as to make us anxious to see how he will on that hypothesis develope his strongly held thesis on the Fatherhood of God. Doubtless, the ground taken by him would be this, that the love of the Eternal Universal Father was so great to the whole of mankind that He sent His Son to save all who should believe in Him. Dr. Crawford says truly, that 'a full discussion of it would be impracticable, apart from the difficult and mysterious subject of the purposes of God.' The limitation of the extent and destination of the Atonement to those and those only who stand in covenant relation with Christ in the counsels of the Godhead, or who are in living union with the Lord Jesus Christ by faith, originates per se so many grievous difficulties that it has done more than anything else to induce the violent criticism of the orthodox doctrine of the Atonement. The not infrequent concession of this hypothesis in this able writer's discussion of other aspects of the Atonement, disturbs the almost unlimited satisfaction with which we have perused the volume. We may say further, by way of criticism, that it seems to us scarcely legitimate to place the theory upheld by Wardlaw, Pye-Smith, Jenkyn and others, on a lower platform than that of Martineau, Jowett, or Bushnell. It is certainly submitted to the most scathing criticism contained in the entire volume, and is represented in colours and terms hardly meted out to those who arraign at the bar of conscience the entire idea of substitution, and who entirely repudiate the Catholic doctrine of the Atonement. We have not space here to discuss or defend Dr. Wardlaw from this powerful attack. We have previously, in this Review, at considerable length, shown that we consider the rectoral or governmental theory insufficient, and exposed to serious objection. It is well known that Dr. Campbell, in his interesting work on the 'Nature of the Atonement,' reveals far less sympathy with the modern Calvinism of the school of Wardlaw and Jenkyn than he does with the more logical and profound principles of Calvin and Owen. But Wardlaw and Campbell, though they widely differ on the rationale of the Atonement, do both, together with Dr. Crawford, stand firmly on the position that our blessed Lord consummated a great work of redemption for human nature, which no individual of the human race could effect for himself, and this over and above that work wrought in humanity by the grace of the Spirit in virtue of the work of Christ. We beg our readers, however, to read Dr. Crawford's examination of the 'theory of sympathy,' which is made by Campbell and others to cover and explain the deep mystery of the sufferings of Christ. The alternative exhibited by Luther, that forgiveness of sins could not be conceived of in the dominion of a holy God, unless there be either a sufficient satisfaction or an adequate repentance, was accepted by Dr. Campbell; but instead of looking, with Luther, for satisfaction of a violated law, he has taken the other side of the alternative, viz., the adequate repentance for the sins of the human race, rendered from the ground of human nature, in the awful sympathy of Jesus, and in that loving consciousness of human sin and peril which filled the cup of sorrow, and broke the heart of the Son of God. Now, Dr. Crawford has not referred to the various Scriptural arguments by which Dr. Campbell endeavoured to sustain his somewhat startling thesis, but has grappled with the main proposition itself, and shown it to be insufficient to sustain the language of Christ or his Apostles; that all the elements of a complete and adequate repentance for the sins of the world could not be found in one who had no experience of sinful desire; further, that if this were possible, and were clearly stated in Holy Scripture, then, so far from the sufferings of Christ consequent on his agonizing sympathy with sinners providing the ground of forgiveness of sins, this theory would merely aggravate the offensiveness of sin, and run the danger of transforming the entire efficacy of the Atonement of Christ into the power of His example exercising a sanctifying influence upon the life of the believer.

We cannot follow Dr. Crawford in his clear, calm, candid treatment of the various hypotheses of Grotius, Maurice, Bushnell, Young, and Robertson. These controversial chapters are models of honourable debate, they are scrupulously fair in quotation, and complete in rejoinder. But it would be incorrect not to state that the greater proportion of this valuable work is expository rather than controversial; inductive rather than deductive. The author assumes no theory or theological definition from which to start, but simply enumerates, with much elaboration and care, in fourteen 'groups,' all the teaching of the New Testament on the subject of the work of Christ. The principal interpretations of these loci classici come under review, and great care is taken to make them sustain no weight greater than they can bear. The conclusions at which the author arrives are given in twelve brief sections of high and sacred eloquence. 'The confirmatory evidence of the Old Testament respecting the Atonement' is summed up under the heading of prophecy and sacrifice; and, while claiming for the Levitical sacrifices a piacular character for sins of a certain class, the non-expiatory theories of Bähr, Hofmann, Keil, and Young are carefully reviewed.

The general objections to the Scriptural doctrine of the Atonement are well handled. We call special attention to the manner in which Dr. Crawford replies to the allegation that Christ manifested personal reserve respecting the Atonement. It is well to remember that 'the purpose of our Lord's ministry was to make rather than preach, the Atonement;' that 'Christ is the subject as well as the author of the Gospel--His life, death, resurrection, and ascension are included in it as its most important elements; that the teaching of Christ was gradual and progressive, and when most advanced indicated the need of further teaching,' and then, finally, that 'this reserve has been greatly exaggerated.' Our author is most happy in refuting a variety of objections raised to the atoning character of the work of Christ from the silence of the parables, and says, most truly, that 'if we were to proceed upon the principle that anything that is not expressly mentioned in a particular passage which speaks of the forgiveness of sin may be set aside as having no connection with that blessing, I might undertake to prove that repentance is not at all necessary to forgiveness.'

We have devoted unusual space to our notice of this important book. The intrinsic grandeur of the theme, and the masterly treatment it has received from our author, must be our explanation. We have, however, touched only a very few of the points with which he has grappled. It ought to be observed, in conclusion, that he has purposely omitted all reference to the history of the doctrine of the Atonement Nor was it necessary. The treatise is, strictly speaking, a vigorous attempt to establish, by an inductive process, 'the Biblical theology' of the Atonement. Dr. Crawford does not use or defend the soteriology of the Fathers, Schoolmen, or Reformers, nor does he the confession of faith of his own Church. We have not read a theological treatise for a long time which, upon the whole, has given us greater satisfaction.

The Doctrine of the Atonement, as taught by the Apostles; or, the Sayings of the Apostles Energetically Expounded. With Historical Appendix. By Rev. GEORGE SMEATON, D.D. Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark.

We cannot too highly commend the conception and general execution of this really great theological work. Professor Smeaton may claim the honour of having inaugurated, at any rate in Scotland, a novum organum of theology. In relation to passing phases of thought in Christendom, he opposes the severely theological character of his work to 'a sort of spiritual religious or mystic piety, whose watchword is spiritual life, divine love, and moral redemption, by a great teacher and ideal man, and absolute forgiveness, as contrasted with everything forensic.' In relation to ordinary Scottish methods of treating theological doctrines, he proposes to establish the doctrine of the Atonement by a severely inductive method. In his former volume he submitted to an exegetical examination the sayings of our Lord in relation thereto; in the present volume he submits to a similar examination the sayings of the apostles. In this he has had predecessors in Germany and Holland--as for example, in the works of Schmid and Van Oosterzee, of which translations have been recently published. But in British theology he has had no predecessor, so far as we remember, in such treatment of the doctrine of Atonement. In his great work on the 'Scripture Testimony to the Messiah,' Dr. Pye-Smith adopted it in relation to our Lord's Divinity. Obviously it is the only satisfactory method. A priori theories constructed for systems of theology can never satisfy independent inquirers concerning a doctrine which, while it appeals to the principles and intuitions of our moral nature, yet as to its facts is a matter of pure revelation. The exegetical method which Professor Smeaton adopts, as opposed to the systematic theology method usually adopted, is clearly the true one.

The question, therefore, is, how far has Professor Smeaton been successful in realizing his method, and what is his exegetical ability? First, we regret that, with all its disadvantages of repetitions and lack of order, he rejected the plan of 'discussing the passages as they lie in situ in the several books,' and adopted the plan of 'digesting them under a variety of topics.' Not only does a strictly inductive method demand the former plan, but very important meanings depend upon the development of a strict chronological order. Professor Smeaton even accepts the arrangement of the Epistles in the English Testament. Next, in our notice of Professor Smeaton's former volume, we were compelled to say that he brought to our Lord's sayings much preconceived theology--that he had not thrown off the heavy burden of the Assembly's 'Confession of Faith,'and that thus his method was seriously vitiated. From this the strictly chronological method would have helped to keep him. In this volume he has perhaps been more successful, but the indications, not to say the bias, of his school of theological thought, are everywhere cognizable, both in phrase and in exegesis--e.g., the term 'surety for others' as applied to our Lord; the statement, 'according to the will of Him that sent Him, He comprehended in himself a body, or a vast multitude;' with the corresponding interpretations of 1 John ii.2. The 'whole world,' according to Professor Smeaton, is 'believers out of every tribe and nation,' 'The redeemed of every period, place, and people.' This bias, too, prompts the interpretation of 1 John i.7 in an objective rather than a subjective sense. Altogether, the subjective conditions of the Atonement are unduly disparaged, although they are not only recognised in Scripture, but are the essential complement of the objective conditions. Throughout, the theological and scholastic predominate over the exegetical and inductive. Professor Smeaton is a very accomplished scholar, and, notwithstanding the qualifications we have mentioned, a vigorous and independent thinker. His work would have been better had its method been more rigidly adhered to, but it is a great and noble work--a credit to British Biblical scholarship, and a great service to doctrinal theology.

An Examination of Canon Liddon's Bampton Lectures in the Divinity of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. By A CLERGYMAN OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND. Trübner and Co. 1871.

This writer is anxious to impale, not only Canon Liddon, but all who hold substantially the Catholic doctrine of the Person of our Lord Jesus, on one or other horn of the following dilemma:--Either Pure Rationalism is our adequate guide, or the Catholic Church is the true divine informant of man. 'Repudiate,' he virtually says, 'orthodox doctrine, or admit that the Church is the depository and organ of Divine revelation.' Protestant orthodoxy confessing Catholic exposition of Holy Scripture, is, to our author's mind, inconsistent in method and fundamentally insecure. He professes not to debate 'the truth or falsehood of a doctrine, but the security or insecurity of a foundation on which a minority of Christians have attempted to erect that doctrine.' In every variety of phrase our author charges upon Protestant interpreters of Holy Scripture, and on Mr. Liddon, as the principal illustration of the painful phenomenon, the prepossession and bias which blunt their exegetical tact; the traditionary and apparently invincible blindness which prevents their understanding the contents of the Bible; and the prejudice which so obfuscates their spiritual perceptions that they continually wrest the true significance of God's Word written, into irrational agreement with the creeds of the Church. Orthodox believers 'never read the other side.' The mastery of standard Unitarian books is no part of clerical preparation in the Church of England, and orthodox Nonconformist ministers are 'not genuinely and honestly acquainted with the adversary at all.' The moral results of Protestant orthodoxy are, in this writer's opinion, deplorable. Where anything has been effected by it, according to our anonymous author, it has not been 'in virtue of the dogma that God is three Persons rather than one Father, but in virtue of truths which are the property of Theism as much as of Ecclesiasticism.' We think he is just when he urges that 'no man or society of men, while abjuring the Church's authoritative, interpreting, and revealing functions, is legitimately empowered to bind on the conscience doctrines which have not reasonable evidence and do not admit of reasonable detailed exhibition.' He is extremely vigorous, if not bitter, in his denunciation of those Protestant divines who, according to him, already surcharged with Catholic or ecclesiastical traditions, pretend to find on Protestant principles the doctrines they know and love in the Holy Scriptures. Repeated examinations of the Bampton lecture of Dr. Liddon have convinced him that the lecturer's method is vicious and unsound, and that no 'unbiased individual judgment, rationally exercised, can deduce from the Bible the doctrines of Christ's co-equal deity.' The work which follows is a searching attempt to grapple with the Scriptural argument as presented by Mr. Liddon. There is great ingenuity in the method of attack. The author lays hold of the most consummate expression of Mr. Liddon's theology--one on which Trinitarians of different schools might join issue with him, and which can hardly be said to be the explicit doctrine of the Nicene or Athanasian Creed--viz., 'that our Lord's Godhead is exclusively the seat of His personality, and that His manhood is not of itself an individual being.' There are those who may say that in this statement Mr. Liddon somewhat verges on Monophysitism, and therefore on a special theory which is intended to explain what for ever must remain inexplicable, if the two halves of the great synthesis are both to be held with equal tenacity. We are not concerned here with this theory further than to show that the author continually supposes this fundamental principle involved by Mr. Liddon in every reference which Holy Scripture makes to the humanity of our Lord. The leading features of the Catholic doctrine in the matter seem to us to be a repudiation of any theory on the how of the hypostatic union, and a continuous assertion of the veritable humanity as well as the eternal godhead of the Christ. Our author refers to the various and abundant proofs contained in Holy Scripture of the humanity, as if they were, pro tanto, a denial of the vast induction of theology touching the Person of the Lord. He appears to imply that every investigator in this great field of theological inquiry must necessarily go through the entire induction for himself before he is at liberty to see in any particular passage of Scripture anything more than what a rigid grammatical praxis can make out of it. Let us take an analogous case: The doctrine of gravitation (together with the third law of motion) is established on a wide induction of facts, still the realization of the truth of it requires a careful elaboration of the facts in a generalized form, and a certain amount of imagination. The motion of the earth towards the falling rain-drops; or the circumstance that each fly on a window-pane drives the round earth backwards in its upward march, is absolutely inconceivable and incredible taken as a separate, isolated fact of observation; and when the observer goes to the special supposed phenomenon he must take with him pre-suppositions and broad generalizations, which countervail all the evidence of his senses. No one fact of attraction would be enough anywhere in the vast field to determine the law, or even suggest it; the majority of isolated facts taken alone would--nay, still do--suggest a counter theory; and yet, for all that, the theory of universal gravitation may be held dogmatically, and must be brought to interpret an apparently recalcitrant fact without violating any principle of induction. It does not follow, even if the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed be accepted as a true induction of the facts of the Scripture, and a broad and satisfying generalization of the revealed Essence of the Godhead and of the Person of Christ, that those who do so accept it are bound to believe the creed to be the result of supernatural guidance given to the Church; nor is it just or rational in their application of it to see all it involves in every text of Holy Scripture on which its elements are presumed to rest. Our anonymous clergyman is lavish in his terms of abuse, and, though careful to quote Mr. Liddon's own words, he does not hesitate to speak continually of his 'heedless rhetoric and readiness of assumption,' of his 'reckless verbiage and stilted exposition and neglected context,' of his 'rapacious deduction,' and 'unscrupulous eagerness, in the face of probability, to appropriate ambiguous language.' He sings a cuckoo-note of 'pre-supposition' and 'orthodox bias' blinding orthodox eyes, and all the rest of it. It would seem that those who take a diametrically opposite view of the Person of our Lord always 'calmly review the evidence,' and are never moved by any predisposition whatever. Now, nothing has seemed to us more obvious than that this clergyman of the Anglican Church has gone with a thorough Arian, if not Unitarian bias, to the New Testament, and he cannot see there what to the consciousness of millions of honest thinkers is as plain as the sun in the heavens. It would be just as easy for Mr. Liddon to turn round, and with text after text accuse his critic of foregone conclusions, of arrant scepticism, of ignorant sciolism, of colour-blindness.

We think that it is scarcely fair of this anonymous critic to promise to refute the Protestant method of Mr. Liddon in demonstrating the Deity of our Lord, and then to commence by undermining, not simply the authenticity of John's Gospel, but the trustworthiness of the synoptists. If the New Testament is to be blown upon as well as the Protestant principle, let us understand one another, and not waste time in writing our rational vindication of the orthodox doctrine of the Godhead.

It is impossible to go into the details of the criticism of Mr. Liddon in a short notice, we therefore confine ourselves to two more remarks on the principle of the volume. The author seems to think that nothing but Catholic, conciliar orthodoxy can be held to account for the perverse exegesis of Protestant theologians, and their unthinking trust in the revealed dogma of the Divine-humanity and Deity of our Lord. Surely the very fact may be in itself a vindication that, apart altogether from Church authority, and apart from the Bible also, in the history of religious thought and philosophical speculation there are predisposing causes and tendencies which lead up to this great induction. Apart from Christianity altogether, religious men have with surprising frequency believed either in Divine incarnation or in apotheosis, or in both. No wonder, when the religious instinct points so strongly in this direction, that the exegetical faculty may be assisted by it to see what mere grammar may sometimes fail to see.

The speculative view, the induction which this author would justify as the final dictum of Biblical theology, would, after all, go a long way in the direction of the truth. He admits the Christ of the New Testament to be more than man; he cannot deny He is the giver of all spiritual gifts to man, and possesses many other lofty sublime superhuman functions. The difficulty in this whole class of exegesis has been felt for ages, and appeared in the Nicene controversy; it leads to practical tritheism, to a rivalry on the throne of God. If the Biblical theory of the author be accepted, he who is less than God is, practically, the God of the Christian; but this, with the Bible in our hands, is impossible. It is the intense monotheism of the Bible, and of Christ himself, which has driven the Protestant Christian consciousness, as well as the Catholic Church, into the formulization of the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity. We cannot affect to regret that the arguments and method of Mr. Liddon should have received so searching a criticism. Our author's extra-bilious hatred of rhetoric has betrayed him into unnecessary severity of personal invective, but there is a manly and obvious desire to be fair and honourable in his treatment. It is a war to the knife over the most sacred theme in human thought, and, while we do not attempt to justify all Cannon Liddon's interpretations, or stand by all his philosophy, we believe that he is much nearer to the thought of St. John and St. Paul than his critic.

Select English Works of John Wyclif. Edited from original MSS., by THOMAS ARNOLD, M.A. Oxford, at the Clarendon Press. 1869.

These volumes were undertaken by the delegates of the University Press, at the earnest instance of the late Canon Shirley, the accomplished editor of the 'Fasciculi Zizaniorum Magistri Johannis Wyclif cum Tritico' of Thomas Netter, of Walden, one of the series of 'Chronicles and Memorials of Great Britain and Ireland during the Middle Ages,' issued by the Master of the Rolls. The learned Canon intended to have personally superintended their preparation, and to have prefixed to them an Introduction, in which he would have endeavoured to fix the exact theological position of the writer, in reference both to his own and to later times, besides probably settling, so far as the means at our disposal allow, the chronology and authenticity of the immense mass of writings ascribed to Wyclif--a task for which he was eminently qualified, having devoted the best part of ten years of his life--alas! too short--to the study of the works and age of the English Reformer. The lamented death of Dr. Shirley devolved the duty of preparing these select works for the press on Mr. Arnold, whom he had previously requested to act as his editorial assistant.

Some time before his death, Dr. Shirley had compiled, partly from previously-published catalogues of the writings of Wycliff, such as those of Bale, Leland, Tanner, Lewis, and the late editor of this Review, and partly from other sources, a carefully prepared catalogue of his own, which he issued from the press in 1865, adding to each article critical notices of the evidence on which it was assigned to the Reformer, and intimating in the preface that one of his objects in the publication was to solicit the aid of scholars generally, in making the catalogue complete. What success this intimation met with does not appear. There is but one writing of Wyclif's published in these volumes which is not included in Dr. Shirley's catalogue, the 'Lincolniensis,' vol. iii. 230. Mr. Arnold prints it from a manuscript in the Bodleian, in which it is inserted between two other tractates, both of which appear in this selection, and one of which had previously been published both by Dr. James and Dr. Vaughan, who, as well as Ball, Lewis, and Dr. Shirley, also ascribe the other to the Reformer. It would have been more satisfactory, therefore, if he had given his reasons for including it in his selection, as it is scarcely possible that it had been 'overlooked,' especially by Dr. Vaughan and Dr. Shirley, the inference from which would be that they regarded it as of much too doubtful authenticity to be even noticed; and all the more so, that although he had previously said (vol. i. 3), 'I have no doubt that this, like most of the remaining contents of the manuscript, was written by Wyclif,' in the note which he has prefixed to the tractate (vol. iii. 230), he confesses 'it cannot be denied that it contains nothing which might not equally well have been written by one of his followers, as Herford, or Repyndon, or Aston.'

Dr. Shirley's catalogue enumerates sixty-five English works which are attributed to Wyclif. Of these, however, Mr. Arnold has only published thirty-two, the others being omitted on one of the following grounds: either 'that they are certainly not by Wyclif, or that their authenticity is more doubtful than that of those selected, or that they are in themselves less valuable, or that they have been already frequently printed.' It is on this last ground, especially, that he omits the Wycket, the best known, and at one time also the most popular of all Wyclif's writings. The omissions are enumerated, vol. iii. et seqq., where Mr. Arnold also states his reasons for assigning each to the head under which it is classified. Some of these reasons are conclusive--e.g., when he rejects the 'Speculum vitæ Christianæ,' because it is found to be a little manual of religious instruction, compiled in English by the direction of Thoresby, Archbishop of York, in the year 1357. But those assigned in other cases strike us as being open to considerable question--e.g., the only one alleged for the rejection of the 'Early English Sermons' is, that 'no one except Dr. Vaughan ever ascribed them to Wyclif, and the partial examination I was able to make of them at Cambridge last year convinced me they were the production of a traveller in the well-known track of homiletics, who possessed no spark of the erratic and daring spirit of our author.' Dr. Vaughan was not the man to rashly commit himself on such a subject, and it is quite possible that his opinion was based on something more than 'a partial examination' of the MS. In other cases Mr. Arnold has endorsed his opinions, though without any reference to him; a more thorough 'examination' might, therefore, have led him to a similar agreement with Dr. Vaughan in this. But Mr. Arnold's omission of some of the other writings included in Dr. Shirley's Catalogue on the ground of their authenticity 'being more doubtful than that of others selected,' is even more summary than his dismissal of the judgment of Dr. Vaughan on the subject of the 'Sermons.' The reason he assigns is, that after carefully reading them through, he 'considered that whether from the absence of a tone of authority, or from the contractedness and poverty of the style, or from peculiarities of diction, or from the multiplied indications of a period of active persecution, it was more probable that they proceeded from some Lollard pen, writing from ten to thirty years after the Reformer's death.' And this appears in the preface to vol. iii., after his Confession in the preface to vol. i. 'Relying on the consensus of all the ordinary English historians, including Lingard. I came to the study of the questions affecting the authenticity of writings ascribed to Wyclif with the preconceived belief that the attempts of the English State and hierarchy to coerce heretical or erroneous opinions had not, previously to the enactment of the famous statute commonly called "De Hæretico comburendo," in 1401, proceeded to the length of inflicting capital punishment, either on the gibbet or at the stake. The common impression certainly is--and it was shared by myself--that no one suffered death in England for his religious opinions, by direct infliction at the hands of the magistrate, before William Sawtre, the first victim to the statute above-mentioned.... Being led to examine narrowly the grounds of the supposition above-mentioned, I came upon certain facts which tended to throw doubt ... on (it). Mr. Bond, keeper of the MSS. at the British Museum, was good enough to point out to me a passage in the Chronicles of Meaux ... which is much to the purpose.... Abbot Burton says (vol. ii. 323) that the Franciscans or a section of them, opposed certain constitutions of John XXIII., who therefore caused many of them to be condemned to be burnt, some in France in 1318, others at various places in France, Spain, Italy, and Germany in 1330; and that among the severities practised on this last occasion, "in Anglia, in quâdam sîlva, combusti sunt viri quinquaginta-quinque, et mulieres octo, ejusdem sectæ et erroris." This is indefinite, certainly, but there seems no possibility of questioning its substantial truth; and if it be true, then men and women were burnt in England for heresy before 1401!' We have no means of judging of the 'multiplied indications of a period of active persecution' in the writings which are ascribed for that reason to 'from ten to thirty years after the Reformer's death,' but they can hardly be more decided or more numerous than similar indications, even in the 'Sermons,' contained in the first and second of these volumes, the 'authenticity of which, taken as a whole,' Mr. Arnold tells us, 'cannot reasonably be questioned.' The following are examples: 'Antecrist denyeth not to alegge Goddis lawe for his power; but he seith that, if men denyen it, thei shal be cursid, slayn and brent' (vol. i. 111). 'Crist diffineth thus, that who so is wroth to his brother is worthi of judgment to be dampnyd in helle: and who so with his ire speketh wordis of scorne, he is worthi to be dampned in counsaile of the Trinitie. And who so with his wrathe spekith folily wordis of sclaundre, he is worthi to be punishid with the fire of helle. Myche more yf preestis now withouten cause of bileve sleen many thousand men, thei been worthi to be dampnyd' (vol. i. 117). 'They procuren the people, bothe more and lesse, to kille Cristis disciplis for hope of great mede' (vol. i. 153); an evident allusion to the Act surreptitiously foisted into the Statute Book by the prelates in 1382, like the following, 'And herfore make them statutis stable as a stoon; and thei geten graunt of knyghtis to confirmen hem. O Crist ... wel y wote that knyghtis tooken gold in his case, to help that thi lawe be hid' (vol. i. 129). 'And this word (Luke vi. 23) comfortith symple men, that ben clepid eretikes and enemys to the Chirch, for thei tellen Goddis lawe: for thei ben somynned and reprovyd many weies and after put in prison, and brend or kild as worse than theves' (vol. i. 205). 'Seculer men for muck ben to these prelatis ... and these betraien Cristene men to turment, and putten hem to death for holdinge of Cristis lawe.'

Had Mr. Arnold consulted Burton for himself, he would have found another passage: 'Hiis diebus (1201) idem papa Innocentius tertius, Philippo regi Franciæ misit ut terram Albigensium converteret et hæreticos deleret. Qui plures capiens cremari fecit; quorum aliqui in Angliam venientes vivi comburebantur' ('Chronicc. Mon. de Meesa,' ed. Bond. i. 333). And if he had pursued the subject further, he would have found the abbot's testimony confirmed by that of Thomas of Walden, of whom he speaks, vol. iii. 9, who says: 'Tempore Joannis Anglorum regis veniunt in Angliam Albigenses hæretici, quorum multi capti vivi combusti sunt' ('Doctr.' i., 2d ed., 1532); and also by Knyghton, who, speaking of the same reign, tells us: 'Albigenses hæretici venerunt in Angliam, quorum aliqui comburebantur vivi' (ap. Twysden, x. Script. 2418): that according to the 'Liber de Antiquis Legibus,' there was an Albigense burnt in London in 1210 (ap. Hook, 'Lives of Abps. of Cant.,' i. 153): and that Ralph of Coggeshall tells us of two persons that were burnt for heresy at Oxford in 1222 ('Chron. Angll.' 268). He would also have discovered that, so far from being 'the first victim to the Statute de Hæretico comburendo,' Sawtre did not suffer under that Act at all. The warrant for his execution had been signed and his execution had taken place before the Act was passed. ('Rott. Parl.' iii. 459. Fascicc. lix.) Such lawyers as Britton, Bracton, Fitzherbert, and Chief Justice Hale maintain that heresy had previously been punished with death under the common law of the realm. (Hale, 'Pleas of the Crown,' i. 383.)

But although for these and other reasons we cannot estimate the critical value of these 'Select works' at all highly, we welcome their appearance with great thankfulness as a very important addition to the materials already supplied, especially by Dr. Vaughan, Dr. Shirley, and Dr. Lechler, for the study of the times and works of the Reformer. They add but little to our knowledge of his opinions or of those of his followers, but they throw great light on his unwearied industry and the heroic zeal in the cause which he espoused; and particularly the 'Sermons,' which were evidently intended to be used by his 'poore preestis' in preaching to the people, on the means by which he acquired so paramount an influence with his countrymen generally. They will not, by any means, supersede Dr. Vaughan's carefully prepared 'Tracts and treatises' (Wycl. Soc., 1845), but rather add to their value. We shall yet hope that the delegates of the University Press will issue, if not all, at least the more important of the English writings of the Reformer which are still unpublished; and, if that were followed by another or two of his Latin theological treatises, under the editorship of some such competent scholar as Dr. Lechler, to whom we are indebted for admirable editions of the 'De Officio Pastorali' (Lips., 1863) and the 'Trialogus,' recently issued from the Clarendon Press, they would do the ecclesiastical student a most noble service.

The Martyrs and Apologists. By E. DE PRESSENSÉ, D.D. Translated by ANNIE HARWOOD. Hodder and Stoughton.

This second volume of Dr. Pressensé's great work on the early years of Christianity, like its predecessor, has been specially prepared by its author for this English edition. Although not, perhaps, of such familiar and pregnant interest as the first volume, which contained the history of the first Christian century, it is yet hardly possible to exaggerate the importance of the sub-apostolic age, its crystallizing life and formulating dogmas, its incipient errors and manifold oppositions; and we need not say that M. de Pressensé brings to the delineation of these the rich eloquence, epigrammatic characterization, keen spiritual insight, and ample learning which have given him perhaps the very foremost place as a Church historian and apologist among his contemporaries in France. Especially must we note the scientific skill of his arrangement, and his artistic sense of proportion--an essential feature, without which a general history becomes a mere encyclopædia. The volume abounds in finished portraits and descriptions. While, however, M. de Pressensé holds firmly by the great principles of the Christian revelation, as they are held by orthodox theologians, he is yet so essentially independent in his judgments, and sympathetic in his charities, that he is utterly removed from either narrowness or dogmatism. He thus combines orthodoxy with liberality, as he does scientific exactness with popular representation, in a way which makes his work for general uses as valuable in England as it is in France. It takes a place of its own, with a power, completeness, and eloquence not likely soon to be surpassed. It is affecting to think how in the midst of the sad tragedies of Paris during the past nine months the author has been engaged, while the translator and printer have been doing their work. The present volume is divided into three sections. The first treats of the missions and persecutions of the Church; the second of its most illustrious representatives, the Fathers of the second and third centuries; and the third of its controversial conflicts, presenting a complete outline of the Apology of the Early Church. We can only touch one or two points, premising that M. de Pressensé's wonderful touch quickens into life and beauty things that dilettanti readers are accustomed to turn from as dry and barren. M. de Pressensé first describes in a few masterly paragraphs the conditions, and, that we may the more vividly apprehend the magnitude of the Church's conquests, he summarizes the elements of conflict; on the one side, the simple, unaided spirituality of the Church, her poverty, lack of prestige, prejudice, and simplicity; on the other, the moral corruption, the intellectual as well as physical sensuousness, the religious fanaticism, the philosophic materialism and infidelity of heathenism. We had marked for quotation more than one eloquent paragraph, but must forbear. M. de Pressensé maintains the continuance and only gradual cessation of miraculous powers in the Church. Equally beautiful and masterly is his picture of Christian life during persecution, carefully gathered in its details from patristic writings. Of the persecutions themselves he gives a discriminating account, especially of the severest and most anomalous of all, the persecution under Marcus Aurelius. Alexander Severus relaxed the severity of Imperial infliction, and on one occasion even exceeded some of our modern Churchmen; for, when some Roman tavern-keepers memorialized him for the closing of a place of Christian worship, he refused, saying that 'It was better that a god should be worshipped in that house, be he who he might, than that it should fall into the hands of tavern-keepers.' He also so much admired the principles of Christian Church government that he sought to introduce some of them into the administration of the empire. In this portion of his work M. de Pressensé gives us admirable epitomes of the principal Christian apologies. Concerning his portraits of the Fathers of the Church, beginning with the Apostolic Fathers, then arranging in two classes the Fathers of the Eastern and of the Western Churches, we can say only they are most admirable. Some are medallions, some are full-length figures; they all constitute a gallery of great richness and brilliancy. M. de Pressensé is never greater than when portrait-painting. We can only commend this very instructive, eloquent, and fascinating book to all who care to know how the forms of Christian life, which fill eighteen centuries, had their origin; once taken up, they will find it difficult to lay it down. It is only just to say that, aided in matters of scholarship by learned friends, Miss Harwood has achieved the translation with great care and ability: while converting idiomatic French into idiomatic English, she has admirably preserved the vivacity and antithesis of M. de Pressensé's style.

The Ten Commandments. By R. W. DALE, M.A. Hodder and Stoughton.

The ten 'Words' of Sinai, both as an injunction of mere authority, and as a mere prohibition of evil, are a very inferior rule of Christian life. They are adapted to the nonage of men, and they relate, in part, to vices from which all men of ordinary Christian morality are far removed; they are, in fact, an authoritative legislation for men who have not yet risen to the intelligent recognition of the great principles of right and wrong, and who know nothing of the love of God and of holiness--which, by making a man a law to himself, makes statutory legislation in the domain of religion and virtue superfluous. The humiliating thing is, that after eighteen centuries of the 'Sermon on the Mount,' and of the principles and constraints of the Gospel of Christ, any teaching from the 'Ten Commandments' should be either requisite or possible. But so it is. There are multitudes of men and women upon whom sheer authority alone will tell, who love to be dealt with as we deal with children; but even with these, among ourselves, Mr. Dale has to exercise his ingenuity in finding practical applications for the first two of the commandments, which relate to idolatry. With the rest he has no difficulty--they furnish him with texts for the inculcation of much practical and urgent moral teaching, often entering, as in the fifth and ninth commandments, into domains of life and relationship that are not often touched by preachers. We especially commend Mr. Dale's wise and beautiful treatment of the fifth commandment; his remarks on family relationships and duties are very felicitous and timely. We cannot agree with Mr. Dale's conclusion that the Sabbath originated with the Leviticus. Some of his arguments in support of it, as, for instance, that the gathering of manna was interdicted on the seventh day before the delivery of the decalogue, to prepare the people for the new Sabbath-keeping, are singularly weak, especially in an acute reasoner like Mr. Dale; while all the presumptions are, we think, against him. We think, too, that the Divine authority for the Lord's Day is stronger than he represents it to be. These, however, are but exceptions to the strong approval and admiration that the volume has constrained. The simple, nervous, lucid style, the clear discrimination, the pointed, practical faithfulness, and especially the manly, fearless honesty of Mr. Dale's expositions, demand the very highest eulogy. It is a vigorous, useful, and honest book.

Fundamentals or Bases of Belief concerning Man, God, and the Correlation of God and Man. By THOMAS GRIFFITH, M.A., Prebendary of St. Paul's. Longmans.

This extremely interesting book is justly entitled a 'Handbook of Mental, Moral, and Religious Philosophy;' and the author, while fully alive to the latent expression of physiological metaphysics, takes a firm stand on the datum of consciousness, and establishes the substantial, moral, religious, progressive, and permanent qualities of the human being, as well as the intelligence and personality of God. The author then proceeds to those facts of history which show that God is carrying on a development for the human race, by awakening men to their need of himself, by sending gifted spirits to respond to this need, by originating the sacred family, nation, and brotherhood, by dwelling in the midst of this brotherhood, by assimilating its members to His own image, and perfecting them in His final kingdom. The volume is full of quotations from the masters of human thought, and is pervaded by a very high tone of speculation. Distinctive doctrines of the Gospel are scarcely touched upon, but they are not ignored. The author makes good his profession that in spite of 'the dust rained by the conflict of opinion in this unsettled age, there are foundation truths upon which to plant the tottering feet.'

Seven Homilies on Ethnic Inspiration; or, on the Evidences supplied by the Pagan Religions of both primæval and later Guidance and Inspiration from Heaven. By the Rev. JOSEPH TAYLOR GOODSIR, F.R.S.E. Part First of an Apologetic Series and a sketch of an Evangelical Preparation. Williams and Norgate. 1871.

There is a wonderful flourish of trumpets about this volume. One might almost suppose that Mr. Goodsir was the first man who from a purely Christian and Biblical standpoint recognised a divine order in the evolution of the human race--a divine and supernatural guidance afforded to the nations of the world beyond the limits of the Hebrew people and the Christian Church. It is remarkable that in spite of his considerable learning he makes no reference to such popular treatises as Archbishop Trench's 'Hulsean Lectures,' or Archdeacon Hardwick's work entitled 'Christ and Other Masters,' or the abundant labours of Döllinger, De Pressensé, Creuzer, and others in the same region. He does not appear in the whole discussion to look into the metaphysical ground of the facts to which he alludes, nor attempt to generalize the law of divine illuminations, nor even to show that the extraordinary light possessed by the 'ethnics,' by great sages, by distinguished races of the old world, is any vindication in itself, of the Father's heart. We believe that Mr. Goodsir has something to say well worth hearing, and while he is aiming to redeem what he calls catholic history from 'rationalizing mythologers like Professor Max Müller, and rationalizing theologians like the Rev. Baring-Gould,' it is rather curious that he should have so little to say in reply to the theories of Sir J. Lubbock, Mr. Tylor, Mr. Darwin, Mr. M'Lellan, and others, whose principles and facts, if they have any truth in them, destroy much of his position. We believe it is a rejoinder to the theory of evolution, and of the utterly savage origin--to say the least--of all our civilization to go back steadily on the traces of the 'intellectual antiquity of man,' and to follow the line of human elevation along the course of certain sublime traditions. There is, however, something mortifying in the extraordinary dependence Mr. Goodsir places on the divine origin of the Great Pyramid. Adopting all Professor Piazzi Smyth's most dubious speculations as to the astronomical significance of the Great Pyramid, he comes to the conclusion that the subtle measurements and recondite facts of modern astronomy, must have been revealed to the builders of the Pyramid, and that the Pyramid was not only a protest against astrology, but is frequently referred to in Holy Scripture! The proof of this is flimsy in the extreme. Mr. Goodsir accepts Mr. Osburn's theory of the early history and mythology of Egypt, and Mr. Galloway's elaborate and inconclusive arguments on the chronology of Egyptian dynasties. It is extraordinary that he does not refer to the Vedic faith, nor make any mention of Buddhism. There is much in the sixth and seventh homilies worthy of careful consideration. The philosophy of the heathen oracles, the significance of dreams, and the ethnic doctrine of Divine Providence and judgment, deserve our hearty recognition; but the ethnological authorities to whom he appeals for his facts are generally of the highest speculative class, the class that may be called crotchety.

The Problem of Evil. Seven Lectures. By ERNEST NAVILLE. Translated from the French, by EDWARD W. SHALDERS. Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark.

We called attention to M. Naville's very able and popular lectures when they appeared in the original (British Quarterly Review, vol. 1. p. 286); we need therefore only announce this translation by Mr. Shalders, which is done with an intelligence and a precision which places the English reader almost upon a par with readers of the French original. The book is a very valuable and honest apologetic, and we shall be glad to know that English readers are induced by Mr. Shalders' translation to make themselves acquainted with it.

The Hidden Life of the Soul. From the French. By the Author of 'The Life of Madame Louise de France,' &c., &c. Rivingtons.

This volume consists of certain brief meditations of Père Jean Nicholas Grou on some of the deepest realities of the spiritual life. This saintly man, born in 1731, and educated by the Jesuit fathers, lived through stormy and eventful days an uneventful life that was hidden with Christ in God. His fellowship was with the Father and the Son, and his spirit seemed above the need of any other companionship. There is more of the spirit of à Kempis than of Aquinas in him, and a clear, stainless, childlike sweetness pervades all his utterances. With exceedingly few exceptions, there is nothing in these meditations which would determine the ecclesiastical position of the writer. They have to do with truth and reality, with eternal beauty and purity, with the redemption in Christ Jesus, with the mysterious joys of the interior life. 'Assuredly (says he) God would not have a soul which clings to Him, scared at the thought of the last narrow passage to be crossed in reaching Him. But no set words or thoughts will enable us to meet death trustfully. Such trust is God's gift, and the more we detach ourselves from all save Himself, the more freely He will give us' this, 'as all other blessings. Once attain to losing self in God, and death will indeed have no sting.' 'God calls such rather to a perpetual death to self, in will, in thought, in deed; so that when the actual moment of material death arrives, it is but the final passage to eternal joy for them.' How near the saints of God approach each other! What gathering together is there unto HIM!

Breviates, or Short Texts and their Teachings. By the Rev. P. B. POWER, M.A. Hamilton, Adams, and Co.

The author of this volume has long been known as the writer of many admirable, sententious, readable tracts, through which he has exercised a wide and beneficial influence. The same happy characteristics of sharp phrase, proverbial sentence, apt illustration, original turns of thought, and earnest piety which mark his tracts, are to be found in these short sermons. There is here more sturdy thinking, taking indeed quaint, pleasant forms of expression, than is contained in many a more pretentious work. We feel inclined to compare it with Beecher's 'Familiar Talks,' different though it is in its style, it has the same forceful, wise, and broad tone in dealing with many special aspects of spiritual life. If sermons are to be reduced to a ten minutes' limit, then we could wish them to be not unlike these.

One Thousand Gems from the Rev. Henry Ward Beecher. Edited and compiled by the Rev. G. D. EVANS. Hodder and Stoughton.

Perhaps no preacher of modern times has said so many wise and good things as Henry Ward Beecher, or said them so well. His sermons abound with passages of racy description, of penetrating exposition, of rhetorical brilliancy, and of fervid, practical urgency. Mr. Beecher's habits of preparation make this very remarkable. Most orators prepare their best passages, and are careless about their frame-work. Mr. Beecher does the reverse: he prepares his frame-work, and trusts to the inspirations of his regal creative imagination to conceive and shape his most brilliant things. Mr. Evans has culled out of the reported sermons of this great preacher a thousand 'Gems.' They are full of wisdom, depth, and beauty. A more precious and suggestive table book--a book to take up in the morning, for a fresh, dewy germinant thought to lay upon the heart, and to expand into the religious wisdom of the day--it would be difficult to name.

The Peace-maker; or the Religion of Jesus Christ in His own Words. Dedicated to all His Disciples. By the Rev. ROBERT AINSLIE, of Brighton. Longmans, Green, and Co.

We like the idea of Mr. Ainslie's little book better than we do the preface in which he expounds it. The latter seems to undervalue those parts of the New Testament which are not the ipsissima verba of Jesus Christ, and apparently casts a reproach at the grand science of inductive theology. Surely there is room for the most varied approach to the revelation of God. History of dogma is not to be despised if we wish in true brotherhood to understand the thoughts of past ages. We agree heartily with Mr. Ainslie in his unwillingness to allow to any doctrinal standards whatever the place due to the words of Jesus. All dogmatists, however, and Mr. Ainslie cannot be shut out from their number, have a trick of believing that the words of Jesus are best explained and enforced in their own system. We think that the translation and arrangement are for the most part excellent. Mark's Gospel is made the central line for the arrangement, and this always seems to us the most satisfactory principle. Mr. Ainslie translates from Tischendorff's eighth critical edition. We are rather surprised to find some omissions, such as the words of our Lord addressed to Paul and John, and a few others from Mark and Lake's Gospel. We think that at times he becomes an interpreter as well as translator; e.g., he translates δῶρον in Matthew x. 5, as 'offering to God,' and ἐν τοῖς τοῦ πατρός μου, in Luke ii. 49, as 'in the house of My Father.' We doubt whether Τελώνης is accurately or satisfactorily translated 'tax-gatherer,' nor do we see why, if ἄρχων is translated magistrate, the Greek terms for moneys should have been retained. However, these are minor blemishes. There is very great care and wisdom shown in the translation as a whole, which does not aim at preserving the tone of the authorized version, but at putting into nervous, modern English the words of 'the Peace-maker.'

Christ in the Pentateuch; or, Things Old and New concerning Jesus. By HENRY H. BOURN. S. W. Partridge and Co.

This volume is the result of much careful and devout study, not only of Holy Scripture, but of some of the best and most thoughtful interpreters of the Pentateuch. The literature bearing on the typology of Scripture is very extensive and unequal in value, and Mr. Bourn has added to the long list a treatise, the aim of which is greatly to enlarge the doctrinal significance of the ritual and sacrificial worship of the Hebrews. The author sets aside Dr. Alexander's prudent canon on the determination of the typical character of the Old Testament history by the express teaching of Scripture as highly unsatisfactory, and proceeds to find the most recondite evangelical truth in minute circumstances and details of the old worship. Analogies may be found between the tabernacle in the wilderness, and the tabernacle of our Lord's humanity, but when the shittim-wood, the gold, the silver, and the brass, have all to do special duty in working out the analogy, when 'the blue covering is made the manifestation of God's love in the ways and death of Christ,' the 'purple as the manifestation of the God-man,' the 'scarlet as the manifestation of the true dignity and glory of man as seen in the Son of Man,' the 'goat's-hair curtain as a memorial of the death of the Lord Jesus Christ as an offering for sin,' and 'the rams' skins dyed red, the outward aspect of Christ as born into this world to die, and 'the badgers' skins as the outward aspect of Christ as having neither form nor comeliness to the natural heart,' we feel that Mr. Bourn has gone beyond his depth, and endangers the significance of the analogy altogether. This allegorical interpretation of Scripture runs the risk of transforming the holy Word of God into a collection of pretty riddles, and makes the whim, audacity, or it may be, good taste of the interpreter, the revelation of God to mankind. It would be just as wise, just as reverent, and perhaps more to the purpose, to see in the seven coverings of the ark, the last seven days of our Lord's life, or any other seven things mentioned in the Old or New Testament. We much prefer Dr. Fairbairn's interpretation of the Cherubim to that of our author. The sentiment that pervades the volume is admirable, but we have very little confidence in the method of interpretation adopted by Mr. Bourn, and the school to which he belongs.

Keshub Chunder Sen's English Visit. Edited by SOPHIA DOBSON COLLET. Strahan and Co. 1871.

This is a volume of more than six hundred pages, filled with the reports of the various public meetings which Mr. Sen attended during his English visit, and the sermons and addresses delivered by him on numerous occasions. We have frequently referred to the work of the Baboo Sen, to what is noble and grand in it, and also to the striking method in which he holds himself aloof from purely Christian thought and enterprise. We merely remark now on the significant welcome he received from all the leading Christian societies in England, the fine and appreciative sympathy he won from the representatives of almost every phase of religious thought in England. This did not prevent his very frequent allusion to the sectarianism of our Christianity. He has gone back to India confirmed in his bare Theism, and in the mystic theology which has been his consolation. The mode in which he patronizes the Bible, the Christ, and the Church of God and Christianity, may be perfectly explicable from his education and his standpoint, but it hardly shows that deference for the religious consciousness of the West which he is so anxious that we should accord to Indian religion. This patronage, often supercilious, if tendered by one who had resiled from Christianity, instead of one who, from a Heathen-Theist standpoint, was drawing near to the Kingdom of God, would be mischievous and offensive. We notice that the address presented to him by the clergy of all denominations at Nottingham is given at length as well as his outspoken reply. The speech he made before the Congregational Union is also included, and his sermon on 'The Prodigal Son.' We believe his mission may prove a harbinger of light and hope for his country,--it corresponds with the attitude assumed by philosophic reformers beyond the pale of the Church at many crises in the history of Western Christianity.

The Hebrew Prophets. Translated afresh from the original, with regard to the Anglican Version, and with illustrations for English readers. By the late ROWLAND WILLIAMS, D.D., Vicar of Broadchalke. Vol. II. Williams and Norgate. 1871.

This volume completes, we suppose, the publication which Dr. Williams projected before his lamented decease. It includes the prophets Habakkuk, Zechariah, and Jeremiah, a version of Ezekiel, and a fragment from his translation of Isaiah lii.-liii. To the translations of the three prophets first mentioned are prefixed introductory dissertations, which are not, however, to be regarded as general introductions to these prophetical Scriptures. The first is occupied with a vigorous attempt to bring into the language of modern thought the famous verse of Habakkuk, or rather, the thought of the Hebrew prophet about the relations of life and faith, as these were subsequently conceived by the apostles of Christ, and expounded in theological systems. We could hardly discuss the question without occupying a space equal to that of the author. There is much hardness coupled with his great learning; there is roughness of translation, and lack of susceptibility to the deeper beauties of the prophetic Scripture, which take away our highest satisfaction with these versions; while a curious admixture of extreme rationalism with mediæval sympathies is very noticeable. Thus, after repudiating all the directly Messianic or predictive qualities of Jeremiah's prophecies, he says (p. 69), 'The collapse, first of popular predictions, and at last of those which seem well grounded, until they are brought into contact with tests of priority or meaning, teaches us the depth of Gibbon's sarcasm, that "with all the resources of miracle at their disposal, the fathers of the Church betray an unaccountable preference for the argument from prophecy." The sting of the remark depends on the supposition that religious faith must have a ground external to its own sphere. It disappears when we recollect that Deity is revealed to us by moral attributes more evidently than by power or wonder.' Surely the sting of the remark is that the great authority of Gibbon should thus insinuate that there was no miraculous evidence worth quoting. Is not the 'supposition' based after all on deepest truth? Can we lose the 'sting' by being ready to inflict it upon ourselves, by endorsing Gibbon's sneer, and making it one element of our faith? Dr. Williams follows up these remarks by many others, which reveal his rationalistic sympathies. Thus he speaks of 'the aggregation of later writers under the name of Isaiah,' and says 'what Jeremiah was for Israel (in the way of meriting Divine favour), Christ is for mankind.' It is very amazing, after remarks of this kind, to find that his commentary on Jeremiah i. 5--'Before I formed thee in the belly, I knew thee,' &c.--is as follows: 'The eternal law that fitness is the gift of God, though human officers or assemblies may consign to it a sphere, appears in Jeremiah's sense of consecration from his birth. Hence the rightful indelibility of holy orders when deliberately accepted.' Dr. Williams's arrangement of the order of Jeremiah's prophecies is very thoughtful, and his moral sympathies are throughout very lofty and pure.

The Holy Bible, according to the Authorised Version (1611); with an Explanatory and Critical Commentary, and a Revision of the Translation, by Bishops and Clergy of the Anglican Church. Edited by F. C. COOK, M.A., Canon of Exeter. Vol. I. Part I. Genesis and Exodus. Part II., Leviticus--Deuteronomy. John Murray. 1871.

This is the first instalment of a work for which scholars have waited with considerable curiosity, and 'the ordinary reader of the English Bible' with some impatience. The publication of 'Essays and Reviews,' and the critical examination of the 'Pentateuch' and the 'Book of Joshua' by a certain Anglican Bishop, who is, for the most part, referred to in these pages as 'a living writer,' or a 'modern critic,' and the appearance of works or translations which many acquainted with the arguments, theories, and historical reconstructions of German philologers and critics, created about seven years ago considerable anxiety. It was a wise thing to combine such forces as Mr. Cook has been able to marshal, to offer the results of modern criticism to the intelligent readers of the Bible in a form in which Christian scholars have received them, to reply to some objections, to vindicate some of the impugned authorities, to take the Bible book by book, and show what, in the estimation of Biblical students, it is reasonable to believe with reference to its authorship, integrity, and trustworthiness; and then to take it, chapter by chapter, and verse by verse, and resolve to shirk no difficulties, to meet honest scepticism by careful criticism, and dishonest conjecture by calm repudiation. It is too soon to speak of this work as a whole, or as finally accomplished. When the 'Speaker's Commentary' is further advanced, we shall venture on a lengthened examination of its merits. We are not precluded, however, from saying how the beginning strikes us. Bishop Harold Browne and Canon Cook, the Rev. Samuel Clark and the Rev. J. E. Espin, are the authors of the commentaries now before us. They appear to us to have done their difficult work with singular tact, fine spirit, and considerable learning, and to have produced a series of exegetical and explanatory comments far in advance of anything in the hands of the English reader. They have aimed at condensation, at explanations of difficulty, at exposition of beauty, harmony, and truth. The pages are not burdened with moral reflections or spiritual homilies. Notes of considerable expansion amounting at times to the importance of essays, on points of special interest, are introduced between the chapters. Improved translations are given in the notes in such a type as to strike the eye. The only deficiency of which we are disposed to complain is the limited choice of marginal references, and the almost entire absence of maps. The latter may be supplied in later volumes or subsequent editions. Few things are more needed by the average reader of the Bible than well-executed maps, conveying the most recent information, not only as to the identification of sites, but the configuration of the country. This noble work will be incomplete unless it include within itself a trustworthy Biblical atlas. It may be true that the introductions and comments on the several books of the Pentateuch are executed with different ability; that the reading of Mr. Espin is more extensive in this particular line than that of the Bishop of Ely. We concede that the latter has not expounded all the theories, or even the latest of the speculations, which aim at the solution of the problem of the composition of Genesis. He has mainly confined himself to the literature which has been produced in reply to the fragmentists, and has presented the arguments of Mr. Quarry rather than any fresh exposition from his own standpoint. He does, however, steer quite clear from Mr. Quarry's authority in his interpretation of the Book of Genesis, and accumulates a mass of presumptive evidence for the traditional belief, which no fresh evolution or re-arrangement of Elohists or Jehovists and Redactors can overturn. Bishop Browne and all his collaborators admit that the author of the Pentateuch may have gone over his work with the new light of the full revelation of the name of Jehovah; that subsequent revisions, and added notes, and quotations from other documents may have been reverently intertwined with the original text; and when they appear in the course of exposition, they are pointed out. This leaves a far truer estimate of their number and insignificance than a laboured discussion of them in rotation. The special discussions in the comments on Genesis are of varied value. The Cherubim, the Deluge, the Chronology of Jacob's Life, and the Shiloh, are useful. We think it would have been well to have given some specimens of the Hindu and Persic analogues to the story of the Creation, the Fall, and the Deluge. Considering the immense interest excited by the recent study of the Zendavesta, and the light thrown on the 'Tree and Serpent Worship,' it would have been desirable to refer to it.

Mr. Cook has had an immense field to traverse in his introduction to 'Exodus,' and his comment thereupon. He has disposed of many of the difficulties raised by Colenso, and ignored others. He takes the naturalistic interpretation of the passage of the Red Sea, but does not adopt the theory of Ewald as to the multiplication of seventy persons into a vast migratory nation. The Essays on Egyptian history and Egyptian words in the Pentateuch, though beyond the faculty of those who are entirely unacquainted with Hebrew, are well adapted to build up the cumulative argument that these books must have been written in the main by one who was learned in all the wisdom of Egyptians, familiar with its manners, laws, language, and people. Mr. Clark's dissertations on the sacrifices of the Levitical law are most instructive and thoughtful; his notes on the clean and unclean beasts, &c., on leprosy, on the various offerings, are worthy of close attention; and Mr. Espin's introduction to Deuteronomy appears to us to be a triumphant refutation of the theories of Colenso and Kuenen. We have not space to enter at the present time into details, but we are satisfied that if the learned and candid scholars who have, for the most part, undertaken this work, complete it with corresponding ability, there will be a practically useful commentary on Holy Scripture, as great in advance of all previous works of the kind, as the Dictionaries of the Bible by Kitto and Smith transcended all cyclopædias of Biblical literature accessible before their time.

Commentary on the Boole of Isaiah, Critical, Historical, and Prophetical; including a Revised English Translation, with Introduction and Appendices. By the Rev. T. R. BIRKS, Vicar of Holy Trinity, Cambridge. Rivingtons. 1871.

This work derives some special interest, from the circumstance that it was originally intended for the so-called 'Speaker's Commentary.' Circumstances, not very fully explained, led to a separate and independent publication. We have thus the prospect of two works on this great theme instead of one, and obtain a treatment of the whole complicated question from different standpoints. Mr. Birks devotes great space, in an appendix, to the question of the integrity of the prophecies of Isaiah, and has, with extreme ability, gathered up the arguments in favour of the Isaian authorship of the last twenty-six chapters, answering objections with admirable vivacity and pith, and doing much to establish the genuineness of this most sublime portion of Hebrew prophecy. We fear that Mr. Birks overstates what he calls the 'external evidence,' for the Isaian authorship of this portion. It does not amount to more than this, that the book was treated as a whole, and that the later prophecies were referred to by the Son of Sirach, by the Baptist, by the Evangelist Matthew, and by our Lord, as those of the prophet Esaias. The theory of the modern critics is made to involve what Mr. Birks calls the 'spuriousness' of the prophecies, and even the character and inspiration of our Lord. It does not appear to us that the theory involves the spuriousness of this portion of Scripture any more than a critical examination of 'the Psalms of David' involves their spuriousness, even though it should refer half of them to later authors and a subsequent period. The arguments of Mr. Birks for their true origin are very difficult for the advocates of the modern theory to refute. He lays stress on the fact that the prophets of the later portion of the captivity and of 'the return' are known, and that they bear not the slightest resemblance to the mysterious unknown author of this most precious portion of the Old Testament. He must therefore have deviated from all his great confraternity, in concealing his name, his date, and the circumstances or great men of his times. He is silent about any prophetic call, and preserves an inexplicable reticence about the names of all the great men and notorious events in contemporary history.

Mr. Birks has elaborated an interesting argument, to show that the structure of the whole book demands unity of authorship; that through the second part there are references more or less distinct to the earlier oracles; that the repeated claim to foretell future events connected with the return from captivity would have constituted his prophecies impudent forgeries, supposing them to have been written in the days of Cyrus. We cannot go over a tithe of the arguments alleged by Mr. Birks, but call special attention to the list of 'words and phrases which the later prophecies have in common with the earlier, but which are not found in the writings of the prophets of the close of the exile, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi, and Daniel.'

Another interesting appendix on the chronology of the Assyrian kings differs from the opinion of the Rawlinsons and others on the matters supplied by the Assyrian monuments. The author shows that it is exceedingly probable that the SARGON of Isaiah and of the monuments is identical with the SHALMANEZER of the Books of Kings, and he thus brings the records of the prophet into harmony with the Assyrian and Hebrew authorities.

We have no space to say in conclusion, more than that we highly value Mr. Birks's translation of the prophecies, and the devout and spiritual tone which pervades all his commentaries. His learning and insight are unquestionably of a high order, and he has devoted them to a maintenance of the integrity, the predictive character, and the Messianic import of the visions of the great 'Isaiah, the son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.'

The Book of Psalms. A new translation with Introduction and Notes Explanatory and Critical. By J. J. STEWART PEROWNE, B.D. Vol. II. Bell and Daldy.

We are glad to receive the completed version of Mr. Perowne's really great and able work. No book of Scripture so thoroughly tests a critic, not only in the lower departments of philology and theology, but in the higher department of spiritual discernment, as the 'Book of Psalms.' Mr. Perowne's scholarship is of a high character; his robust common sense is equal to it, and his poetic and religious feeling are superior to both. Introductions, translations, and comments are alike excellent. It is not to be expected that Mr. Perowne will always carry with him the convictions of his critical readers, but he will commend himself very generally. The peculiar gratification that we have felt in the use of his book is, that the higher devotional feeling of the Psalms is neither vulgarized nor comminuted by their critic. He helps us to meanings in a scholarly, reverent, and sympathetic spirit. We repeat our conviction that Mr. Perowne's book is by far the best commentary on the Psalms that English theology possesses.

The Psalms Translated from the Hebrew. With Notes, chiefly Exegetical. By W. KAY, D.D. London: Rivingtons. 1871.

Notwithstanding the endless translations of this ancient hymnal, no one who has carefully examined the subject will think that the result is so satisfactory as to render a further attempt unnecessary and superfluous. So much, however, has been accomplished as to justify us in expecting from anyone who enters the field afresh a conclusive proof of his possessing the highest qualifications for the task. The time for mediocrity is gone by. We would not deny that Dr. Kay possesses several important qualifications for the work. He is orthodox in sentiment, and free from dogmatism. He has profound reverence for Divine truth, and exhibits considerable reading, with the power to make use of it. But we have been deeply impressed with the fact that he lacks several of the qualities which constitute the successful exegete, and, above all, a thorough and profound knowledge of the Hebrew language. Hence we find him disappointing in passages demanding the highest critical ability. There are, as all Hebrew scholars are aware, several crucial passages which always test the strength and quality of the translator--e.g., Ps. xvi., 2, 3, where he translates, 'I have said to the Lord, My Lord art Thou, my prosperity has no claims on Thee: 'tis for the holy ones, who are in the land,' &c. Pss. xxxii. 6 and 9; xl. 5, 6, 7; cx. 3, 6; cxxxix. 14, 15, 16, &c. In all the instances above-mentioned, the author has signally failed. In dealing with some of the psalms he has, consciously or unconsciously, allowed doctrinal predilections to shape his conclusions; we can see no other reason for such renderings as Ps. ii. 12, 'Kiss the Son.' xvi. 10, corruption for pit or grave. Ps. civ. 'Making his angels to be wind.' This will also account for the wide range of the author's Messianic Psalms, and the faith he places in the authority of the titles. The chief faults we have to find with the translation are its obscurity, and its unnecessary innovation, and in some instances the substitution of Latinized words for the simpler but equally expressive Anglo-Saxon--e.g.:

Ps. ii. 12. 'While His wrath blazes for a moment.'

Ps. vii. 6. 'And rouse Thee unto me.'

Ps. xiv. 4. 'The eaters of My people have eaten bread.'

Ps. xxvi. 8. 'O Lord, I have loved Thy house domicile.'

Ps. xxxii. 9. 'With curb and rein must its gaiety be tamed, so as not to come near Thee.'

Ps. xxxix. 10. 'I am wasted away because Thy hand is cross to me.'

Ps. c. i. 'Shout ye aloud to the Lord, all the whole earth.'

Ps. cxxxix. 14. 'Wondrously amid awful deeds was I formed.'

We have observed many instances where literalness has been aimed at to the violation of good taste, idiom, and rhythm.

The notes are not intended to form a full and complete commentary; we are not, therefore, surprised at finding some of the most difficult expressions passed over without any explanation. This is, alas! too often the case with more extensive commentaries; but we think Dr. Kay might, with advantage to the reader, have confined himself to a critical explanation of the text, instead of indulging so freely in theological and allegorical interpretations. Several literary mistakes of minor importance might be pointed out, which, though of small moment in themselves, yet tend to shake our confidence in the accuracy of the author's scholarship. We regret our inability to pronounce this volume a successful attempt to translate and explain this ancient Psalter. We think it inferior to what we might fairly expect from one who had before him the valuable commentaries of Hüpfeld, Hitzig, Olshausen, Ewald, and Kamphausen. We would, however, remind our readers that Dr. Kay has undertaken a very difficult task in appearing on a field where so many have failed, and that, notwithstanding all faults of the work, its excellencies are very numerous. We have thorough sympathy with the author's spirit, and fully agree with many of his renderings.

Notes and Reflections on the Psalms. By ARTHUR PRIDHAM. Second Edition. Nisbet and Co.

These, like most notes and reflections that have come under our notice, are exceedingly feeble. We see no reason why such books might not be produced by the score. A person has only to exercise a little patience and to draw freely upon his inner consciousness, disregarding at the same time all exegetical laws and lexical meanings, and the result will inevitably follow. We would gladly recognise in any one the ability to evolve out of this old book any new truths which it may be justly said to contain, but we protest against having so much common Christian experience and so many religious platitudes crammed into it, in violation of all the laws of common sense as well as of interpretation. The author has full right to ventilate his own views on Messianic prophecy, the restoration of the Jews, and the details of the millennial reign, with which he seems to be perfectly familiar, but we demur to his palming them off upon the authors of the Psalms. The work is for the most part composed of pious reflections loosely strung together, dogmatic assertions, and illogical inferences. The author spiritualizes the Book of Psalms without ever catching its spirit or comprehending its meaning. Mr. Pridham tells us in his preface that his aim is twofold, to 'minister to the refreshment of those who are already established in the grace of God,' and to 'afford encouragement to the inexperienced but godly inquirer after truth.' And with a view to this end he has attempted 'to present a faithful though general outline of the Book of Psalms both as it respects the true prophetic intention of each psalm, and also its immediate application to the Christian as a partaker of the heavenly calling.' This will enable our readers to comprehend the writer's standpoint. It is just the kind of work to be pronounced by certain oracles as containing 'much precious truth and able criticism.' The pious conceit of such productions has often secured for them an immunity from the criticism they richly deserved. To let them pass without condemnation is an abuse of Christian charity.

A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures--Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical--with especial reference to Ministers and Students. By JOHN PETER LANGE, D.D., with a number of eminent European Divines. Translated from the German, revised, enlarged, and edited by PHILIP SCHAFF, D.D. Vol. VII. of New Testament, containing the Epistles of Paul to the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, and Colossians.

The Book of the Prophet Jeremiah, theologically and homiletically expounded. By Dr. C. W. EDWARD NAEGELSBACH. Translated, enlarged, and edited by SAMUEL RALPH ASBURY.

The Lamentations of Jeremiah. Translated by W. H. HORNBLOWER, D.D. Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark.

This great work is advancing to completion. Whoever becomes possessed of it will have, in a compendious form, the results of all ancient and modern exegesis of the sacred Scriptures, with an apparatus criticus of surprising copiousness. The doctrinal lessons and homiletic and ethical comments give a sketch of the entire literature of every verse passing under review. These two volumes equal their predecessors in every respect; the first puts the student in possession of all the work done by the great English scholars who have devoted so much of their energy to the elucidation of the epistles to the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, and Colossians. Dr. Schmoller is the author of the Commentary on the Galatians, and the translation is made by Mr. Starbuck and Dr. Riddle. We have often been struck by the admirable 'additions' which are the work of the latest editor. The epistles to the Ephesians and Colossians were originally entrusted to Dr. Schenkel, but the present commentary has been substituted for Dr. Schenkel's in consequence of his change of theological position. The work has been effected by Dr. Karl Braune, and translated by Dr. Riddle. Dr. Braune is also the author of the Commentary on the Epistle to the Philippians. It would be obviously impossible to convey in a brief notice any idea of the contents of this large volume by referring to a few details of exposition.

The elaborate Commentary on Jeremiah is accompanied by a careful introduction to the two books, in which the chronological and historical difficulties are treated with clearness and independence. Dr. Hornblower has criticised Dr. Naegelsbach's curious scepticism as to the authorship of the Lamentations, and has vindicated the traditional opinion on this matter with a great array of argument. Although nearly seven hundred pages of closely printed matter are devoted to these two books, a far larger proportion of the work is occupied with the exegetical and critical departments, than in some previous volumes of the series. The author has developed with considerable care both in his introduction and in his commentary, the important canon 'that all parts of the book in which the threatening enemies are spoken of generally, without mention of Nebuchadnezzar or the Chaldeans, belong to the period before the fourth year of Jehoiakim, while all the portions in which Nebuchadnezzar and the Chaldeans are named, belong to the subsequent period.' This canon enables the author to reduce the difficulties of a chronological kind, and the supposed confusion in the order of the prophet's discourses. The new translation, in spite of the use of certain Latinized words, appears to us to be singularly excellent and spirited, to preserve the fire of the original, and to remove much of its obscurity. It is incomparably the most elaborate work on the writings of this prophet accessible to the English scholar. We heartily congratulate Dr. Schaff and his English publishers on the admirable despatch and punctuality with which this Herculean task is approaching completion.

Commentary on Paul's Epistle to the Romans with an Introduction on the Life, Times, Writings, and Character of Paul. By WM. S. PLUMER, D.D., LL.D. Edinburgh: W. Oliphant.

An imperial octavo of 650 pages on the Epistle to the Romans is somewhat appalling, especially from Mr. Plumer, whose verbiage is chiefly the cause. He is not very learned, and not very logical. He heaps together a vast amount of comment from various writers,--not, however, modern ones, whom he ignores,--in which are some things acute and useful. We could spare the bits of sermons; e.g., 'Reader, have you a good conscience? Is it purified by atoning blood? Do you study to keep it void of offence?' Dr. Plumer should not palm off sermons under the guise of a commentary.

The Epistle of St. Paul to the Galatians. A new Translation, with Critical Notes and Doctrinal Lessons. By JOHN H. GODWIN. Hodder and Stoughton.

The volume before us contains a treatment of the Epistle to the Galatians after the same general principle of arrangement as that adopted by Professor Godwin in his translation of the Gospels of Matthew and Mark. The translation is not offered as a specimen of the revision which it is desirable to introduce into the authorized version, it being 'agreed by all that in this revision the fewer changes the better, none being proper that are not necessary.' 'But it is (continues Mr. Godwin) desirable that ordinary religious instruction should be given in familiar modes of speech; and so there is an advantage in looking at the writings of prophets and apostles without the guide of an antique dress, and with the aids to clear thought and correct reasoning which are afforded by the language we daily use.' Mr. Godwin has taken full advantage of this principle, and by his use of certain non-technical words and phrases, which may in theological usage have acquired a different signification from that intended by the Apostle, provokes inquiry and compels attention. Thus, the word gospel is uniformly translated good message; grace is rendered favour; to be justified is rendered to be judged right; child-guide by schoolmaster; and the flesh by a lower nature. Familiar verses are thus made to startle us by unfamiliar forms. Conscientious labour and long pondering are very evident throughout the entire work. The notes and the apothegmatic statements of doctrinal truth are charged with significance, and are models of lucid condensation. The exposition of the train of thought pervading the third chapter is singularly happy. We wish we had space to quote the note to verse 16, as it appears to us a most felicitous removal of the difficulty involved in Paul's use of the promise made to the seed of Abraham. Mr. Godwin's exposition of the celebrated verse 20 of the same chapter deserves careful study. Everywhere we have the results of scholarship, of penetration, of strong sense, and practical sympathy with the purpose of the Apostle.

A Commentary on the Epistles for the Sundays and other Holy Days of the Christian Year. By the Rev. W. DENTON, M.A. Vol. II. Bell and Daldy.

The great excellency of Mr. Denton's running commentary on the Epistles of the Prayer-book is its richness of patristic reference; while his own remarks are vigorous, spiritual, and suggestive. Literally every paragraph has a marginal reference to some Church writer, either as embodying his sentiments or quoting his words. Excepting Mr. Williams's 'Devotional Commentary on the Life of our Lord,' we know no work that in this respect is to be compared with it. It is, however, a great defect that only the name of the writer is given, and not the reference to his works. Mr. Denton is evangelical in sentiment, and although a very decided Churchman, tolerant in spirit.

Synonyms of the New Testament. By RICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH, D.D., Archbishop of Dublin. Seventh edition. Revised and enlarged. Macmillan and Co. 1871.

The two small duodecimo volumes which Dr. Trench, when Professor of Divinity at King's College, published on the Greek synonyms of the New Testament, have long been highly prized by all the students of Holy Scripture. The seventh edition of this invaluable work in a goodly octavo, revised and enlarged by the accomplished author, will augment the obligation under which he has placed all who are searching for the exact meaning of the sacred text. Dr. Trench's work even now does not pretend to be a complete encyclopædia of reference on this profoundly interesting theme. He gives us in the preface to the present volume a long list of words on the mutual relations of which he would have thrown light, if they had been included in his scheme. Among them are many which Archbishop Trench candidly admits are among 'the most interesting and instructive.' We have only to refer to such words as πνεῦμα and νοῦς, ὄλεθρος and ἀπωλεία, λυτρωτὴς and σωτὴρ, προσφορὰ and θυσία, δικαίωμα, δικαίωσις,and δικαιοσύνη, to make it evident that certain large divisions of exegetical theology which are included in a full discussion of the synonyms of the New Testament, have been purposely omitted from this volume. Still this does not detract from the extreme value of the work that has been actually done by our author. The treatises on the words νέος and καινός, on ἀγαπάω and φιλέω, on ζωή and βίος, on μετανοέω and μεταμέλομαι, and many others will be fresh in the recollection of all students. The great range of Archbishop Trench's reading, and the ease with which Greek literature is laid under contribution to further his well-defined purpose, the flashes of light that he throws over many difficult texts, and the caution, candour, and fairness of his judgments, combine to render this edition of his important work a very welcome addition to the apparatus criticus of the Biblical student.

A History of the Christian Councils, from, the original documents, to the close of the Council of Nicæa, A.D. 325. By CHARLES JOSEPH HEFELE, D.D., Bishop of Rottenburg, formerly Professor of Theology in the University of Tübingen. Translated from the German, and edited by WILLIAM R. CLARK, M.A., Oxon., Prebendary of Wells. Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark.

We are glad to see this instalment of a translation of Dr. Hefele's great work on the history of Christian Councils. As the title indicates, this volume of five hundred pages does not bring the history beyond the proceedings, canons, and creeds of 'the first Œcumenical Council.' Dr. Hefele's last published volume of the Conciliensgeschichte comes down to the Council of Constance. He does not confine the history of this volume to the preliminaries and discussions of the Council of Nicæa, but gives what documentary evidence is at hand to throw light on the synods relative to Montanism, and the feast of Easter, in the first two centuries; on those held at Carthage and Rome on account of Novatianism and the Lapsi; on those held at Antioch on account of Paul of Samosata, and on the African synods demanded in the Donatist controversy. He has, moreover, presented from a thoroughly Roman standpoint a general introduction to the history of this department of ecclesiastical history. There is no controversial tone in the exposition of the elements of his theme, but the divine inspiration and supernatural guidance granted to these assemblies is quietly assumed as undoubted and indubitable. The chief authority for such a conviction is the way in which these sacerdotal réunions were accustomed to speak of themselves. This sublime self-consciousness has never forsaken them, and has reached its highest expression in the Vatican Council, which, by its infallibility dogma, has, probably, constituted itself the last of the series. Dr. Hefele seems also more impressed than we can be, with the opinion of the Emperor Constantine on this point. The deference of Constantine to the bishops, and his belief in the infallibility of their conciliar conclusions, have not the smallest weight with those who mourn over the entire work of Constantine, and who see in his subsequent treatment of Arius a practical refutation of the high-sounding titles he gave to the Council of Nicæa.

Dr. Hefele assumes that an Œcumenical Council must be summoned by 'the oecumenical head of the Church, the Pope; except in the case, which is hardly an exception, in which, instead of the Pope, the temporal protector of the Church, the Emperor, with the previous or subsequent approval and consent of the Pope, summons a council of this kind.' Our author refutes the arguments of Bellarmine in favour of the formal recognition by the Ancient Church of the hierarchical initiative in this matter, because his proofs are derived 'from the pseudo-Isidore, and, therefore, destitute of all importance;' but he tries to build up a similar argument in support of the early recognition of the supremacy of Rome in this matter, which is very shaky. Constantine is supposed to have consulted Sylvester, Bishop of Rome, before issuing his summons to the bishops to attend the first oecumenical council, because in the year 680 A.D., i.e., 355 years after the Council of Nicæa, it is said that the sixth oecumenical council made reference to such consultation. A second argument appears to us even more Jesuitical: 'Ruffinus says that the Emperor summoned the Synod of Nicæa ex sententia sacerdotum, and certainly, if several bishops were consulted on the subject, among them must have been the chief of them all, the Bishop of Rome.'

The way in which our author toils to make it appear that theπρόεδροι of the council were the delegates sent from Sylvester, diminishes our confidence in the general excellence of this elaborate, painstaking, conscientious work. The effort is made to show the part which the Pope took in the calling of the subsequent general councils. The volume will not be studied for its treatment of Christian doctrine, so much as of ecclesiastical discipline. The whole discussion of the Easter controversies, which were brought before the Council of Nicæa, is done with much greater clearness and fulness than the exposition of the doctrine of the ὁμοούσιος. Indeed there is, for general purposes, no dissertation more valuable than this in the entire volume. The elements are contained here for a reply to the speculations of the Tübingen school on the irreconcilability of the traditionary notices of the Johannine practice, and the primâ facie evidence of the Fourth Gospel as to the day on which the Passover was kept in the week of our Lord's Passion. Dr. Hefele also explains the astronomical controversy between the Easter calculations of Rome and Alexandria, and clearly expounds the several problems brought up for the solution of the Council of Nicæa.

We thank Mr. Clark for this well translated and carefully-edited volume. It supplies a great desideratum in English literature, and we hope he will be enabled to continue his task. We have no doubt it is impossible to secure perfect accuracy in producing such a volume. The egregious misprint on p. 309, involving a huge chronological blunder, will almost correct itself. Polycarp is said to have visited Amcetus 'in the middle of the eleventh century.'

Title-Deeds of the Church of England to her Parochial Endowments. By EDWARD MIALL, M.P. Second edition, revised. Elliot Stock.

Few people know the history of English tithes. Nothing is more common than to hear intelligent Churchmen talk of the pious enthusiasm with which the early English Church was parochially endowed. The very completeness and universality of the system might make us sceptical concerning the spiritual fervour of the people, whatever the feeling of their rulers. Mr. Miall shows convincingly that the charter of Ethelwolf, which is the title-deed of the English tithe system, was a bribe to Aelstan, Bishop of Sherburn, who, during his absence in Rome, had conspired to depose him, and that it was necessary, in order to secure its provisions, that the charter should be renewed by successive monarchs, sometimes in a minatory and coercive way that is very significant. Thus Edgar, A.D. 967, enacts that if any one shall refuse to pay tithes, the king's sheriff shall seize them by force, causing the tenth part to be paid to the Church, four parts to the lord of the manor, four parts to the bishops, the unfortunate owner being left with but a tithe himself. With great minuteness, Mr. Miall traces the history and operation of the law, and shows that the law knows nothing of the Church as a corporate ecclesiastical body, or of a common ecclesiastical fund. Individual bishops and clergymen may claim personal revenues as assigned to them by Act of Parliament, but that is all. The individual claim that is, is the only claim to be satisfied in the event of disendowment. The Church is no more a corporate body than the army is; in its relations to Church property, the endowments pertain not to Protestant Episcopalianism, as such, but to the State Church for the time being, whether Roman, Episcopalian, or Presbyterian.

Mr. Miall has done good service in publishing his able and valuable little book for eighteen-pence. No Nonconformist or Churchman who wishes to be well informed concerning the questions of Church property that are pending should be ignorant of it.

Letters from Rome on the Council. By QUIRINUS. Reprinted from the Allgemeine Zeitung. Authorized Translation. Rivingtons.

We have already noticed the first parts of this admirable history and critique on the Council. It is full of learning, wisdom, and wit, and must be read so long as the Council itself engages the attention of either theologians or historians. We do not wonder that a book so able and well-informed should have excited denunciation and protest from those whose trickery it exposes. Written by Liberal Catholics, it is the most damaging exposure of the chicanery of Rome that this century has seen.

Reasons for Returning to the Church of England. Strahan and Co.

This is a kind of book of Ecclesiastes, which no one will read without interest, and which will be even instructive to some of the author's co-churchmen; but it is almost astounding to find him detail as new discoveries, arrived at after years of pondering, reasons for leaving the Church of Rome which have been the principia of Protestantism from the time of the Reformation.

The real interest of the book lies in the contrasts of practical religious life in the two churches which the peculiar experience of the author enables him to give. Thirty-five years ago he took orders in the Church of England. Twenty-five years ago he became a member of the Church of Rome. After remaining in it thirteen years he seceded from it, and has for the last twelve years passed a 'life of isolation,' which he now ends by returning to the bosom of the Anglican Church. Those acquainted with that Church will have no difficulty in identifying the author with Mr. Capes. In much that he says about the common religious life of the two Churches, and of all Churches, we agree, although he goes too far, we think, in his depreciation of the practical religious influence of Divine dogmas. The credulities of intellectual ability and moral conscientiousness chiefly strike us in reading the author's confessions; but he has furnished us with an interesting apologia pro vitâ suâ.

Pioneers and Founders; or, Recent Workers in the Mission Field. By C. M. YONGE. Macmillan and Co.

Miss Yonge has made a selection of biographies of eminent missionaries, with a view of exhibiting the scope and progress of modern English Protestant missions. The names selected are John Eliot; David Brainerd; Christian Frederick Schwartz; Henry Martyn; Carey, Marshman, and Ward; the Judson family; the Bishops of Calcutta--Middleton, Heber, and Wilson; Samuel Marsden; John Williams; Allen Gardiner; and Charles Frederick Mackenzie. Knowing Miss Yonge's strongly marked Anglicanism, we opened her volume with some apprehension, but were gratified to find it not justified, for, with the exception of a certain phraseology when speaking of Nonconformists or Americans--such as 'it is the custom of this sect,' the word being used with a perceptible emphasis, as from a vantage ground of ecclesiastical orthodoxy--the spirit of the book is admirable. We all know how lucidly, beautifully, and sympathetically Miss Yonge can write, and all that is best in her devout feeling flows forth without restraint as she narrates the marvellous stories of Carey, the Judsons, and John Williams. She cannot resist--she has no wish to resist--the power and wisdom with which they spake, or the indubitable signs and wonders of God's Spirit that followed them. We have only words of commendation for her charming little book; never have the achievements of these Christian heroes been told in a more religious or fascinating way.

Baptist History: From the Foundation of the Christian Church to the Present Time. By J. M. CRAMP, D.D., with an Introduction by Rev. J. ANGUS, D.D. Elliot Stock.

We confess to an utter and disqualifying impatience with 'the Baptist Controversy.' We wish that our friends who prefer immersion and think the baptism of believers the true conception of the design of the ordinance, would follow their preferences, and cease to vex the Church so much with their reasons, defences, and assaults. The controversy is not worth its cost. Dr. Cramp begins fiercely with 'Pædobaptist Concessions and the New Testament,' and finds support for his views in the Apostolic Fathers and in the past Nicean Church. Be it so; we are not convinced, but we will not controvert him. His book aims at being a general history of Baptists throughout the world, as distinguished from provincial histories of Baptists--English, American, and Foreign. We might be glad to accept it as a chapter of Church history, containing many things in which all good men have a common interest; but then, conceived and based as it is, it has necessarily a denominational twist and colour. Baptists whose faith needs confirmation and support may derive benefit from it.

The Practical Moral Lesson Book. Edited by the Rev. CHARLES HOLE, F.R.G.S. Longmans and Co.

Mr. Hole has produced a very valuable elementary lesson-book on topics too often neglected in education. It is divided into three books--the first which is the only one yet published, treats of duties which men owe to themselves--(1) duties concerning the body, including the laws, functions, and conditions of physical life, such as food, air, light, exercise, cleanliness, rest, recreation, temperance, &c.; (2) duties concerning the mind--treating of the right conduct of the appetites, the senses, the intellect, the emotions, the will, the actions, &c.; and (3) embracing the whole range of self-culture, and of moral and social obligations.

The little work is prepared and adapted for schools, and is written simply, popularly, and with great wisdom and completeness. We have only good to speak concerning it. We should be thankful to know that it was used in every elementary school in the kingdom.

Synonyms Discriminated; a Complete Catalogue of Synonymous Words in the English Language, with Descriptions of their Various Shades of Meaning, and Illustration of their Usages and Specialities. By C. J. SMITH, M.A. Bell and Daldy.

It is impossible to exhibit the character of works of this kind by detailed criticisms. Even the best will furnish abundant material for adverse judgment, while the worst must be right sometimes. A thorough knowledge of such works, moreover, can be attained only by long use. We can only, therefore, give our impressions of Mr. Smith's work, formed, after turning over his pages, and fixing upon examples here and there most likely to test his knowledge and his judgment.

The task which he has set himself is a very delicate one--it demands an equal knowledge of philology, literature, and popular usage, and a keen faculty for discerning things that under apparent resemblances really differ, and things that under various and unlike forms, have common root ideas. The philologist has to deal with only one root word. The compiler of a book of synonyms must be, so to speak, a compound philologist, and must have in hand, for comparative purposes, several root words. Nor, again, is philology a sufficient guide, for the significance of words changes in popular usage; they are found sometimes in a state of ambiguous, sometimes of even contradictory meaning. Mr. Smith had the advantage of Crabbe's previous labours; but to say nothing of Crabbe's inferior scholarship, his book is almost obsolete--for, unlike dictionaries which deal with intrinsic meanings, a book of synonyms has chiefly to do with conventional meanings. Generally, we may say, that Mr. Smith is a very accomplished etymological scholar, a very keen discriminator, and that his illustrative examples are selected with great industry, and from a wide field of English literature--although he might have laid under greater contribution great living masters, such as Tennyson, Freeman, Froude, Browning, and others; but it is only gradually, and by the labour of contributive students, that a corpus of references is formed. Perhaps the defect that we the most frequently note is in derivations. Mr. Smith is too often contented with popular meanings, to the neglect of etymological ones. Thus, under 'Devout, Pious, Religious, Holy;' all that he says under the crucial word 'Religious' is, that it is 'a wider term, and denotes one who, in a general sense, is under the influence of religion, and is opposed to irreligious or worldly, as the pious man is opposed to the impious or profane, and the devout to the indifferent or irreverent.' He ventures upon no etymology, although he has given us Fr. dévot--why not the Latin devotus?--Lat. pius--A.S. halig. A book of synonyms is not, however, a hook of etymological solutions; and we are very thankful to Mr. Smith for a work incomparably superior to Crabbe, and which will be indispensable on every scholar's desk.

The Practical Linguist; being a System based entirely upon Natural Principles of Learning to Speak, Read, and Write the German Language. By DAVID NASMITH, Member of the Middle Temple. In 2 vols. Nutt.

Mr. Nasmith is the author of the ingenious chronometric characteristic History of England, by which the student may learn at a glance, more than it might take him hours to put together for himself. Information obtained so easily, though impressed involuntarily upon the eye, does not leave so deep an effect behind it. In the 'Practical Linguist' Mr. Nasmith has endeavoured to throw into a system the principle naturally adopted by a child or uneducated person in learning a foreign tongue. The more frequently used words, called the 'permanent vocabulary,' are separated from the 'auxiliary vocabulary,' and an effort is made to bring the former into great prominence, and gradually to introduce the latter according to the varied subject-matter of a prolonged series of graduated exercises, terminating in translation and re-translation of Heine and other German classics. A careful and practical arrangement of the German accidence precedes the exercises, and grammatical commentaries follow them; while each exercise is accompanied by a Germanized English version of the English sentence that is to be rendered into German. The Germanized English which is called by the author 'Anglicized German,' forms the rock in the midst of the stream, to and from which it is supposed more easy to throw the pontoons over which the army of young scholars may pass from one territory to another. This, like many other systems, will demand much effort and patience to master. We have no doubt that if it be followed carefully to the end, a thoroughly practical acquaintance with the German language will be secured.

THE

BRITISH QUARTERLY REVIEW.

OCTOBER, 1871.

ART. I.--Dr. Carl Ullmann.[43]

Dr. Carl Ullmann is perhaps best known in this country and in America as the author of the two apologetic treatises, 'The Sinlessness of Jesus' and 'The Essence of Christianity;' but his name will probably live in the history of theology mainly as the founder, and for many years conductor of the Theologische Studien und Kritiken, that oldest and ablest of all the German theological journals. Though not what his fellow-countrymen term an epoch-making man, either in the scientific or practical sphere, he was unquestionably a representative man--representative of the best elements both of German thought and German character. Both the strength and weakness of German theologians were illustrated in his experience; the former in his successes, the latter in his failures. There are few, if any, German theologians whose works contain so much that applies directly to the theological needs and efforts of the present moment.

Dr. Carl Ullmann was born on the 15th of March, 1796, at Epfenbach, a village about half-way between Heidelberg and Mosbach, six miles from the river Neckar, where his father was pastor of the Reformed Church. Several of his forefathers on his mother's side had been pastors at Epfenbach; and his father, who was a native of Heidelberg, took possession of the living, and married the daughter of its previous incumbent at the same time. His father was a harmless, kind-hearted, cheerful, and pious man; his mother had a lively, imaginative, poetical temperament; the son inherited the qualities of both. The only other child, a daughter, died when very young.

Carl was of a delicate physical constitution, but eager to learn. Till he reached his ninth year, he went to the village school, the instruction at which was supplemented by his father. Among the first things he read were the poems of Claudius and Hebel; and he learnt by rote so easily, and took such a pleasure in declaiming poetry, that his parents used to say--'We must make a Professor of him.' Happy as he was at home, he began early to feel the lack of other companionship than that supplied by the peasant children with whom he associated, and a desire stirred in him to go out into the world. In the fragment of an autobiography which was found among his papers, he says:--'I remember the very spot--it was in one of the beautiful forests near my birth-place--where I first became conscious of a yearning to leave home. It was as strong as the yearning which one generally feels to return home when one is away. I was then seven years old.' In his ninth year he was accordingly sent to Mosbach, where he lodged with a clerical brother of his mother's, and attended the Latin school. After a year he entered the Gymnasium at Heidelberg, with the distinct idea of becoming a pastor, and perhaps eventually of succeeding his father. The school does not seem to have been all that it ought to have been; but the social influences by which he was surrounded were of an exceptionally stimulating and elevating kind. He rose from class to class in the Gymnasium with such rapidity, that he was prepared to pass the so-called Abiturienten-Examen[44] before reaching his seventeenth year--an unusually early age.

About this time his thoughts were almost completely turned aside from the profession he had intended to pursue, by the influence of friends of the family with which he lived. These were the brothers Boisseree, who were enthusiastic lovers of art, and had a fine collection of works of the old German masters. Young Ullmann was often invited by them to study their treasures, and became eventually so infected with their enthusiasm; or rather, perhaps, one ought to say, his own slumbering love of, and susceptibility to, the beautiful in nature and art, was so awakened, that he proposed to his parents to allow him to become a landscape painter. Two young men who were then his friends, and in whose company he used to traverse the charming scenes which abound in the neighbourhood of Heidelberg, afterwards became eminent artists, and he himself produced sketches and drawings full of the brightest promise. His parents, however, were shocked at the idea of their son taking up a profession that brought more honour than bread, especially as they were not in circumstances to sustain him until he should have attained a name and position; they urged on him, therefore, that he might secure leisure enough for the pursuit of art as a country pastor, and promised to let him study in Munich after completing his course at the University. The prospect thus opened up calmed him, and by the time his theological studies were completed, other thoughts filled his mind. To the end of his life, however, Ullmann remained a lover of art, and the æsthetic turn of his mind manifested itself in occasional poetic effusions, in that grace of style for which he was reputed beyond most of his contemporaries, and in a general refinement of culture. It is scarcely likely, however, that he would have attained the eminence as an artist that he gained as a theologian; and certainly the pursuit of art would not have admitted of his exerting the direct practical influence which he eventually wielded, and which was to him a source of such deep satisfaction.

He matriculated at Heidelberg in the autumn of 1812. The University had just lost one or two of its brightest ornaments--the youthful Neander, for example,--but still, notwithstanding its losses, next to the young and rising Berlin, it had the ablest professors, and was inspired by the highest aims. The most eminent member of the theological faculty was Daub; the most notorious was Paulus. The former was a man of remarkable force, energy, simplicity and earnestness, and so devoted to his academic vocation that he once wrote to his then young friend Rozenkranz, now Professor of Philosophy in Königsberg, and one of the few remaining Hegelians of the right wing, 'Holidays, do you say? Does the old man still take no holidays? No, my dear friend, not yet, nor do I want any; my heart's desire is, if possible, to die in my chair, docendo.' His desire was almost literally fulfilled; for the stroke which terminated his life, smote him whilst lecturing on anthropology, November 19th, 1836. He has been termed, rather wittily, but spitefully, the Talleyrand of German Philosophy and Theology, because 'he passed from the Kantian Revolution, through Schelling's Imperialism, to Hegel's Reactionaryism.' Deducting the spite, there is truth in the description, for he began his career as a thorough Kantian, then became a warm disciple of Schelling, and finished up as a Hegelian of the right wing. The changes he underwent were both sign and evidence of the honesty and thoroughness with which he devoted himself to the investigation of truth; there was not a trace in him of the frivolity of the French diplomatist. His best-known work is 'Judas Iscariot; or, Meditations on the Good in its relation to Evil.' Daub was still in his Schelling stage when Ullmann began to study. Paulus was, on the other hand, the most noted representative of the Rationalismus vulgaris, as it has been termed, in the department of exegesis. He was a man of wide reading, great learning, and acuteness, but possessed by so intense an aversion to everything that did not square with his narrow common sense, that he was incapable of understanding Christianity, and therefore made it his business to explain away everything that bore a supernatural or mystical character. Perhaps this was due in part to the fact that his father, who had been removed from his pastorate, ob absurdas phantasmagorica visiones divinas, forced him, whilst still a boy, to take part in the conferences with spirits and demons which he was in the habit of holding in conjunction with others like-minded. Professor Tholuck, of Halle, rarely lets pass an opportunity, in his exegetical lectures, of whetting his humour on some absurdity or other of Paulus. A greater contrast than that between him and Daub could scarcely have existed; and scientifically they may be said to have lived like cat and dog. Beside these two, another eminent name then graced the rolls of the University--Creuzer, author of the 'Symbolik und Mythologie der alten Völker, insbesondere der Griechen,' a work which was long the chief authority on its subject, and which even now well deserves consulting.

Ullmann's mind seems at this stage to have been in the unreflective state, in which, perhaps, a majority of German theological students are at the outset; naturally so, too, for his vocation was rather the choice of his parents than his own. He says about himself:--

'As I was still young, and my father wished me to have plenty of time for study, I did not at once devote myself exclusively to strictly professional studies, but attended the philosophical and philological lectures of Daub and Creuzer, and those on the "Encyclopædia of Theology" and "Church History," by Paulus. During the year that I thus spent at Heidelberg, I cannot say that I either felt any specific interest in science, or evinced any independence of mind. I was an industrious and respectful hearer, but little more. With the idea of setting me on my own feet, and plunging me more into theology, my father wished me to go to another University.'

Advised by Daub, Ullmann accordingly resolved to go to Tübingen.

This custom of students pursuing their studies at more than one University is almost universal in Germany; and where the system of instruction is one by lectures, has, unquestionably, many advantages. Some of the direct personal influence and stimulus that a man of eminent vigour may exercise, is perhaps lost; but, on the other hand, the danger of a young man being too much influenced is avoided, and a greater manifoldness of development is favoured. This is one reason why thought in Germany is less stereotyped than among ourselves. Some, however, may, perhaps, deem this no advantage.

Tübingen was at that time considered the safest and soundest of all the German universities. It was the seat of the so-called Supranaturalistic school, and had been the refuge and stronghold of orthodoxy during the prevalency of Rationalism. Students of theology streamed thither from all parts of Germany. The principal theological professors were Scheurer, Flatt the younger, Bengel, and Bahnmeier, whose teachings tended to confirm young Ullmann on the positive Christian belief which had been inculcated on him at home and at school. Still he cannot be said to have been satisfied. The Tübingen theology, based as it was on philosophical presuppositions that had been to a large extent outgrown, was now becoming antiquated, and his mind was unconsciously reaching out towards the new mode of representing Christian truth, of which Schleiermacher was the harbinger, and which he himself eventually did so much to propagate. Some of his best and highest instincts and capabilities found nourishment and stimulus, however, in the circle of University friends to which he belonged. Among these were Gustav Schwab, the biographer of Schiller, and himself a poet, and above all, Uhland, who had then just published his first poems. The friendship formed with Schwab continued unbroken to the end of life. Such circles, originating in like literary interests and tastes, were then common in Germany. The atmosphere, especially of the universities, was full of what strikes our colder English mind as sentimental enthusiasm, but which then appeared to be glowing love for the highest ideals in State and Church, in science and philosophy, in prose and poetry. It were possibly better for our national and social life if there were a little more capability of enthusiasm for the ideal in the young men of our universities and colleges. We are too hard, muscular, and materialistic. Ullmann retained his susceptibility for the beautiful in literature to the end of life; and occasionally, too, expressed his thoughts and feelings in rhymes, of which, even poets by profession would not have needed to be greatly ashamed. He returned home in the autumn of 1816, and shortly afterwards passed his theological examination at Carlsruhe. The certificate he received was so good that he was at once offered a teachership at the Lyceum in Carlsruhe, but declined it on the ground of health, and resolved, according to the general custom in Baden, to become a 'vikar,' or, as we say in England, a 'curate,' or assistant. He was ordained on the 12th of January, 1817, in the church at Epfenbach, and immediately thereupon entered on a vikariat at Kirchheim, where a friend of his father's was the incumbent. There he remained a year, but his wish to become a country pastor was not to be realized. The manner in which he had passed his examination had excited the attention of the ecclesiastical and university authorities, and as there was at that time a strong wish to see Baden young men selecting the academical career, that is, settling as teachers at the university with a view to becoming professors, the Government called upon him to take this course, and offered to supply him with the means necessary to further study. Ullmann's own inclinations responded to this invitation; but he hesitated at first because he had a wholesome horror of adding another to the already too long list of second-rate professors. His parents were naturally gratified; but with noble tact and generous self-sacrifice, at once said that they themselves would provide their son with the requisite means, in order that he might remain free to take whatever course seemed most suitable to himself.

In the autumn of 1817, he accordingly recommenced his university studies. At first he hesitated whether he should go to Göttingen or remain at Heidelberg; he wisely decided on the latter. For though the former had not a few eminent men, it was bound too much by the traditions of the eighteenth century, whereas Heidelberg was one of the fountains of the new theological and philosophical life that had begun to permeate Germany.

Philosophy was the subject to which he first devoted himself; in particular, the philosophy of Hegel, who had then just been appointed professor at Heidelberg. He never properly relished Hegel; indeed, to judge from one of his letters to his friend Schwab, he seems to have been made not a little melancholy by it. Satisfaction it could not well afford him, for his was not a mind to put up with dry bones and logical subtilties; but it proved to be an excellent intellectual gymnastic, and compelled him to an examination of his own theological and philosophical position that was greatly needed, and which would otherwise have been scarcely possible. The à priori constructive method of the Hegelian philosophy did not accord with the native bent of his mind. He shows, too, that he began to be aware of the line he himself would have to take in the following words addressed to one of his examiners who had urged him to turn his special attention to systematic theology:--

'I am not one of those who are able to construct an historical fact like the Christian religion, by starting from a philosophical centre. My way into science is that of historical inquiry; it passes from the particular to the general, not from the general to the particular; or, applied to theology, from exegesis and history to systematic theology and Christian ethics.'

He accordingly first took up philological, exegetical, and patristic studies; he did so from a just though instinctive conviction that satisfactory solutions of the great problems of theology and philosophy are only possible on the basis of sound and thorough historical studies. That it cost him no little self-restraint to carry out this method, is evident from the letters he wrote about this time. In one addressed to Schwab occur the words--

'It is my misfortune that at present I have little time to give to the highest questions. I have so many of the merely outward parts of science which are absolutely necessary to fetch up, that I often groan as under a heavy burden. Still, even in the desert of grammatical and critical study, I meet with many a refreshing oasis.'

He began also to feel a deeper sympathy with the practical aspects of the vocation on which he was entering. In the same letter from which we have just quoted, he says--

'I am sometimes disposed to envy the men--and there are many of them--who live on an untroubled life, doing the right without difficulty. My life appears, by comparison, one continuous self-torture. But should I not be acting unworthily? Must I not rather confess to myself that I have as yet no solid ground on which I can take my stand? Yes; and therefore, I am resolved to forego all the enjoyments and pleasures of life rather than not attain to certainty--rather than not be able to say, "I know in whom I have believed."'

He concluded his studies at Heidelberg by taking the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, and in the spring of 1819 entered on a scientific tour intended to embrace Jena, Göttingen, Dresden, Leipzig, Berlin, and other centres of German culture. His stay in Berlin was both the longest and the most important. He there made the personal acquaintance of De Wette, Neander, and Schleiermacher, and his intercourse with the last two in particular had a determining influence on the whole of his future course. That for which his own studies had been preparing the way was now accomplished, namely, his emancipation from the old supranaturalistic forms of theological thought which had hitherto hampered him. He did not, however, quit his hold of the substance of the Christian faith; on the contrary, it became more completely a living possession. In the sketch he wrote of the life of his friend Umbreit, he describes his Berlin experiences as follows:--

'In intercourse with De Wette, Neander, and Schleiermacher, I absorbed into myself the elements of the new theology. In opposition to both Rationalism and Supranaturalism, Christianity presented itself to me then as a new vital creation and divine revelation, in the full sense of the term, but, at the same time, as something undergoing an organic development in the history of mankind. I saw accordingly that it was the function of the theologian to seek to effect a reconciliation between the Christian faith and the healthy elements in the culture of the age, that is, to exhibit it in its reasonableness, instead of in the form of authority.'

De Wette's influence was more an exegegetical than a critical one, and Ullmann never showed much taste for the business of the critic. Schleiermacher taught him the distinction between faith and theology and the central significance of the person of the Redeemer, without, however, seriously infecting him with his own exaggeratedly subjective and speculative tendencies. Through Neander, his mind was open to the appreciation of Christianity as a phenomenon and power in the history of humanity. He was most drawn towards the last-mentioned, and always spoke of him with deep and loving reverence. There was not a little affinity between the two--an affinity which manifested itself even more distinctly in later years; and if their course of development had been more similar, the resemblance between them would have been something very unusual. This will appear as we advance in our task.

During this tour, Ullmann visited Hamburg, and there formed an acquaintance which was destined to become very intimate, and to have not a little influence on his career as a theologian--it was that of the celebrated publisher, Friedrich Perthes. The circumstances under which the introduction took place were embarrassing enough. Ullmann had ran short of money, and not knowing what else to do, went to Perthes, who at once, on the credit of his honest face, as he said, lent him a sufficient sum of money to enable him to carry out his immediate plans. Perthes subsequently became Ullmann's publisher.[45]

In the autumn of 1819, Ullmann commenced lecturing at Heidelberg, taking for subjects Exegesis and Church History. With unusual consideration, the Government gave him, even as Privat-Docent, a small salary, and promised him early promotion to an Extraordinary Professorship, a promise which was fulfilled in 1821. The first published fruits of his studies were a critical treatise on the Second Epistle of Peter, in which he defended the first two chapters as a genuine fragment of the Apostle, but admitted the remainder to be the work of another hand; and an examination of the 'Third Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians,' which had just been translated from the Armenian by Rind, and which he demonstrated to be a forgery. These were the first and last properly critical essays he ever wrote. His next publications, which were 'An Archæological Essay on the Christian Festivals,' originally appended to the second edition of Creuzer's 'Symbolik,' and another on the sect of the Hypsistarians, written in Latin, as the programme when he entered on his professorship, inaugurated the labours in the field of Church history where lay his true vocation, and in which he achieved his best successes.

The year 1820 brought two events on which he never ceased to look back with the intensest thankfulness--his betrothal with Hulda Moreau, who eventually became his wife, and his friendship with Umbreit, who had become his colleague as Professor of Oriental Languages. The strain in which he refers to the former, when writing to his friend Schwab, was all that the most ardent lover could demand. It will suffice to quote one sentence:--'Never had I either in hopes or dreams represented to myself the happiness of love so beautifully and truly as I have found it to be in reality.' Of Umbreit he spoke in the following terms:--'He is just the friend for whom I have longed; one who takes me and understands me just as I am and live; who loves me faithfully with all his heart, despite my defects, and who has insight into and sympathy with the needs of my soul.' 'Soon,' says he, in his own sketch of Umbreit's life, 'our hearts opened to each other, and ere long our relation to each other was such that it became a necessity to meet daily and exchange thoughts and experiences. We were one as to the basis and goal of life; and yet the individuality and development of each were so different that we supplemented each other, and were thus for each other a perpetual stimulus.' It was due to Ullmann's influence that Umbreit became positively Christian, both in his theology and life.

These were the bright aspects of the life of the young professor. It had, however, its shadows. The University numbered at this time only fifty-five students of theology, and they were mainly divided between Daub and Paulus; besides, the ground was so pre-occupied by Rationalism on the one side, and Speculation on the other, that there was no room for a theology that aimed to be at once evangelical and historical. In 1823, Ullmann wrote to Schwab:--'In a scientific respect, our position here is bad. The constellation of theological studies is of such a kind that several, I might say most of the professors, are really useless. To this number I have the honour to belong, along with men like Abegg and Umbreit. I deliver my regular lectures, but I have very few hearers and little hope of an improvement.' In addition to this, his salary was so small that it did not suffice for his own wants, much less could he marry on it. He became at last so weary of this state of things that he begged the Government to give him a living in the country. Instead of acceding to his wish, however, they increased his salary, and thus enabled him to venture on marrying in 1824.

In the following year he published his first large work--a monograph on Gregory Nazianzen, which proved him to be a worthy compeer of Neander, and brought him, in 1826, an invitation to the Theological Seminary at Wittenberg. Had not the Government again increased his salary, and made him in addition Professor in Ordinary, he would probably then have quitted Heidelberg, much as he loved it, and thoroughly loyal and grateful as were his feelings towards his native land. He no longer, however, felt so happy there as he had done in former years. The party spirit under which he had to suffer so severely at a later period, and which has done so much to degrade both theology and the Church in Baden, was just beginning to make itself felt, both in the University and in private circles.

The next great event in his life, and an important event in the history of German theology, the founding of the Theologische Studien und Kritiken, shall be narrated in his own words:--

'About this time the thought occurred to us' (referring to Umbreit and himself) 'of establishing a new theological journal, of which we proposed to ourselves to be joint editors. Our idea was, not to increase the already too numerous depositories of mere dry erudition, but to create an organ for the new theology which was either already in existence or in process of growth. After talking the matter over carefully between ourselves, we communicated our idea to our friends--Nitzsch, Lücke, and Gieseler,[46] all of whom were then in Bonn. As they at once promised their cooperation, we arranged to meet, for the maturing of our plans, at Rüdesheim, in the spring of 1827. Singularly enough, too, the publisher to whom we proposed applying, Friedrich Perthes, had himself also, quite independently, been entertaining a similar plan; and that not merely as a business speculation, but also for the sake of promoting the so-called new theology.'

As his and their wishes thus happily met, the scheme was speedily ripened, and the first number made its appearance at Hamburg, in 1828, bearing on its title-page the names of Drs. Ullmann and Umbreit as editors, and of Drs. Gieseler, Lücke, and Nitzsch as collaborateurs.

During the first years of its existence, the Studien und Kritiken had a severe struggle: in a commercial point of view it certainly did not pay; indeed, as such things are now regarded in this country, it never has paid well. The highest circulation it ever attained--unprecedented before, and since, in Germany--was between 900 and 1,000. This was prior to that year of political and social disturbances--1848. What the number of its subscribers at the present moment may be, we do not know; we have been told they do not reach 500. Among its contributors it has had almost all the greatest German theologians of the last forty years; for example, Schleiermacher, De Wette, Rothe, Julius Müller, Twesten, Hundeshagen, Tholuck, Bleek, Neander, Dorner, Schenkel, Schweitzer, and others too numerous to be specified. At present, it is edited by Drs. Hundeshagen and Riehm. Whilst from the beginning the original design of its founders--that it should be the organ of the theology of which Neander and Nitzsch may be said to have been the best-known representatives--was conscientiously adhered to, its pages were constantly open to opinions diverging very widely from those of the editors. In fact, it was a kind of neutral ground on which men of, one might almost say, opposite theological opinions met for courteous tourney. None were excluded from contributing whose spirit was that of reverential inquiry. It has accordingly been in the best sense a power, not only in Germany but even throughout Christendom. We cannot write these words without blushing with shame that we in Great Britain have never been able adequately to sustain, for any length of time, any purely theological journal at all, much less one that dared to be something more than the mere organ of a little party or sect. It is a disgrace to us. In this matter, we are far behind even America; how much farther behind Germany! and that, too, notwithstanding that a certain interest in theological questions is much more widely diffused among us than in the latter country.

The article with which the Studien opened, at once established the character both of the journal and of its principal editor; it was one on the 'Sinlessness of Jesus,'[47] which subsequently appeared in a separate and considerably enlarged form. During Ullmann's lifetime it ran through seven editions, and was translated into, at all events, one foreign language. Few books have rendered better service to young theologians, in their doubts and struggles, than this.

In 1829, an invitation came to him from Prussia to take the chair of Church History at the University of Halle. Strongly as he was attached to Heidelberg, and patriotically desirous as he was of serving Baden, still this time he felt that it was his duty to go. Such, too, was the opinion of his friends; even the Minister of Education in Baden raised little objection, though he expressed the hope that when the right moment came, Heidelberg would be able to reclaim its own. The change was a very great one--greater than can well be appreciated by any one who is not acquainted with the difference, not only between Halle and Heidelberg, but also between their respective inhabitants. South Germans do not always harmonize well with North Germans. No contrast could be greater than that between the two towns. The praises of Heidelberg--of its river, castle, forests, mountains, and valleys--everybody sings, and sings with justice. Halle is known to comparatively few, and is not likely to be loved by ordinary tourists. And yet those who have lived in Halle for any length of time always think of it with affection. Its streets are narrow and close; its pavements used to be uncivilized in summer, and absolutely barbarous in winter; its atmosphere is tainted by one general smell of the peculiar kind of turf that is burnt, and by numerous particular odours; the older houses and rooms are fusty, and abound in tenants who do not pay, but exact rent from their fellow-lodgers; it is awfully hot in summer and cold in winter; the scenery around, save in one direction, is very dismal--and yet few who have studied there can help saying, 'Dear old Halle!' The secret is the kind, unpretending, truly scientific spirit that prevails among the professors and their families, rendering them very accessible to all, and facilitating close intercourse. Ullmann found in Halle all the diversities of point of view that existed at Heidelberg, and, indeed, at every University. Wegscheider and Gesenius represented Rationalism, but a better and larger spirit possessed the faculties. More frequent opportunities were, moreover, afforded him of meeting the other eminent men of the age. He visited Schleiermacher and Neander in Berlin; Tieck in Dresden; Hase and Baumgarten-Crusius in Jena; went a foot tour with Lachmann, Hossbach, and Schleiermacher in Thuringia; and held a conference with the co-operators and contributors of the Studien in Marburg. But the chief source of satisfaction were the 800 theological students who then frequented Halle; for he now secured auditories double the number of all the theological students of Heidelberg taken together. Naturally, too, his income was more adequate to the necessities of a man of family and learning than it had ever been before. All these circumstances gave his letters to his friends in South Germany a tone of unmistakeable cheerfulness.

During the early Halle years, his time and energies were so much absorbed in the preparation of his lectures and the editing of the Studien, which now devolved almost entirely on himself, that extensive literary undertakings were out of the question. He lectured on Church History, History of Doctrine, Symbolics, Introduction to the New Testament, and at last also on Dogmatics. This last subject was taken up by way of counteracting the influence of Wegscheider. In his inaugural discourse on 'The Position of a Church Historian in the Present Day,' afterwards printed in the Studien (1829), Ullmann sounded the key-note of his entire future teachings in words some of which may be quoted here. The entire discourse well deserves studying by ourselves at the present time:--

'Sound reason and pure revelation of God are not at the root diverse, and cannot be opposed to each other, though they may present religious truth in differing forms and compass. A truly divine doctrine will never interfere with the freedom of thought and of intellectual development; on the contrary, it will confer true, inward liberty. That which separates the opposing parties in our midst is, on the one hand, that the defenders of reason are not always rational enough, not truly and impartially rational; and on the other hand, that the believers in revelation do not adhere with sufficient simplicity to the word and spirit of revelation.' 'Christianity is higher reason; it is reason in the form of history, in the form of a divine institution; and as such it connects itself with the deepest needs of the human soul.' 'Christianity and reason must not and cannot be separated from each other.'

The years 1831 and 1832 were years of deep sorrow: in the former he lost his eldest daughter; in the latter his beloved wife. Severe as was the test to which his faith was thus put, it stood it well. He was able to say, 'The Lord gave; the Lord hath taken away: blessed be the name of the Lord.' But the blow affected him very severely. He withdrew from the social intercourse in which he had so greatly delighted; his health, too, was so enfeebled that he was compelled to go for a time to Baden on visits to friends. The following extract from a letter to Umbreit, after his return, shows how he thought and felt:--

'I have found it very hard to settle down in Halle after so long an enjoyment of the beauties of my old home. Like an unwilling child, I have only given in by degrees. Nor did I really become contented again till I set thoroughly to work. And now that I am at work, I am again looking forward to the holidays. One always seems to remain a child, and life is an eternal circle, and after all a labour and sorrow, occasionally broken by brighter glimpses of heaven, of the hearts of friends, of one's own soul, and of nature. When one looks seriously at life, one can scarcely help both smiling and weeping; and it would be utterly unintelligible to me without God and eternity. It is not good, however, to think and grub too much about it; one must undertake some work, even though it be not much. Faith and work are the only sources of lasting peace.'

In the autumn of 1834 he married again. Until 1833, when his first contribution to the 'History of the Reformers before the Reformation'--'John Wessel and his Times'--appeared, he printed nothing but a few essays and reviews in the Studien. That the time was not a very favourable one for theological authorship would appear from the circumstance that Perthes, the publisher of 'Wessel,' large-minded and sympathetic as he was, did not expect it to pay expenses. It proved, however, a success, and with the portions subsequently issued, is now esteemed one of the best German monographs in the domain of Church history.

Early in 1835, Ullmann wrote to a friend: 'In the world of literature we have at present a complete ebb; nor does there seem any prospect of our being stirred out of our quiet jogtrot existence. What a blessing it would be, if some great light were to arise in theology--some second Luther, or Lessing, or Goethe!' He little thought that the stirring up that he desired would so soon come; still less that it would come in the way in which it did come. It was not a new Luther, or Goethe, or Lessing that arose, but Strauss, with his 'Life of Jesus.' As is well known, this work, notwithstanding its containing little that was really new, produced an unexampled sensation in the theological and ecclesiastical circles of Germany. It called forth a perfect flood of replies; and among them, Ullmann's, though small in compass, occupied a very honourable position. He put his finger on the weak spot in Strauss's book, in the following words of a letter written to Schwab, immediately after he had taken a first glance at it:--'All honour to criticism, but in Strauss's case it becomes plainly unhistorical; for on the view with which he starts, the origin of Christianity and the rise of men like the Apostle Paul are alike inexplicable.' His reply consisted of two essays in the Studien of 1836 and 1838, and afterwards published separately, under the title, 'Historisch oder Mythisch.' Next to Neander's 'Life of Jesus,' Ullmann's treatise is said to have had most influence on Strauss.

Shortly after his second marriage, Ullmann wrote to a friend that he felt he was becoming every year more and more attached to Halle and North Germany; and yet, when the call came to him, in 1836, to resume his position at Heidelberg, he was unable to resist it. He had previously declined without hesitation to entertain a proposal to remove to Kiel. Many considerations weighed with him; certainly, however, not an increase of income, for he positively lost by the change. The thought of revived intimacy with Umbreit; the being near to his aged father; the beauty of Heidelberg; perhaps, too, the sorrows associated with Halle; but, above all, the prospect held out that his return should be the first step in the renewal of the theological faculty, were the magnets drawing him homeward. Still he found it difficult to decide. The Prussian Government did all in their power to retain him, but he thought duty pointed to a return; and he accordingly left Halle in the autumn of 1836. He could not always congratulate himself on the step thus taken. Indeed, a certain feeling of disappointment almost immediately took possession of him. He missed especially the large Halle auditories. In Halle he had 100 students; in Heidelberg he began with six, who evinced, moreover, little interest. His hope of securing Nitzsch as a colleague was frustrated; the Government soon grew weary of special efforts to further theological study; the old ornaments of Heidelberg died rapidly out; and the new generation had neither faith nor refinement, so that when a professorship was offered him in 1841 at the University of Bonn he was strongly tempted to accept it, although he had previously refused one at Tübingen. Indeed, he probably would have returned to Prussia but for the renewal of the promises to do more for theology than had been done heretofore, and an autograph letter from the Grand Duke himself, begging him in the most flattering terms to remain. Having, soon after this time, purchased a house and garden of his own, he settled down inwardly and outwardly as a permanent Heidelberg fixture.

Death again visited his household, taking this time the only remaining daughter of his first wife, and the only child of his second. In other respects, however, he grew more content as the years advanced; partly because the circle of sympathizing friends gradually increased, and partly because the state of things at the University materially improved. The advent of new colleagues like Rothe, Hundeshagen, Schenkel, and Schöberlein, was naturally a source of great satisfaction.

In 1842, he completed his principal work--'The Reformers before the Reformation.' It was his last great effort. An intention, long entertained, of writing a life of Luther, was never realized. He became too absorbed in the various theoretical and practical questions that successively agitated the political, theological, and ecclesiastical worlds, to find time or energy for extensive literary undertakings; not that he ceased writing, but that what he wrote bore predominant reference to questions of immediate interest, and appeared for the most part in the pages of the Studien und Kritiken. Two of the most notable of the essays written at this period are those on the 'Cultus des Genius' and 'Das Wesen des Christenthums.' The former was directed against Strauss, who, in his 'Vergängliches und Bleibendes im Christenthum,' having reduced Jesus Christ to the rank of a religious genius, maintained that the cultus of genius is the only form of public and common religion the educated of the present generation can celebrate. The immediate occasion of his 'Sendschreiben,' as he termed it, was an oration delivered by his friend Schwab in connection with the inauguration of a monument to Schiller, at Marburg. It has always been esteemed one of the freshest, completest, and most artistic products of his pen. Of the geniality of the tone in which he approached the subject, the following passage will be sufficient evidence:--

'Our age is an age of distracted spirits. Let us look at the greatest among them, that ideal of all who really are, or affect to be, at discord with themselves and God, the Poet-Lord! A spirit of defiance, of contempt for mankind, of doubt; a cold breath of hopelessness and destructiveness pervades his writings. Terror is his domain; the destruction and misery of mankind are his dwelling place; he knows little of those fundamental elements of piety, hope, humility, and self-sacrifice. And yet who dare deny that he is engaged in a struggle, painful and desperate it is true, after the highest; that he is filled with irrepressible longings after the noblest? Because human life seemed to him so vain and empty, therefore did he despise it; because he would fain have loved men so much more truly than he could, therefore did he hate them; and yet, when at certain moments the primal consciousness of the heavenly and divine welled up from the depths of his soul, what energy and vitality did it evince, and what a mighty influence did it wield!'

There is very much in this essay that deserves carefully weighing by all who are mixed up with the intellectual struggles of the present time; and we have noted numerous passages for quotation, but our space forbids. The second one, on the 'Essence of Christianity,' strikes us as a scarcely satisfactory answer to the question discussed, though one's estimate of it naturally depends on one's own point of view. His course of thought is as follows.

Christianity, although unchangeably one and the same, has been viewed in different ages in different ways; first as doctrine, then as law, then as a plan of redemption. If we wish to understand its inmost essence, and to account for its workings in their entire compass, we must regard it as a new life, grounded on a complex of divine deeds and manifesting itself in human works. This life necessarily had a creative centre; this centre must have been a living one; and as it is life of the highest kind, the centre must have been a person. The founder of Christianity was the person in whom was effected that which all religions have striven after, the perfect union of God and man. Such being his character, the relation in which he stands to the religion founded by him, is not the outward one which subsists where the religion is advanced as a doctrine, or a law, or an institution; no, he himself embodies in himself the religion he founded, and his religion is essentially faith and life in him. The essence, the distinguishing character of Christianity, must accordingly be defined to be the person of its founder. Many of the ideas unfolded in this essay have exercised a very great influence on, and are now the common property of Christendom. Schleiermacher was the first in modern times to assign to the person of Christ the central position in Christianity; but Ullmann purified Schleiermacher's teaching on this subject from its speculative accessories, and made it in the best sense popular. The wide-spread tendency among the preachers and religious thinkers of this country to bring the person Christ to the foreground is, unquestionably, largely traceable to this German source. What we should blame in it is the vagueness and sentimentalism by which it is often accompanied or marked. The treatise pleased neither the critical nor the ultra-orthodox. An attack made on it by Count Agenor de Gasparin, in the 'Archives du Christianisme' (1851), called forth a reply from Ullmann which, to our mind, is far more interesting and valuable than the work it was meant to defend. From that reply, which appeared in the Studien of 1852, we cannot forbear making the following quotation, partly for what seems to us its intrinsic suggestiveness, and partly because it is characteristic of its author's position. 'The subject in dispute between Count Gasparin and myself,' says Ullmann,

'May be reduced to three points, the relation first between the outer and inner rule; secondly, between dogma and love; thirdly, between the person and the work of the Saviour. As to the first point, he appeals solely to the outer rule. Now an outer rule is one that comes to us from without, with the claim to be the norm of our spiritual life. The completest embodiment of the idea of the outer rule is Catholicism. But the Count will say, "The true outer rule is the Bible, not the Church." But how does he decide which of these outer rules is the true one? Each is a form of the same thing; each claims to be the only true form. In discriminating between them, appeal must clearly be made to an inner rule of some kind or other. Do I then mean to deny that the Scriptures are an outer rule? Certainly not! If I am asked, In what sense, then, is the Bible an outer rule?--is it in a sense that excludes all reference to an inner rule, to something higher, deeper, broader than the written word? I reply, No! In such a sense the Bible does not itself claim to be an outer rule. That in it which is outward issued forth from what was originally inward, and has the tendency, and is designed to become inward again. In thus becoming inward, it is not intended to operate as an outward rule, but to bear witness to itself in our inner life, and secure our free assent. Inward and outward thus act and react on each other. If the Scripture be a rule, it is fair to ask whence it came to us? It did not fall from heaven; it was not written immediately by the hand of God; it did not exist prior to Christianity. Christianity, on the contrary, existed first, and the Scripture was the organ through which it presented itself to, and propagated itself among men. That which existed before Scripture was the complex of saving facts, whose centre is Christ and the Christian life. The function of the Scripture, therefore, was to be the medium of making known the person and work of Christ, where the living message could not reach. For this reason its position and worth are not unconditional. Christ it is who conditions Scripture and gives it its worth. It is not the Scripture that gives authority to Christ, but Christ to Scripture. The proper object of faith is Christ, not the Scripture; the latter is merely the guide and educator unto Christ.'

The point of view indicated in the above extract is one that needs taking to heart and developing by the Christian thinkers of this country; rightly carried out, it would aid them materially in meeting the difficulties raised by the critics or opponents of the Bible. The exposition of the nature and function of mysticism in this same reply is admirable.

In two things, Ullmann had always differed from the majority of German theologians, and resembled the majority of English theologians. He endeavoured to write so as to be intelligible and acceptable to educated laymen, and aimed at exerting direct practical influence. Science, including theology, is too frequently pursued and expounded in Germany in the genuine dry-as-dust style; and theological authors in particular have been in the habit of completely ignoring the fact that they lived to serve the Church, and ought therefore to have an eye to its practical needs in all their enquiries. Hence the astonishing ignorance of theology that prevails in all but distinctively professional circles. A better feeling on this point has been growing up during the last ten years; but any change of practice has been rather forced on the theologians than spontaneously adopted--forced on them by the consideration that the laity of their Church were being utterly robbed of faith by the popular anti-Christian expositions of philosophy, criticism, and natural science that abounded. We in this country have erred for the most part in an opposite direction. Our eye to popularity and practical effect has had a squint in it. But though our theological investigations have lacked depth, they have, at all events, been far more widely appreciated. And that our fault is the less serious of the two is clear from the fact which is possibly unknown to most--that sound German theological works like those published by the Messrs. Clark, of Edinburgh, have had, with few exceptions, a larger circulation in the English than in their original dress. Still, it were well if both writers and readers in this country were a little more eager to sound the deeper depths of the science even at the risk of creating and meeting with difficulties.

The desire felt by Ullmann to exert a direct influence in Church matters grew with his years. He longed to see the ideas he had expounded becoming realities, and thought he could and ought personally to put hand to the work. There was much, too, in the circumstances of the ten years that preceded 1853 to draw his mind in the direction in which it naturally tended. Germany was everywhere in a state of ferment; especially in the domain of ecclesiastical affairs, were new and difficult problems constantly presenting themselves. He was also repeatedly called upon by the authorities of various German States to supply them with Gutachten on difficulties that had arisen; and the opinions he gave carried great weight, because of the sound judgment, thorough conscientiousness, and reverential liberality which characterised them.

One movement in particular greatly strengthened the inclination to which we are referring: we mean the secession from the Roman Catholic Church of Germany that took place under Ronge. He was not, however, carried away by it, as were many of his contemporaries, who hailed it as the harbinger of a new era in the history of the Christian Church. Its insignificance was clear to him from the very first. In a letter to his friend Schwab, he says sarcastically:--'The reformers of the nineteenth century have already passed through Heidelberg and Mannheim, doing a notable amount of eating and drinking and halloeing by the way.' An essay on the subject, published originally in the Studien for 1845, and afterwards as a pamphlet, contains much that bears forcibly on efforts that are now being made among ourselves to form churches or religious communities without either historical or doctrinal basis.

In 1853, a post was offered to him, which seemed to meet the wish he had cherished, to be able to wield direct practical influence in ecclesiastical affairs. He was called to be Prälat of Baden. This office or dignity--to which nothing exactly corresponds in our own country--conferred on its holder a seat in the Upper Chamber of Deputies, as the representative of the Evangelical Church; but, singularly enough, did not necessarily make him a member of the Upper Ecclesiastical Council, so that his direct influence was more personal than official. Ullmann hesitated at first to sacrifice the quiet and independence of his University position, and the opportunities of free action which he largely enjoyed, possessing, as he did, the confidence of the better clergy throughout the country; but at length he yielded. Considerations, such as loyalty to his prince, disgust at the illiberal liberalism that was increasingly gaining the upper hand at Heidelberg, and perhaps, too, an unconscious stirring of ambition, influenced his decision; but the main reason, undoubtedly, was the one to which reference has already been made. Before making this change, he did as he had done when he consented to remove from Halle to Heidelberg, and his experience, as a man of a less idealistic turn of mind might have anticipated, was again the same. He stipulated for many alterations, both in the principles and methods of ecclesiastical procedure. Could the programme which he laid before the Grand Duke have been thoroughly carried out, a great reform would have been the consequence; but the programme was a professor's programme, and the professor was not the man to make it a reality. He soon found that bureaucratic redtapeism, vested interests, indifference, incapacity, not to mention intrigue and open opposition, were as common in the higher ecclesiastical as in the political circles, and as difficult to vanquish.

In 1857, he was appointed to the office of Director of the Upper Ecclesiastical Council--a position equivalent, in some respects, to that of the Minister of Cultus in Prussia. The increase of honour brought an increase of care, but the increase of apparent power did not bring a corresponding increase of real power. He was associated with men who, besides being narrow bureaucrats, and having no sympathy with the higher interests of the Church, looked on Ullmann as a sort of interloper; the consequence being perpetual struggles and annoyance, without adequate compensation. Dislike to him personally began also to spread among the clergy, and the laity charged him with being a High Church reactionary. His difficulties culminated in the so-called Agenden-Streit, and in the disputes relating to the new constitution proposed for the Church; the upshot of the whole, being that, in 1860, he retired from office, broken in health, and almost broken in spirit.

He was never able to resume independent literary work, though he did again undertake the direction of the Studien und Kritiken, which for several years had mainly devolved on his colleague Umbreit. After the death of the latter, in 1860, he associated Dr. Rothe with himself as joint editor; but, owing to an ever-increasing divergence of their views--both practical and theoretical--this arrangement terminated in 1864, at which date the journal passed into the hands of its present editors.

The faith that Ullmann had expounded and defended in life, sustained him in the decline of health and in the hour of death. In the autumn of 1863, both bodily and intellectual vigour began seriously to fail; and on the 12th of January, 1865, he died, surrounded by his family, and repeating to himself the closing words of that grand, but almost too moving hymn--

'O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden.'

FOOTNOTES:

[43] For the materials of this paper, we are largely indebted to a biographical sketch by Dr. W. Beyschlag, Professor of Theology in Halle.

[44] This is the examination which every gymnasiast, or scholar of a Gymnasium, who intends going to a University must pass ere quitting school. Papers certifying that this examination has been passed have to be laid before the University authorities prior to matriculation.

[45] F. A. Perthes, of Gotha, son of F. Perthes, has recently published a collected and cheaper edition of the works of Ullmann.

[46] Dr. Gieseler, author of one of the most valuable Church histories Germany has produced; Dr. Lücke, best known by his exhaustive commentary on the writings of St. John; and Dr. Nitzsch, equally celebrated as a theologian and practical ecclesiastic.

[47] A translation has been published by the Messrs. Clark, of Edinburgh. The line of argument pursued by Ullmann has an important bearing on controversies that are now arising in our midst, especially on that relating to the Incarnation, as opened by such writers as Mr. Hutton, in his 'Essays,' and Mr. Baring-Gould, in his work on 'The Origin and Development of Religious Beliefs.' It is not a little remarkable that the latter, in his discussion of the evidence for the incarnation, should never allude to the sinlessness of our Lord--a point on which great stress has justly been laid by some of the most eminent of the recent apologists for Christianity. If it be true that Christ was sinless; if it be further true that moral perfection is impossible, save on the condition of complete fellowship and harmony with God; if it be further true that the creature, the more intimate its fellowship with God, the more completely it will recognise, in word and deed, the distinction between itself and God, then, as it seems to us, the sinlessness of Jesus, taken in connection with the claims he advanced for himself, involves his standing in a relation to God such as is meant by the word incarnation. Either that, or his own very assertion of sinlessness, is one of the strongest evidences of his sinfulness. Mr. Baring-Gould's arguments for the incarnation, in another form, may be utilized by such as hold the old position; in his hands, they seem to us a piece of caprice.

ART. II.--Aerial Voyages.

Travels in the Air. By JAMES GLAISHER, F.R.S., CAMILLE FLAMMARION, W. DE FONVIELLE, and GASTON TISSANDIER. Edited by JAMES GLAISHER, F.R.S. With 125 illustrations. London: Richard Bentley and Son. 1871.

A few years ago a Frenchman, apostrophising the Genius of Humanity as none but a Frenchman can do, took the liberty of reproaching that metaphorical being for its extreme backwardness in one department of duty. He called upon it to 'march,' an injunction which his countrymen are so fond of issuing that they sometimes forget to tell you where, or to state the reason why. The present age, he intimated, demanded this movement: the coming generations would be greatly disappointed if it were not accomplished. 'One effort,' said he encouragingly to the Genius, 'and the future is thine (l'avenir t'appartient)!' The crooked places, he promised, should be made straight, and the rough ones delightfully smooth. There should be no more mountains (Pyrenees or otherwise), and the valleys should become as level as the plains!

And what does the reader suppose was the duty in respect of which the genius in question was so shamefully in arrear? It was, says M. Farcot, in the matter of aerostation. How is it, asked this individual, somewhat sharply, that man, who is so anxious to conquer everything and everybody (except, we might add, himself), should not have made greater exertions to subdue the sole element which continues in a state of rebellion? How is it that a being who has such magnificent forces at command, and can traverse the ocean with an ease and a rapidity which the fleetest denizens of the deep cannot surpass, should suffer himself to be outstripped in the air by an insignificant fly? M. Farcot could not comprehend it; M. Farcot would not submit to it. He therefore offered his services to mankind as the precursor of a new era, in which the balloon was to become the prominent figure, and entreated the object of his invocation to wake up, and with a single bound to overleap the gulf that lay between it and its greatest triumphs.

We are not in a position to state whether the genius in question listened favourably to M. Farcot's fervid appeal; but it is certain that his hopes have not yet been realized. The balloon has always appeared to possess such splendid capabilities that it is no wonder its admirers never weary of predicting a brilliant future for the machine. Considering the prominent part which Frenchmen have played in the history of aerostation, it will be readily understood that the apparatus commenced its career with a dash and élan which led mankind to anticipate that it would accomplish marvellous things, and become one of the foremost agents in the great work of civilization. Our lively neighbours, ever on the alert for glory until their recent misfortunes, and probably so still, were charmed with the idea of conquering a new region, though it contained nothing but clouds, and were by no means insensible to the vanity of riding in the air, though in most cases they went up, like their famous sovereign, simply to come down again.

Many years have elapsed--nearly a century--since Pilâtre de Rozier and the Marquis d'Arlandes made their daring voyage into the atmosphere in the car of a fire-balloon, this being the first excursion ever attempted by living creatures, if we except three anonymous animals, a sheep, a duck, and a cock, which were sent up in the previous month, and returned in safety to the earth. But as yet, though the machine has rendered considerable service to science, and will doubtless assist in the solution of many interesting problems, it is a thing of promise rather than of performance. It is still in a rudimentary state, and should be received, says M. Glaisher, simply 'as the first principle of some aerial instrument which remains to be suggested.' Potentially, it may include the germ of some great invention, just as Hiero's eolipile and Lord Worcester's 'water-commanding' engine contained a prophecy of the most masterly of human machines--the steam giants of Watt. But to apply the well-known metaphor of Franklin, when asked what was the use of a balloon, we may say that the 'infant' has not grown up into a man.

Within the last twelve months, however, this largest of human toys--the plaything of pleasure seekers, and the cynosure of all eyes at fêtes and tea-gardens--has been converted into a useful machine, though under the pressure of circumstances which every philanthropist must deeply deplore.

Of course, when the balloon was presented to mankind, one of the first thoughts which suggested itself to our combative race was this--'Can we turn it to any account in war? Will it assist us in killing our enemies, or capturing their fortresses?' And when we remember that the machine was reared amongst the most military people in Europe, can we doubt that as Napoleon's great question respecting the Simplon road was, whether it would carry cannon, so the chief point with a Frenchman would be, whether a balloon could be rendered of any service in a battle? Not many years were suffered to elapse before regular experiments were instituted with this view. An aerostatic school was established at Meudon, a company of aeronauts, under the command of Colonel Coutelle, was formed, and a number of balloons constructed by Couté were distributed amongst the divisions of the French army, not even forgetting the troops despatched to Egypt. At the sieges of Maubeuge, Charleroi, Mannheim, and Ehrenbreitstein the invention was found to be of some value for purposes of reconnoitring; and previous to the battle of Fleurus, Coutelle and an officer spent several hours in the air, studying the positions of the Austrians, and this with such effect that their information materially assisted General Jourdan in gaining the victory. The machine was, of course, held captive during the process, but its tether was easily extended by means of a windlass, and thus the occupants were enabled to soar above the enemy's fire.

More than once it has been proposed to build huge balloons, and freight them with shells and other missiles, which might be conveniently dropped down upon a hostile corps, or 'plumped' into the midst of a beleaguered town. With a view to the demolition of the fortress of St. Juan de Ulloa, during the war between Mexico and the United States, Mr. Wise suggested the construction of an enormous air-ship, which was to carry up a quantity of bombs and torpedoes, and, whilst securely moored in the atmosphere by means of a cable several miles in length, it would be in a position to rain down death upon the devoted place. To its honour, however, the American Government declined the use of such an aerial battery.

Fortunately--we think we may say fortunately--for the interests of mankind, the balloon has not succeeded to any considerable extent as a military machine. Even the Jesuit Lana felt inclined to weep over his abortive project (he did pray over it) when he considered how easy it would be for warlike marauders to set the stoutest walls and ramparts at defiance, and to hurl destruction into any city they might select. Let us hope that the balloon is destined for more pacific purposes. The range of modern guns, and the difficulty of manoeuvring so rudderless an apparatus, seem to cut it off from a career of glory. If employed for purposes of reconnoitring purely, and kept in a captive condition, it may occasionally render service by darting suddenly into the atmosphere, and taking a glimpse of the enemy's position or movements. But, then, a tethered balloon, as M. de Fonvielle intimates, belongs neither to the air nor the earth; it is a creature compelled to serve two masters, and therefore cannot do its duty to either; but, whilst attempting to obey the commands of its rulers below, it is forced to yield to the caprice of the breezes above. If free, asks M. Simonin, and if the wind were everything the aerial heroes could wish; if, moreover, the balloon, charged with the most formidable fulminates, were carried direct to the hostile camp, could they expect to find the enemy massed for a review or a manoeuvre precisely at the spot over which they sailed, and could they time their discharges so beautifully, having due regard to the speed of the machine, that their projectiles should explode at the most fitting moment for damaging their foes? Happily, in neither of the two greatest struggles of recent times--how recent none need say, for the scent of blood is yet on the soil of Virginia, and the bones of Teuton and Gaul still lie blended on the fields of France--has the balloon brought itself into formidable confederacy with Krupp cannon or the murderous mittrailleuse.

War, however, the greatest of scourges, is sometimes compelled, in the good providence of God, to yield an incidental harvest of blessings. Liberty has often been entrusted to the keeping of the bayonet, and civilization has more than once depended upon the explosive virtues of charcoal and saltpetre. It is not impossible that the recent investment of Paris may ultimately lead to the development of aerial navigation on a scale which would gladden the heart of M. Farcot, and almost satisfy the expectations of some of the greatest enthusiasts in the art. We allude, of course, to the employment of the balloon for postal purposes. During the recent siege of that city--we mean, of course, by the Germans, and not by Frenchmen themselves--upwards of fifty of these aerial packets sailed from the beleaguered metropolis with despatches for the outer world. They conveyed about two-and-a-half millions of letters, representing a total weight of about ten tons. Most of them took out a number of pigeons, which were intended to act as postmen from the provinces. One, called Le Général Faidherbe, was furnished with four shepherds' dogs, which it was hoped would break through the Prussian lines, carrying with them precious communications concealed under their collars. The greater number of these balloons were under the management of seamen, sometimes solitary ones, whose nautical training, it was naturally supposed, would qualify them more especially for the duties of aerial navigation. More than one fell into the hands of the enemy, having dropped down right amongst the Prussians. In some of these cases the crews were generally made prisoners, but in others they effected their escape; and more than once their despatches were preserved in a very remarkable way--in one instance being secreted in a dung cart, and in another being rescued by a forester, and conveyed to Buffet, the aeronaut of the Archimède, who had been sent out in search of them, and had traversed the hostile lines on his errand. Many of these postal vessels were carried to a considerable distance, some landing in Belgium, Holland, or Bavaria; whilst one, La Ville d'Orléans, was swept into Norway, and came to anchor about 600 miles north of Christiania. A few, unhappily, never landed at all. Le Jacquard, which left the Orleans railway station on the 28th November, with a bold sailor for its sole occupant, disappeared like many a gallant ship. It was last observed above Rochelle, and probably foundered at sea, as some of its papers were picked up in the Channel. Le Jules Favre (the second of that name), which set out two days subsequently, has arrived nowhere as yet; and one of the last of these mail-balloons, the Richard Wallace, is missing, as much as if it had sailed off the planet into infinite space. So long as these machines continued to be launched by day, they were exposed to a fusillade whilst traversing the girdle of the Prussian guns, the bullets whistling round them even at an elevation of 900 or 1,000 mètres. To avoid this peril it became necessary to start them by night, although the disadvantages of nocturnal expeditions, in which no light could be carried, and consequently the barometer could not be duly read, were held by many to outweigh all the dangers attaching to German projectiles.

Let us now attempt an imaginary voyage through the air, availing ourselves as much as possible of the experience of the gentlemen whose excursions are chronicled in the work which heads this article. A more attractive volume cannot well be imagined. It is the production of one Englishman and three Frenchmen. Mr. Glaisher is well known, in companionship with Mr. Coxwell, as our greatest authority on the subject. All his visits to the clouds have been for scientific purposes, and if the question,

Quis crederet unquam Aerias hominem carpere posse vias?

could be put in reference to any man, it might surely be applied to him, for he has had the honour of ascending higher than any other mortal from Icarus to Gay-Lussac. MM. Flammarion, Fonvielle, and Tissandier are all enthusiasts in the matter of ballooning; the second of these gentlemen having expressed his willingness to be shot up into the air in connection with a sky-rocket, provided its projectile force could be duly regulated and a proper parachute were attached. In the narratives of their numerous ascents, there is necessarily some degree of sameness; but the whole are not only thoroughly readable, but thoroughly enjoyable to the last. The illustrations to the book are really superb. As a mere portfolio of sky-sketches, it is well worth the price. Not unreasonably indeed, one of the writers expresses his hope that the work will form a kind of epoch in the history of the subject, 'for it is the first time that artists have gone up in balloons for the purpose of familiarizing the eyes of the public with a series of aerial scenes.' We have charts of triple texture, showing, first, the path of the machine through the air; secondly, the geography of the country over which it passed; and thirdly, the gradations of light and darkness during the expedition, these being so arranged as to answer point for point. We have also pictures in which the balloon is seen in almost every phase of adventure--sweeping through the clouds, plodding through the snow, cruising amongst the stars by night, exploding in the sky, plunging into the sea, dragging on the ground, caught in the trees, stranded amongst the sheepfolds, or tumbling upon the coast and struggling madly to escape the pursuing billows. But we have also some gorgeous views of cloud-land, with its marvellous scenery; now silvered with the pale radiance of the moon or the stars, now drenched in the golden glories of the setting sun--at one time darkening into night under the gathering thunderstorm, at another fantastically illuminated with haloes and many-tinted spectra; and through all these wonderful fields of air, a tiny sphere, a mere bubble of the sky, with a bubble or two of human breath attached, may be seen pursuing its noiseless way as if it had escaped for ever from this turbulent earth.

Before we start, however, the great question is, Dare we start at all? Well might the first aerial navigator, like the anonymous hero qui fragilem, truci commisit pelago ratem primus, shudder at his own audacity as he launched his miserable vessel upon the untraversed deep. When it was first determined to send up some human beings to the clouds in a Montgolfier, it was by no means an unnatural suggestion that the experiment should be tried upon a couple of criminals; but French valour would not permit even French rascality to carry off the honour of the exploit, and Pilâtre de Rozier indignantly protested that vile malefactors ought not to have 'the glory of being the first to rise in the air.' Brave men, however, whose courage could not be impeached even in the fieriest hour of battle, have been known to shrink from a balloon when they would have calmly faced a battery. A gallant field-marshal, says Flammarion, 'who had never hesitated to advance through the discharge of cannon and musketry,' declared more than once that he would not, for a whole empire, ascend even in a captive machine! On the other hand, it is related of an old woman (who had been an inmate of Lambeth workhouse for forty years, and who, on losing her son at the age of seventy-five, exclaimed, 'I felt sure I should never bring up that poor child!') that being asked on her hundredth birthday what treat she would like by way of celebrating the occasion, the ancient female decided upon an excursion in the great balloon then tethered at Chelsea. Her wish was granted, and she enjoyed a ride in the atmosphere at the foot of this huge floating gasometer, which was fettered to the earth by a cable of two thousand feet in length. The fair sex, indeed, have never exhibited much timidity in dealing with balloons. Out of the seven hundred persons carried up in the air at various times by the veteran Green, not less than one hundred and twenty were females. 'If,' hinted he to Fonvielle, 'you wish balloons to become popular in France, begin by taking women in them; men will be sure to follow!' Does not this accord to the letter with George Stephenson's dictum, that feminine influence would draw a man from the other side of the globe when nothing else would move him? Not that we think the advice was specially needed for France, for the first lady who made an ascent was a Frenchwoman, Mme. Thiblé; and the first lady who met her death on an aerial excursion was Mme. Blanchard, who belonged to the same nation.

First of all, then, we ought to see the balloon before it is inflated. There it lies, a vast expanse of varnished silk, or calico, or india-rubber cloth, enveloped in netting, and covering many a square yard of ground with its flabby, crumpled form. Nothing more lifeless and uninteresting can well be conceived than the huge shape which, in a short time, will lift itself by degrees from the soil, like a giant creeping gradually into consciousness, and then standing erect in all the pride of its newly-discovered powers, will expand into one of the most stately and picturesque machines ever invented by man. It is even possible to sympathise with M. Flammarion in his heroics when he imagines an aeronaut addressing it in language of mingled insult and adulation:--

"Inert and formless thing, that I can now trample under my feet, that I can tear with my hands, here stretched dead upon the ground--my perfect slave--I am about to give thee life, that thou mayest become my sovereign! In the height of my generosity I shall make thee even greater than myself! O vile and powerless thing! I shall abandon myself to thy majesty, O creature of my hands, and thou shalt carry my kingdom unto thine own element, which I have created for thee; thou shalt fly off to the regions of storms and tempests, and I shall be forced to follow thee! I shall become thy plaything; thou shalt do what thou wilt with me, and forget that I gave thee life!"

For many reasons, carburetted hydrogen, or coal gas, is the agent employed to give levity to the machine. In the earlier days of aerostation, hydrogen presented strong temptations. It is the lightest of the gases, being upwards of fourteen times rarer than atmospheric air, and therefore it was naturally regarded as the element best fitted to do man's bidding, and to drag him nearest to the stars. But hydrogen is an expensive article, and needs an elaborate apparatus for its production, whereas coal gas is burnt in every civilized street, and may be obtained in any quantity by connecting a flexible tube with the nearest tap. In the still darker ages of aeronautic science, it is well known that heated air was the element employed; and, going back into yet more benighted times, we find that Father Lana proposed to give buoyancy to copper globes by filling them, as an Hibernian once remarked, with a vacuum; whilst another worthy Père, Galien of Avignon, gravely suggested that balloons should be inflated with attenuated air, brought down from mountain tops in bags prepared for the purpose, in which case they would, of course, ascend to similar heights!

Let us now enter the car. The huge monster above us is swaying to and fro in the breeze, and struggling for freedom like some giant soul which has done its work on earth and is eager to reach its native skies. The cords which hold us captive are loosed, and, as if by instinct, we grasp the nearest rope, or hold fast to the wicker work, to secure ourselves from the effects of our sudden translation--we might almost say projection--through the air. But the first feeling is one of surprise. We find ourselves perfectly stationary, whilst, strange to say, the earth--the great solid globe on which we recently stood, with all its towers and temples, its gazing crowds and spreading landscapes--is seen shooting downwards in space with frightful velocity! Worse still, glancing upwards, the sky appears to be falling, as if the ceiling of the universe had given way; and yonder big dark cloud, which seemed to be motionless when we took our seat, is now tumbling headlong upon us, and will, infallibly, crush our balloon like a moth. It requires some little consideration to correct this delusion, and satisfy ourselves that here, as in many of the moral and social phenomena of life, the change is in us, and not in the world itself.

As we rise, the view below grows more expansive, but, at the same time, it appears to flatten. The hills are planed down, the valleys are filled up, and the rich undulations and inequalities which contribute so much to the picturesque are in a great measure lost to the aerial eye. We seem to be hovering over a huge, variegated ordnance map, tinted for the most part with green; its rivers looking like silver ribbons, its railways like ruled lines, its woods represented by patches of verdure, and its towns exhibiting grooves or gutters for streets, and kitchen areas for squares.

This effect is the more striking when we look perpendicularly down upon tall, slender objects like steeples, pillars, or elevated statues. The Monument of London becomes a mere gilded speck on the pavement. The hapless column in the Place Vendôme, now overthrown by the hands of Frenchmen themselves, was described by an aeronaut as a kind of 'pin stuck head downwards in a cushion.' A view of the statue of Napoleon, as seen from on high, is given by M. Flammarion, and presents a ludicrous picture, the figure being crushed into a sort of black amorphous lump, which would be utterly unintelligible were it not that the shadow exhibits something of the human form, and not inaptly suggests some strong reflections respecting the fallen fortunes of the imperial dynasty. In fact, the landscape seems to be flattened as if some great roller had passed over it, and ironed out all the prominences in order to reduce it to one vast plain.

This appearance may be qualified by another, which, however, is not visible to every voyager. Without going so far as to imagine that the earth will display any portion of its convexity, we certainly should not expect it to assume a concave aspect to the eye. Yet, for the same reason that the sky above us looks like a great vault, and that the clouds overhead slope down towards the horizon, if sufficiently extended, the landscape beneath us should appear to be similarly hollowed were it surveyed from a corresponding elevation. In some degree, and to some susceptible minds, this curious impression is realized in a balloon. The central parts of the expanse below seem to sink and assume a dish-like form, so that, as M. Flammarion observes, we float between two vast concavities, the blue dome of heaven resting upon the green and shallow but inverted dome of earth.

But can we witness all this without a sensation of giddiness? Is not our enjoyment of the scene marred by a strong disposition to vertigo, such as is natural to human heads when raised to perilous altitudes? This tendency, however, is far less prevalent than might be expected in the car of a balloon. Professor Jacobi, who could not look down from a lofty building without dizziness, made his first, perhaps his only ascent without experiencing the least swimming of the brain. The chief feeling of an aeronaut, according to M. Simonin, is one of elation; his sense of individuality becoming so triumphant that he glances down upon the poor wretched globe he has left grovelling in its sins and sorrows, with a species of pity which is probably very much akin to contempt! But this sentiment, according to M. Flammarion, may be combined with another of a much more equivocal description. 'I also felt,' says this gentleman, 'a vague desire to throw myself out of the balloon. Though feeling convinced that it would be certain death, I was under the influence of a mild temptation to allow myself to fall, and my death became, for the moment, a matter of indifference to me.' The lofty air with which this is written, and the supreme nonchalance displayed, are eminently characteristic of the soil, or rather of the sons of France. 'Let me live or let me die,' he seems to say; 'whether I float in these pure ethereal regions, victorious over all the evils of earth, or whether my body lies shattered on those rocks below, a mass of featureless pulp, is a question of no consequence to Camille Flammarion! He is perfectly content whether he figures as an aerial conqueror or as a poor, palpitating corpse!'

We continue rising. The balloon will, of course, persist in doing so until the weight of the included gas and of the entire apparatus exactly balances an equal bulk of the surrounding air. Starting from the earth with all its buoyant power in hand, it would soon acquire a considerable momentum were it not controlled by the resistance of the atmosphere, which reduces its motion to a steady, uniform ascent. This presumes, however, that nothing transpires to alter its gravity. The addition of a few rain-drops to the machine would infallibly slacken its speed, whilst the fall overboard of one of the passengers would convert it for the time into a runaway balloon. When Mr. Cocking severed his parachute from the great Nassau, the latter, huge as it was, bounded aloft with such swiftness that whilst the poor fellow was descending to death, the two aeronauts seemed to be mounting to destruction, either by the bursting of the balloon or the stifling emission of gas.

In another way, also, too rapid a start may lead to dangerous consequences. In 1850, MM. Bixio and Barral took their places in the car of a balloon inflated with pure hydrogen. Their object in using this lightest of all aerial fluids was to climb to an elevation of thirty or forty thousand feet; but not having made due allowance for its buoyancy, the machine, when released, shot through the air like a ball from a gun. The envelope expanded so rapidly that it bulged down upon the aeronauts and shrouded them completely, the car being slung at too slight a distance below. Struggling like men beneath a fallen tent, one of them, in his endeavours to extricate himself, tore a hole in the great bag, from which the gas poured upon them, producing illness and threatening suffocation. Precipitately they began to sink, and it was only by tossing everything overboard that they succeeded in landing safely on the earth. They had traversed a bed of clouds 9,000 feet in thickness, reached a height of 19,000 feet, and then performed the return journey all in the space of little more than three quarters of an hour.

Higher and higher we mount. Shall not we knock our sublime heads against the stars, if we continue to ascend in this indefinite way? How rapidly we move, and what curious effects vertical travelling may involve, a single illustration will suggest. Aeronauts may enjoy a spectacle which, at the first mention, might almost recall the retrograde movement of the solar shadow on the dial of Ahaz--namely, that of two sunsets in one day. An early balloonist, M. Charles, was very much impressed by this vision. When he left the earth for an evening excursion, the great luminary had just disappeared, but, said the Frenchman, proudly, 'he rose again for me alone!' 'I had the pleasure of seeing him set twice on the same day.' For was the spectacle such as the dwellers on the soil may command, by permitting the orb to sink behind some elevation, and then mounting it so as to bring him again into view--thus playing at bo-peep with the lord of day. For, continued M. Charles, still more proudly, 'I was the only illuminated object; all the rest of nature being plunged into shadow!'

But now, looking aloft, we observe a mass of clouds, towards which we are rapidly speeding. There are mountains of snow and great threatening rocks, against which it seems as if our fragile vessel would inevitably be dashed. The novice in aerial navigation almost instinctively holds his breath as he sees the distance narrowing between his frail skiff and these frowning piles, and awaits the awful collision. But they open as if by magic, and the balloon glides into the midst without a shock, or a tremor in its frame. We are then enveloped for a time in a sort of obscurity, but we have nothing to fear, for the machine might travel blindfold without dread of the slightest obstruction in these pathless expanses. Destitute of every object which could serve as a guide, we proceed until we emerge into sunshine once more, and then, looking down, we see the clouds through which we have entered closing like a trap-door after us, and shutting us out from the dear old world, where we lead such a life of charmed misery.

Sometimes, however, it seems impossible to rise above the 'smoke and stir of this dim spot, which men call earth.'

In an ascent from Wolverton, in June, 1863, Mr. Glaisher passed through an extraordinary succession of fogs and showers and rain-clouds; and though he soared to a height of 23,000 feet, the balloon was unable to extricate itself from its earthly entanglements. Following a fine rain came a dry fog, which continued for some distance; this traversed, the aeronauts entered a wetting fog, and subsequently a dry one again. When three miles in height, they imagined that they would certainly break through the clouds, but, to their great surprise, nebulous heaps lay above them, beneath them, and all around them. Up they clambered, but at an elevation of four miles dense masses still hung overhead as if to forbid any further progress, and two clouds with fringed edges specially attracted their attention, from the fact that they were unmistakeably nimbi, although formations of this latter class are mostly creatures of the nether sky. On returning, a heavy rain fell pattering on the balloon at an altitude of three miles, and then, lower down, for a space of 5,000 feet, they passed through a curious snowy discharge, the air being full of icy crystals, though the season was high summer.

It is not often, however, that the atmosphere is in this nebulous condition throughout so large a portion of its depth. For days together terrestrials may be enveloped in fog and rain, and in that case must wait patiently until the clouds please to roll off, and drench some other locality; but if at such seasons we were to jump into a balloon, we might soon pass out of the watery zone and soar into the jocund sunshine. Continuing our ascent, therefore, through the dense tract of moisture we first entered, our machine at last lifts its head joyously above the surface, and shaking off the cloudy spray, bounds into a new sphere, where the great giver of light glows with unadulterated ray. We are, in fact, in a new world. We are completely cut off from our native earth by a huge continent of vapour, which appears to have been suddenly petrified into rock.

'Above our heads,' writes Mr. Glaisher, 'rises a noble roof, a vast dome of the deepest blue. In the east may perhaps be seen the tints of a rainbow on the point of vanishing; in the west, the sun silvering the edges of broken clouds. Below these light vapours may rise a chain of mountains, the Alps of the sky, rearing themselves one above the other, mountain above mountain, till the highest peaks are coloured by the setting sun. Some of these compact masses look as if ravaged by avalanches, or rent by the irresistible movement of glaciers. Some clouds seem built up of quartz, or even diamonds: some, like immense cones, boldly rise upwards; others resemble pyramids whose sides are in rough outline. These scenes are so varied and beautiful that we feel we could remain for ever to wander above these boundless plains.'

As we ascend, however, a serious question comes into play. To the first adventurer we may suppose that it would present itself with alarming force. Shall we be able to breathe safely in yonder upper regions, where the air is so thin that the lungs must work 'double shift,' as it were, to procure their necessary supply? At the earth's surface, it is well known that the atmosphere presses upon every square inch with a force of from fourteen to fifteen pounds. A column of air forty miles in height resting upon a man's hat, would, of course, crush it flat upon his head in a moment, were it not for an equal resistance within; and, but for the same cause (the equal diffusion of pressure at the same level), we should all go staggering along under our burden of thirty thousand pounds--such is our share of the atmospheric load--or, if laid prostrate, should find ourselves incapable of rising. But of course the pressure grows smaller as we ascend, for the simple reason that the height of the column above us continually decreases. Seeing, moreover, that we are adapted by our organization to existence at the bottom of this aerial ocean, it is natural to expect that at considerable elevations some sensible disturbance of our functions will ensue. At the height of three miles and three-quarters the barometer, which stands at about thirty inches at the level of the sea, has sunk to fifteen inches, exhibiting a pressure of some seven-and-a-half pounds to the square inch, and showing that as much of the atmosphere in weight is below us as there is above. Reaching an elevation of between five and six miles, the mercury would be found to mark ten inches only, representing a pressure of five pounds to the square inch, and proving that two-thirds of the aerial ocean had been surmounted, leaving a thin third alone to be traversed. The following table, as given by Mr. Glaisher, will, however, best express this decline of density:--

'At the height of 1 mile the barometer reading is 24·7 in. " 2 miles " " 20·3 " " 3 " " " 16·7 " " 4 " " " 13·7 " " 5 " " " 11·3 " " 10 " " " 4·2 " " 15 " " " 1·6 " " 20 " " " 1·0 " less.'

One indication of increasing rarity in the air is to be found in the lowering of the point at which water boils. On the surface of the earth ebullition takes place, as is well known, at 212° Fahr.; but at the top of a mountain like Mont Blanc, where the pressure is so much lightened, and the liquid therefore encounters so much less resistance to its vaporous propensities, it will pass into steam at a temperature of about 178°. At still greater elevations this point becomes so ridiculously reduced--if the expression may be employed--that we might plunge our hand into the fluid when in full simmer, or drink it in the form of tea when absolutely boiling. Of course, under such circumstances, it would be impossible to extract the full flavour of that generous herb unless the process were carried on under artificial pressure, and therefore the most gentle and legitimate of all stimulants must lose much of its potency if decocted at 20,000 feet above the level of the sea.

Another little circumstance is very significant. In opening a flask of pure water at the earth's surface, we should not expect the cork to fly out with an explosion as if it were a flask of Clicquot's sprightliest champagne; but this is what occurs when we reach an altitude where the external pressure is slight compared with the spring of the imprisoned air. In dealing with a bottle of frisky porter or highly impatient soda-water, it may be well to act cautiously, lest the cork should go like a shot through the envelope of the balloon; and in drinking the contents it will be wise to wait till the effervescence has subsided, lest the same results should arise as those which were experienced by the Siamese king, when, instead of mixing his soda powders in his goblet, he put the acid and the alkali separately into his stomach, and left them to settle their affinities there.

Whilst urging his way aloft, therefore, the novice will probably call to mind some of the accounts he has read of poor animals which have been tormented and philosophically murdered in the receiver of an air-pump. He will remember how miserable butterflies and other insects have been unable to use their wings, and, after a few flutterings, have fallen motionless; or how helpless mice, after gasping for a time in hopeless distress, have expired, unwilling martyrs to science. And can he enter such an attenuated atmosphere as the one above him without undergoing some of their agonies, though in a milder and less fatal form? For, on ascending a lofty mountain, the traveller is soon reminded that his lungs are dealing with a much thinner fluid than they inhaled below. Long before he reaches the summit he finds that his drafts upon the atmosphere are increased in consequence of its tenuity, and that the requisite supply can only be obtained with much pulmonary toil. His head begins to ache, a feeling of nausea is frequently induced, and sometimes he experiences the taste of blood in the mouth, or the scent of the same fluid in the nostrils. With throbbing temples and tottering limbs, he drags himself to the peak, and then probably throws himself upon the rock utterly exhausted, his first sentiment being one of relief that the ascent is well over, and his next one of regret that the descent is not already accomplished.

But in estimating the results in such a case, we must remember the great physical exertion which has been incurred. Every traveller who plants himself upon the summit of the Dôme du Gouté must have lifted as many pounds avoirdupois as he weighs, to say nothing of his baggage and personal accoutrements, to a height of some 15,000 feet in the atmosphere by the sheer force of his own muscles. To carry one's own body about is scarcely regarded as porter's work, but what particularly stout man would ever dream of reaching the Grand Plateau, or even attempt to scale the Great Pyramid, without a troop of attendants to drag him to the top? In a balloon, however, all this expenditure of strength is spared. The aeronaut arrives at an elevation far higher than the tallest peak in Europe without squandering as much force as would be required to grind an ounce of coffee. Here, therefore, the influences of rarefied air may be tested without any of the complications arising from previous fatigue or present muscular exhaustion.

Now, the results, as noted by different voyagers, are by no means accordant. In his first ascent, Mr. Glaisher found his pulse throbbing at the rate of a hundred per minute, when he had reached a height of 18,844 feet. At 19,415 feet, his heart began to palpitate audibly. At 19,435, it was beating more vehemently, his pulse had accelerated its pace, his hands and lips were dyed of a dark bluish hue, and it was with great difficulty that he could read his philosophical instruments. At 21,792 feet (upwards of four miles), he seemed to lose the power of making the requisite observations, and a feeling analogous to sea-sickness stole over him, though there was no heaving or rolling in the balloon. Of course, we may well suppose that different individuals will be differently affected. There are some terrestrials who suffer little from sea-sickness, whilst there are others who can scarcely cross the bar of a river without incurring the agonies of that abominable complaint. But Mr. Glaisher seems to be of opinion that the balloon voyager may speedily master the maladie de l'air, and become quite at home at any elevation hitherto attained. It is a matter of simple acclimatization. In his own case, he found that he could breathe without inconvenience at a height of three or four miles, whereas his first sallies into that region, as we have seen, were productive of considerable discomfort; and though he regards an altitude of six or seven miles as the frontier line of natural respiration, with a possible reserve in favour of its extension, he hints that artificial appliances may, perhaps, be devised for freighting the aerostat with the fluid in suitable quantity, and so enlarging the sphere of atmospheric enterprise. We are not certain whether this hint has reference to an apparatus for condensing the air; but it is a pleasant fancy, whether practicable or not, to picture a couple of excursionists feeding their lungs by compressing the thin medium around them into pabulum of the needful density.

There is another enemy, however, to encounter, and it is probably to this more than to the attenuation of the air that the painful effects in question are attributable. We allude to the extreme cold of the upper skies. The atmosphere has its polar regions as well as the earth. There frost builds no solid barriers it is true, but his invisible ramparts are a surer defence against intrusion than bulwarks of granite. Even at a height of three or four miles, explorers are apt to find their extremities benumbed, and their faces turning purple or blue. In a night ascent in 1804, Count Zambeccari, who subsequently met his death in consequence of his balloon taking fire, was so severely handled by the frost that he lost the use of his fingers, and was compelled to have some of them amputated. On one occasion, Mr. Coxwell, having laid hold of the grapnel with his naked hand, cried out in pain that he was scalded, which is precisely the punishment inflicted by metallic objects upon all who grasp them incautiously in arctic latitudes, when the temperature is exceedingly low.

Combining, therefore, these two causes, the rarefaction of the upper air, and the crushing influences of frost, we may readily understand why so many bold adventurers have been smitten with asphyxia when pushing their way into such untrodden solitudes. When Andreoli and Brioschi ascended from Padua, in 1808, to a prodigious height, the latter sank into a state of torpor, and shortly afterwards the former found that he had lost the use of his left arm. In the instance already alluded to, when Zambeccari was so mangled by the cold, he and Dr. Grassetti both became insensible, and their companion alone retained the control of his faculties.

On one memorable occasion, Mr. Glaisher and Mr. Coxwell rose to a region which had certainly never been visited before, and most probably will not be speedily visited again. The precise elevation they reached could only be guessed, but it could scarcely be less than 35,000 feet, and might possibly extend to 37,000 feet, or seven miles. This famous ascent was made in 1862 from Wolverhampton. When the aeronauts had soared to a height of some 29,000 feet, about five-and-a-half miles, Mr. Glaisher suddenly discovered that one arm was powerless, and when he tried to move the other, it proved to have been as suddenly stripped of its strength. He then endeavoured to shake himself, but, strange to say, he seemed to possess no limbs. His head fell on his left shoulder, and on his struggling to place it erect, it reeled over to the right. Then his body sank backwards against the side of the car, whilst one arm hung helplessly downwards in the air. In a moment more, he found that all the muscular power which remained in his neck and back had deserted him at a stroke. He tried to speak to his companion, but the power of speech had departed as well. Sight still continued, though dimly; but this, too, speedily vanished, and darkness, black as midnight, drowned his vision in an instant. Whether hearing survived, he could not tell, for there was no sound to break the silence of those lofty solitudes. Consciousness certainly remained; but the mind had ceased to control the body, and the reins of power seemed to have slipped for ever from his grasp. Was this the way men died? And did one faculty after another desert the soul in its extremity, as servile courtiers steal away from the presence of royalty when its last hour has arrived? Soon afterwards consciousness itself disappeared.

Fortunately, this insensibility was not of long duration. He was roused by Mr. Coxwell, but, at first, could only hear a voice exhorting him to 'try.' Not a word could he speak, not an object could he see, not a limb could he move. In a while, however, sight returned; shortly afterwards he rose from his seat, and then found sufficient tongue to exclaim, 'I have been insensible!' 'You have,' was the reply; 'and I too, very nearly!'

At the time Mr. Glaisher was smitten with paralysis, Mr. Coxwell had climbed up to the ring of the balloon, in order to free the valve-rope, which had become entangled. There, his hands were so frozen that he lost the use of them, and was compelled to drop down into the car. His fingers were not simply blue, but positively black with cold, and it became necessary to pour brandy over them to restore the circulation. Observing on his return that Mr. Glaisher's countenance was devoid of animation, he spoke to him, but, receiving no reply, at once drew the conclusion that his companion was in a state of utter unconsciousness. He endeavoured to approach, but found that he himself was lapsing into the same condition. With wonderful presence of mind, however, he attempted to open the valve of the balloon, in order that they might escape from this deadly region, but his hands were too much benumbed to pull the rope. In this fearful extremity, he seized the rope with his teeth, dipped his head downwards two or three times, and found to his relief that the machine was rapidly descending into a more genial sphere. Fortunately, the voyagers reached the ground in safety, without feeling any lasting mischief from their audacious excursion; but it would be difficult to invent a scene better calculated to make the nervous shudder than that of a balloon floating at a height of nearly seven miles, with its occupants awaking from a state of insensibility to discover that their limbs were utterly powerless, that the rope which might enable them to descend was dangling beyond their reach, and that there they must remain until the cold, which had turned every drop of water into ice, should eat away the feeble relics of vitality from their frames.

We proceed. We are now cruising in the full glare of the sun. The rays of that luminary beat upon us with scorching force; but whilst the head seems to be in the Sahara, the feet may be in Spitzbergen. For here, as on the top of a snow-clad mountain, the temperature of the air is one thing, the direct heat of the sun is quite another. The difference may amount to thirty or forty degrees in an ordinary ascent, and of course, becomes more noticeable the higher the flight. The thin air and scanty vapour of the upper regions furnish us with flimsy clothing; whilst in the nether world we wrap the dense medium round us like a mantle, and keep our caloric within our frames.

Is there any law, however, by which the decrease of temperature can be expressed? Seeing that the atmosphere is divided, as it were, into various storeys, these being formed of changing currents, or fugitive strata of clouds, each with its peculiar charge of heat, is it possible that any fixed principle of decline can be detected?

Take a few results. On leaving the ground, where the temperature was 50° (in the afternoon of the 31st of March, 1863), the thermometer indicated 33½° at one mile, 26° at two miles, 14° at three miles, 8° at 3¾ miles, where a bed of air heated to 12° was entered, and then at an elevation of 4½ miles, the instrument had fallen to zero. In descending, the temperature rose to 11° at about three miles in height, it sank to 7° in passing a cold layer, afterwards increased to 18½° at two miles, to 25½° at one mile, and finally settled at 42° on the ground.

Again, on starting (17th July, 1862), the temperature at the surface was 59°, at 4,000 feet, it was 45°, and at 10,000 feet it had sunk to 26°. For the next 3,000 feet it remained stationary, during which time the aeronauts donned additional clothing, in anticipation of a severe interview with the Frost King; but to their great surprise, the thermometer rose to 31° at 15,500 feet, and to 42° at 19,500 feet, by which time they found it necessary to divest themselves of their winter habiliments. Sometimes, indeed, the changes of temperature experienced are startling and unaccountable. At an elevation of 20,000 feet, Barral and Bixio, whilst enveloped in a cloud, found their thermometer at 15° Fahr. Above this cloud, at a height of 23,127 feet, the instrument had sunk to 38° below zero, making a difference of not less than 54° of heat between the two points. Judging from this observation, might we not expect to find all the moisture at those cheerless altitudes curdled into ice? and if our globe is sheathed in an envelope of frozen particles, is the fact wholly without meaning in reference to the aurora and other meteorological phenomena?

From such capricious data, it would seem impossible to extract any definite law; but it has been assumed by many that, taking all things into account, the temperature decreases one degree for every 300 feet of elevation. Putting the matter more exactly, there is, according to Flammarion, a mean abatement of one degree for every 345 feet where the sky is clear, and of one degree for every 354 feet when the heavens are overcast; the decline being quicker when the day is hot than when it is cold, and in the evening than in the morning. Mr. Glaisher, however, feels himself compelled to repudiate this theory of a steady, constant diminution of heat. The results of all his midday experiments amounted to this:--

'The change from the ground to 1,000 feet high was 4° 5´ with a cloudy sky, and 6° 2´ with a clear sky. At 10,000 feet high it was 2° 2´ with a cloudy sky, and 2° with a clear sky. At 20,000 feet high the decline of temperature was 1° 1´ with a cloudy sky, and 1° 2´ with a clear sky. At 30,000 feet the whole decline of temperature was found to be 62°. Within the first 1,000 feet the average space passed through for 1° was 223 feet with a cloudy sky, and 162 feet with a clear sky. At 10,000 feet the space passed through for a like decline was 455 feet for the former, and 417 feet for the latter; and above 20,000 feet high the space with both states of the sky was 1,000 feet nearly for a decline of 1°. As regards the law just indicated, it is far more natural and far more consistent than that of a uniform rate of decrease.'

It should be carefully observed that these conclusions refer to ascents by day; and that by night the temperature augments within certain limits, as Marcet showed, and as numerous experiments have confirmed.

Scarcely less interesting is the question as to the moisture in the atmosphere. Does it decline according to any graduated law? From a large number of observations it has been concluded that the watery vapour increases up to a certain elevation (varying with the season of the year, the hour of the day, and the condition of the sky), and then, having reached this maximum, we find that the air grows continually drier the further we climb. Upon this simple fact much of the physical happiness of our globe depends, for it is the moisture in the lower regions which arrests the efflux of caloric, preserves it for home consumption, and assists the earth in the kindly production of its fruits.

Meanwhile, the rays of the sun playing with unchecked fervour upon the balloon, have been heating and expanding the gas. Lightened also by the dissipation of the moisture contracted in the cloudier portion of the ascent, it probably occurs to the voyager, particularly if he is prone to take alarming views of events, that as the machine rises into a rarer atmosphere the envelope may distend until it actually bursts. Nor is this apprehension, however painful to the nerves, wholly without foundation. Looking up at the flimsy globe above his head, he will observe that it is now fully inflated, though purposely left somewhat flaccid when the journey commenced; and, possibly, he may observe signs of the sun's action on its sides, as if it were blistering under the solar beams. Brioschi, the Neapolitan astronomer, wishing to soar higher than Gay-Lussac, who had reached 23,000 feet on his way to the stars, was stopped on his ambitious flight, as Icarus had been before him, by getting too near the sun. He had no wings to melt, it is true, but he had a balloon to rupture, and the swollen tissue accordingly gave way, though, happily, without involving him in the fate of the presumptuous youth. Will it be credited, however, that any aeronaut could deliberately make an ascent with the express intention of bursting his balloon himself? Yet this has been done without pre-engaging a coroner, and without the slightest wish to commit scientific suicide. The individual by whom this perilous experiment was performed was Mr. Wise, the American. He argued that if the explosion were neatly managed, the collapsing envelope would act as a sort of parachute, the lower part retreating into the upper, and forming a concavity which would present sufficient resistance to ensure a safe and steady descent. Nor were his expectations wholly disappointed. Having risen through a thunderstorm to a height of 13,000 feet, he fired his magazine of hydrogen gas. The car rushed down with awful rapidity, supported, however, by the relics, like a torn umbrella, and alighted upon the ground without inflicting any great violence upon the daring navigator. Not many weeks afterwards, he repeated the exploit, if such it may be called, and in exploding the gas tore the silk receptacle from top to bottom; but, with equal good fortune, he arrived at the earth without a broken limb, the machine having taken a spiral course in falling, which enabled him to descend with uniform velocity.

Having now reached the highest point to which our aerostat will mount so long as its weight continues unchanged, we surrender ourselves to the guidance of the current in which we are involved. In rising to a moderate elevation, a balloon will sometimes shoot through more than one of these aerial streams. Mr. Foster detected the existence of four distinct currents in one experiment, namely, from the E.N.E., N., S.W., and S.S.E., and on the following day found there were three, namely, from the E.N.E., S.E., and S.S.W. Sometimes an upper and an under current may move in opposite directions. Had it not been for this fact, M. Tissandier's début in the clouds might have terminated in his death in the ocean. Ascending with M. Duruof from Calais under somewhat rash and defiant circumstances, their balloon was borne out to sea, not towards the English coast, which might, perhaps, have been reached, but right up the North Sea, where they would probably have perished. Fortunately, after proceeding for some distance, they observed a fleet of cumuli steering for Calais at a depth of some 3,000 feet below, and by dropping into this counter stream they were floated back to land.

There is no subject of greater moment to aeronauts than the determination of the atmospheric currents. Upon this question in a great measure depends the utility of ballooning as an art. We should certainly consider that ocean navigation was in a despicable condition if the utmost we could do for a vessel was to commit it, preciously freighted with our own persons, to the wind and waves, without a sail to propel it or a rudder to guide it in any particular direction. Yet this is pretty much the state of aerial seamanship, except for purposes of vertical travelling. If it could be ascertained that streams flowed to different quarters at different elevations--river rolling over river--then it might be easy to book our balloon for some special point of the compass. But the atmosphere is comparatively unexplored in this respect, and it will require long study before any definite conclusions can be formed, even if such should be ever realized.

That there is some degree of certainty in air-currents may be indicated by a curious fact mentioned by Flammarion, namely, that the traces of his various voyages are all represented by lines which had a tendency to curve in one and the same general direction. 'Thus,' says he, 'on the 23rd June, 1867, the balloon started with a north wind directly towards the south-south-west, and, after a while, due south-west, when we descended. A similar result was observed in every excursion, and the fact led me to believe that above the soil of France the currents of the atmosphere are constantly deviated circularly, and in a south-west-north-east-south direction.'

Still more curious is a fact which Mr. Glaisher may be said to have discovered.

We are accustomed to talk much of the Gulf Stream. It is as popular a marine phenomenon as the Great Sea Serpent. For some time it has figured in meteorology as the subtle agent to which all climatic eccentricities, and not a few climatic advantages, are ascribed; but what shall we say to a genuine 'aeria Gulf Stream?' What, to a stream flowing through the atmosphere in kindly correspondence with the beneficent current which sweeps through the Atlantic below?

On the 12th January, 1864, Mr. Glaisher left the earth, where a south-east wind was prevailing. At a height of 1,300 feet he was surprised to enter a warm current, 3,000 feet in thickness, which was flowing from the south-west, that is, in the direction of the Gulf Stream itself. At the elevation in question the temperature, according to the usual calculation, should have been 4° or 5° lower than that at the ground, whereas it was 3½° higher. In the region above, cold reigned, for finely-powdered snow was falling into this atmospheric river. Here, therefore, was a stream of heated air previously unsuspected, which, if its course is steady, as it appears to be during winter, constitutes a prodigious accession to our resources, and adds another to the many meteorological blessings the world enjoys.

'The meeting with this south-west current (writes Mr. Glaisher) is of the highest importance, for it goes far to explain why England possesses a winter temperature so much higher than our northern latitudes. Our high winter temperature has hitherto been mostly referred to the influence of the Gulf Stream. Without doubting the influence of this natural agent, it is necessary to add the effect of a parallel atmospheric current to the oceanic current coming from the same regions--a true aerial Gulf Stream. This great energetic current meets with no obstruction in coming to us, or to Norway, but passes over the level Atlantic without interruption from mountains. It cannot, however, reach France without crossing Spain and the lofty range of the Pyrenees, and the effect of these cold mountains in reducing its temperature is so great that the former country derives but little warmth from it.'

The velocity of these atmospheric streams must, of course, differ considerably; but, however rapid may be their motion, the balloonist will not fail to notice the feeling of personal immobility which gives such a peculiar character to aerial travelling. We can hardly realize the idea of being transported, say, from London to Dover, without experiencing sundry jars of the muscles or tremors of the nerves, even if we escape, as is by no means certain, the chances of a collision; but M. Flammarion remarks in reference to one of his journies, that the distance accomplished was a hundred and twenty miles, 'during the whole of which time we never felt ourselves in motion at all.' No better illustration of this exemption from the jerks and joltings of terrestrial locomotion could be given than a simple experiment. A tumbler was filled with water till the liquid stood bulging over the brim. The balloon was travelling with the velocity of a railway train, and sometimes rising, sometimes falling, through hundreds of feet at a time, yet not a single drop of the fluid was swung out of the glass!

Striking as the fact is, it would be still more surprising if it were otherwise; for, having once entered a current of air, and surrendered our machine to its guidance, we become, as it were, part of the medium in which we are immersed. The balloon has no longer any will of its own, or of its occupants, except for purposes of ascent or descent. It glides along with the stream, and, coming athwart no obstructions, it knows none of the bumpings to which more grovelling vehicles are exposed. Hence results another consequence which will scarcely escape attention, namely, that here, in the very place of winds, we experience no wind whatever. You may sit in the car of a balloon without undergoing much danger from draughts. There are no fierce gales to encounter, and therefore there are no weather-beaten mariners aloft. If we come to a spot where two breezes meet in battle, or, if two currents of differing directions were so sharply defined that the upper part of the machine could emerge into the superior stream whilst the lower part was in the keeping of the inferior, then very unpleasant results might ensue; but these are not events which aerial navigators have frequently to record in the serener regions aloft.

And as all motion seems to have ceased, except what is due to the rotatory action of the balloon, so all sound appears to have expired. On earth we have nothing to compare with the awful stillness of these airy solitudes. Some noise--be it the sighing of the wind, the pattering of the rain, the fall of a crumbling particle of rock--will break the tranquillity of the vale, the loneliest wilderness, the loftiest peak. But here nature appears to be voiceless, and silence, 'the prelude of that which reigns in the interplanetary space,' seems to be a consecrated thing, as if it were destined to remain uninterrupted until the Trumpet of Judgment shall wake the world.

But did we say we were in absolute solitude? If so, imagine the startled look of an aeronaut when, on issuing from a cloud, he sees before him, at the distance of some thirty or forty yards, the figure of another balloon! If a feeling of horror creeps over him at the sight, he might well be pardoned, for his first thought would doubtless be that it was some phantom of the air sent to lure him to destruction, as the Flying Dutchman is reported to do with mariners at sea. One remarkable feature, however, instantly attracts his attention. The car of the stranger is placed in the centre of a huge disc, consisting of several concentric circles--the interior one being of yellowish white, the next pale blue, the third yellow, followed by a ring of greyish red, and, finally, by one of light violet. That car, too, is occupied. Its tenants are engaged in returning the scrutiny, and their attitudes express equal surprise. By-and-bye, one of them lifts his hand; but that is just what one of the aeronauts has done. Another motion is made, and this is imitated to the letter. A laugh from the living voyagers follows. They have discovered that the stranger is an optical apparition, for on examination it is found to correspond with their own machine, line for line, rope for rope, and man for man, except that they, the living ones, are not surrounded by a glory as if they were resplendent saints.

This beautiful phenomenon is due to the reflection or diffraction of light from the little vesicles of vapour, and must not be confounded with the ordinary shadow of the balloon which, under fitting conditions, and in a more or less elongated form, generally appears to accompany us like some spectral shark in pitiless pursuit of an infected ship.

It is now time, however, to commence our homeward voyage. In other words, we must tumble perpendicularly to the earth, but so regulate our fall that no bones shall be broken, and no concussion, if possible, sustained. To do this from an elevation of three or four miles must strike us as a vastly more dangerous problem than the ascent to a similar height. The valve at the top of the balloon affords us the means of diminishing its relative levity by a gradual discharge of the gas. But this process must be cautiously performed, otherwise the machine may start off like a steed which is suddenly inspired with a new life when its face is turned towards its home. Hence the necessity of retaining a proper amount of ballast to control its impatient descent. If it should sink too rapidly, the emptying of a bag or two will check its pace, and even give it an upward turn for the time, so that the aeronauts, in rising again, will sometimes hear a pattering upon the balloon, which proves to be the very shower of sand they have just ejected.

So delicately, indeed, does the machine respond to any alteration in its weight, that once, when M. Tissandier threw out the bone of a chicken he had been assisting to consume, his companion gravely reproved him, and, on consulting the barometer, he was compelled to admit that this small act of imprudence had caused them to 'rise from twenty to thirty yards!'

Not unfrequently it happens that a balloon has to dive through such heavy clouds, or through such a rainy region, that its weight is considerably increased by the deposited moisture. In passing through a dense stratum, 8,000 feet in thickness, Mr. Coxwell's aerostat, on one occasion, became so loaded that, though he had reserved a large amount of ballast, which was hurled overboard as fast as possible, the machine sped to the earth with a shock which fractured nearly all the instruments.

Lunardi, having ascended from Liverpool in July, 1785, found himself without ballast, and in a balloon insufficiently inflated. He was carried out to sea, retaining of course the power of sinking, which, however, he did not wish to exercise, as he was almost without the means of rising. To lighten the machine, he tossed off his hat, and even this insignificant article afforded him some relief. Soon afterwards, he removed his coat, and this enabled him to mount a little higher, and bear away towards the land. To escape a thunder-cloud, he subsequently divested himself of his waistcoat, and finally succeeded in grappling the earth in a cornfield near Liverpool, spite of his improvidence in the matter of ballast.

It is under such circumstances, however, that we discover the value of the long rope suspended from the car, and which may be let out to the depth of some hundreds of feet. It is a clever substitute for ballast, with this great-advantage, that it is retained, not lost; and that it may also be used as a kind of flexible buffer to break the force of the descent. When the balloon is sinking, every inch of the rope which rests upon the ground relieves it of an equivalent portion of its weight: the process is tantamount to the discharge of so much ballast, and, therefore, the rapidity of the descent is not only lessened, but possibly the downward course of the machine may be arrested some time before it reaches the soil; should it mount again, every coil of the cable lifted from the earth adds to its gravity. In cases where the aeronaut has from any cause lost the mastery of his vessel, this self-manipulating agency may preserve him from a fatal reception, whilst, on the other hand, he has it in his power, by letting out gas when the balloon is balanced in the air, to lower himself (other conditions being favourable) as peaceably as he chooses.

The Géant of Nadar, with a weight of 7,000 to 8,000 lbs., in descending on one occasion, after all the ballast had been exhausted, rushed down towards the earth with the speed of an ordinary railway train, and yet, thanks to the guide-rope, no serious accident occurred, though the instruments were all broken, and a few contusions were sustained. This admirable contrivance was introduced by that 'ancient mariner' of the air, Mr. Green.

In returning to our native soil, however, one of the most dangerous conditions which can arise is the prevalence of a thick fog, or the necessity for ploughing our way through a dense cloud. Under such circumstances, how do we know where the earth lies? Not that we are likely to miss it--the great fear is that we may hit it too soon, and too forcibly. It is then that the value of the barometer is most fully appreciated. This instrument does for the aeronaut what the compass does for the sailor. But the observer must be prompt and careful in his reading, for if the descent is rapid, the least inattention may result in a fractured collarbone, or a couple of shattered bodies.

Presuming, however, that, as we sink through the cloudy trap-door by which we entered the upper sky, we find all clear below, the old familiar earth again bursts upon our view. For a few moments the planet appears to be shooting upwards with considerable velocity. It is like a huge rock which has been aimed at our little balloon, or a star which has shot madly from its sphere, and is hastening to crush us on our return from our sacrilegious voyage. By throwing out a quantity of ballast, however, as if in defiance, we seem to check it in its course, and if it continues to approach, it does so with moderate speed. But we soon discover the deceit, and learn (probably to our chagrin) that it is not the world which is troubling itself to meet us, but we who are doing obeisance in our own puniness to its irresistible will.

In one sense, indeed, the appearance of a balloon in the sky is always the signal for a certain amount of commotion. Dogs begin to bark furiously, poultry begin to run to and fro in evident alarm, whilst cattle stand gazing in astonishment or scamper off in terror, as people used to do--so we suppose--when hippogriffs were in the habit of alighting at their doors. One French aeronaut remarks very drily that the best mode of obtaining a correct estimate of the population of any given district is to approach it in a balloon, for then every individual rushes out of doors to look at the visitor, and so 'the people can be counted like marbles.' Another states that in passing over Calais the only figure that did not lift its head to gaze at the travellers was the Duc de Guise, whose bust in the Place d'Armes was incapable, for good reasons, of paying them that act of homage.

Other things being duly considered, the chief business of a balloonist in descending is to select an open and unincumbered locality. To plump down upon a cathedral, or impale his car upon the top of a spire; to allow it to alight amongst the clashing trees of a forest, or to attempt to ground it amongst the chimneys and gables of a crowded town, would be pretty much the same as for a sailor to run his vessel amongst the breakers, or to drive it full tilt against the nearest lighthouse. The experienced navigator knows where to throw out his grapnel, and this, digging into the soil or catching in the rocks, or laying hold of any object from a tree to a tombstone, will bring the big airship to anchor, and enable the crew, with a little management, to disembark.

But having landed, what kind of a reception shall we encounter? That is a question of some little consequence. There are two ways of dealing with aeronauts: the first is to invite them to dinner and offer them beds for the night; the other is to make an extortionate claim for damages, or carry them before the magistrates as trespassers. The latter practice is much in vogue in rustic regions. You have scarcely leaped out of the car than up there comes an angry farmer, vociferating loudly, gesticulating frantically, and when he sees his fences broken down, and his crops trampled under foot by a crowd of villagers who rush to the spot to inspect the stranger from the clouds, his wrath rises to the boiling point (far below 212° Fah.), and the brute threatens immediate arrest, or appears to be on the eve of inflicting personal chastisement. In some instances, attempts have been made to distrain upon the balloon, damage feasant, as lawyers would say, though it would have puzzled the bumpkins to determine how such an unmanageable object could be safely lodged in the village pound.

When the first hydrogen balloon fell at Gonesse, near Paris (1783), a most extraordinary scene was witnessed. The inhabitants of the village were struck with terror upon seeing an unknown monster descending from the sky. A genuine dragon could not have excited more consternation. Was it some fabulous animal realized in the flesh, or was it the great fiend in proper (or improper) person? On all sides they fled. Many sought an asylum at the house of the curé, who thought that the wisest mode of dealing with the intruder was to subject it to exorcism. Under his guidance they proceeded falteringly to the spot where it lay, heaving with strange contortion. They waited to see what effect the good man's presence would produce, but the creature seemed to be utterly insensible to his fulminations. At length one of the crowd, more intrepid than the rest, took aim with his fowling-piece, and tore it so severely with the shot that it began to collapse rapidly; whereupon the rest, summoning up courage, darted forward and battered it with flails or gashed it with pitchforks. The outrush of gas was so great that they were driven back for the time, but when the dying monster appeared exhausted, the peasants fastened it to the tail of a horse and drove it along until the carcase was utterly dismembered.

The rustics who witnessed the first descent in England--Lunardi's, in Hertfordshire--shrank from the aeronaut as a very equivocal personage, because he had arrived on what they called the 'devil's horse.' Nor are these terrors wholly extinct in the present day, for Flammarion gives a description (with the pencil as well as the pen) of a descent in which men appear to be flying, children screaming, and animals scampering, whilst the balloon with its flags and streamers, waving fantastically on each side like long arms or tentaculæ, is regarded by them as some formidable being coming from the clouds. 'It is the devil himself!' they exclaim.

But having anchored, and escaped all the perils due to chimney-tops or infuriated farmers, the first question we put will doubtless be--Where are we? A more unfortunate query could scarcely be propounded. It expresses the greatest of all the infirmities under which the balloon labours--namely, that no mortal can tell us beforehand where we shall alight. Would it not be rather inconvenient if a traveller, on setting out from Derby, were unable to say whether he should land at Liverpool or at Hull, at Brighton or at Berwick-upon-Tweed? For aught we know, we might find ourselves, after ascending from the most central part of England, hovering over the Irish Sea or the English Channel, with simple power to rise into the clouds or plunge into the waves, but with none to choose any horizontal path or enter any particular port. Whilst drifting tranquilly along in a current, we could hardly fail to ask whether no means could be adopted for propelling balloons in the air as is the case with vessels on the water. Put out our oars? Unhappily they would do little to assist our progress, for, however broad their blades, they would meet with small resistance from the thin medium into which they were dipped. Rely upon paddle-wheels? Just as bad! There is no dense fluid like water to grip, and the floats would spin around almost as vainly as if they were worked in the receiver of an air-pump. Besides, the inflated globe with its suspended car does not constitute a rigid and inflexible whole, and if it did, the attempt to drive it against or athwart a current, in its present form, would be like rowing a man-of-war, with all its canvas stretched, right in the teeth of a gale.

It would be impossible in an article like this to glance at the innumerable schemes which have been propounded for the guidance and propulsion of balloons. Wonderful ingenuity has been expended upon the subject. In one project, for example, the waste gas, instead of being idly discharged, was to be conveyed into an apparatus from which it would issue with a centrifugal force capable--so it was fondly supposed--of urging the aerostat in any given direction. In another, the balloon itself was to be converted into a kind of screw, so that when turned by means of a small engine, it should advance at each motion through a space proportioned to the distance between the threads of this monster spiral. M. Farcot gives us a description, in a little treatise on Atmospheric Navigation,[48] of a petit navire aèrien de plaisance, framed like a flying whale, 100 yards in length, with an extensive gallery slung below, and fitted up with fins or wings, by means of which it is to be propelled. The picture of this marvellous structure is so enchanting, that we feel an irrepressible desire to mingle with the passengers who seem to be lounging luxuriously over the balcony, and who are evidently as much at home as if they were taking a pleasure excursion in a steamer on Windermere or the Lake of Geneva. M. Dupuy de Dôme not long since received a grant from the French Government to enable him to construct a fish-like machine to be worked by a screw, and assisted by a sort of swimming bladder. Indeed, a large number of persons, either doubting or despairing of man's power to master the balloon in its ordinary form, rest their hopes upon the construction of machines which, whether lighter or heavier than the air, shall be driven through the atmosphere by brute force, if it may be so called. Mr. Glaisher does not, of course, share in these views. He tells us that he has attempted no improvement in the management of the balloon, that he found it was wholly at the mercy of the winds, and that he saw no probability of any method of steering it being ever discovered. Fonvielle and Tissandier, on the other hand, whilst admitting that the machine is still in its infantile stage, complain that the engineers have not yet brought all their resources to bear upon the subject, and entertain some vague notion that what has been done for locomotives, for steamboats, and ordinary sailing vessels, will surely be done for the ships of the air, forgetting that the problem to be solved is not exactly how you shall skim the surface of the water in a boat, but rather how you could drive a frigate through the fluid with its sails set when sunk to a depth of many feet, and this with the whole body of water in motion in a different direction. M. Flammarion remarks that a bird is much heavier than its bulk of air, yet the eagle and the condor, massive as they are, soar with ease to the tops of the tallest rocks; and shall man, he inquires (especially a Frenchman, to whom the empire of the air properly belongs[49]), be beaten by a bird? M. Flammarion declines. M. Farcot positively refuses.

For all purposes of aerial travelling, however, the painful fact remains, which may, perhaps, be most summarily expressed by saying that there is no Bradshaw for balloons. When the day comes in which it can be announced that 'highflyers' or 'great aerials' will leave Trafalgar-square for Paris or Dublin, weather permitting, at a certain hour; or that balloon trains will regularly ply between Hull and Hamburg, or, better still, that a Cunard or Collins line of atmospheric steamers has been established between London and New York, then the apparatus will be admitted into the noble army of machines which, like the ship, the locomotive, the steam-engine, the spinning jenny, the telescope, the mariner's compass, the electric telegraph, and many others, have rendered such splendid service to mankind.

Some dozen years ago, indeed, an aerial ship, intended to traverse the Atlantic, was announced as in course of construction in America, by Mr. Lowe. Weighing from three to four tons in itself, it was to possess an ascending power equal to twenty-two tons. Its capacity was to be five times larger than that of any previous machine. Fifteen miles of cord were to be employed in the network alone. Beneath the car a boat thirty feet in length was to be slung, and this skiff was to be fitted up with masts, sails, and paddle-wheels, in order that the crew might take to the water in case their balloon failed them at sea. Copper condensers were to be attached, in order that additional gas might be driven into the globe, or surplus gas abstracted, as occasion demanded, the object of this contrivance being to enable the navigators to raise or lower themselves without wasting any precious material. The ship was to be directed by an apparatus containing a fan like that of a winnowing machine, and this was to be worked by an Ericsson's caloric engine of four-horse power. Various ingenious appliances, amongst others a sounding line one mile in length to show the course of the atmospheric currents, were to be adopted, and it was confidently hoped that this Great Eastern of the atmosphere, which was to be styled the City of New York, would cross the Atlantic in not less than three days, and possibly in two! We regret to say that it has not yet put into any European port, though its arrival would be hailed with more satisfaction than the first steamship, the Sirius, was in America.

Let it not be supposed, however, that the balloon, even in its present rudimentary condition, is available for frivolous or exceptional purposes alone--for the former, when it is used as a brilliant supplement to some display of fireworks; for the latter, when we happen to be locked up in some steel-begirded city. For scientific objects it may be difficult to overrate its value as a 'floating observatory,' and we cannot refrain from sharing in M. Fonvielle's chagrin when he tells us how, on one occasion, after preparing to view an eclipse from a lofty elevation, he found that his aeronaut was not ready to set out until the eclipse was over; or how on another, when all had been arranged to make a sally amongst the November meteors on one of their grand gala nights, he found, on arriving at the spot, that the workmen had taken to flight in consequence of the escape of the gas, and that his only chance was to go up the 'day after the fair.' Many uses also may be found for captive balloons. Half in jest, M. Flammarion inquires, whether these might not be pleasantly employed in traversing the deserts where camels or dromedaries constitute the ordinary means of conveyance. How uncomfortable is a seat upon the back of one of these brutes--what patience it requires to endure the tearing, jerking motions of these ships of the wilderness--most wanderers in the East well know, and perhaps painfully remember. Suppose, then, that an aerostat were harnessed to a dromedary and drawn peacefully along, whilst the traveller sat softly in the car--reading, smoking, sleeping, dreaming--without a single jolt to mar his enjoyment, would not this be a blessed improvement in locomotion? Half in jest, too, we might carry the idea a little further, and ask whether, if balloons occupied by delicate voyagers were attached to steamers, and allowed to float at a sufficient height, so as to reduce the see-saw motion of the vessels to an imperceptible quantity, the pains of that abhorrent malady, sea-sickness, might not be avoided in crossing the Channel, or making small marine excursions?

So, many homely uses for captive balloons might be imagined. A traveller in Russia gives an account of a church at St. Petersburg with a lofty spire crowned with a large globe, upon which stood an angel supporting a cross. The figure began to bend, and great fears were entertained lest it should come down with a terrible crash. How could it be repaired was the question? To erect a proper scaffold would involve a formidable expense, and yet to reach the object without it seemed utterly impracticable, for the spire was covered with gilded copper, and looked more unscaleable than the Matterhorn. A workman, however, undertook the task. The plates of metal had been attached by nails which were left projecting. Furnished with short pieces of cord, looped at both extremities, he slung one end over a nail, and placing his feet in the other, raised himself a short distance: this enabled him to reach a little higher and fasten another loop over another nail, and so by repeating the process, and mounting from stirrup to stirrup, he crawled up, until by a still more daring manoeuvre he threw a cord over the globe, and then finally clambered to the side of the figure. A ladder of ropes was next drawn up, and the rest of the work became comparatively easy of execution; but with a captive balloon the needful materials might have been sent up, and the angel put in repair, without costing an anxious thought, or jeopardising either life or limb.

How far it is possible to employ a balloon for purposes of exploration in quarters which are naturally inaccessible, or at any rate difficult of approach, must be a question dependent in no small degree upon the power of replenishing the machine with gas or heated air. It would, doubtless, be a fine thing if men could thus sail over all the obstructions which fence in the two poles, and pry into the Antarctic continent, or solve the problem of a hidden Arctic sea. Many years ago Mr. Hampton designed, and we believe completed, a big Montgolfier, which was to be employed in the search after Sir John Franklin. The machine was to be inflated by means of hot air produced by the agency of a great stove; but, if the necessity for a supply of the ordinary gas was thus avoided, the demand for fuel in regions where neither timber nor coal could be had (blubber, indeed, might perhaps have been procured), must have proved an insuperable difficulty, and the enterprise would probably have terminated in leaving the aeronauts stranded on some icy waste, without any better means of return than were possessed by the poor lost ones themselves.

Let us not part from this subject, however, without informing the reader that if M. Flammarion's views are correct, it is the most important topic under the sun. 'For,' says he, with the look of a prophet and the tone of a poet, 'when the conquest of the air shall have been achieved, universal fraternity will be established upon the earth, everlasting peace will descend to us from heaven, and the last links which divide men and nations will be severed.' Without laying any stress upon the oracular form of this prediction--and the indefinite 'when' may conceal some sly reference to the Greek Kalends--we regret to say that we cannot join in his jubilant conclusion. Our firm persuasion is, that in the present state of affairs, seeing that so large a portion of the world's revenue is squandered upon fighting purposes, one of the first steps which would be taken in case the 'conquest of the air' were perfected to-morrow, would be to fit out a fleet of war-balloons, to raise a standing army of aeronauts, to add a new and afflictive department to our annual estimates, and to encourage the Chancellor of the Exchequer to make another assault upon the match-sellers, and probably to double our income-tax without compunction.

FOOTNOTES:

[48] 'La Navigation Atmosphérique.' Par M. Farcot, Ingenieur-Mécanicien, Membre de la Société Aérostatique et Météorologique de France. Paris, 1859.

[49]

'Les Anglais, nation trop fière, S'arrogent l'empire des mers; Les Français, nation légère, S'emparent de celui des airs.'

ART. III.--Early Sufferings of the Free Church of Scotland.

(1.) Illustrations of the Principles of Toleration in Scotland. Edinburgh. 1846.

(2.) The Headship of Christ and the Rights of the Christian People. By the late HUGH MILLER. Nimmo, Edinburgh.

(3.) The Cruise of the Betsy. By HUGH MILLER. Nimmo.

(4.) Evidence before a Committee of the House of Commons on the Refusal of Sites for Churches in Scotland, 1847.

(5.) Statement on the Law of Church Patronage, prepared by a Committee of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, in compliance with a suggestion of the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone. William Blackwood and Sons. 1870.

We were enabled to present our readers last year with what we believe to be the only full sketch in existence, drawn from authentic and official documents, of the rise and progress during a quarter of a century, of the Free Church of Scotland. From the figures there quoted it was made clear that at the very time when the Archbishop of Canterbury was proclaiming that this voluntary church was 'a failure' financially, its yearly income, steadily increasing from £275,000 of its earliest lustrum, had at last reached the highest point of £400,000; and that just when his Grace was asserting that 'whereas for a time it went forth triumphantly, now the ministers in all remote places are utterly destitute,' these remote ministers had, for the first time (although their number was doubled) attained the minimum stipend proposed by Dr. Chalmers of £150 each. The organization and machinery by which such a striking success has been achieved, as well as the principles which gave the original impulse to the body, were worthy of careful statement and study. Yet while devoting exclusive attention to these, we became gradually conscious that we were treading coldly upon the ashes of what history will describe as a marvellous outburst of self-sacrifice. The pathos and the suffering of that sad but noble year of 1843 have never yet been brought before English readers, but there is not so much heroism among us that we can afford to lose from the annals of this easy-going modern time so startling a narrative.

'Ah! that was something like disestablishment,' said a minister of the Free Kirk to us in the spring when the precedents of the Irish Church Bill were being discussed. He had been arguing that besides assuring their life-interests to the Irish clergy, it would be only fair to make a present to them of their glebes and parsonages. 'You should let a working-man take his working tools with him,' said our friend, and he was not sorry when the House of Lords gave a million or so of money to the new body. We were rash enough in reply to ask whether he got any equivalent for a glebe when a quarter of a century ago he and his two boys left the pleasant manse of B---- overlooking the Great Strath. But we had touched too deep a sore. The old man cheerfully turned it off with the words we have quoted above, but we could not forgive ourselves; and the thing led us back to enquire into some extraordinary scenes which took place in Scotland when many of the present generation were too young to observe them.

For this chapter of forgotten heroism, in which men of kindred blood and almost of our own generation took part, there are fortunately authentic as well as vividly descriptive materials. The reports presented year by year to the Scotch General Assemblies are the most public of all documents, and are intended to invite challenge and scrutiny. The evidence presented to the House of Commons Committee in 1848 is of great importance and of unquestioned authority. The writings of a man of genius like Hugh Miller will carry part of the truth down to other generations of readers. And yet, while much is known, much must ever remain untold. Scotchmen, who are men of education, and in a sacred office, are precisely the men to cover the sharpest pangs of poverty, and dread of poverty, with an impenetrable covering of reserve; and now that twenty-six years have passed, most of those grave, suffering faces have gone down into a deeper silence. Besides, the Free Kirk has come to be so proud of its extraordinary success in reconstruction, that it has rather attempted (notably in the recent debates in the House of Commons) to throw into the background the anguish of its birth, and to dwell rather on the achievements of the whole than on the sufferings of individuals. Our business is now rather with the latter, and fortunately there is one additional source whence this information can be derived. Dr. Thomas Guthrie, of Edinburgh, is known chiefly by his philanthropic efforts, after the example of Dr. Chalmers, to provide churches and schools and ragged schools for the masses in the large towns of Scotland; but the great achievement of his life, and one, too, for which men of all parties can now join in his praise, was that marvellous tour through Scotland in the year 1845, as the result of which parsonages, or 'manses' as they are called in Scotland, were actually provided for the seven hundred ministers, most of whom had been left homeless a year or two before, and whose places in the Establishment had all now been filled up. In the course of this great 'circumnavigation of charity,' he naturally became acquainted with facts and details, some of which found their way into speeches published at the time, and it is fortunate that we can still quote, from one of the greatest platform orators whether of England or Scotland, some of the fresh facts of that suffering time.

Until we recently came to the knowledge of these documents, we had the feeling that this suffering must have consisted more in apprehension or imagination than in actual privations--that the terrible dread which haunted men who were giving up their whole livings had scarcely any actual realization. And even though this turns out not to be the case, it is plain from Dr. Guthrie's own statements, that all over Scotland the approaching trial struck a chill to the hearts even of those who were determined to face it:--

'I remember,' he says, 'in a certain district of country, a minister said to me, "You think there is no chance of a settlement?" I said, "We are as certain of being out as that the sun shall rise to-morrow." I was struck by something like a groan, which came from the very heart of the mother of the family; they had had many trials in their day: there had been cradles and coffins in their home, and the place was endeared by many associations to the mother; there was not a flower or shrub or a tree but what was dear to her--some of them were planted by the hands of those who were in their graves,--and that woman's heart was like to break. I remember another instance, where there was a venerable mother who had gone to the place when it was a wilderness, but who, with her husband, had turned it into an Eden. Her husband had died there. Her son was now the minister. This venerable woman was above eighty years of age; yes, and I never felt more disposed to give up my work than in that house. I could contemplate the children being driven from their home; but when I looked on that venerable widow and mother, with the snows and sorrows of eighty years upon her head, and saw her anxiety about two things, namely, that Lord Aberdeen should bring in a bill to settle the question, but her anxiety, at the same time, that if Lord Aberdeen did not bring in a satisfactory measure, her son should do his duty,--I could not but feel that it was something like a cruel work to tear out such a venerable tree--to tear her away from the house that was dearest to her on earth.'

For, as we formerly said, compared with this blow, the disestablishment of the Irish Church was a fall into the lap of luxury. Every minister in Scotland who adhered to the Church lost his income in one day--Whit-sunday of 1843. On the same day they lost their dwellings. The professors of divinity, with Chalmers at their head; the missionaries, with Dr. Duff at their head; the humble schoolmasters, with no great name to sustain them--were all turned out at the same moment. And the great strain and crisis of conscience must have been in the spring of that year, when those who in 1842 had pledged themselves, with two-thirds of the Assembly, 'to endure resignedly the loss of the temporal blessings of the Establishment,' saw that there was to be no escape from the sacrifice. The dread and depression must often have been extreme; yet it was not unmixed with a sustaining joy, as in the case of the following story, with reference to Dr. Charles Mackintosh (a venerated minister in the North, whose memorials have recently been published), for which we are indebted to a correspondent who is a native of the Highlands:--

'One morning in the spring of 1843, I jumped early out of bed, for my head was full of marbles and peg-tops, and a dozen or so of games before breakfast has its attractions for a schoolboy. To my astonishment, I found my father down before me; nay, he had evidently been there for some time, for the moment I appeared he folded up the newspaper in which he had been so unseasonably engaged, and--with a break in his voice indicating an emotion that was quite unaccountable to me--he asked me to take it at once over to the manse, with his compliments to the minister. I went very readily, for, besides the comfort of fingering the marbles in my pocket, the hedge-rows were full of young birds upon whom legitimate hostilities could be waged in passing. But as I went I reflected on the austere and stately image of the minister--a man everywhere respected, but whose face inspired awe rather than love in the beholder--(Had I not seen the town-boys break and scatter round one corner of the street as soon as he appeared at the other?)--and I resolved that my interview with him should be short. And it was shorter than I expected, for I had scarcely got out of the sunshine into the manse evergreens, when I found him in the porch; and when I offered him the newspaper, he showed me that he had already got the Times, by some unusual express, and as he spoke he patted my head and smiled--but such a smile, so full of radiant kindliness! I was confounded; and as I went back between the edges the birds sang unheeded while I thought what could be up with the minister. Had anybody left him a fortune? or had he met one of the shining ones walking among the hollies in that early dawn? And it was not for some weeks that I found out that this was what had happened--the newspaper that morning had brought him the vote of the House of Commons, finally refusing an inquiry into the affairs of the Scotch Church, and so making it certain that within a few weeks he and his aged mother would leave for ever the home, at the door of which I saw him; in which his father, the previous minister, had dwelt peacefully before him, but which the son would now have to quit without retaining a farthing of his income for the future. Of course he came out, and 470 ministers with him.'

For the crisis followed in May. The disruption itself (as the actual and final wrench given to the Church came to be called) concentrated the anguish of the general sacrifice in a very painful, but, at the same time, a more poetical form. Sir George Harvey, the present President of the Scottish Academy, has painted the 'Leaving of the Manse' with much dignity and power: the grey-haired pastor moving with feeble steps from the well-known door; his wife's quiet tears, as she guides the child whose pet lamb refuses to accompany it in its early exile; the awe-struck respect of the rustics around, while the men take off their caps, and the women throw their aprons over their faces and sob. Yet the words which immediately follow what we have already quoted from Dr. Guthrie, are, perhaps, the most memorable record of the feelings which accompanied the final step:--

'I remember passing a manse on a moonlight night, with the minister who had left it,--for the cause of truth, his brother Scotchman earnestly adds--'No light shone from the house, and no smoke arose. Pointing to it in the moonlight, I said, "Oh, my friend, it was a noble thing to leave that house." "Ah, yes," he replied; "it was a noble thing, but for all that it was a bitter thing. I shall never forget the night I left that house till I am laid in my grave. When I saw my wife and children go forth in the gloaming, when I saw them for the last time leave our own door; and when in the dark I was left alone, with none but my God in the house; and when I had to take water and quench the fire on my own hearth, and put out the candle in my own house, and turn the key against myself, and my wife, and my little ones that night--God in His mercy grant that such a night I may never again see! It was a noble thing to leave the manse, and I bless God for the grace that was given to me; but, for all that, it was a cruel and bitter night to me."'

The actual circumstances of departure must have been very various: 'One minister writes to us that he left the manse with his family in a snow-storm, when the mountain was white with snow, and the sky was black with drift; but that he never knew so much of the peace of God as he did that night, when following his wife and children as they were carted over the mountain, without knowing where they were to find a place to dwell in.'

And in many places over Scotland, this was the beginning of sorrows. In some parts, and especially in the large towns, the actual hardships were nothing worse than diminution of income and straitened circumstances; while in not a few cases even that was not felt. But in the country, and especially in the Highlands, it was different. It was some years before the manses were built, and homelessness added to poverty pressed heavily on the outed ministers.

'I remember well,' writes the Highland correspondent we have already quoted from, and for whose accuracy and good faith we can vouch, 'how I used to watch one man, the minister of the neighbouring parish of E----, who, like many others, was unable to find a place to dwell in among his own people, and had to come into the neighbouring town. He was a scholarly and cultivated man, who in his early days had attained much academical distinction at a Northern University, but a weak chest and a threatening of heart complaint now bore heavily upon him. Yet week after week, as every Sabbath morning came round, he persisted in driving away for miles through that first inclement winter, to meet his congregation; and I can remember to this day his keen, delicate face set to meet a heavy snow-storm from the north-west, while a hacking cough shook his whole frame as he set out on his journey, four miles of which must pass ere he caught sight of the well-sheltered manse, which the year before he had left for ever.'

But those who, like him, found shelter in a town dwelling, however humble, were not worst off. The great difficulty was in the country; even where harbouring the minister was not forbidden (as in some cases, from a desire to crush out the movement, it was) by the great landlords. And of course it was with this that Dr. Guthrie's facts chiefly dealt.

'I have a letter here from a man who has suffered more for gospel truth than any other I know. He says that he has been obliged to pack two nurses and eight children into two beds, in the small house to which they have removed. His wife took a cold in October, which there was some apprehension might end in consumption; and at my own table he told me, what was enough to melt a heart of stone, that when he and his family gather together at the family altar, they have not room to kneel before Almighty God, and some of them require to kneel on the floor of the passage before they can unite together in their family devotions. Some of our ministers write that they live in crofter's houses; some in places as damp as cellars, where a candle will not burn. One says he sits with his great coat on; another that the curtains of his bed shake at night like the sails of a ship in a storm. One minister, a friend of mine, lives in a house which every wind of heaven blows through. On getting up one morning he found the house all comparatively comfortable, and wondered what good genius had been putting it in order, when he discovered that a heavy shower of snow had fallen, and stopped up the crevices of the roof.'

Narrating this to a vast meeting in Glasgow, at the close of which he announced that upwards of £10,000 had been subscribed during that one day for his scheme, Dr. Guthrie added, with Scotch shrewdness, 'I said to my friend, that I was glad he had told me that story, for if that shower of snow did not produce a shower of notes, I would be very much disappointed.' The story of the shower of snow was hearsay; but we must make room for what the speaker testifies to having seen with his own eyes.

'Some of you may have read of the death of Mr. Baird, the minister of Cockburnspath, a man of piety, a man of science, a man of amiable disposition, and of the kindest heart, but a man dealt most unkindly by; although he would not have done a cruel or unjust thing to the meanest of God's creatures. I was asked to go and preach for a collection to his manse, last winter. He left one of the loveliest manses in Scotland. He might have lived in comfort in Dunbar, seven or eight miles away, but what was to become of his people? They were smiting the shepherd, that they might scatter the sheep. No, said Mr. Baird, be the consequences what they may, I shall stand by my own people. I went out last winter, and found him in a mean cottage, consisting of two rooms, a but and a ben, with a cellar-like closet below, and a garret above; and I honestly declare, that the house was so small and so cold that, when sitting by the fire, the one part of the body was almost frozen, while the other was scorched by the heat. Night came, and I asked where I was to sleep. He showed me a closet; there was a fire-place in it, but it was a mockery, for no fire could be put in it; the walls were damp. I looked horrified at the place; but there was no better. Now, said I to Mr. Baird, where are you to sleep? Come, said he, and I will show you. So he climbed a sort of trap stair, and got up to the garret, and there was the minister's study, with a chair, a table, and a flock bed. His health was evidently sinking under his sufferings; and, but that I was not well myself, I never would have permitted him to lie on such a bed. A few inches above were the slates of the roof, without any covering, and as white with hoar frost within, as they were white with snow without. When he came down next morning, after a sleepless night, I asked him how he had been, and he told me that he had never closed an eye, from the cold. His very breath on the blankets was frozen as hard as the ice outside. I say, that man lies in a martyr's grave ... and I would rather, like him this day, be laid in the grave, with a grateful Church to raise my honored monument, than dwell in the proudest palaces of those that sent him there.'

We have exscinded from these quotations, not only all polemics, but such not unnatural expressions of indignation as the brethren of the more unfortunate ministers slipped into. There is no injustice in omitting these now, for the time has come when all parties, and in particular most of the members of the Scotch Established Church, are earnest in expressing their admiration of the heroism of those who suffered. But, in order to bring out the story completely, and, in particular, to do justice to the difficulties in the face of which the enormous task of covering the land with voluntary churches and manses and ministers was accomplished, it is necessary to go farther down, and refer to another historical chapter. We allude to the facts which came out in the Committee of the House of Commons on 'Sites for Churches (Scotland),' in 1847. No doubt these hardships have nearly all now passed away, and the great landowners, themselves chiefly members of the Church of England, have, almost in every case, consented to sell to the poorer congregations of the Church ground on which to erect churches. But at first it was perhaps natural that men, most of them imperfectly acquainted with their countrymen, should have conceived it possible to stamp out, or starve out, the new church. And, accordingly, some very strong things were done. The writer happened to be acquainted with one district, where a gentleman of large property, a man, too, of immense energy and public spirit, entertained a passionate opposition to the popular movement, and had been heard to declare, shortly before the disruption, that he would 'give five hundred trees from his woods, to hang the seceding ministers upon.' Those innocent vegetables were, fortunately, not called upon to bear the novos fructus et non sua poma, thus destined for them; but Mr. R---- soon tried another course, which was practically of not much more use. He suddenly issued a notice, that every labourer on his estates, who did not go to the parish church, should cease, after next Monday, to work on his land. Now, in that part of the Highlands, as in most others, the people had gone out en masse with their ministers, and no one would go to the Established Church for the heaviest bribe. What was the result of the attempt at coercion? The result was simply this, that on that Monday no plough or spade was touched on all his estates; and Mr. R----, proud and passionate as he was, had simply and unconditionally to surrender--knowing, too, that he had consolidated the whole country-side in a bond of mutual allegiance, which would long survive the living generation of men. The same sort of oppression was attempted in particular cases for years afterwards. So late as 1847, we find, in the evidence before Parliament, many cases, e.g., a witness, whose family had been tenants of a farm, in Strathspey, for many generations, 'probably since 1630,' saying, that 'there is a general rumour prevalent in the district, and among the adherents of the Free Church, that certain of their number may be made examples of at the earliest opportunity, in the way of being evicted from their farms, possessions, or holdings', and expressing his own lively apprehensions in consequence. Nor was this general belief unfounded. A poor woman, who had offered a shed on her holding, where the congregation might meet, 'got a message from his lordship's factor, through another person, that, in the event of her granting such a site, he would withdraw her lease.' One Donald Cameron, in the same place, who, being an elder in the church, had come out with his brethren, was urged by the same middleman with the sensible argument, 'Why, I conceive you to be the greatest fool in the nation; might not a minister who remained within the walls of a church, be as instrumental in saving your soul, as those who preach in woods or fields?' but, on this very fair reasoning failing to make him abandon his own pastor and principles, he was summarily turned out of his situation as the great man's overseer. But the most curious instance of this sort of thing being carried out systematically is given in the evidence of Mr. M----, of Skye, who was factor for Lord Macdonald, in that island. In this case, not only was the minister refused a holding, but a list was made out of all the collectors who ventured to go round and gather up the small contributions of their brethren, and all of them received summary notice to quit, some under circumstances of the greatest hardship. The factor, who seemed, at last, to be somewhat ashamed of the transaction, told the Committee that 'It was Lord Macdonald himself who gave me the list of such as he wished to be served with notices, on account of their being collectors. The day he was leaving the country he gave me a list, and said, "Here is a list of fellows that must have notice to quit."' One of the poor men travelled all the way up to London to try to persuade his landlord to be merciful; but, as the factor told the Committee, 'I rather think his lordship did not look at his petition.' Nor was it merely the officials connected with the Free Church who were turned out: the innkeeper and the miller of the district were both ejected on account of their being members, or, as the factor put it, partisans, of that body. 'Being, as we considered, public servants, we thought it better to remove them.' The Committee was very severe in dealing with the allegations of partisanship made ex post facto against these unfortunate people, the factor not being able to say that he had ever hinted such a reason to themselves. Mr. Bouverie's question to the factor, 'Was any locus penitentiæ allowed to the miller?' was met by the curious reply, 'That would be interfering with the man's conscience, if he thought he was acting rightly,' and Mr. Fox Maule's rejoinder, 'And you think it was no interference with his conscience, turning him out of his farm?' received the placid answer, 'No.' Niel Nicholson, one of the unfortunate Free Churchmen removed at this time to make way for a teacher of the Established Church, at the time he received notice to quit, had a bedridden wife, and his son the eldest of eight or ten children, laid up with a broken leg. Another man, removed by a brother of the Established minister, after being ejected from his land had nowhere to go, and lived for a considerable time in a kind of tent by the roadside, at last receiving shelter from the very factor of Lord Macdonald whose general conduct seems to have been so harsh. The correspondence brought in evidence before the Committee on this occasion was very instructive, as in the case of the following laconic missive:--

'ARMADALE, 16_th November_, 1846. SIR,--I refuse a site for a Free Church for your people. I am, sir, your obedient servant, MACDONALD.'

But the same minister who was thus addressed as to his church, wrote a very respectful letter to his landlord, as to his house, trusting 'that your Lordship does not really intend to drive me, with my young and helpless family, out of my present dwelling-house.'

'I am willing to give any rents for the same which another will offer; and should your Lordship not choose to give the farm on any terms, I would be satisfied with the house, and grass for two cows and a horse. The building of this house cost me £150, and I have been at considerable expense in improving the farm, for which, from the shortness of the lease, I have had as yet little or no returns. Will your Lordship allow me to observe without offence, that at a time[50] when we are all suffering under the chastening hand of our heavenly Father, it looks somewhat unseemly that we should be the occasion of suffering to one another. I have already taken the principal part in distributing food supplied by the Free Church among your Lordship's cotters and crofters in this country. I am at this moment in receipt of nearly £40 (I may now say £100) from respectable private parties in London, Edinburgh, and Glasgow, with which I am helping to relieve much of the present distress, besides lessening the burden of supporting many of the people to your Lordship and tenants. From all these considerations, I might naturally expect some favour at your Lordship's hands.'

The answer to this letter came through, another factor, to the effect that 'Lord Macdonald instructs me to inform you that he has received your letter, and that it is not his intention either to grant you a site or give you any lands;' adding that the landlord would not give him any compensation for his improvements, and that 'he had brought it all on himself' by persisting in staying with his present congregation.

But with the House of Commons Blue-book before us, let us leave cases of individual suffering for a time, and look at the case of whole congregations. Throughout Scotland the Free Church was, with labour and difficulty, erecting places in which to worship God. But in many places the landlords refused a foot of soil on which to do it. The congregations who met in the open air were not much to be pitied at their starting, for it was summer, and a thorough soaking with rain was the worst that befel them. But as the first winter of 1843 darkened down upon them, it was no wonder that men and women gathering weekly under a canvas tent, and in some cases without even that, but in the open air, under the bitter inclemency of the northern sky, began to set up piteous requests to be permitted to meet under some roof, or at least to be allowed land on which to erect a roof to cover them. But in many instances this was refused; and during that winter, in different districts of Scotland whole congregations of not men only, but delicate women and children (after coming, as the Scotch manner is, many miles to worship or to sacrament), remained through each Sunday of December, January, and February, under whatever variety of snow, sleet, slush, frost, rain, and ice, their native sky, rich in such alternations, chose to pour upon them. Another year came round, and though by this time a number of the proprietors had relented, a great many stood firm, and the second winter showed the same kind of suffering as the first. The following circumstances in which one of the ordinary services in a congregation in the South of Scotland, in February of the year 1844, was held, must have had parallels during the same months, especially in Skye, and the Western Isles, and the Highlands of Inverness and other counties. But it is given by the Edinburgh minister who conducted the meeting, and whose evidence on matters of which he was eye-witness we have already found so graphic. In this case the congregation had met for some time in a canvas tent on a piece of moor or waste ground by the permission of the tenant; but the landlord, who had already refused a site, checkmated this evasion of his will by procuring an interdict, or order of Court, and the congregation were driven in the beginning of winter to meet on the public road, and to try to erect their tent there. But the tent could not be erected without digging holes for the poles, and making holes in the public road was an illegal proceeding, which they were afraid to attempt so soon after being driven off a waste moor. Consequently, they met all that winter without shelter, as described in the following private letter, written at the time, but afterwards read publicly to the Committee of the House of Commons:--

'Well wrapped up, I drove out yesterday morning to Canobie, the hills white with snow, the roads covered ankle deep in many places with slush, the wind high and cold, thick rain lashing on, and the Esk by our side all the way, roaring in the snow-flood between bank and brae. We passed Johnnie Armstrong's tower, yet strong even in its ruins, and after a drive of four miles a turn of the road brought me in view of a sight which was overpowering, and would have brought the salt tears into the eyes of any man of common humanity. There, under the naked boughs of some spreading oak trees, at the point where a country road joined the turnpike, stood a tent, around, or rather in front of which was gathered a large group of muffled men and women, with some little children, a few sitting, most of them standing, and some old venerable widows cowering under the shelter of an umbrella. On all sides each road was adding a stream of plaided men and muffled women to the group, till the congregation had increased to between 500 or 600, gathering on the very road, and waiting my forthcoming from a mean inn, where I found shelter till the hour of worship had come. During the psalm-singing and first prayer I was in the tent, but finding that I would be uncomfortably confined, I took up my position on a chair in front, having my hat on my head, my Codrington close buttoned up to my throat, and a pair of bands, which were wet enough with rain ere the service was over. The rain lashed on heavily during the latter part of the sermon, but none budged; and when my hat was off during the last prayer, some man kindly extended an umbrella over my head. I was so interested, and so were the people, that our forenoon service continued for about two hours. At the close I felt so much for the people; it was such a sad sight to see old men and women, some children, and one or two people pale and sickly, and apparently near the grave, all wet and benumbed with the keen wind and cold rain, that I proposed to have no afternoon service; but this met with universal dissent--one and all declared that if I would hold on they would stay on the road till midnight. So we met again at three o'clock, and it poured on almost without intermission during the whole service; and that over, shaken cordially by many a man and many a woman's hand, I got into the gig and drove here in time for an evening service, followed through rain in heaven and the wet snow on the road by a number of the people.'

When this letter was produced to the House it was taken advantage of by Sir James Graham, with the view of bringing out that so sad a sight must have had the effect of driving the minister who witnessed it into some bitterness of expression in the pulpit, such as might perhaps justify or excuse the Duke of Buccleuch. Said Sir James--

'May I ask whether your own feeling was not that some oppression had been exercised towards those people? Ans. Certainly; I felt that the people were in most grievous circumstances, being necessitated to meet on the turnpike road; and not only I, but I may mention in addition that the person who drove me in the gig from Langholm to Canobie, when we came in sight of that congregation standing in the open air upon such a day, and in such a place, burst into tears, and asked me, Was there ever a sight seen like that?

'You have mentioned that "oppression makes a wise man mad;" the feelings of the driver might be one thing, but you, a minister of the gospel, would be very considerably excited by seeing what you have described; you thinking it an act of oppression upon the people? Ans. Deep feeling would be excited--if you mean by excitement that I was ready to break forth into unsuitable expressions, I say certainly not; I felt when I saw it as if I could not preach, I was so overpowered by the sight--to see my fellow-creatures, honest, respectable, religious people, worshipping the God of their fathers upon the turnpike road was enough to melt any man's heart.'

Sir James was disappointed in the object of his examination, for it turned out that Dr. Guthrie on this occasion had with some deliberation avoided making any reference to the circumstances of the congregation, and had turned all the feeling roused within him into the channel of more fervid preaching of the common gospel.

This was in 1844; the following year the ministers, even in the bleakest Highlands, began to have some comfort, for now the manse scheme was set on foot, and was being pressed by Dr. Guthrie; but the position of these unfortunate and exceptional congregations remained the same. A minister in Skye, whom the Highlanders there regarded with boundless veneration, but who was little fitted to face hardships (he saw his family of eleven delicate children melt into the grave before him), used to preach at Uig in the open air, with a covering over himself, but none for the people. 'I have preached,' he says, 'when the snow has been falling so heavily upon them, that when it was over I could scarcely distinguish the congregation from the ground, except by their faces.' Two years more passed on; and even then, in 1847, there were still thirty-one cases in Scotland in which sites were absolutely refused, besides many others in which very inconvenient and humiliating places were alone offered, and in many cases had been accepted. The House of Commons now took up the matter, and perhaps the most curious thing in their investigation was the careful cross-examination of medical men on the question whether it could be proved that the members of the congregation who met winter after winter in the open air had actually suffered, or at least had suffered seriously and fatally from their compulsory exposure. No doubt they were drenched with rain and chilled with sleet, and then they caught cold and died; but were the medical men prepared to prove (so argued the apologists of oppression in the committee)--could the medical men say that their taking cold was the necessary consequence of the drench and chill, or that the fatal result was due to this original cause, and not to subsequent carelessness or blunders in the treatment? For example, when 'Miss Stewart, Grantown, about eighty years of age, but strong for her years, and of sound constitution, after attending public worship of the Free Church in the open air, was attacked by sub-acute rheumatism,' and died exhausted after four months of the disease, no one could certainly say that the old lady might not have taken rheumatism even if she had separated from her neighbours, and gone peaceably back to the Established Church!

We shall quote no more, however, from the details of this Blue-book, but it will be remembered that, after taking evidence extending to nearly five hundred pages of print, the committee unanimously concurred in expressing an 'earnest hope that the sites which have hitherto been refused may no longer be withheld.' They held, and all Englishmen will echo the opinion, that 'the compulsion to worship in the open air, without a church, is a grievous hardship inflicted on innocent parties;' while they found that even at that late date of 1847, about 16,000 people were still compelled so to worship, or at least were 'deprived of church accommodation,' and were without 'a convenient shelter from the severity of a northern climate.'

But though the site-refusing caused much distress to the people, still the edge even of this fell chiefly upon the ministers. Driven out of their old homes in one day, they were often refused new ones, and in the great Highland counties denied even temporary shelter. Lodging there was hardly to be got, and in many places the tenantry were haunted with fears of what the consequences might be to themselves if they gave house-room where their landlords had already refused a site. 'Many of these ministers' families,' said Dr. Guthrie in 1845, when the facts were recent,--'some of them motherless families--are thirty, and fifty, and sixty, and seventy miles separated from them. I think of the hardship of many of these men going to see their own children; and of children who see their father so seldom that they do not know him when he visits them.' One of the most curious cases thus produced was that of the parish of Small Isles--so called because it consists of four little islands clustered together in the Atlantic. The minister, Mr. Swanson, well known now as the friend from youth of Hugh Miller--famous as a geologist, and much more famous as a Scottish stonemason, gave up his home, 'placed far amid the melancholy main,' and came out with the others in 1843; and a site both for manse and Church being refused on the central island, where the whole congregation adhered to him, he betook himself to what his friend, the gifted editor of the Witness, dubbed the 'Floating Manse.' It was a little yacht, 30 feet by 11 feet, in which he lived when visiting his parish, his family, however, residing in Skye.

In 1844, Hugh Miller set out to visit his friend on a geological excursion, the scientific record of which he has preserved in his volume 'The Cruise of the Betsy,' where he also gives a most curious account of the relations of Mr. Swanson, the minister, to the people to whom he so clung. On one Sunday morning the geologist and his host got ashore on their way to a low dingy cottage of turf and stone (just opposite the windows of the deserted manse), which its former occupant had built with his own money as a Gaelic school for the people, and which they were obliged to use as a place of worship--'the minister encased in his ample-skirted storm-jacket of oiled canvas protected atop by a genuine sou'-wester, of which the broad posterior rim sloped half-a-yard down his back; and I closely wrapped up in my grey maud, which proved, however, a rather indifferent protection against the penetrating powers of a true Hebridean drizzle.' When they got in, the minister took off his sou'-wester, and preached on 'God so loved the world,' and the visitor remarks how the attention of his hearers to him who was not only their pastor, but the sole physician, and that without fee or reward, in the island, was increased by his new life of hardship and danger undertaken for their sakes; for they had seen his little vessel driven from her anchorage just as the evening had fallen, and always feared for his safety when stormy nights closed over the sea. Next year Miller had himself an opportunity of judging of this, for while he was on board the Betsy 'the water, pouring in through a hundred opening chinks in her upper works, rose, despite of our exertions, high over plank, and beam, and cabin door, and went dashing against beds and lockers. She was evidently fast filling, and bade fair to terminate all her voyagings by a short trip to the bottom.' They barely saved themselves by the Point of Sleat interposing between them and the roll of the sea. The 'Floating Manse' will not be forgotten while the works of this charming writer survive; but very much later than this, on Loch Sunart, also in the West, a 'floating church' also had to be provided in consequence of the refusal of a site; and the Sheriff of Edinburghshire, himself a naval officer in his youth, testified to the Committee of the House that in the winter of 1846 it answered very well. It was moored about a hundred yards from the shore, and although there was a little difficulty in the people going out in boats, still it was possible to manage it. Many English pedestrians in Sutherland have seen the famous Cave of Smoo, a vast cavern protected by a natural gateway of rock, and with an interior chamber where a black stream flows in perpetual darkness. It was here that the Free Church congregation of Durness met.

'One minister has preached for two years in a deep sea pit, which I saw in Sutherlandshire; God's sea is their protection. No man can say he is ruler of the sea, though he boasts himself possessor of the land. In a deep gully, where the rocks are some hundred feet high, a hollow has been closed in from the sea by a barrier of rocks, which protects them from the Western Ocean, behind this they meet; and there, some hundred feet down, where no man can see them till he stands on the verge of the precipice, and where they might have been safe from Claverhouse in the days of old, that minister with his congregation, while the waves of the Atlantic Ocean were roaring beside them, and protected by that barrier of rock, met two winters and two summers; and I know, from the determination of that man and his people, that there they would have met till their dying day if the Duke of Sutherland had not granted them redress.'

But we were treating of the hardships rather of the ministers than of the congregations, and Dr. Guthrie's question is pertinent,

'Where does the minister go after having preached in such circumstances? Not in the case I have just mentioned, but in another, the minister, after preaching to his hearers in the winter snow, where there was no barrier or creek sheltering them from the salt sea spray, had to go back, not to a comfortable home, like you and me, but to a miserable dwelling, where he had to climb to a lonely and miserable garret, and in a place where there was little ventilation, and in a room where he could have no fire, the minister had to sit from week's end to week's end, till his health was broken down, and he was obliged to retire from the battle-field, forced away from it to save himself from an early, and, I say, a martyr's grave.'

It need not be said that such cases as these were exceptional and extreme; but, on the other hand, it is certain the facts in these cases are accurately given, and are representative of other extreme cases that were never published. Our last quotation from the eloquent divine who laid the foundations of the homes of a whole Church (and to whom we shall not apologize for quoting so many facts which are the inheritance of the Church catholic) is interesting to the writer, because the younger of the two ministers spoken of in it was one of the first men whom he remembers in his childhood to have seen in the pulpit. He gave up no manse in 1843, but belonged to another class, the licentiates or candidates of the Church, who threw in their lot with the body now to be stripped of all its prospects and emoluments. The following visit, narrated by Dr. Guthrie, was to the old minister of Tongue, 'a man of the highest character and the best affections.' His son, whom we remember merely as a gentlemanly young cleric, with a rather plaintive voice, which ranged through endless intonations and cadences, and was provocative of meditation much more than of thought, was at this time his father's assistant, and died of the fever mentioned by Dr. Guthrie.

'The place where Mr. Mackenzie's old manse is situated is near the small village of Tongue, the prettiest place in all that country. He had a sort of ancestral right to it--his family having had possession of it for about a hundred years--and he had spent several hundreds of pounds in improving the property, never dreaming but that his son would inherit it after he was gone. It was told me that his Grace of Sutherland wrote to him, expressing his hope that he would not go out, considering how much he had done for him. Mr. Mackenzie wrote back that he was not forgetful of his Grace's kindness, but that he owed more to the Lord Jesus Christ.... When I went to Tongue, where did I find him? I passed the manse, with its lawns, its trim walks, and its fine trees. I went on till I came to a bleak, heather hill, under the lee of which I found a humble cottage belonging to the parish schoolmaster, where this venerable man and his son had found a shelter, and were accommodated for four shillings a week. There was nothing inviting about the house, though I believe the people were kind enough. Before the door there was an old broken cart, and a black peat stack, and everything was repulsive. I opened the door of the single room, which served for dining-room, drawing-room, parlour, library, study, and bedroom, all and everything in one; and there, beyond the bed, I saw him, nature exhausted. He had never closed his eyes all night, having passed a night of extreme suffering; and there, in exhausted nature, he was sitting half dressed in a chair, in profound slumber, his old grey locks streaming over the back of the chair on which he was sitting--a picture of old age, a picture of disease, a picture of death. I stood for some time before him, and as I looked round the room I thought, Oh! if I had B----, if I had any of the men here who are persecuting our poor Free Church, surely they would be moved by such a sight as this! I pushed open a door, and in a small mean closet I found this venerable man's son--a minister of our Church, and a man who would be an honour to any Church--lying on a fever bed. His children were seventy miles away, for no house could be procured for them in the district. The son had never closed his eyes all night, his own sufferings having been aggravated by his father's. I tried to console him, but I was more fit to weep with him than anything else. I only remember that he said something to this effect: "Ah, Mr. Guthrie, this is bad enough and hard enough, but, blessed be God, I don't lie here a renegade; my own conscience and my father's are in peace." As I came back amid the driving tempest, I confess that I was more like a child than a man, so little was I able to resist what I had seen; and as I came along I saw a little flower, that God in his providence had taught, when the storm came on, to close its leaves; and I thought, if God is so kind to this little flower, he will never see the righteous man forsaken, nor his seed begging bread.... When I returned from the North a few days ago, I found a letter, informing me that this venerable man was dead. Death has tied his tongue: it has loosed mine. I believe that that man may have died as much in consequence of the privations he endured, as John Brown did from the pistol of Claverhouse. There was some mercy in the dragoon's pistol; it put an end to the man's sufferings at once. But he is now in his coffin, and they cannot disturb him there.'

'And what I pray this meeting to remember,' concluded the speaker, 'is that there are other men in similar circumstances.' There were others, not a few; but most of them now dwell where they hear not the voice of the oppressor; and though family records all over Scotland might add not a few pages to our chronicle of constancy, these are generally too sacred to draw upon. Enough has been said to recall us to the circumstances of straitening and suffering under which the extraordinary work of church organization and construction which we formerly sketched was carried on; and to remind us that the favourite motto of the Scottish church, Nec tamen consumebatur, has more modern applications than to those days of the Covenant

'Whose echo rings through Scotland to this hour.'

But this subject has at present a more than historical interest. The paragraph referring to Scotland and its urgent educational needs in the Queen's Speech at the opening of this Session, followed by the immediate introduction of a bill by the Lord Advocate, which was promptly opposed by his political opponents, on the ground that it confessedly cuts off the parish schools from any connection with the Established Church, reminds us of perhaps the most cruel chapter in the whole history of suffering in 1843. The parish school-masters of Scotland have always been a most meritorious but very ill-remunerated set of men; and it might have been hoped that whatever severities a mistaken sense of duty might have led those in power to exercise towards the ministers and leaders of the Church after 1843, these humbler members not being themselves ecclesiastical officials, might have been allowed to remain in the possession of their hearths and homes. But it was not so. Many of the schoolmasters were elders of the Church. All of them were to a certain extent educated men, and took an interest in the questions raised as to the Church's right to be free from patronage and from civil dictation generally. The consequence was, that not a few of them came out along with the other laymen who followed the ministers in 1843, prepared to take their share of the pecuniary burdens which were thus brought upon the community. But this milder lot was not allowed them. They, too, like the ministers, had their Bartholomew's Day. They would gladly have clung to their humble daily work in the school-house, and more gladly still to the little home built generally at the end of it, during the week, with bare liberty on the Sabbath to join with either congregation in worship; but it was not to be. Throughout Scotland, every schoolmaster who joined with the Church in fulfilling its pledge of 1842, was at once ejected from his small house, and deprived of his smaller income; and the consequences to them and to their families were in many cases misery, approaching almost to starvation. The result to education was not disadvantageous; for the Free Church, having thrown upon it the burden of so many men deprived of bread, for no other crime than their attachment to itself, was in no mood to shrink from the duty. It at once added to the rest of its organization an education scheme. Homes were gradually built for the ousted schoolmasters, and in as many places as possible they continued to teach the same children of the same hamlets where they had previously dwelt. The Free Church has now, or had very recently, 620 schools and 645 teachers, and taught upwards of 60,000 of the youth of Scotland, many of whom were in the most remote and destitute parts; while its normal schools are reported by her Majesty's inspectors as the most efficient in Scotland. Yet for a proper national scheme, such as has for many years been desired in Scotland, the Free Church would at once be ready to give up an organization so interesting in its origin, and so powerful in its results. Some years ago, in the midst of the keenest opposition by the Conservative party and the Established Church, the choice of a teacher of any denomination was allowed to the heritors; and next year, whatever else is done on this most important subject, it is plain that the last strands of exclusive connection will be parted.

The remaining matter which may come before Parliament during the next session is one in which the other Voluntary and Presbyterian Churches of Scotland are quite as much interested as that which dates from 1843. It is the proposal to transfer the patronage of the churches from the few existing possessors, partly to the landowners, and partly to the communicants of the Established Church, but excluding other parishioners. A Committee was appointed in 1869 by the General Assembly, to watch over a legislative measure to this effect, and their first step was to go to the Prime Minister. In answer to Mr. Gladstone's questions, they explained that the chief reason for the sudden change of sentiment on the part of a body which had hitherto been distinguished by its uncompromising defence of the present rights of patrons, was a desire to conciliate the Presbyterians outside by a deference to their well-known views. On this point, and on the proposal generally, Mr. Gladstone requested that a formal memorial might be drawn up, not only 'because it is desirable that the Government should have in their hands some statement with some degree of authority,' but also to instruct 'the Parliament of the three kingdoms' in a matter which Scotchmen alone can be expected accurately to know.

The desired 'Statement on the Law of Church Patronage' has accordingly now been issued and transmitted to the Government, and will doubtless be laid on the table of the House. It is a very remarkable document, giving the ecclesiastical history of Scotland with great fairness until it comes down to quite recent times, but making it in consequence quite impossible for any Legislature with the least sense of justice to reconstitute church endowments in the way desired. It narrates how patronage was abolished in Scotland at the Revolution settlement; and how its restoration by an Act in 1711 (protested against by the Free Church in 1843 as altering a thing reserved from the jurisdiction of the Union Parliament) was 'one of the acts of a conspiracy for the purpose of bringing back the Stuart dynasty to the throne.' The Assembly of 1735 stated in an address to the King, 'That it was done in resentment against the Church of Scotland.' Bishop Burnet, present at the passing of the Act, says it was intended to 'weaken and undermine' the Church of Scotland. The 'Statement' then goes on to show how it was not merely the Free Church that protested against the outrage: the Assembly of 1812 protested that 'the Act abolishing patronage must be understood to be a part of our Presbyterian constitution secured to us by the Treaty of Union forever;' and for seventy years in succession thereafter the Assembly yearly instructed its Committee to attempt to get redress. Gradually, however, as the cold eighteenth century crept on, a party began to dominate in the Church which took the same view of patronage which was afterwards formulated by Dr. Mearns and Dr. Cook, and by the aid of the civil courts became finally triumphant in 1843. And thus followed the first secession. Ebenezer Erskine, a great name in those northern regions in that dark century, protested publicly that 'those professed Presbyterians who thrust men upon congregations without, and contrary to, the free choice their king had allowed them, were guilty of an attempt to jostle Christ out of his government.' He and three other ministers were thereupon deposed in 1733, and 'appealed unto the first free, faithful, and reforming General Assembly of the Church of Scotland.' The second secession, in 1752, was a still more exact parallel to the third great schism of 1843, for the founders of the Relief Church in 1752 were driven out, like Dr. Chalmers and his friends, because they refused to take a personal part in ordaining those whom the patron had presented, but whom the people refused to receive. These circumstances are very fairly narrated in the Statement, which farther refers to the evidence given before the Select Committee of the House of Commons on the Law of Patronage in 1834, as giving 'the best summary of the historical and legal aspects of the question which we possess.' That Committee, it is stated, came to no definite finding, because the necessity for doing so was superseded by the Act of the previous General Assembly, giving the people a veto against an unacceptable presentee--an Act which was 'not passed without a full assurance from the law officers of the Crown in Scotland that it was quite within the power of the Church.' Within a year thereafter, however, a question arose as to this, and a narrow majority of the Scotch judges, backed by the House of Lords, held that it was not within their power. The Church at once took steps to appeal to the Legislature to correct the anomaly, and concede the power which was questioned; asking only that in the meantime the courts should not force them to take a part in violating with their own hands those rights of the Christian people which they had affirmed. The refusal to allow this brought on the disruption. The 'Statement' winds up with pointing out how 'the non-intrusion controversy thus passed into that of spiritual independence;' and 'it was on a question thence arising in regard to the respective provinces of the ecclesiastical and civil courts that the secession of 1843 actually took place.' They add, however, that though in 1836 the Church refused to condemn patronage altogether, and was satisfied with the supposed security of the Veto Act, in 1842 this as well as other matters came to maturity, and the General Assembly resolved, 'That patronage is a grievance; has been attended with much injury to the cause of true religion in this Church and kingdom; is the main cause of the difficulties in which the Church is at present involved; and that it ought to be abolished.' Far from conciliating opponents, however, this resolve was made part of the reason by the courts and the moderate party for driving its authors into disruption.

The candour and fairness of the earlier historical part of this memorial will always give it importance; but the gross inadequacy of the practical measures proposed has subjected it in Scotland to an unfair amount of ridicule. Dr. Cook, as the head of the moderate party, the proper representative of those who stayed in in 1843, at once protested against it, asserting that patronage is essential to the stability of the Church of Scotland. Dr. Tulloch, of St. Andrew's, as representing the broad section of the Church, repudiated it two days after. Mr. Story, the biographer of Dr. Lee, and Dr. Wallace, who is Dr. Lee's successor in Edinburgh, made haste to attack it also. The great difficulty within the Church seems to be the proposed refusal to admit all parishioners to vote for the parish minister. So long as he was appointed by a single laird or nobleman, who might be a stranger altogether, that difficulty was not felt. The people were excluded, but they were excluded equally. It is now proposed, however, that the minister should be paid by the whole country, but should be appointed by the communicants of the Established Church alone, excluding the members of the older and properly anti-patronage bodies, who have all the same creed, but whose principles of Church polity the Established Church, itself a minority of the nation, is only now adopting. It is clearly the vague sense of injustice and wrong thus caused which is at the root of the dissatisfaction everywhere expressed with the proposed measure, even by members and ministers of the Scottish Establishment itself. But another more important result has been the clear recognition that there is no chance of thereby 'conciliating' the older anti-patronage Presbyterians or uniting the Church. Last year we expressed the belief that any fair proposals or endeavours on the part of the Establishment would have the effect of at least producing a pause in the projected union of the voluntary Presbyterians outside. The 'Statement' to be laid before Parliament has had decidedly the effect of consolidating that union, and there is no doubt now that it will go on, though probably in the meantime rather by way of mutual co-operation. A very short time will see the Free Church, the United Presbyterian Church, and the Reformed Presbyterian Church--all the large Presbyterian communities who have protested against patronage, and whose leading principle is the liberation of religion from State control--absolutely united in their work, and partitioning Scotland between them. It need not be said how hopeless is the proposal to choose this time for asking Parliament to reconstitute the endowment of a minority of the Scotch people at the expense of the whole, or how fatal to the Church the success of the scheme would be, even if it could be expected to succeed.

The movement is more likely to be in quite another direction. Dr. Wallace, in his paper on 'Church Tendencies in Scotland,' and some other men not belonging to his party in the Kirk, have rather indicated that the Highlands of Scotland, with which a large part of our paper has dealt, should be handed over from their own body to that disestablished church which for the last twenty-five years has with increasing success taken charge of it. In July last, this subject came up in the House of Commons, in the discussion upon Mr. M'Laren's Church Rates Abolition Bill for Scotland, a measure which its able and energetic mover has withdrawn, upon receiving a promise from the Government to introduce one next year upon their own responsibility. On some matters raised by this bill differences of opinion were expressed. Mr. Graham, member for Glasgow, said that he knew from experience that 'a large number of his constituents--the enormous mass of the people of Scotland--bitterly resented these compulsory assessments;' while his colleague, Mr. Anderson, opposed the bill as premature, on the ground that 'if, as is very probable, in the course of a few years the House should think proper to disestablish and disendow that Church, its property will have to be handed over to the State.' But the special matter of the Highlands, a scandal which even the friends of the Establishment are desirous to see wiped out at any expense, was brought forward by Mr. Ellice, who 'agreed with the hon. member for Edinburgh, that in many parts of the country the Church of Scotland was but the caricature of a Church, and that the presence of the Established Church, in places where it was only represented by five or ten persons, was a reproach to the Legislature. He hoped the Lord Advocate, when dealing with the question, would also deal with those useless churches and manses which were a standing reproach to common sense, and ought no longer to be supported.' The Lord Advocate was cautious in his rejoinder to this appeal, restricting his observations to the Highland churches and manses 'provided by Parliament at a time when the Church numbered a larger portion of the population than it does now.' With regard to these--the annual payments in connection with which form, perhaps, the most offensive example of mere waste of public money at present existing--the Government officer said, 'So far as I have been able to ascertain, it would be in accordance with good sense to make provision whereby that accommodation, which is not profitable either to the kingdom or the Church, might close.' Any money saved in this direction will almost certainly be devoted to the education of Scotland; for the Free Church will refuse a concurrent endowment which would include Roman Catholics, and the long Conservative battle against a good Education Bill beyond the Tweed, cannot be successful for ever. When the Scotch Presbyterians form their Union (in which as Mr. Gordon pointed out in Parliament, there is no reason why the members of the present Established Church should not join), they will undertake a weighty responsibility for the religious good of Scotland. But the weight which they unite to bear will be easy, compared to that crushing load which fell upon one of them in 1843, and which yet became to it only such a burden 'as wings are to the bird.'

FOOTNOTE:

[50] The famine of 1846, to relieve which the Free Church sent £15,000 to the Highlands.

ART. IV.--The Romance of the Rose.

(1.) Le Roman de la Rose. Nouvelle Édition. Par Francisque Michel. Paris: Firmin Didot Frères. 1864.

The study of pre-Renaissance literature belongs especially to the present century. A few ballads had been previously rescued from oblivion; a few names unearthed from the rubbish of centuries; but the great mass of writers who lived and flourished in what men used to call the Dark Ages had been utterly forgotten, names as well as writings, until the labours of Ampère, Fauriel, Raynouard, and others in France, as well as those of our own antiquarian scholars in England, brought them again to light within the last fifty years.

The literature thus revived has a value of its own quite independent of any literary merit, though this is by no means contemptible. It reveals to us not only the manners and customs of the time, the mediæval daily life, but, which is more important, the mediæval conditions and modes of thought, within such limits--too narrow, alas!--as the conventional rules of poetry allowed. But artificial grooves cannot wholly prevent a vigorous mind from running off the beaten track, and in spite of conventionalism, the reader comes sometimes, in the midst of sandy deserts of commonplace morality, monotonous repetitions, and thirsty verbiage, upon oases of such exceeding brightness and splendour, cooled with fountains so sparkling and foliage so luxuriant, that he feels he is repaid for all his trouble. And the country is by no means explored. As in the great goldfields of Australia, the big nuggets have disappeared and been gathered up long since; nevertheless there remain, for those who have patience to dig, plenty of smaller pieces of virgin gold, which may amply serve to reward their toil. But because all have not the time or the opportunity for this work, and because, after all, it lies a good deal out of the beaten track of scholars, it may not be uninteresting to our readers to invite them to come with us and visit, sparing themselves the trouble of looking for them, certain oases which lie scattered about in a vast Sahara of verse called the 'Romance of the Rose.' 'Rien n'est agréable et piquant,' says Sainte Beuve, 'comme un guide familier dans les époques lointaines.'

Our sketch of the book will be necessarily incomplete; nor could any ordinary limits of a paper suffice for its thorough examination. Its importance is evidenced by the fact that for two hundred and fifty years it was a sort of Bible to France; the source whence its readers drew their maxims of morality, their philosophy, their science, their history, and even their religion; and which, after having retained its popularity for a length of time almost unparalleled in the history of literature, was revived with success after the Renaissance, the only mediæval book which enjoyed this distinction.

We shall endeavour to show some of the reasons of this long-continued success, and to prove that the book, once the companion of knights and dames, of damoiseaux and damoiselles, has the strongest claims on the student of the Middle Ages; that it is not a congeries of dry and dead bones of antiquity, not a mass of mediæval fables, but a book full of ideas, information, and suggestion--a book warm with life.

France, whence it came, is indeed the mother of modern literature. Thence both Italy and England derived their inspiration. In the countries of Provence and Languedoc lingered longest the remains of the Latin civilization: there the lamp of learning, dwindled down at last to a mere speck, had yet flame enough to light the new taper of the troubadour; there was first heard the 'Nibelungen Lied;' there originated the tenson, the canso, the sirvente, the chanson royale, the triolet, and all the varied forms of mediæval poetry; and there was the chosen home of such philosophy and science as existed between the ninth and thirteenth centuries. English writers before the Elizabethan age copied openly and avowedly from French sources, taking plot, plan, and framework of their poems. Even Dante deferred to Provence, and owned that the troubadour led the thought of Western Europe. Other countries of Europe have little indeed in their early literature to compare with the treasures of the Langue d'Oc and the Langue d'Oil; and while, outside France, stand almost alone the great figures of Dante, Petrarch, and Chaucer, there is, within the circle of the Langue d'Oil alone, a constellation in which are the names of Marie de France, Rutebeuf, Jean de Meung, Charles of Orleans, Christine de Pisan, Alain Chartier, Eustache Deschamps, and François Villon, besides a host of minor poets whose works are little inferior, and who may still be read, if not always with delight, certainly always with profit. Scattered about in their writings is the whole of the mediæval life; by their light we can penetrate through the clouds of six hundred years, and bring those picturesque ages of colour and splendour back to our minds as brightly and vividly as we realize any battle-field in France by the pen of a special correspondent. And besides the mediæval life, with its habits and its thought, the student will trace in this poetry the gradual development of the true French Muse--her mockery, her satirical spirit, her cynicism, her incredulity, her curiosity, her want of reverence, with her inimitable wit and fresh buoyancy of spirit--a muse gaillarde et moqueuse, unlike any other that the world has seen, whom to know is to love, though not always to respect. It is no fault of modern France if her old literature is not known as it deserves to be. Editions have been multiplied of the fabliaux, romances, poems, and chronicles which began with Wace and ended with Clement Marot. But as yet no great writer has taken up the subject as it deserves, and a consolidated history of the literature and thought of the Middle Ages, from the tenth century to the Renaissance, embracing as a whole, and not in unconnected parts, the writings of Italy, France, and England, with those of Spain and Germany, is a work which awaits the hand of some man who will devote to it the greater part of a lifetime. Materials for such a work amply exist; but he who undertakes it should bring to his task a knowledge of languages and an amount of reading rare indeed, and difficult to be found.

English readers principally know this 'Romance of the Rose' through the translation which is attributed to Chaucer. Whether it be really his or not is a matter which does not concern us here, and, to save trouble of explanation, we will refer to it as Chaucer's translation. It is unfortunate, in some respects, that it contains only a portion--viz., the first 5,170 lines, and then, with an omission of 5,544 lines, about 1,300 more. It gives entire the portion contributed by Guillaume de Lorris, and as much of the remainder as fell in most readily with the humour of the translator, the attack on the hypocrisy of monks and friars. But by omitting all the rest, amounting to about two-thirds of the whole, he has failed altogether in giving the spirit of the work; and those who read only Chaucer's version would certainly be at a loss to explain the rapid, extraordinary, and lasting popularity which the book achieved.

The reasons of this popularity have, indeed, been the subject of considerable discussion among French critics. Pasquier speaks of its 'noble sentiments,' and considers that its object was moral--viz., to show that love is but a dream. Roquefort can see in it only a long and rather stupid allegory, enlivened by occasional gleams of poetry; Villemain considers it a mere gloze on Ovid's 'Art of Love,' with a mélange of abstractions, allegories, and scholastic subtilties. Nisard deduces from its popularity a proof of its entire conformity with the spirit of the age--an almost obvious conclusion. Other writers, Goujet among the number, try to account for its success by the reputation which Jean de Meung enjoyed as an alchemist, and the belief that the great secrets of the science were to be found in the poem: a manifestly inadequate reason, because the proportion of alchemists to the rest of his readers must have been small indeed. Others, among whom were Molinet and Marot--of whom more presently--thought its success was due to a double allegory which they found in it; while Professor Morley and Mr. Thomas Wright, the latest writers who have given any account of the book--both of them meagre, dry, and uninteresting--do not attempt to explain its popularity at all. There are sufficient reasons why the book sprang at once into favour, which we hope presently to explain. The great success which it attained is illustrated by the number and weight of its assailants. Foremost among these was Gerson, the 'most Christian Doctor.' He calls it a book written for the basest purposes; he says that if there were only one copy of it in the world, and if he were offered fifty pounds in gold for it, he would rather burn it: that those who have it ought to give it up to their father confessors to be destroyed: and that even if it were certain--which was unfortunately far from being the case, the contrary being presumable--that Jean de Meung had repented his sins in sackcloth and ashes, it would be no more use praying for him than for Judas Iscariot himself. Cursing so ecclesiastical, invective so angry, stimulated public curiosity more and more, and instead of copies being given to confessors to be burned, copies were given to scribes to be multiplied. Assailants came every day unto the field. Christine de Pisan, later on, took up the cause of her sex, and vindicated womankind from the sweeping charges made against them by the poet; while Martin Franc, who styled himself 'Le Champion des Dames,' wrote an elaborate apology for his clients, which has all the dreariness of the 'Romance of the Rose,' and none of its brightness. The one is a desert indeed; the other, as we have said, is a desert with oases.

The book is the work of two writers, Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meung. The earlier of these seems to have died about the time that his successor was born. Of his life we know absolutely nothing. He came from the little town of Lorris, where, it is said, the house in which he was born is still shown. Two or three lines in the poem are cited to prove the date of his birth and death. These, however, are by no means to be relied upon. Thus, he tells us in his opening lines--

'Au vingtiesme an de mon aage, Si vi ung songe à mon dormant.'

whence most writers have assumed that he died at the age of twenty, considering, we suppose, that it would not take a year to write the 4,670 lines which form his part. This would be, at least, quick writing, while internal evidence seems to us to point most unmistakeably to the bestowal of very careful thought, and therefore much time, upon the work. And the lines which follow shortly after have not received proper attention--indeed, hardly any modern writer on the 'Romance of the Rose' appears to have read the book at all. Here the poet says--

'Avis m'iere qu'il étoit mains; Il a j'à bien cinc ans au mains.'

which would make him five and twenty at least, a much more likely age, considering the work he had done, for his death.

At the close of his part of the book we get the following note by the scholiast, if we may call him so:--

'Çi endroit, trespassa Guillaume De Lorris et ne fist plus pseaume; Mais après plus de quarante ans Maistre Jehan de Meung li romans Parfist, ainsi comme je treuve, Et ici commence son oeuvre.'

That is,--

'Here William died; his song was done. When forty years had passed away, Sir John the romance carried on, And here commencing, told the lay.'

While Jean de Meung himself says, prophesying after the event--

'Car quant Guillaume cessera Jehan le continuera Après sa mort que je ne mente Anns trespassés plus de quarente.'

So that if we fix the date of Jean de Meung, we have that of Guillaume de Lorris. Now, there is nothing to help us, except a tradition that Guillaume died in the middle of the thirteenth century, and whatever internal evidence the book itself affords. Most writers, because the order of Knights Templars is mentioned as still existing, have been content to date the book at about 1306, the year before the destruction of the fraternity; but the poet mentions Charles of Anjou as King of Sicily. We have, therefore, a much lower limit, viz., the year 1282. Perhaps on closer examination, a range of years might easily be found in which the book was written. It is, however, sufficient for our purpose to date its authorship about 1280, and that of Guillaume de Lorris at 1240.

It is not all certain that the poet was very young when he feigned his dream. The hero of the poem is necessarily a young man. Early manhood is the period of vehement desire and passion. Twenty is the typical age of early manhood; that age may have very well been selected as the one best fitted for dreams of love and the adventures of a lover. We are, however, inclined to believe, on the whole, that the poem was written in quite early manhood. A tradition which only recalls one fact is generally true, and the one fact recorded of the poet is that he died quite young. Internal evidence, too, appears to support this view. His style bears marks which seem, though one may here be very easily mistaken, those of inexperience. His imaginative faculty is abundant, and even luxuriant. His descriptive power, fully employed in his portraits of abstract personifications, is very much above the average. He revels in picturesque accessories and details which his copious fancy has conjured up; and his pictures, if they have not always the tone, have all the vividness, with the wealth of work, which belongs to a young poet's early style. The versification, moreover, is cold, regular, and monotonous; there is nothing to indicate the possession of experience or the presence of passion. He had read Ovid, and used him freely to suit his own purposes; but he wants Ovid's sympathetic power, and tries to supply its place by a certain cold and mannered grace; his faults being attributable, in the assumption of his early death, more to inexperience and youth, than to any defects which years would not have removed. Considered in this light, his work remains an unfinished monument of early genius, chiefly redeemed from mediocrity by its collections of curiously constructed allegorical portraits, a work which would never have been rescued from oblivion but for the splendour of light thrown on it by Jean de Meung.

Chaucer's translation is exceedingly accurate, giving line for line, and almost word for word, save when he sometimes adds a line to enforce its meaning, or to make it clear. Thus, when translating the famous

'La robe ne faict pas la moyne,'

he says--

'Habite ne makyth monk no frere; But clene life and devocioun, Makyth gode men of religioun.'

The saying itself (for nothing in the 'Romance of the Rose' appears to be original), may be traced to Neckham, who died at Cirencester in 1217.

'Non tonsura facit monachum, nec horrida vestis, Sed virtus animi, perpetuusque vigor.'

The great ease of the translation makes it read almost like an original work, though we cannot agree with those who think that the translator has improved on his model. No literal translation, not even the very best, can be free from a certain stiffness and constraint.

The felicity with which difficult passages are occasionally rendered may be judged by the following lines, which contain a touch almost worthy of Shirley. It is, if our own experience be worth anything, excessively hard to translate. We subjoin original and translation, side by side.

'Les yex gros et si envoisiés, Qu'il rioient tousjors avant Que la bouchette par couvant.'

'Hir eyen greye and glad also, That laugheden ay in hir semblaunt, First or the mouth by couvenant.'

That is, her eyes began to laugh before her lips.

We must, as briefly as possible, set forth the action of the poem. It begins, like De Guilleville's 'Pilgrimage of Grace,' Chaucer's 'Court of Love' (borrowed, of course, from this), Alain de l'Isle's 'Complaint of Nature,' and so many other mediæval works, with a dream. In the month of May,--that season when the earth forgets the poverty of winter, and grows proud of her renewed beauty, clothing herself in a robe of flowers of a hundred colours; when the birds, silent during the long cold months, awake again, and are so joyous that they are fain, per force, to sing,--the youth of twenty summers wanders forth and comes upon the Garden of Delight (Déduit). We may remark here, how the walled garden, secured from the outer world, is the mediæval writer's only idea of scenery. Perhaps our modern craving for the picturesque would be greatly modified if we were uncertain, as our ancestors were, about wolves, bears, and brigands, whose admiration for wild scenes induces them to inhabit them.

The wall of the garden is painted with figures of all evil passions, such as Envy, Hatred, Avarice, and Hypocrisy (Papelardie), with those of Sorrow, Age, and Poverty. The youth is admitted at a wicket by the Lady Oyseuse (Idlesse), and wanders about, admiring the rows of strange trees, the birds and flowers, the peace and safety of the place. Presently he comes upon Déduit himself, whom Chaucer calls Myrthe.

'Ful fayre was Myrthe, ful long and high: A fayrer man I never sigh.'

With him are all his courtiers, including Léesce (Joy).

'And wot ye who came with them there? The Lady Gladness, bright and fair.'

With the company was the God of Love, accompanied by Doux Regard, bearing two bows: one of them was crooked and misshapen; the other straight, and beautifully wrought. This shows the different impressions of love, or its opposite, produced by the eyes. He had, too, ten arrows (the idea is borrowed from Ovid), five belonging to Love, viz., Beauty, Simplicity, Frankness, Company, and Fair Semblance; and five to Dislike, viz., Pride, Villany, Shame, Despair, and New Thought. Love was followed as well by Beauty, whose attendants were Riches, Largesse, Franchise, and Courtesy, as Dames d'honneur, each of whom had with her a lover, that of Largesse being 'sib to Arthur Duke of Bretaigne.' This is intended, of course, to show how different qualities attract love.

The garden is square; it contains all sorts of fruit trees, 'brought from the country of the Saracens;' these are set five or six fathoms apart; wells, fountains, and streams, soft grass and turf, and flowers of every kind. Round the stone-work of one fountain he finds written, 'Here died the fair Narcissus,'--an accident which enables the poet to narrate at length the full history of that unfortunate swain. Getting over his digression, the youth discovers a rosebush laden with roses and rosebuds, one of which he desires incontinently to pluck. Here his troubles begin. Love shoots at him with five arrows, and when he is sick and faint with wounds, calls upon him to surrender, and become his vassal. This he does, giving Love as a gage of fealty his heart, and receiving in return a code of rules which have been imitated by many subsequent poets, notably by Chaucer, in the 'Court of Love,' and by Charles of Orleans. He also receives as a mark of especial favour, Hope, Doux Penser, Doux Parler, and Doux Regard--Sweet-Thought, Sweet-Speech, and Sweet-Looks--as companions. He makes a rash and ill-considered attempt upon his Rosebud. But Danger is there with Malebouche, Shame (child of Trespass and Reason), and Chastity, the daughter of Shame. He is driven away, loaded with reproaches. His companions leave him, and while he is sitting dejected and despairing, Reason comes to him and argues on the folly of love.

'Love is but madness! I tell you true; The man who loves can nothing do. He has no profit from the earth: If he is clerk, he forgets his learning: If anything else, whatever his worth, Great is his labour and little his earning. Long and unmeasured and deep the pain: Short is the joy; the fruition vain.'

But the pleading of Reason, as generally happens in such cases, is quite useless. The lover

'For still within my heart there glows The breath divine of that sweet Rose,'

goes next to a Friend (Ami), from whom he gets small sympathy, but much practical relief. Acting on his counsel, he begs pardon of Danger, who grants it sulkily. Danger in most mediæval allegories stands for the husband, but there is nothing to show that Guillaume de Lorris meant him to be understood in this sense, and we may without any violence take him to represent the natural guardian of the damsel. Getting Bel Accueil to accompany him, he goes once more to see his Rosebud, which he finds greatly improved. Venus obtains for him the privilege of a kiss. Shame, Jealousy, and Malebouche, are alarmed, and interfere. Danger turns everybody out. Jealousy builds a high tower, in which Bel Accueil is shut up, a prisoner, with Danger and Malebouche to guard him. Outside the tower sits the disconsolate lover, lamenting his misfortunes, and the mutability of love's favours, which he compares to those of Fortune, of whom he says:

'In heart of man, Malice she plants, and labour, and pain; One hour caresses, and smiles, and plays; Then as suddenly changes her face: Laughs one moment, the next she mourns; Round and round her wheel she turns, All at her own caprice and will. The lowest ascends, and is raised, until He who was highest was low on the ground, And the wheel of Fortune has quite turned round.'

And at this point the poet died--'trespassa Guillaume de Lorris.' Had he lived to complete his work we should had a complete Ars Amoris, fashioned on the precepts of Ovid, and clothed in an allegory--cold, monotonous, bloodless--though graceful, fanciful, and not devoid of poetic taste.

Perhaps we should have had more than this. In its simple, first meaning, it is not difficult for anyone to make out. Idleness or Leisure alone makes Pleasure possible; through Idleness we enter into the garden of Delight, where love wanders. Youth is the season of love, and Spring is an emblem of youth. The escort of Love is the collection of qualities which belong to the time of youth, and make it happy, such as beauty, wealth, and courtesy. What has Reason to do with Love? Who can advise but an experienced friend? The only possession that the vassal can give to Love the suzerain is his own heart; the chief aid to success is Bel Accueil--'fair welcome'--while Envy, Shame (for fear of Malebouche--Calumny), Jealousy, and Chastity protect the maiden.

So far all is clear and easy to be read. Was there not, however, under an interpretation as easy as that of Bunyan's Holy War, a second and a deeper meaning? It is a question not easy to answer. Molinet, the dull and laborious Molinet, who published, towards the end of the fifteenth century, an edition of the book in prose,

'Le Roman de la Rose Moralisé cler et net Translaté en rime et prose Par votre humble Molinet,'

pretends not only that there is a hidden meaning, but also to discover what this hidden meaning was. 'The young man,' he tells us, 'who awakens from his dream is the child born to the light: he is born in the month of May, when the birds sing: the singing of the birds is the preaching of holy doctors (!)' He dresses, in his dreams, to go out. This is the entrance of the child into the world, enveloped in human miseries: the river represents Baptism: the orchard is the Cloister of Religion; outside it, because they cannot enter therein, or have no share or part in paradise, are the figures of human vices. Déduit is our Lord; Léesce is the Church; Love is the Holy Spirit; the eight doves of Venus's chariot are the eight Beatitudes; and the combat between Love and the guardians of Bel Accueil is the perpetual conquest between good and evil. Even the story of Narcissus is not without its meaning; and the pine which shades the fountain is the tree of the Cross, while the fountain itself is the overflowing stream of mercy. Love, again, in the latter part, stands for our Saviour; homage to him is the profession of faith of a novice; the commandments of Love are the vows of chastity and poverty. Even the legend of Virginia is an allegory; the maiden being the soul, and Appius the world. This position he strengthens by deriving, after the fashion of the philologists of the period, the name of Appius from a, privative, and pius.

Clement Marot, on the other hand, in his edition, where he turned the language into French of his own day, and thereby utterly spoiled it, finds an interpretation of his own, quite as ingenious and quite as improbable as that of Molinet. The Rose is the state of wisdom, 'bien et justement conforme à la Rose pour les valeurs, doulours, et odours qui en elle sont: la quelle moult est à avoir difficile pour les empeschements interposez.' It was a Papal Rose, made of gold, and scented with musk and balm; of gold, on account of the honour and reverence due to God; scented with musk to symbolize the duties of fidelity and justice to our neighbours; and with balm because we ought to hold our own souls clear and precious above all worldly things.

Or, the Rose is the state of Grace, difficult for the sinner to arrive at, and fitly symbolized by the flowers which had sufficient virtue to transform Apuleius from an ass back to his human shape.

Or, again, the Rose was the Virgin Mary--the Rose of Jericho, pure and spotless, and not to be touched by human hands.

Fourthly: it was the rose which the Queen of Sheba gave to Solomon, which signified eternal happiness. The interpretations of Molinet and Marot are both manifestly absurd, and represent the pedantic trifling of a time when the taste for double allegories had been carried to a ridiculous extent. And as for Jean de Meung's part, there are plenty of touches in it which show that the writer, though no heretic, had little sympathy with church matters; and would certainly not be disposed to spend his time in laboriously concocting a riddle of twenty thousand lines, the answer to which was to be found in the Romish creed. And in Guillaume de Lorris himself, it is difficult to find a word for or against the Church.

He was, no doubt, mindful of the stern lesson read to heretics in the crusade of Provence, fresh in all men's recollection. But he had been nurtured and fed on the poetry of the troubadours; the form of his verse and the turn of his thought were Provençal. Was it likely that so young a writer should escape the spirit of the literature while he studied its form? And since in a time of violent religious excitement, he can find no word of sympathy for a church which persecutes, is it not probable that his sympathies are, if not with the Church persecuted, at least with the people? The probability, moreover, of there being a double allegory in the 'Romance of the Rose,' as planned originally by Guillaume de Lorris, appears to us to be strengthened by a further consideration of the Provençal literature and the line of its development.

Love, in a time when life had few pleasures and distractions to offer--when these were generally only to be snatched in the intervals of fighting--became not only the symbol of all life's joy, but grew into a kind of religion. It had its own ritual, its ceremonies, its sacraments, its lessons, and its hymns. Aged poets were its bishops, the guardians of its forms; young poets its priests; instead of the images of saints, were living women, and instead of the procession and the chant, were the love song and the dance. It was nothing new to the Provençal to celebrate the religious worship with a dance. He alone, among Christians, preserved a custom handed down from old pagan times, and as late as the sixteenth century, the worthy people of Marseilles welcomed Christmas in this way.

The other sex would naturally offer few obstacles to a homage which, though it sometimes destroyed their virtue, always flattered their vanity, and invested them with a power which was beyond that of kings. Princes, indeed, might make men rich, but women alone could make men happy. An accurate knowledge of love's ceremonies became part of the education of a gentleman; these were reduced, like those of chivalry, to a sort of code; questions of law, so to speak, arose, which were tried with great solemnity at courts of law where ladies were judges; appeals from these decisions were often made to higher courts, and there is every reason to believe that the Arrêts d'Amour, numerous examples of which are given in the work of Martial d'Auvergne, were courts as serious and as gravely disputed in times of peace, as those which decided other differences of opinion. From being, therefore, the legitimate end of a young man's hope, the chief solace of his life, love grew gradually to be surrounded by all sorts of restrictions and ceremonies, and losing its charm of spontaneity and freedom, was idealized until it lost itself, and became the mere shadow of a poetic dream. As every idea, pushed beyond its legitimate limits, provokes some kind of rebellion, two streams of thought presently diverged from the main channel, one of them, with which we have nothing to do, satirical, cynical, earthly and gross; the other, religious. Sexual love is only possible, or is strongest when life is young and the blood is strong and hopeful; as years creep on and the end of things approaches, its insufficiency to satisfy the cravings of the soul must become, even to its most ardent votary, more and more deeply apparent. The days when a smile from his mistress made him, according to the rules of the craft, happy, or a frown miserable, would leave behind them, when they had passed away, an increased sense of the real seriousness of life; while at the best of times, the art of love would not be felt as anything but elegant trifling, and the passion which it excited, transitory. Women, too, the object of all this homage, were really, though they might not know it, degraded by what was intended to do them honour. And let those who lament the subjection of the sex, own that the extravagant honour paid to ladies in the Middle Ages has had something, at least, to do with it. From some such feelings as the above, we believe it came to pass that the poet began first to imagine, and then to contrive, for his love songs a deeper and a mystical meaning. The sentiment of nearly all the Provençal poets, as regards women, was delicate, elevating to themselves, and enthusiastic. Women are to men, in the poet's imagination, what heaven is to earth; their gentleness contrasts with man's ferocity, their weakness with his strength, their strength with his weakness. Love is the principle of all honour and merit, the mainspring of every noble action; its desires and its pleasures are only legitimate, inasmuch as they are as a stimulus to the painful duties of chivalry; the springs of poetry are in love; without love there is nothing that civilizes, softens, or elevates. But earthly love, so high, so pure, so separated from the common instincts of the world, is but a type of that infinitely higher and purer heavenly love. All the allegories of the poets are to be read in a deeper sense by those who are initiated into the mysteries, and when a poet sings songs of love, he is singing songs of a mysterious religion.

That this was the case with all the troubadours, or even with most of them, we do not affirm; that it was at one time believed to be true of all of them seems tolerably clear. And no doubt many an honest bard, quite simply putting down his thoughts about his mistress's lips, or the tangles of her hair, would have been astonished to hear that he was preaching the glories of the Virgin, or advocating a free and Pope-less Church. On the supposition that Guillaume de Lorris was one of those who had learned from the troubadours the art of double allegory, and that he conveyed religious teaching under this disguise, we should expect to find the key to his poem in the religious difficulties of his time. It is not, at least, difficult to get at these.

The people of Provence[51] had always mixed freely with the educated Mahometans of Spain, and the wealthy Jews who lived among them: their own Christianity sat lightly upon them, as a cloak, the fashion of which might at any time be altered; theology was held in universal disesteem, and the priesthood, taken from the lowest strata of society, were objects of pity and contempt: a widespread heresy existed, which does not appear to have had much, if anything to do with modern Protestantism, holding 'erroneous views' on Baptism and the Eucharist, rejecting the Old Testament, denying the authority and necessity of the priesthood, and even repudiating, in some cases, marriage itself. It was growing rapidly not only in Switzerland and Languedoc but also in the Nord, in England, and in Germany, by means of wandering bards, who scattered their new doctrines broadcast wherever they went. By local persecutions and burnings, attempts were made to stop it, but in vain; and Rome saw with consternation a province the most cultivated, the most richly endowed with genius, the most wealthy, that from which the greatest help for the Church was to be expected, a prey to free thought of the most unbridled kind.

As soon as persecution began, or even suspicion of the truth, the poets would see the necessity for veiling their thoughts under carefully-constructed allegories, and while they chanted a monotonous refrain on one of the many rules of love, secretly inculcated a code of doctrines more subversive than any the Church had yet combated. Occasionally we hear a voice which speaks aloud, and plainly enough, to let us know the kind of thing that was whispered. Thus Fauriel gives the following from Pierre Cardinal.[52] He is considering the insoluble problem of suffering and evil, and cries, with a boldness that has more despair than blasphemy in it--'At the Last Day I shall say, myself, to God that He fails in His duty to His children if He thinks to destroy them and plunge them into Hell.... God ought to use gentleness and to keep His souls from trespass.'

Voluptuous, loose in morals, satirical, and careless as these poets were, they yet have the merit of boldly using thought, and carrying conviction to its logical and legitimate end. They anticipated the movement of the fifteenth century, without its knowledge and higher light: their penalty was extermination, thorough and complete. The land was destroyed; its cities burned; the people massacred; Pope and kings combined to make a desert, and to call it peace.

What could the Church do more? What indeed, could she do less? For the war was a struggle for existence, and the heresies of Provence were only the most formidable in a general movement of free thought which shook the powers of Rome to its very foundations. But one thing the Church could not do. The flame of insubordination and opposition could be handed down in secret. Things that could not be attacked openly, might be attacked secretly. There were secret societies in the Middle Ages, which had a real and definite object, the danger and the terror of the Church.[53] And to this day Rome excommunicates the members of all secret societies, whether the mild and convivial Freemason or the bloodthirsty Fenian. The Society of Jesus is the only secret society to which a Roman Catholic may belong. Guillaume de Lorris belongs to a time when doctrine was secretly assailed; his successor, Jean de Meung, to a time when practice was openly assailed. For men very soon left off attacking their enemies by allegory, and Guillaume de Lorris, if he was indeed one of that school, was one of its last disciples.

Whether he was, or was not, can never now be satisfactorily answered. He left his poem unfinished, hardly, perhaps, begun. Whatever has to be said on the subject of its original plan, must be necessarily conjectural. We incline, on the whole, to believe that he did have a religious purpose, which was not understood by Jean de Meung; that one who bears in mind the religious history of Provence as well as the character of its situation, may well construct an interpretation of the work of Guillaume de Lorris far more probable and consistent than that of Molinet or of Marot.

Jean de Meung, so-called because he was born at the little town of Meung, in the department of Loiret--

'De Jean de Meung, s'enfle le cours de Loire.'

Jean Clopinel, Limping John, because he was lame, finding himself, some forty years later, with his head stuffed full of all the learning of his time, and nearly bursting with sentiments, convictions, and opinions, on religion, politics, social economy, and science, began, one may suppose, to cast about for some means of getting rid of his burden. Lighting on the unfinished and half-forgotten work of Guillaume de Lorris, he conceived the idea of finishing the allegory, and making it the medium of popularizing his own opinions. He could hardly have hit upon a readier plan. It was not yet a time for popular science; there were no treatises in the vernacular on history, theology, and political economy, and the only way of getting at people was by means of rhyme. But Jean de Meung was no allegorist, and no storyteller. He took up the tale, indeed, where his predecessor left it, and carried it on, it is true, but in so languid a manner, with so many digressions, turns and twists, that what little interest was originally in it goes clean out. Nothing can well be more tedious than those brief portions devoted to the conduct of the story. It finishes, somehow. Love calls his barons together, is defeated, sends an embassy to his mother, Venus, who comes to his assistance; the fortress is taken, Bel Accueil is released, and the Rose is plucked. In the course of the poem, Malebouche gets his tongue cut out, Déduit, Doux Regard, Léesce, Doux Penser, and others drop out of the allegory altogether; the Garden is forgotten; all the little careful accessories of Guillaume de Lorris, such as the arrows of Love and his commandments, are contemptuously ignored. Those that remain are changed, the Friend in the second part being very different from the Friend in the first, while Richesse appears with a new function. Every incident is made the peg for a digression, and every digression leads to a dozen others. The losses of the old characters are made up by the creation of new ones, and, in Faux Semblant, the hypocrite and monk, Jean de Meung anticipates Rabelais and surpasses Erasmus.

Between Guillaume de Lorris and his successor there is a great gulf hardly represented by the forty years of interval. Men's thoughts had widely changed. The influence of Provençal poetry was finally and completely gone, and its literature utterly fallen, to be revived after many centuries only by the scholar and the antiquarian. More than this, the thoughts and controversies of men which had turned formerly upon the foundations of the Christian faith, now turned either on special points of doctrine, or on the foundation and principles of society.

No writers, so far as we remember, have noticed the entire separation between the two parts of the romance. They are independent works. Even the allegory changes form, and the idea of the trouvère, Guillaume, was lost and forgotten when his successor professed to carry it on.

In passing from one to the other, the transition is like that from a clear, cold, mountain stream to a turbid river, whose waters are stained with factory refuse, and whose banks are lined with busy towns. The mystic element suddenly disappears. Away from the woodland and the mountains and among the haunts of men, it cannot live. The idea of love becomes gross and vulgar. The fair, clear voice of the poet grows thick and troubled; his gaze drops from the heavens to the earth. It is no longer a trouvère bent on developing a hidden meaning, and wrapping mighty secrets of religious truth in a cold and careful allegory; it is a man, eager and impetuous, alive to all the troubles and sorrows of humanity, with a supreme contempt for love, and for woman, the object of love, and a supreme carelessness for the things that occupied the mind of his predecessor. We have said that new characters were introduced. The boundaries of the old allegory were, indeed, too narrow. Jean de Meung had to build, so to speak, the walls of his own museum. It was to be a museum which should contain all knowledge of the time; to hold miscellaneous collections of facts, opinions, legends, and quotations, than which nothing can be more bewildering, nothing more unmethodical, nothing more bizarre.

As a poet he is superior, we think, to his predecessor, though Guillaume de Lorris can only be reckoned as a second-rate versifier. He is diffuse, apt to repeat himself, generally monotonous, and sometimes obscure. His imagination is less vivid, and his style less clear, than those of Guillaume de Lorris. Occasionally, however, passages of beauty occur. The following, for example, diffuse as it is, appears to us to possess some of the elements of real poetry. The poet is describing a tempest followed by fair weather. Nature weeps at the wrath of the winds:--

'The air itself, in truth, appears To weep for this in flooded tears. The clouds such tender pity take, Their very clothing they forsake: And for the sorrow that they bear, Put off the ornaments they wear.

* * * * *

'So much they mourn, so much they weep, Their grief and sorrow are so deep, They make the rivers overflow, And war against the meadows low: Then is the season's promise crossed; The bread made dear, the harvest lost, And honest poor who live thereby, Mourn hopes that only rose to die.

* * * * *

'But when the end arrives at last, And fair times come, and bad are passed; When from the sky, displeased and pale, Fair weather robs its rain and hail, And when the clouds perceive once more The thunder gone, the tempest o'er-- Then they rejoice, too, as they may, And to be comely, bright, and gay, Put on their glorious robes anew, Varied with every pleasant hue; They hang their fleeces out to dry, Carding and combing as they fly; Then take to spinning, and their thread Abroad through all the heavens spread, With needles white and long, as though Their feathery gauntlets they would sew-- Harness their steeds, and mount and fly O'er valleys deep and mountains high.'

It is needless, after what has been said, to pursue any further the story of the romance. There is not much lost by this omission, because the work has really little or nothing to do with the allegory, and might simply be called, 'The Opinions of Jean de Meung.' Our object is to show what actually were the opinions of a scholar of liberal views in the thirteenth century.

They may be divided into four classes, foremost of which, in his own mind, stands his hatred of monks. In religion he was not an infidel, or even a heretic; he was simply in opposition. He writes, not against sacerdotalism, but against the inversion of recognised order by the vagabond friars. Order, indeed, he would insist upon as strenuously as Hooker himself; but order he would subordinate to what he deems the most essential thing, personal holiness. To decry, deride, and hurl contempt on the monastic orders: to put into the strongest possible words the inarticulate popular hatred of these was, we believe, his leading thought when he began his book.

His second idea was to make an angry, almost furious protest against the extravagant respect paid to women, and an onslaught on their follies and vices. It is very curious, and shows how little he was trammelled by his allegory, that he fails altogether to see how entirely out of place is such an attack in the 'Romance of the Rose.'

He had two other principal ideas: one to communicate in the common tongue as much science as the world could boast; and the other, to circulate certain principles of vague socialism and hesitating republicanism which were then beginning to take the place of those religious speculations which occupied men's minds in the early part of the century.

Jean de Meung's was not the only book of the time which aimed at being an encyclopædia, but it was by far the best known and the most widely répandu. There were written towards the close of the thirteenth century certain collections called trésors, which were designed to contain everything that was to be learned, quicquid scibile, in mathematics, physics, astronomy, alchemy, music, speculative philosophy, and theology. They were generally in verse; one of the best of them being by a monk, called 'Mainfroi,' which professedly contained the Arabic learning, borrowed from the Moors in Spain. Probably Jean de Meung had access to this. Readers of old English literature will also remember that dreariest of dreary books, Gower's 'Confessio Amantis,' into which the hapless student plunges without hope, and emerges without profit, having found nothing but vapid imitation, monotonous repetition, and somnolent platitudes. The 'Confessio' is a trésor, and designed to contain all the science of the time. It is adapted, so far as the science goes, from a trésor called the Secretum Secretorum.

Let us, then, gather some of the opinions of our author, classifying them according to this fourfold division. It may be premised that the division was not thought of by the poet, from whom, indeed, sequence and method are not to be expected.

Liberal thought, in the time of Jean de Meung, did not attack the domain of doctrine, partly, perhaps, from an unwillingness to meet the probable consequences of a charge of heresy; indeed, when doctrine came in its way, it seems to have leaned in the direction of orthodoxy. Thus we find Jean de Meung siding with Guillaume de St. Amour in an attack on the 'Eternal Gospel,' that most extraordinary book, ascribed to Joachim, Abbot of Flora,[54] which was intended to have the same relation to Christianity which Christianity bears to Judaism, to be at once its fulfilment and its abolition, which was to inaugurate the third and last, the perfect age, that of the Holy Spirit. The mendicants, an ignorant, credulous body, quite incapable of appreciating cause or consequence of teaching, espoused the cause of the book; Guillaume de St. Amour arraigned them, not only of the ordinary vices attributed to them--vices entirely contrary to their vows--but as preachers of doctrines pernicious, false, and heretical. Probably Jean de Meung was actuated by esprit de corps, Guillaume de St. Amour being a champion of the University of Paris, as well as by hatred to the monks, and, in spite of his hard words, was not moved strongly by any specially inimical feeling towards the book. Following the instincts of his time, however, he flatly ascribes its authorship to the Devil, the alleged author of so many theological books. Partizanship in those days, as in ours, meant, to be effective, a good, sound, honest hatred, and much command of language. In his description of hell, Jean anticipates the realistic horrors of Dante.

'What guerdon,' he asks, 'can the wicked man look for, save the cord which will hang him to the dolorous gibbet of hell? There will he be rivetted with everlasting fetters before the prince of devils; there will he be boiled in cauldrons; roasted before and behind; set to revolve, like Ixion, on cutting wheels turned by the paws of devils; tormented with hunger and thirst, and mocked with fruit and water, like Tantalus, or set to roll stones for ever up hill, like Sysyphus.'

One thing seems here worthy of remark. The place of punishment for the wicked man, in the Middle Ages, was the torture-chamber of their own criminal courts, intensified by imagination. Their punishment was through the senses. Of mental agony they had no conception. Yet, strangely enough, their heaven was never a heaven of the senses; and it shows how deeply they were penetrated with the feeling of Christ's holiness that while every temptation seemed set to make the mass believe in a paradise like that of Mahomet, the heaven of Christendom has always offered, as its chief charm, the worship and praise of a present God. 'There, by the fountain of mercy,' says Jean de Meung, 'shall ye sit.'

'There shall ye taste that spring so fair; (Bright are its waters, pure and clear), And never more from death shall shrink, If only of that fount you drink. But ever still, untired, prolong The days with worship, praise, and song.'[55]

The poet reserves, however, his chief strength and the main exposition of his views for his character of Faux Semblant--False seeming--the hypocrite. There is a dramatic art of the very highest kind in the way in which Faux Semblant draws and develops his own character, pronounces, as it were, the apology of hypocrisy. His painting of the vices of the mendicant orders cannot approach those of Walter de Mapes, of Erasmus, and of Buchanan, in savage ferocity; but it is more satirical and more subtly venomous than any of those, and has the additional bitterness that it is spoken as from within the body which he attacks. The others, standing outside the monastic orders, point the finger of scorn at them. Jean de Meung makes one of themselves, an unblushing priest, with a candour which almost belongs to an approving conscience, with a chuckling self-complacency and an entire unconsciousness of the contrast between his life and his profession, which rises to the very first order of satirical writing, depict his own life, and take credit for villanies which he takes care to inform us are common to his order. He has been compared with Friar John; but the animalism and lusty vigour of this holy man lead him to a life of jovial sensuality through sheer ignorance; whereas Faux Semblant, his conscience seared with a hot iron, sins against the light. We may compare, too, the attacks made by Jean de Meung's contemporaries and immediate successors. They never even attempt satire.[56] It was an instrument whose use they could not comprehend. Their line is invective, as when Rutebeuf says, in his straightforward way--

'Papelart et Beguin, Ont le siècle honi.'

or, as Eustache Deschamps attacks the pluralists--

'Prestres et clers qui tenez vos monciaulx De chapelles, vous autres curiaulx, Des povres clers ayez compassion: Repartez leur ces biens ecclesiaulx, Afin que Dieu vous soit propiciaulx: Vous les tenez à vo dampnacion.'

Faux Semblant, in his sermon, or address, a small part only of which we consider, begins by telling his hearers that he lives, by preference, in obscurity, and may, therefore, chiefly be found where this is most readily obtained, viz., under a religious habit. With the habit, however, he does not put on the reality of religion. He attaches himself to powerful patrons; he goes about preaching poverty, but living on the best of everything; nothing can be more contrary to his experience than that religion is to be found at all under the robe of a monk; nor does it follow that men and women lead bad lives because they wear a worldly garb; very many, indeed, of the saints have been married, were parents of children, and men and women of the world.

He tells how he changes his habit from time to time; how, out of the religious life, he 'takes the grain and leaves the straw;' how he hears confession and grants absolution, as well as any parish priest; but how, unlike the parish priest, he will hear the confessions only of the rich, who can afford to pay; 'let me have the fat sheep, and the pastors shall have the lean.' So with the poor; he will not help any.

'Let dying beggars cry for aid, Naked and cold on dunghill laid: There stands the hospital, with door Wide open to receive the poor. Thither let all who please repair, For help nor money can I spare: No use for me to save their life: What can he give who sucks his knife?'

Now, with the rich it is different; and the mendicant, while he takes the alms of those whose sins he has heard, may glow with conscious virtue, reflecting that the rich are much more exposed to temptation, and therefore, as a rule, more grievously weighed down with a sense of guilt than the poor. When relief can be given, surely it should first be bestowed on those who need it most.

Mendicancy, Faux Semblant acknowledges with an engaging candour, is only right when a man has not learned and cannot learn a trade. Monks, according to the teaching of Saint Augustine, ought to earn their bread by labour, and when we are commanded to give all to the poor, it is not meant that we should take it back by begging, but that we should work for our living. But the world, neglecting this among other wholesome rules, has set itself to rob, plunder, and despoil, every man trying to get whatever he can from his neighbour. As for himself, his business, and that of his brethren, is to rob the robber: to spoil the spoiler.

The mendicants keep up their own power by union; if a man does one of them an injury, they all conspire to effect his ruin: if one hates, all hate: if one is refused, all are refused, and revenge is taken: if any man is conspicuous for good deeds, they claim him as their own disciple, and in order to get the praise of people and inspire confidence, they ask, wherever they go, for letters which may testify to their virtue, and make people believe that all goodness abounds in them.

He says that he leaves others to retire into hermitages and caves, preferring to be called the Antichrist of robbers and hypocrites: he proclaims himself a cheat, a rogue, a liar, and a thief: he boasts that his father, Treachery, and himself rule in every realm, and that in the security of a religious disguise, where no one is likely to suspect him, he contrives various means to charm and deceive the world. Set forth in this bold fashion, the discourse of Faux Semblant loses all its dramatic force. It is fair, however, to state that this is chiefly found in detached passages, and that the sermon is entirely spoiled by the many digressions, notably that on the 'Eternal Gospel,' which are found in it. Chaucer's rendering of this portion appears to us to be far less happy than the rest of his work.

Another long and very curious dissertation, into which there is no space here to enter, is that on Predestination, where he arrives at the conclusion that the doctrine must be accepted as a dogma in Christian faith, but that it need not affect the Christian life--

'For every man, except a fool, May guide himself by virtue's rule.'

A conclusion which seems almost to anticipate the conclusion arrived at in the Article of the Church of England.

The sum of Jean de Meung's religious teaching is to be found in the sermon of Genius--

'And, Lords and Ladies, this be sure, That those who live good lives and pure; Nor from their work and duty shrink, Shall of this fountain freely drink.--

* * * * *

To honour Nature never rest, By labour is she honoured best; If others goods are in your hands, Restore them all--so God commands. From murder let all men abstain; Spotless keep hands, and mouth keep clean. Be loyal and compassionate, So shall ye pass the heavenly gate.'

The one thing insisted on by Jean de Meung is the absolute necessity of a pure life. A profound sense of the beauty of a pure life is, indeed, the key-note to all mediæval heresies and religious excitements.[57] The uncleanness of the clergy was the most terrible weapon wielded by the heresiarchs. Thus Peter de Brueys compelled monks to marry. Henry the Deacon taught that the Church could exist without priests. Tanchelin of Antwerp held that the validity of the sacraments depended on the holiness of him who administered them. Peter Waldo sent out his disciples two by two, to preach the subversive doctrine that every virtuous man was his own priest; while the Cathari went gladly to the stake in defence of their principle that absolute personal purity was the one thing acceptable to God. The more ignorant the age, the wider is religious speculation; but in the most ignorant ages, there rises up from time to time a figure with a spiritual insight far beyond that of more learned times. Protestantism in its noblest form has found nothing more sublime than this conception of a Church where every good man is a priest; and there is nothing in the history of religious thought more saddening than these efforts of the people, ever hopeless, ever renewed, to protest against dogma, creed, perfunctory and vicarious religion, and to proclaim a religion of personal holiness alone.

Let us turn to the second division. We find the book teeming with a misogyny, bitter enough to make us believe that there must have been some personal cause for it. 'What is love?' he asks. 'It is a maladie de pensée--the dream of a sick fancy.... There is a far higher and nobler thing in the friendship of men.' And it is after narrating the stories of 'Penelope' and 'Lucretia,' that he puts into the mouth of Jealousy the famous couplet--

'Toutes estes, serez, ou fustes, De faict ou de voulenté, putes.'

Of course it may be urged that these are the words of jealousy, and not of the poet; but, unfortunately, there are so many indications of the author's entire approval of the sentiment, that the plea is hardly worth much. Take, for instance, the dramatic scene, when the wife worms out her husband's secret; or that of the old woman's lesson to Bel Accueil, where, as in the case of Faux Semblant, he puts woman's condemnation in her own mouth. She teaches him the art of love almost in Ovid's own words; she prefaces her lesson by a lament over the past days of youth and beauty; her regrets are not for a life of sin and deceit, but for the past bad days that can come no more. She is steeped in wickedness and intrigue; she can see no happiness, except in love and luxury.

'My days of gladness are no more; Your joyous time is all before; Hardly can I, through age and pain, With staff and crutch, my knees sustain. Almost a child, you hardly know What thing you have to bear and do. Yet, well I wot, the torch that all Burns soon or late, on you will fall; And in that fount where Venus brings Her maidens, will you drench love's wings. But ere you headlong enter, pause, Listen to one who knows Love's laws. Perilous are its waters clear; He risks his life who plunges here Without a guide. Who follows me Safe and successful shall he be.'

She tells of her vanished youth and all the pleasant follies of her young days; how she threw away her affections on a scoundrel, who only robbed and ill-treated her; how she wasted her money and neglected her chances; how she grew old, and her old friends ceased to knock at her door.

'But ah! my child, no one can know Save him who feels the bitter woe, What grief and dolour me befell At losing what I loved so well. The honeyed words, the soft caress, The sweet delight, the sweet embrace; The kisses sweet--so quickly sped, The joyous time so quickly fled. Fled! and I left alone to mourn. Fled! never, never to return.'

The whole passage is full of the truest touches of nature, and is written with a verve quite extraordinary. Villon has imitated it in his ballad of the Belle Heaulmière,--

'Avis m'est que j'oy regretter La belle qui fust Heaulmière; Soy jeune fille souhaiter Et parler en ceste manière.

* * * * *

Qu'est devenu ce front poly, Ces cheveulx blonds, sourcils voultiz, Grant entr'oeil, le regard joly, Dont prenoye les plus subtils; Ce beau nez ni grand ni petit; Ces petites joinctes oreilles; Menton fourchu, cler vis, traictiz Et ces belles lèvres vermeilles?'

And Béranger sings in the same key,--

'Combien je regrette Mon bras si dodu, Ma jambe bien faite, Et le temps perdu.'

Jean de Meung's old woman is no more reformed than her successors. And she tells Bel Accueil all that Ovid had to impart.

It is quite possible that in putting an imitation of the 'Art of Love' into the old woman's mouth, Jean de Meung catered to the lowest tastes of the age, and courted a popularity from this part of his work which he might not have obtained from the rest. The same sort of defence--no defence at all, but another and a worse charge--has been set up in the cases of Rabelais and Swift. All such offenders we are told, deferred to popular opinion, and wrote what they inwardly disapproved. This surely is worse. To be yourself so far depraved as to take delight in things impure is bad; to deliberately lay yourself out to please others with things impure is surely infinitely more wicked. It is possible that Jean de Meung, Rabelais, and Swift, did this; but we do not think it probable. In the case of the poet whom we are now considering, there seems every reason to believe that he had formed the lowest possible ideas of love and women; that from the depths of a corrupted morality, which permitted him the same pleasure in impurity which the common herd of the vulgar and illiterate shared, he had eager yearnings for that purity of life which alone as he felt and preached, could bring one to taste of the heavenly spring. That a man could at the same time grovel so low and look so high, that his gaze upwards was so clear and bright, while his eyes were so often turned earthward, is a singular phenomenon; but it is not a solitary one. Other great men have been as degraded as they were exalted. Perhaps when Christiana and her children saw that vision of the man with the muck-rake, while the angel, unregarded, held the crown of glory over his head, had they looked much longer, they might have seen him drop his rake and gaze upwards, with streaming eyes, upon the proffered glory. Jean de Meung was the man with the muck-rake who sometimes looked upwards.

The poet feels it necessary to apologize for his severity against the sex. 'If,' he says, 'you see anything here against womankind, blame not the poet.'

'All this was for instruction writ, Here are no words of idle wit. No jealousy inspired the song; No hatred bears the lines along. Bad are their hearts, if such there live, Who villainie to women give. Only, if aught your sense offend, Think that to know yourself is good, And that, with this intent, your friend, I write what else might seem too rude.'

He thinks it right, too, to make a sort of apology for the severity of his attack on monks.

'I strung my bow: I bent it well; And though no saint, the truth to tell I let my random arrows fly, In lowly town and cloister high. For what cared I where'er they lit? The folk that Christ called hypocrite, Who here and there are always found, Who keep their Lent the whole year round,

* * * * *

But feed on live men's flesh the while With teeth of envy and of guile, These were my mark; no other aim Was mine except to blot their fame.'

Let us pass to what is perhaps the most curious part of the book, and the richest for the student of mediæval ideas, that in which he gives us his views on the growth and principles of society. Here are advanced theories of an audacity and apparent originality which make one curious to know how far they penetrated into the lower strata of France; whether they were the speculations of a dreamer, or the tenets of a school; whether there was any connection--it is more than possible--between this kind of teaching and the frantic revolt of the peasantry; whether, in fact, Jean de Meung was a prophet with a following, or a visionary without disciples. Read, for instance, his account, somewhat abridged, of the Golden Age:--

'Once on a time, in those old years, When lived our grandsires and forbears, (Writers, by whom the tale we know, And ancient legends, tell us so), Love was loyal, and true, and good; The folk was simple; the fare was rude; They gathered the berries in forest and mead: For all their meat and all their bread; They wandered by valley and plain and mountain, By river and forest and woodland fountain, Plucking the chestnuts and sweet wild fruits, Looking for acorns and rustic roots. They rubbed together the ears of wheat; They gathered the clustering grape to eat; Rich fare they made when the forest bees Filled with honey the hollow trees: Water their drink; and the strong red wine Was not yet pressed from the autumn vine.

* * * * *

'When sleep came with the shades of night, They spread no beds of down so light, But stretched in their cabins on piles of hay, Fresh gathered grass and leaves they lay. Or slept without--when the air was mild-- And summer winds were hushed and stilled; When birds in the early morning grey Awoke to welcome, each in his way, The dawn that makes all hearts so gay. In that glad time when the royal pair, Flora--Queen of the flowers fair-- And Zephyr, her mate, give timely birth To flowers of spring, through all the earth.

* * * * *

... 'such splendour give That you might think the world would strive With Heaven itself for glory--so bright, So fair, so proud, with its flowers bedight. Then in the woods they lay at ease, Over their heads the branching trees-- Lovers kissed, who lovers were, And kissed again, and had no fear-- Then they chaunted rounds and lays, Joyously led their sports and plays: A simple folk; they had no prayer-- No fond ambition--nor other care Then just to live a life of joy-- And loyal love without annoy. No king or prince was with them yet To plunder and wrong, to ravish and fret; There were no rich, there were no poor, For no man yet kept his own store: And well the saying old they knew-- (Wise it is, and is proven true) Love and Lordship are two--not one: They cannot abide together, nor mate: Who wishes to join them is undone, And who would unite will separate.'

Or, as Dryden, who certainly never read the 'Romance of the Rose,' unless perhaps in Marot's edition, says:--

'Love either finds equality, or makes it.'

The end of the Golden Age--a thing not generally known--was accelerated by Jason's voyage, the hero bringing home with him treasures from Outremer: people begin to get ideas of property: they amass wealth: they rob and fight for plunder: they go so far as to divide the land. 'La propriété,' says Proudhon, 'c'est le vol.'

'Even the ground they parcelled out, And placed the landmarks all about; And over these, whene'er they met, Fierce battle raged. What they could get, They seized and snatched; and everywhere The strongest got the biggest share.

* * * * *

So that at length, of plunder tired, Needs must a guardian should be hired.

* * * * *

A sturdy peasant chose they then, The mightiest of the sons of men; Strongest in battle or in ring, And him they chose to be their king.'

Voltaire has exactly the same idea:

'Le premier roi fut un soldat heureux.'

This is the origin of royalty. The growth of feudalism, of armies, taxation, and division into classes is carefully traced from these small beginnings.

But he deduces the great law of charity and love for our neighbours. Having this, we have everything; and wanting this, we get wars, tyranny, and all the miseries of the world.

What is the nature of true gentility? Lineage, he explains, has nothing to do with it. None are gentle, but those whose virtues make them so. Ancestors may leave their wealth behind them, but not the qualities that made them great. Clerks have an advantage over unlettered persons in knowing what is right. If they are coarse and rude, they sin against greater light, and incur heavier punishment.

'Let him, who gentleman would be, From sloth and idleness keep free; In arms and study be employed, And coarse rusticity avoid. Let him, with humble, courteous grace, Meet every class in every place; Honour all women, wife or maid, So that not too much trust be laid In woman's faith. So may he steer, Of this great danger wholly clear.

* * * * *

Know all that gentle blood may bring No benefit, or anything, Except what each man's worth may give. Know, also, none of all that live Can ask for honour, praise, or blame By reason of another's name.'

The idea, of course, is not new. It is found frequently enough in the Greek and Latin literature. It occurs, we believe, for the first time in the fragments of Epicharmus,--

ἀγαθὸς δ' ἄνηρ κἂν Αἰθίοψ καὶ δοῦλος, εὐγενὴς ἔφυ.

and afterwards it is found in Euripides, Horace, Juvenal--'Stemmata quid faciunt?'--and, lastly, in Seneca. Doubtless, Jean de Meung took it from Seneca. Once started anew, the idea, of course, became popular, and poet after poet repeated it, until it became a mere commonplace. But so far as we have been able to discover, Jean de Meung gave it new life.

A few words only, for our limits press, on the natural science taught in the 'Romance of the Rose.' The poet, having got rid of this indignation and wrath that lay at his soul anent the mendicant friars, and the vices of women, wishes now, it seems, to sit down for a quiet and comfortable disquisition on universal knowledge, including alchemy, in which he is a firm believer; indeed, he wants to pass, in a certain ballad of his, for an adept. This part takes the form of a confession of Nature to her chaplain Genius (in which Power afterwards copies him). The confession is long and wearisome, but it is curious as being the earliest and fullest popular account of mediæval science.

He fancies Nature to be perpetually at work, fashioning creatures whom Death continually tries to destroy.

'Nature, who fashions all that holds The sky beneath its ample folds, Within her forge meanwhile was found, And at her work's eternal round,-- Struck out new forms of every race, Lest life should fail, and types should cease; She made so many, that Death, who toiled With heavy mace to kill, was foiled.

* * * * *

They fly to save themselves, where'er Their fate may lead, or feet may bear; Some to the Church and convent rule, Some to the dance, some to the school; Some to their merchandize are turned, Some to the arts which they have learned.

* * * * *

Another, sworn by Holy Writ, Puts on the cloak of hypocrite; And, flying, would his thoughts conceal, Did not his life the truth reveal. So, shunning Death, do all men shape Their diverse ways, his blows to 'scape.'

The scientific discourse follows: observe the good sense of many of his remarks:--

'God, having made the world out of nothing, having put all things into their proper places, measured spaces, and allotted courses, handed all over to Nature as his chambrière. Whatever man can do--and his power is very great--he cannot equal Nature, the inexhaustible and untiring. By alchemy he can interchange metals; can restore its pristine purity to everything; can turn quicksilver into gold by subtle medicines; but he cannot change or create species. This Nature alone is able to effect, changing the complexions of things, so that they assume new forms and become new substances; as when in thunderstorms, stones fall from the clouds, where no stones ever were.

'The heavens turn every day, bearing with them the stars. They go round from east to west, rejoicing the world. A complete revolution is made every 26,000 years.

'The moon is different from the planets in being obscure in some places and clear in others. The reason of this is, that the sun can penetrate through one part of it, as through glass; the dark part, on which is figured a serpent having a tree on his back, reflecting the rays.

'In the centre is the sun, like a king. He it is who makes the stars so bright that they serve as lamps of the night; were we nearer to the sun we should be scorched; were we farther away we should be frozen.

'The comets are not attached to the heavens, but fly about in the air. They do not last long, and it is a mistake to suppose that they portend disaster. For there is no man of worth or power sufficient for the heavens to take notice of him.

Nor any prince of so great worth, That signs from heaven should give to earth, Notice of death for him alone: Nor is his body--life once gone-- Worth one jot more than simple squire, Or clerk, or one who works for hire.

'Foolish people imagine, too, that stars fall like flying dragons from the skies; and that eclipses are to be taken as portents. Now, no one would be astonished at these things who understood the causes of things.

'Every student ought to acquire a knowledge of optics, which can be learned by the aid of geometry, from the books of Aristotle, Albacen, and Hucayen. Here can be learned the properties of mirrors; how they produce things which appear miracles; make small things seem great--a grain of sand like a mountain; and great things small--a mountain like a grain of sand; how glasses can be used to burn things; how straight lines can be made to look crooked, round things oblong, upright things reversed; the phantoms which do not exist appear to be moving about.'

The book from beginning to end is as full of quotations as Burton. The author quotes from Aristotle, Justinian, Horace, Seneca, St. Augustine, Ovid, Cicero, Boethius, Lucan, Claudian, Suetonius, and he has, probably through Cicero, some knowledge of Plato, but all this in the wildest jumble, with no discrimination and no critical power whatever. His range of reading was not by any means contemptible, and though we know of no writer of his time who can compare with him in this respect, it is evident that since one man had command of so many books, other men must have enjoyed the same advantages. There is reason to believe from Jean de Meung alone that acquaintance with Latin literature was much more extended than is generally thought, and that the scholarship of the time was by no means wholly confined to scholastic disputation.

Such, roughly sketched, is the work of Jean de Meung, from which we have plucked some of the fruits that come readiest to our hand. If not altogether an original or a profound thinker, he has at least the merit of fearlessness. He taught the folk, in the most popular way possible, great and valuable lessons. He told them that religion is a thing apart from, and independent of, religious profession; that "la robe ne faict pas le moyne;" he says that most of the saints, men and women, were decent married people, that marriage is a laudable and holy custom, that the wealth of monks is a mockery of their profession and a perjury of their vows, that learned persons ought to set an example, and what is sheer ignorance and brutality in others is rank sin with them; he attacks superstition, showing that all phenomena have natural causes, and have nothing to do with earthly events and the fortunes of men, because men are equal in the sight of God; and he teaches in terms as clear as any used by Carlyle, that labor is noble, and in accordance with the conditions of our being--that man's welfare is the end and aim of all earthly provision.

All this is what used to be called the Dark Ages. After six hundred years, the same questions exercise us which exercised Jean de Meung. We are still disputing as to whether true nobility is inherited or not; we have not all made up our minds about the holiness of marriage; we still think the clergyman, because he wears a surplice, holier than other men; work has been quite recently and with much solemnity pronounced noble by a prophet who forgot, while he was about it, to call it also respectable; men yet live who look upon scientific men with horror, and quote with fine infelicity, a text of St. Paul's about 'science falsely so called;' while the lesson of personal holiness has to be preached again and again, and is generally forgotten in the war over vestments and creeds.

Jean de Meung wished, as it seems to us, to write a book for the people, to answer their questions, to warn them of dangers before them, to instruct their ignorance. On the sapless trunk of a dying and passionless allegory he grafts a living branch which shall bear fruit in the years to come. His poem breathes indeed. Its pulses beat with a warm human life. Its sympathies are with all mankind. The poet has a tear for the poor naked beggars dying on dung-heaps and in the Hôtel-Dieu, and a lash of scorpions for the Levite who goes by on the other side; he teaches the loveliness of friendship; he catches the wordless complaint of the poor, and gives it utterance: he speaks with a scorn which Voltaire only has equalled, and a revolutionary fearlessness surpassing that of D'Alembert or Diderot.

And much more than this. It seems to us that his book--absolutely the only cheerful book of the time--afforded hope that things were not permanent: evil times may change; times have not been always evil: there was once a Golden Age: the troubles of the present are due, not to the innate badness of Nature and the universal unfitness of things, but to certain definite and ascertainable causes. Now to discover the cause is to go some way towards curing the disease.

In that uneasy time, strange questions and doubts perplexed men's minds--questions of religion and politics, affecting the very foundations of society. They asked themselves why things were so; and looking about in the dim twilight of dawning knowledge they could find as yet no answer. There was no rest in the Church or in the State, and the mind of France--which was the mind of Europe--was gravitating to a social and religious democracy. An hour before the dawn, you may hear the birds of the forest twitter in their sleep: they dream of the day. Europe at the close of the thirteenth century was dreaming of the glorious Renaissance, the dawn of the second great day of civilization. Jean de Meung answered the questions of the times with a clearness and accuracy which satisfied if it did not entirely explain. Five generations passed away before the full burst of light, and he taught them all, with that geniality that is his greatest charm. His book lasted because, confused and without art as it is, it is full of life and cheerfulness and hope. Not one of the poets of his own time had his lightness of heart: despondency and dejection weigh down every one: they alternate between a monotonous song to a mistress or a complaint for France; and to Jean de Meung they are as the wood-pigeon to the nightingale. They all borrowed from him, or studied him. Charles of Orleans, Villon, Clement Marot, Rabelais, La Fontaine, Regnier, Molière, Béranger, all come down from him in direct line, his literary children and grandchildren. And in Jean de Meung, to make an end, is the first manifestation of the true spirit of French literature--the esprit Gaulois--the legacy, they tell us, of the ancient Gaul.

FOOTNOTES:

[51] Milman's Hist. of Latin Christianity, vol. iv. p. 407

[52] He died about 1308, at the age of one hundred. A selection from his satires is to be found in Raynouard's collection of Provençal literature.

[53] Among these, the most formidable, at one time, was the great order of Knights Templars--Ecclesia super Ecclesiam.

[54] See Révue des Deux Mondes, 1866, vol. 64.

[55] Cf. also Richard of Hampole--

'Ther is lyf withoute ony deth,

* * * * *

Ae yatte the most sovereign joye of alle Is the sight of Goddes bright face, In whom resteth all manere grace.'

[56] It may be objected that 'La Bible Guyot' was a satire on the times. But this curious book is, so far as it deals with the Church, a querulous complaint of certain indignities and privations suffered by the author, chiefly in the way of eating and drinking. 'The Abbot,' he says, 'gets the meat and the clear wine; the monks get beans and muddy wine. And they are obliged to be "roaring and bellowing" all night long, so that they can get no sleep.' A monk, whose chief complaint is the frequency of church services and the rigorous mortification of the flesh, can hardly be called a satirist.

[57] It was, among others, the cause of that most singular movement, the Crusade of Children. Friar Nicholas preached that by reason of the rapacity and lust of the soldiers, the Holy Land would never be conquered, but that, were the children to invade it, the arms of the infidels would drop powerless from their hands. Acting on this belief, hundreds of children started from Germany and France, in the belief that the Mediterranean would be dried up for them to pass. Seven shiploads were kidnapped and sold for slaves in Alexandria, several thousands perished; only a few found their way back. The story is told by M. Capefigue in a note to Michault's 'Histoire des Crusades.'

ART. V.--Letters and Letter Writing.

Gossip about Letters and Letter Writers. By GEORGE SETON, Advocate. Edinburgh. 1870.

We all of us know well, and to our cost, that we can make no improvement in the management of our affairs, no change for the better in the arrangements, economical and ethical, of our modes of life and action without some attendant trial, trouble, or loss coming ever like a shadow in its train. It is, therefore, not a cause for wonder that some spirit of evil has cast its shadow in the wake of the introduction of the penny post, and the still later changes in the direction of cheapness in the newspaper press. A feeling of regret arises in our minds that with their introduction the good old-fashioned long and newsy letter of bygone days has been almost crushed out of existence. Letter writing is becoming a lost art, and no correspondence is now carried on as in the olden time; for no one now lives 'a life of letter writing' as Walpole said he did. The reason of this is not far to seek, for the hurry and bustle of life has become too great to allow of anything but the passing thought being committed to paper, and each writer finds it to be useless to tell news to a correspondent who has already learned what has happened from the same source as himself. It is now frequently a shorter operation to call upon your friend and talk with him than to write him a long letter; but it is a happy thing for us of this day that this was not always the case, for the letters of the past which we possess form one of the most charming branches of our lighter literature.

The value of communication between persons in distant places was appreciated in very early times; and we find Job exclaiming, 'Now my days are swifter than a post.' In the days of Hezekiah 'the posts went with the letters from the king and his princes throughout all Israel and Judah,' and Ahasuerus sent letters into every province of his empire by 'the posts that rode upon mules and camels,' and were 'hastened and pressed on by the king's commandment,' to inform his subjects that it was his imperial will that every man should bear rule in his own house. Various modes of communication other than writing have at different times been in use, such as numerically marked or notched pieces of wood, and the many-coloured cords, regularly knotted, which were called quipus by the Peruvians. Herodotus tells us of a cruel practice resorted to, in order to convey secret intelligence with safety. The head of a trusty messenger was shaved, and certain writings were impressed upon his skull. After his hair had grown sufficiently long for the purposes of concealment he was sent on his mission, and on arriving at his destination was again shaved, in order that the writing might be revealed. When the Spaniards visited America they found the postal communication in Mexico and Peru to be carried out on a most perfect system; and we learn that the couriers of the Aztecs wore a differently coloured dress, according as they brought good or bad tidings.

The establishment of a postal system in England is chiefly due to the sagacity of Richard III., who commanded the expedition against the Scots, in his brother Edward's reign. During this time, as it was necessary for the king and his government to know how the war was carried on, stages of about twenty miles each were established upon the North road. When Richard came to the throne he did not allow this system to fall into abeyance. Henry VIII. instituted the office of 'Master of the Postes,' and from his time to the present the Post Office has increased in importance year by year. Henry Bishop was appointed Postmaster-General at the Restoration, on his entering into a contract to pay to Government the annual sum of £21,500. In Queen Anne's reign the revenue of the Post Office had risen to £60,000; in 1761 it reached £142,000; in 1800 £745,000; in 1813 £1,414,224, and is now between four and five millions sterling.

Much of this great increase in the revenue is owing to the various improvements that have been introduced; and most of these have come from without, and have been opposed by the officials. John Palmer had great difficulty in obtaining the adoption of his scheme of mail coaches, and Sir Rowland Hill battled for many years for his penny postage. Thomas Waghorn, the hero of the Overland Route, was originally a pilot in the service of the Hon. East India Company, and came to England with a letter of introduction from the Governor-General to the chairman of the Company. The chairman cared nothing for his scheme, and told him to return to his duties in India, saying that the East India Company were quite satisfied with the postal communication as conducted viâ the Cape of Good Hope. Waghorn left the room, disgusted with his reception, and wrote the following laconic note in the hall:--

'To John Harvey Astell, Esq., M.P., Chairman of the Hon. East India Company.

'SIR,--I this day resign my employment as a pilot in the Hon. East India Company's Bengal Marine Service, and have the honour to remain, your obedient servant,

'THOMAS WAGHORN.'

With the ink scarcely dry he rushed into the august presence, and delivering his letter, said, 'There, sir, is my resignation of my position in the Company's service, and I tell you, John Harvey Astell, Esq., member of Parliament, and chairman of the Hon. East India Company, that I will stuff the Overland Route down your throat before you are two years older.'[58]

It was very long before the present enlightened views of cheap postage took root in the official mind, and in a tract, entitled 'England's Wants,' reprinted in 'Somers's Tracts' (vol. ix. p. 219), letters are among the objects proposed for taxation. When the cost of postage was high the receiver expected to get his money's worth in a long letter, but various tricks were often resorted to in order to save this cost, and blank letters, with a cipher on the outside, were sometimes sent, and refused by the persons to whom they were directed, because they had learnt from the exterior all that they wanted to know. Another trick discovers an ingenious mode of getting letters free. A shrewd countryman, learning that there was a letter for him at the post office, called for it, but confessing that he could not read, requested the postmaster to open it, and let him know the contents. When he had obtained all the information he required, he politely thanked the official for his kindness, and drily observed, 'When I have some change I will come and take it.' The doctrine of the inviolability of letters is held by all persons of honour, and Cicero asks 'who at all influenced by good habits and feelings has ever allowed himself to resent an affront or injury by exposing to others any letters received from the offending person during their intercourse of friendship?' Nevertheless, all Governments have reserved to themselves the right of opening, in time of emergency, the letters that pass through their hands. The great Falkland would not countenance any such dishonourable doctrine, and Lord Clarendon says of him, 'One thing Lord Falkland could never bring himself to, while Secretary of State, and that was the liberty of opening letters upon suspicion that they might contain matter of dangerous consequence, which he thought such a violation of the law of nature that no qualification of office could justify him in the trespass.' In late years Sir James Graham incurred much public odium, for allowing the letters of Mazzini to be opened as they passed through the English post.

The history of literature presents us with many specimens of beautiful letters, and of continued correspondence of a high order. The French, more especially, excel in this charming department of the belles lettres, and can claim a De Sevigné and a Du Deffand; while we too can boast of the possession of Walpole, Gray, and Cowper among the men, and of Lady Russell and Lady Mary Montagu among the ladies. Good letters should be like good conversation, easy and unrestrained, for fine writing is as out of place in the one as fine talk is in the other. Pope did not understand this, and his early letters are showy and unnatural, full of rhetorical flourishes on trivialities. He was in the habit of keeping rough copies of his own letters, and sometimes repeated the same letter to different persons, as in the case of the two lovers killed by lightning, an account of which he sent to the two sisters Martha and Theresa Blount. His letters, therefore, are of little more interest than those of Katherine Phillips, the matchless Orinda, to her grave Poliarchus (Sir Charles Cottrel). Dr. Sprat, in his life of Cowley, makes some judicious remarks upon this subject, but draws the conclusion that familiar letters should not be published to the world.

'There was (he says), one kind of prose wherein Mr. Cowley was excellent; and that is his letters to his private friends. In those he always expressed the native tenderness and innocent gaiety of his mind. I think, sir, you and I have the greatest collection of this sort. But I know you agree with me that nothing of this sort should be published; and herein you have always consented to approve of the modest judgment of our countrymen above the practice of some of our neighbours, and chiefly of the French. I make no manner of question but the English at this time are infinitely improved in this way above the skill of former ages. Yet they have been always judiciously sparing in printing such composures, while some other witty nations have tried all their presses and readers with them. The truth is, the letters that pass between particular friends, if they are written as they ought to be, can scarce ever be fit to see the light. They should not consist of fulsome compliments, or tedious politics, or elaborate elegancies, or general fancies, but they should have a native clearness and shortness, a domestical plainness, and a peculiar kind of familiarity which can only affect the humour of those for whom they were intended. The very same passages which make writings of this nature delightful among friends will lose all manner of taste when they come to be read by those that are indifferent. In such letters the souls of men should appear undressed; and in that negligent habit they may be fit to be seen by one or two in a chamber, but not to go abroad in the street.'

The letters of Scott, Byron, Southey, and Burns--all thoroughly different in style--keep up the character of the moderns, and show that they understood the secret of the art.

Letter-writing has a special charm for shy, retiring men, because they are able to exhibit upon paper the feelings and emotions about which they could not speak. Some men seem able to think only when a pen is in their hands; though others, in the same situation, seem to lose all their ideas. Johnson said of the industrious Dr. Birch, 'Tom Birch is as brisk as a bee in conversation, but no sooner does he take a pen in his hand than it becomes a torpedo to him and benumbs all his faculties.' Dr. French Lawrence was an instance of the exact reverse, for Fox made him put on paper what he wanted to relate, saying, 'I love to read your writing, but I hate to hear you talk.'

Sir James Mackintosh was a great admirer of Madame de Sevigné, and we find in his works the following admirable remarks on the proper tone for polite conversation and familiar letters. We doubt whether it would be possible to find juster or finer thoughts on this subject, expressed in more elegant language:--

'When a woman of feeling, fancy, and accomplishment has learned to converse with ease and grace, from long intercourse with the most polished society, and when she writes as she speaks, she must write letters as they ought to be written, if she has acquired just as much habitual correctness as is reconcilable with the air of negligence. A moment of enthusiasm, a burst of feeling, a flash of eloquence may be allowed, but the intercourse of society, either in conversation or in letters, allows no more. Though interdicted from the long continued use of elevated language, they are not without a resource. There is a part of language which is disdained by the pedant or the declaimer, and which both if they knew its difficulty would dread; it is formed of the most familiar phrases and turns in daily use by the generality of men, and is full of energy and vivacity, bearing upon it the mark of those keen feelings and strong passions from which it springs. It is the employment of such phrases which produces what may be called colloquial eloquence. Conversation and letters may be thus raised to any degree of animation without departing from their character. Anything may be said, if it be spoken in the tone of society; the highest guests are welcome, if they come in the easy undress of the club; the strongest metaphor appears without violence, if it is familiarly expressed; and we the more easily catch the warmest feeling, if we perceive that it is intentionally lowered in expression out of condescension to our calmer temper. It is thus that harangues and declamations, the last proof of bad taste and bad manners in conversation, are avoided, while the fancy and the heart find the means of pouring forth all their stores. To meet this despised part of language in a polished dress, and producing all the effects of wit and eloquence, is a constant source of agreeable surprise. This is increased when a few bolder and higher words are happily wrought into the texture of this familiar eloquence. To find what seems so unlike author-craft in a book, raises the pleasing astonishment to the highest degree. I once thought of illustrating my notions by numerous examples from "La Sevigné." I must some day or other do so, though I think it the resource of a bungler, who is not enough master of language to convey his conceptions into the minds of others. The style of Madame de Sevigné is evidently copied, not only by her worshipper, Walpole, but even by Gray, who, notwithstanding the extraordinary merits of his matter, has the double stiffness of an imitator and of a college recluse. Letters must not be on a subject. Lady Mary Wortley's letters on her journey to Constantinople are an admirable book of travels, but they are not letters. A meeting to discuss a question of science is not conversation; nor are papers written to another, to inform or discuss, letters. Conversation is relaxation not business, and must never appear to be occupation, nor must letters. Judging from my own mind, I am satisfied of the falsehood of the common notion that these letters owe their principal interest to the anecdotes of the court of Louis XIV. A very small part of the letters consist of such anecdotes. Those who read them with this idea must complain of too much Grignan. I may now own that I was a little tired during the two first volumes. I was not quite charmed and bewitched till the middle of the collection, where there are fewer anecdotes of the great and famous. I felt that the fascination grew as I became a member of the Sevigné family; it arose from the history of the immortal mother and the adored daughter, and it increased as I knew them in more detail; just as my tears in the dying chamber of Clarissa depend on my having so often drank tea with her in those early volumes, which are so audaciously called dull by the profane vulgar. I do not pretend to say that they do not owe some secondary interest to the illustrious age in which they were written; but this depends merely on its tendency to heighten the dignity of the heroine, and to make us take a warmer concern in persons who were the friends of those celebrated men and women, who are familiar to us from our childhood.'

A French writer has said, 'les marins ecrivent mal;' but the gallant admiral, Lord Collingwood, whose correspondence was published in 1828, was a brilliant exception to this rash assertion. The following letter, addressed to the Honourable Miss Collingwood, is dated July 1809, and shows that its writer, in the midst of his manifold duties as a sailor, found time to direct the education of his children.

'I received your letter, my dearest child, and it made me very happy to find that you and dear Mary are well, and taking pains with your education. The greatest pleasure I have amidst my toils and troubles is in the expectation which I entertain of finding you improved in knowledge, and that the understanding which it has pleased God to give you both has been cultivated with care and assiduity. Your future happiness and respectability in the world depend on the diligence with which you apply to the attainment of knowledge at this period of your life, and I hope that no negligence of our own will be a bar to your progress. When I write to you, my beloved child, so much interested am I that you should be amiable and worthy the esteem of good and wise people, that I cannot forbear to second and enforce the instruction which you receive by admonition of my own, pointing out to you the great advantages that will result from a temperate conduct and sweetness of manner to all people, on all occasions. It does not follow that you are to coincide and agree in opinion with every ill-judging person; but after showing them your reason for dissenting from their opinion, your argument and opposition to it should not be tinctured by anything offensive. Never forget for one moment that you are a gentlewoman, and all your words and all your actions should mark you gentle. I never knew your mother--your dear, your good mother--say a harsh or hasty thing to any person in my life. Endeavour to imitate her. I am quick and hasty in my temper, my sensibility is touched sometimes with a trifle, and my expression of it sudden as gunpowder; but, my darling, it is a misfortune which, not having been sufficiently restrained in my youth, has caused me much pain. It has, indeed, given me more trouble to subdue this natural impetuosity than anything I ever undertook. I believe that you are both mild; but if you ever feel in your little breasts that you inherit a particle of your father's infirmity, restrain it, and quit the subject that has caused it until your serenity be recovered. So much for mind and manners; next for accomplishments. No sportsman ever hits a partridge without aiming at it, and skill is acquired by repeated attempts. It is the same thing in every art; unless you aim at perfection you will never attain it, but frequent attempts will make it easy. Never, therefore, do anything with indifference. Whether it be to mend a rent in your garment or finish the most delicate piece of art, endeavour to do it as perfectly as it is possible. When you write a letter give it to your greatest care, that it may be as perfect in all its parts as you can make it. Let the subject be sense, expressed in the most plain, intelligible, and elegant manner that you are capable of. If in a familiar epistle you should be playful and jocular, guard carefully that your wit be not sharp, so as to give pain to any person; and before you write a sentence examine it, even the words of which it is composed, that there be nothing vulgar or inelegant in them. Remember, my dear, that your letter is the picture of your brains; and those whose brains are a compound of folly, nonsense, and impertinence are to blame to exhibit them to the contempt of the world, or the pity of their friends. To write a letter with negligence, without proper stops, with crooked lines and great flourishing dashes, is inelegant. It argues either great ignorance of what is proper, or great indifference towards the person to whom it is addressed, and is consequently disrespectful. It makes no amends to add an apology for having scrawled a sheet of paper, for bad pens, for you should mend them; or want of time, for nothing is more important to you, or to which your time can be more properly devoted. I think I can know the character of a lady pretty nearly by her handwriting. The dashers are all impudent, however they may conceal it from themselves or others; and the scribblers flatter themselves with the vain hope that, as their letter cannot be read, it may be mistaken for sense. I am very anxious to come to England; for I have lately been unwell. The greatest happiness which I expect there is to find that my dear girls have been assiduous in their learning. May God Almighty bless you, my beloved little Sarah, and sweet Mary too.'

Having seen from the foregoing extracts the principles that should govern the composition of familiar letters, we shall be better able to judge of the merits or demerits of the specimens that follow; and we will take this opportunity of saying that we have preferred to choose our examples from little known sources, rather than from such well-known volumes as the correspondences of Walpole, Gray, or Cowper. The celebrated Mrs. Elizabeth Carter was much troubled by one of her most intimate and early friends always writing to her in terms of great respect. In order to show her correspondent the absurdity of her conduct, and to obtain an easier kind of intercommunication, she wrote the following letter:--

'Nov. 29, 1742.

'To MISS ----

'It is with the utmost diffidence, dear Miss ----, that I venture to do myself the high honour of writing to you, when I consider my own nothingness and utter incapacity of doing any one thing upon earth. Indeed, I cannot help wondering at my own assurance in daring to expose my unworthy performance to your accurate criticisms, which to be sure I should never have presumed to do if I had not thought it necessary to pay my duty to you, which, with the greatest humility, I beg you to accept. Unless I had as many tongues in my head as there are grains of dust betwixt this place and Canterbury, it is impossible for me to express the millionth part of the obligations I have to you; but people can do no more than they can, and therefore I must content myself with assuring you that I am, with the sublimest veneration, and most profound humility,

'Your most devoted, 'Obsequious, 'Respectful, 'Obedient, 'Obliged, 'And dutiful, 'Humble servant,

'E. CARTER.

'I know you have an extreme good knack at writing respectful letters; but I shall die with envy if you outdo this.'

Aaron Hill expresses in elegant words what many have felt when they have received a letter from one who was separated from them by time and space:--

'Letters from absent friends extinguish fear, Unite division, and draw distance near; Their magic force each silent wish conveys, And wafts embodied thought a thousand ways. Could souls to bodies write, death's power were mean, For minds could then meet minds with heaven between.'

James Howell, who has left us a most amusing collection of letters, and therefore may be allowed to speak with some authority, says 'familiar letters may be called the 'larum bells of love;' and he puts the same idea into the form of a distich, thus--

'As keys do open chests, So letters open brests.'

Unfortunately all the letters in the Epistolæ Ho-elianæ are not genuine, but were written when Howell was confined in the Fleet prison, and were made up in order to supply their author with money for his necessities.

To Atossa, the daughter of Cyrus, has been given the credit of the invention of letterwriting, but her claim is easily disposed of, as we have specimens of written communications very long before her time. The earliest letter of which we have any record is that written by David to Joab, directing him to place Uriah in the front of the battle. There are several classical stories, that bear a likeness to this, of persons who carried letters, in which their own execution was desired; thus Homer tells the story of Bellerophon, who himself bore the sealed tablets that demanded his death. In later Jewish History we learn from the Bible that Queen Jezebel wrote letters in Ahab's name, and sealed them with his seal, and sent them to the elders and nobles.

Cicero was one of the earliest to bring the art to perfection, and his letters exhibit most of the graces of which it is capable. Seneca and the younger Pliny were also amongst the masters in the art. When we consider the inconvenient and perishable medium that the Romans had to content themselves with, we cannot but feel surprise at the number of letters that were written, and the large proportion that has come down to us. Thin wooden tablets, coated over with wax, were used and fastened together with a crossed thread. The knotted ends were sealed with wax, and as the letters were usually written by a confidential slave (the librarius), the seal was the only guaranty of genuineness. Sometimes ivory or parchment tablets were used, and an elevated border was probably added, in order to prevent rubbing. The want of a system of posts was not felt among the Romans, as most families possessed tabellarii, or special slaves, whose duty it was to convey letters to their destination.

It was the practice with the Romans to place the names of both the writer and his correspondent at the commencement of the letter, as 'Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, unto Timothy, my own son in the faith;' and the ending usually consisted of the word vale, or ave, or salve. The dates were scrupulously added, and sometimes the very hours were mentioned. This method of the Romans might well be imitated by us, for we often find an old letter rendered of little value by the omission of a date. A bad habit that some writers indulge in is to use the name of the day of the week, instead of the day of the month and year.

Amongst ourselves, etiquette once placed her stern hands upon correspondence, and laid down rules of how a letter was to be written. Among persons pretending to any fashion it was considered proper to use fine gilt paper, sealed with a coat of arms. Ladies used tinted paper with borders, and sealed their letters with coloured and perfumed wax. In town it was not the fashion to send letters or notes through the post, nor to put the address upon the envelope, for no one could be supposed to be ignorant of the abode of so distinguished a person as Lady Arabella Smith. The circle of fashionable life, however, has been so much enlarged and encroached upon, that most people now are forced to acknowledge their ignorance on such points. If we imagine that we should groan under these restrictions, what should we think of the etiquette enjoined in the East? There correspondence is carried on with many degrees of refinement. Letters are written by some accomplished scribe, on beautiful paper, and the sender's mark is placed in a particular position, according to the recognised status of his correspondent. The letter is folded by rule, and a florid superscription is added, such as, 'Let this come under the consideration of the benefactor of his friends, the distinguished in the State, the renowned, the lion in battle, on whom be peace from the Most High.' The following are two amusing specimens of the untrue complaisance common in Chinese correspondence:--

'To a Friend who has lately left another.

'Ten days have elapsed since I had the privilege of listening to your able instructions. Ere I was aware, I found my heart filled and choked with noxious weeds. Perhaps I shall have to thank you for favouring me with an epistle, in which I know your words will flow, limpid as the streams of pure water: then shall I instantly see the nature of things, and have my heart opened to understand.'

'To a Friend at a distance.

'I am removed from your splendid virtues. I stand looking towards you with anxious expectation. There is nothing for me, but toiling along a dusty road. To receive your advice, as well as pay my respects, are both out of my power. In sleep my spirit dreams of you; it induces a kind of intoxication. I consider my virtuous brother a happy man, eminent and adorned with all rectitude. You are determined in your good purposes, and rejoice in the path of reason. You are always and increasingly happy. On this account I am rejoiced and consoled more than can be expressed.'

We are not now so distant as formerly in the commencement of our letters, and use more friendly openings (such as 'Dear Sir,' 'My dear Sir') than our fathers did. 'Sir,' alone, was once nearly universal, but is now usually considered cold. Even Howell, who was most inventive in his endings, usually commences with Sir, although once he breaks forth with 'Hail! half of my soul.' Such beginnings as 'Right worshipful Father,' 'Good Sir,' 'Honoured Sir,' 'Respected Sir,' are quite out of date, but many writers adopt a variety in their commencements, and do not always follow the beaten track; thus the great Chatham wrote to his wife, 'Be of cheer, noble love.' In modern letters we miss the use of some of the quaint and loving expressions of former days, such a one, for instance, as the good old word 'heart,' for is there not always a charm about an old letter beginning with the words 'Dear Heart?'

The ending of a letter requires some taste, and many find it as difficult to close one gracefully as to finish conversation and leave a room with ease. The 'I remain' requires to be led up to, and not to be added to the letter without connection. There is a large gamut of choice for endings, from the official 'Your obedient servant,' and high and mighty 'Your humble servant,' to the friendly 'Yours truly,' 'Yours sincerely,' and 'Yours affectionately.' Some persons vary the form, and slightly intensify the expression by placing the word 'yours' last, as 'Faithfully yours.' James Howell used a great variety of endings, such as 'Yours inviolably,' 'Yours intirely,' 'Your intire friend,' 'Yours verily and invariably,' 'Yours really,' 'Yours in no vulgar way of friendship,' 'Yours to dispose of,' 'Yours while J. H.,' 'Yours! Yours! Yours!' Walpole writes--'Yours very much,''Yours most cordially,' and to Hannah More, in 1789, 'Yours more and more.' Mr. Bright some years ago ended a controversial letter in the following biting terms, 'I am, sir, with whatever respect is due to you.' The old Board of Commissioners of the Navy used a form of subscription very different from the ordinary official one. It was their habit to subscribe their letters (even letters of reproof) to such officers as were not of noble families or bore titles, 'Your affectionate friends.' It is said that this practice was discontinued in consequence of a distinguished captain adding to his letter to the Board, 'Your affectionate friend.' He was thereupon desired to discontinue the expression, when he replied, 'I am, gentlemen, no longer your affectionate friend.' The expression was supposed to have been adopted from James Duke of York, who, when Lord High Admiral, always so subscribed his official letters; but we have found a letter from the Navy Office to the Officers of the Ordnance, dated '9th May, 1653,' which is subscribed 'Your very loveing ffrends.' The position of the writer's name was once a matter of consequence in Europe, as it is now in the East, and this appears from the following curious directions in Angel Day's 'English Secretary' (1599).

'And now to the subscriptions, the diversities whereof are (as best they may be allotted in sense) to either of these to bee placed, forwarned alwaies unto the unskilfull herein, that, writing to anie person of account, by howe much the more excellent hee is in calling from him in whose behalfe the Letter is framed, by so much the lower shall the subscription thereunto belonging in any wise be placed.

'And if the state of honour of him to whome the Letter shall be directed doe require so much, the verie lowest margent of paper shall do no more but beare it, so bee it the space bee seemelie for the name, and the room faire inough to comprehend it.'

We now come to the consideration of directions, and here a certain etiquette still lingers, as many who have no claim to any title are dignified by the addition of the meaningless &c., &c., &c. A friend of the once celebrated agriculturist, Sir John Sinclair, amusingly ridiculed the fancy that some men have for seeing a number of letters of the alphabet after their names, by directing his letter to 'Sir John Sinclair, A.M., F.R.S., T.U.V.W.X.Y.Z.' Besides the name of the person to whom the letter was sent, it was formerly the custom to write on the outside of a letter various directions to its bearer: thus a letter of the Earl of Hertford afterwards the Protector Somerset, to Sir William Paget, upon the death of Henry VIII., was addressed 'Haste, Post Haste, Haste with all diligence, For thy life! For thy life!'

As long as letters have been written, the inadvertent misdirecting of them must have been a constant source of trouble and annoyance. In James I.'s reign a lover sent a letter intended for his mistress to an obdurate father, and his letter renouncing her to the lady. When he found out the dreadful mistake he had committed life became insupportable to him, and he threw himself upon his sword. Swift sent a love-letter to a bishop, and the letter intended for the bishop to the lady.

The celebrated civilian, Dr. Dale, was fortunate in the success of his expedient of purposely misdirecting his letters. When he was employed on a diplomatic mission to Flanders he was much pressed for money, and in a packet to the Secretary of State he sent two letters, one for Queen Elizabeth and the other for his wife, which he misdirected, so that the letter for his wife was addressed to her most excellent Majesty, and that for the Queen to his dear wife. The Queen was surprised to find her letter beginning 'Sweetheart,' and concluding with a request to her to be very economical, as the writer could send her nothing because he was very short of money, and could not think of trespassing on the bounty of Her Majesty any further. Dale was successful in his stratagem, as an immediate supply of money was sent to him and to his family.

There are three peculiarities in letter-writing that ladies indulge in, viz., crossing, postscripts, and the underlining of words. Disraeli makes Henrietta Temple advise her lover to cross his letters, and states her reasons as follows:--

'I shall never find the slightest difficulty in making it out, if your letters were crossed a thousand times. Besides, dear love, to tell the truth, I should rather like to experience a little difficulty in reading your letters, for I read them so often, over and over again, till I get them by heart, and it is such a delight every now and then to find out some new expression that escaped me in the first fever of perusal; and then it is sure to be some darling word fonder than all the rest.'

Few men cross their writing, but many of them indulge in the luxury of a postscript, and some even when they have closed their letters think of a last word, and write it on the envelope. It is said that the underlining of words is a confession of weakness in the writer, because if he had used the best possible word he would not need to give it extra force by the mere mechanical contrivance of underscoring it with a pen.

Letters written in the third person are a constant snare to some people and usually lead to confusion. This form can only be used with safety in very short letters.

Frequently, a short note contains more pith than a longer letter, and Politian's letter to his friend well exemplifies this: 'I was very sorry, and am very glad, because thou wast sick, and that thou art whole. Farewell.' One of the most spirited letters ever written, was that sent by Ann, Countess of Dorset, to Sir Joseph Williamson, Secretary of State in Charles the Second's reign, when he wrote to her to choose a courtier as member for Appleby:--

'I have been bullied by an usurper, I have been ill-treated by a court, but I won't be dictated to by a subject. Your man shall not stand.

ANN DORSET, Pembroke and Montgomery.'

The following note from one Highlander to another is very pointed and witty:--

'MY DEAR GLENGARY,--As soon as you can prove yourself to be my chief I shall be ready to acknowledge you. In the meantime,

'I am yours, MACDONALD.'

Charles Lamb being tickled by the oddity of Haydon's address, sent him the following reply to an invitation:--

'My Dear Haydon,--I will come with pleasure to 22, Lisson Grove North, at Rossi's, half-way up, right hand side, if I can find it.

'Yours, C. LAMB.

'20, Russel Court, 'Covent Garden East, 'Half-way up, next the corner, 'Left hand side.'

Ignorant people when they manage to write a letter are usually very proud of their performance, and this is illustrated by a very good story in the Countess Spencer's 'East and West.' A lady proposed to Mrs. Law, a poor woman in St. Peter's Home, Kilburn, that she should write to Lady E., who had been very kind to her. She had some doubts at first, but they passed away, and she dictated a letter which is given, and the narrator adds:--

'Having finished it to her evident pride, I offered to read it to her; but I had hardly got down the first page when she became so deeply affected by her own eloquence, that she began to cry and rock herself backwards and forwards. I persevered, and when I had read the last word, paused, not knowing what to say to this unexpected grief. Mrs. Law put down her handkerchief, and shaking her head very seriously, said, "Well, now, that is a lovely letter! It's a great denial to me that I can't write, or I'd send plenty like it."'

It is usually supposed that writing comes natural to all, but we are often led to agree with Sheridan, that 'easy writing is cursed hard reading,' and the highest art is often required to be thoroughly natural. The Irish hodman, however, managed to express in a fine confused way his inner feeling, that he himself was little better than a machine:--

'DEAR PAT,--Come over here and earn your money: there is nothing for you to do but to carry the bricks up a ladder, for there is a man at the top who takes them from you and does all the work.'

Excuses of hurry, with expressions of fear lest the post should be lost, and such endings as 'yours in haste,' should seldom be indulged in, as they partake somewhat of the character of a slight to the receiver. The letters of ladies are usually more natural and unconstrained than those of men, and these are great merits, for the real man or woman should be seen in the letter. Locke says:--

'The writing of letters enters so much into all the occasions of life, that no gentleman can avoid showing himself in compositions of this kind. Occurrences will daily force him to make use of his pen, which lays open his breeding, his sense, and his abilities to a severer examination than any oral discourse.'

The deficiency of ordinary people in the art has long been felt, and complete letter-writers have been compiled to supply the want. Sir Henry Ellis has pointed out that manuals of epistolary composition, both in French and English, of the early part of the fifteenth century, exist in manuscript. The 'English Secretary,' published in 1599, is perhaps the earliest work on the subject in print. The voluminous author, Jervis Markham, brought out in 1618 a guide, with the following title: 'Conceited Letters: or a most excellent Bundle of New Wit, wherein is knit up together all the perfections of the art of Epistoling.' The booksellers, Rivington and Osborne, applied to Samuel Richardson to write for them a volume of letters in a simple style, on subjects that might serve as models for the use of those who had not the talent of inditing for themselves. While employed in composing some letters for the benefit of girls going out to service, the idea of 'Pamela' came into Richardson's head, and the subsequent success of that novel caused him to continue the mode of telling his stories by letters, which he had there adopted.

In entering upon the consideration of special classes of letters, we will take love letters first. This is a style of literature of which the outer public have few opportunities of judging, and doubtless it is one that is not fitted for rigid examination. Those love-letters that we read in the reports of breach-of-promise cases are usually beneath contempt: they are often unreal, and make us sick with references to Venus and Cupid, goddesses and nymphs, and many other absurdities. There are, however, existing some interesting letters of the reckless Earl of Rochester to his wife, which exhibit him in a new and pleasing character. The following breathes a tender consideration to which few are able to rise:--

'I kiss my deare wife a thousand times, as farr as imagination and wish will give mee leave. Thinke upon mee as long as it is pleasant and convenient for you to doe soe, and afterwards forget me; for though I would fain make you the author and foundation of my happiness, yet I would not bee the cause of your constraint or disturbance, for I love not myself soe much as I doe you, neither doe I value my owne satisfaction equally as I doe yours.

Farewell, ROCHESTER.'

As Sterne was making love to women throughout his entire life, we suppose he may be considered as an authority on how a love-letter should be written, and here is a specimen of his style:--

'MY DEAR KITTY,--If this billet catches you in bed, you are a lazy, sleepy slut, and I am a giddy, foolish, unthinking fellow for keeping you so late up--but this Sabbath is a day of rest; at the same time that it is a day of sorrow, for I shall not see my dear creature to-day, unless you meet me at Taylor's, half-an-hour after twelve; but in this do as you like. I have ordered Matthew to turn thief and steal you a quart of honey--what is honey to the sweetness of thee, who art sweeter than all the flowers it comes from! I love you to distraction, Kitty, and will love you on so to eternity. So adieu, and believe, what time will only prove me, that I am, Yours.'

Sir Richard Steele had for his second wife a woman who was difficult to please, and the collection of his letters to her give us a curious insight into his domestic life. They are mostly short, but filled with excuses. The following are three of them:--

'DEAREST BEING ON EARTH,--Pardon me if you do not see me till eleven o'clock; having met a school-fellow from India, by whom I am to be informed in things this night which immediately concern your obedient husband.'

'MY DEAR DEAR WIFE,--I write to let you know I do not come home to dinner, being obliged to attend some business abroad, of which I shall give you an account (when I see you in the evening), as becomes your dutiful and obedient husband.'

'DEAR PRUE,--I have partly succeeded in my business to-day, and I inclose two guineas as earnest of more. Dear Prue, I cannot come home to dinner. I languish after your welfare, and will never be a moment careless more. 'Your faithful husband.'

These are natural and real; but let us look into 'The Enemy of Idleness,' 1621, and see there what the author thought a lover should write to his mistress:--

'A Lover writeth unto his Lady.

'To expresse unto thee (my deere) the inward griefes, the secret sorrowes, the pinching paines, that my poore oppressed heart pitifully endureth, my pen is altogether unable. For even as thy excellent vertue, beautie, comelines, and curtesie farre surmounteth in my conceipt that of all other humane creatures, so my pitious passions both day and night are no whit inferiour, but farre above all those of any other worldly wight. So excell not thy giftes, but as much exceede my griefes. Therefore (my sweete) vouchsafe of thy soveraigne clemencie to graunt some speedie remedie unto the grievous anguishes of my heavie heart; detract no time, but wey with thy selfe, the sicker that the patient is--the more deadly that his disease is deemed--so much the more speede ought the physitian to make--so much the sooner ought he to provide and minister the medicine, least comming too late his labour be lost. But what painefull patient is hee that sustaineth so troublesome a state as I, poore soule, doe, except thou vouchsafe to pittie me? For the partie patient being discomforted at thy handes can have recourse unto none, but still languishing must looke for a lothsome death. Consider, therefore, my deare, the extremitie of my case, and let not cancred cruelty corrupt so many golden gifts, but as thy beauty and comelinesse of body is, so set thy humanity also and clemency of minde. Draw not (as the proverb saith) a leaden sword out of a golden scabberd. And thus hoping to have some speedy comfort at thy handes, upon that hope I repose mee till further opportunity.'

The fair fame of Mrs. Piozzi (Dr. Johnson's Mrs. Thrale) has been injured by an attempt to represent her as in love with a young actor in her old age and some letters of hers to William Augustus Conway were published a few years ago as the 'Love Letters of Mrs. Piozzi.' In 1862 the original correspondence was placed in the hands of the editor of the Athenæum, and in an article in that journal her character is vindicated, and the letters are proved to have been garbled in order to infer a sexual love. Mrs. Piozzi formed an intimate friendship with Mrs. Rudd, Conway's mother, and the two ladies passed much of their time together, consulting how to help the young actor. Conway was in love with a young lady who jilted him, and Mrs. Piozzi tried to comfort him. In consideration of all her kindness he calls her 'his more than mother,' and she calls him 'her youngest adopted child.' The following is one of Mrs. Piozzi's letters to Conway:--

'You have been a luckless wight, my admirable friend, but amends will one day be made to you, even in this world; I know, I feel it will. Dear Piozzi considered himself as cruelly treated, and so he was by his own friends, as the world perversely calls our relations, who shut their door in his face because his love of music led him to face the public eye and ear. He was brought up to the Church; but, 'Ah! Gabriel,' said his uncle, 'thou wilt never get nearer the altar than the organ-loft.' His disinclination to celibacy, however, kept him from the black gown, and their ill-humour drove him to Paris and London, where he was the first tenor singer who had £50 a night for two songs. And Queen Marie Antoinette gave him a hundred louis-d'or with her own fair hand for singing a buffo song over and over again one evening, till she learned it. Her cruel death half broke his tender heart. You will not wait, as he did, for fortune and for fame. We were both of us past thirty-five years old when we first met in society at Dr. Burney's (grandfather to Mrs. Bourdois and her sisters), where I coldly confessed his uncommon beauty and talents; but my heart was not at home. Mr. Thrale's broken health and complicated affairs demanded and possessed all my attention, and vainly did my future husband endeavour to attract my attention. So runs the world away.'

Among the letters quoted in the Athenæum is the following amusing one:--

'While there was so much talk about the town concerning maladministration, some of the Streatham coterie, in a quibbling humour, professed themselves weary of male-administration, as they pronounced it emphatically, and proposing a _fe_male one, called on Dr. Johnson to arrange it. "Well then," said he "we will have

Carter for Archbishop of Canterbury. Montague, First Lord of the Treasury. Hon. Sophia Byron, Head of the Admiralty. Heralds' Office under care of Miss Owen. Manager of the House of Commons, Mrs. Crewe. Mrs. Wedderburne, Lord Chancellor. Mrs. Wallace, Attorney-General. Preceptor to the Princes, Mrs. Chapone. Poet Laureate, Hannah More."

"And no place for me, Dr. Johnson?" cried your friend. "No, no; you will get into Parliament by your little silver tongue, and then rise by your own merit." "And what shall I do?" exclaims Fanny Burney. "Oh, we shall send you out for a spy, and perhaps you will get hanged. Ha, ha, ha!" with a loud laugh.'

Having thus noted what may be said about love, let us turn to the opposite feeling, and see what may be written under the influence of hate.

'Ungracious offspring of hellish brood, whome heavens permit for a plague, and the earth nourisheth as a peculiar mischiefe, monster of mankinde and devourer of men, what may I tearme thee? With what illsounding titles maie I raise myselfe upon thee? Thou scorne of the world, and not scorne but worldes foule disdaine, and enemie of all humaine condition, shall thy villanies scape for ever unpunished? Will the earth yet support thee, the clouds shadow thee, or the aire breath on thee? What lawes be these, if at leastwise such may be tearmed lawes, whereout so vile a wretch hathe so manie evasions? But shalt thou longer live to become the vexation and griefe of men? No; for I protest, though the lawes doe faile thee, myselfe will not overslip thee. I, I am hee that will plague thee; thou shalt not scape me. I will be revenged of thee. Thinke not thy injuryes are so easie that they are of all to bee supported; for no sooner shall that partched, withered carkasse of thine sende foorth thy hatefull and abhorred lookes into anie publicke shew, but mine eyes shall watch thee and I will not leave thee till I have prosequuted that which I have intended towardes thee, most unworthie as thou art to breath amongst men, which art hated and become lothsome even in the verie bowels and thoughtes of men. Triumph, then, in thy mischiefes, and boast that thou hast undone mee and a number of others, whom with farre lesse despight thou hast forced to bende unto thee; and when by due deserte I shall have payed what I have promised thee, vaunt then (in God's name) of thy winnings. For my part--but I will saie no more, let the end trie all. Live wretchedlie and die villainouslie, as thou hast deserved, whome heavens hencefoorth doe shunne, and the world denieth longer to looke upon.'

This is the model that Angel Day, in his 'English Secretary' (1590), thinks suitable for 'a hot enraged spirit' to write to his adversary.

Most persons at some time in their lives are called upon to write letters of condolence, but it is usually found to be a difficult task. However well the writer may succeed, he must feel how inadequate words are to give relief to a troubled spirit, and it is only insomuch as he shows his own heart and sympathy that he is successful in his attempt. When Alexander Lindsay, Earl of Balcarres, died, a few months before the Restoration, Charles II., who was then at Bruxelles, wrote the following kindly letter to the widow, Lady Anna Mackenzie:--

'Madame,--I hope you are so well persuaded of my kindness to you as to believe that there can no misfortune happen to you and I not have my share in it. I assure you I am troubled at the loss you have had; and I hope that God will be pleased to put me into such a condition before it be long, as I may let you see the care I intend to have of you and your children, and that you may depend upon my being very truly, madame, 'Your affectionate, CHARLES R.'

Letters of thanks are frequently difficult things to write well, as it is a hard matter to appear grateful for the present of something that we do not want. Talleyrand made a practice of instantly acknowledging the receipt of books sent to him; for he could then express the pleasure he expected to enjoy in reading the volume, but if he delayed he thought it would be necessary to give an opinion, and that might sometimes be embarrassing. A celebrated botanist used to return thanks somewhat in the following form:--'I have received your book, and shall lose no time in reading it.' The unfortunate author might put his own construction on this rather ambiguous language. When Southey published his 'Doctor' anonymously, he gave directions to his publishers to send all letters directed for the author to Theodore Hook, and the following letter from Southey himself was found among Hook's papers:--

'SIR,--I have to thank you for a copy of the "Doctor," &c., bearing my name imprinted in rubrick letters on the reverse of the title-page. That I should be gratified by this flattering and unusual distinction you have rightly supposed; and that the book itself would amuse me by its wit, tickle me by its humour, and afford me gratification of a higher kind in its serious parts, is what you cannot have doubted. Whether my thanks for this curiosity in literature will go to the veteran in literature,[59] who of all living men is the most versed, both in curious and fine letters; whether they will cross the Alps to an old incognito,[60] who has the stores of Italian poetry at command; whether they will find the author in London,[61] surrounded with treasures of ancient and modern art, in an abode as elegant as his own volumes; or wheresoever the roving shaft which is sure to reach its mark may light, the personage, be he friend, acquaintance or stranger, to whose hands it comes is assured that his volumes have been perused with great pleasure by his obliged and obedient servant,

'ROBERT SOUTHEY.'

One of the most elegant letters of thanks we have met with is now before us. It was written by Lord Lytton soon after the publication of his 'Zanoni.'

'DEAR SIR,--I am extremely pleased and flattered by the attention with which you have read, and the marks of approval with which you have honoured, "Zanoni." Allow me to wish to yourself a similar compliment from some reader as courteous and as accomplished as yourself, you will then judge of the gratification you have afforded to your very truly obliged, E. B. LYTTON.'

Begging letters are hardly a branch of literature, although great ingenuity is frequently exhibited in their composition; but a sufficient number of them can be seen in the 'Mendicity Society's Reports.' W. F., the author of the 'Enemy of Idlenesse,' 1621, gives the following directions how to ask a favour:--

'As concerning the manner how to demand temporall things, as a booke, a horse, or such like, the letter must be divided into foure partes. First, wee must get the goodwill of him to whome wee write by praising his liberality, and specially of the power and authority that hee hath to grant the thing that hee is demanded. Secondly, wee must declare our demand and request to bee honest and necessary, and without the which wee cannot atchieve our determinate end and purpose. Thirdly, that the request is easie to be granted considering his ability, and that in a most difficult thing his liberality is ordinarily expressed. Fourthly, to promise recompence; as thankes, service, &c.'

Some men have very obdurate hearts, and will not be moved by any such language. Jeffrey had a form of refusal which must have been very tantalizing to his correspondents. He managed to bring the sentence 'I have much pleasure in subscribing' to the end of the first page, and then added, on the opposite side, 'myself, yours faithfully, F. Jeffrey.'

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