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of population, he cites Mr. Clay, "one of the most enlightened men of the Union, and one of the most ardent defenders of slavery."

In 1315, Louis the Tenth made all men free who touched the soil of France, but Louis the Thirteenth introduced slavery into the French colonies. Formerly the Spanish slaves were better treated than others, but now, in point of cruelty, "Spanish slavery can only be compared to the American." He thinks the revolts and escapes show that the slaves are not happy, and quotes Mr. Humboldt, who says he has studied their condition where the laws and national habits tend to ameliorate their lot, but goes back with the same horror of slavery as when he first quitted Europe. It seems the American churches are not alone in their defence of the "patriarchal institution," for the seminary of Saint Esprit, in which most of the colonial clergy are educated for their functions, teaches the legitimacy of slavery and the slave-trade; "the religion of a nation seldom prevails over its interests," says Humboldt. "It is the philosophers, not the devotees, who agitate the question of slavery." He thinks emancipation works well in the British West Indies: the blacks have money in the savings bank; they join temperance societies, build churches, and fill them; they send money to the London Abolition Society, to promote their work; they send missionaries to Africa to preach Love and Liberty on their natal soil; crime decreases from year to year. He says there are three schemes of emancipation: 1. gradual and progressive; 2. general and graduated; 3. general and spontaneous. He recommends general and immediate emancipation.

In Chapter III. he gives a history of ancient colonization, by the Greeks, Romans, and Phoenicians; in Chapter IV. he proposes a reform of the French colonies; in Chapter V. he touches upon the condition of Algiers.

13.- Evangeline, a Tale of Acadie. By HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. Third Edition. Boston: Wm. D. Ticknor & Co. 1848. 16mo. pp. 163.

THIS is a beautiful poem in Hexameter verse, and relates the adventures of a young French maiden - Evangeline — a native of Acadie. The English destroy the French settlement of Grand Pré, and carry off the inhabitants, who are scattered over the continent. Evangeline gets separated from her lover, Gabriel, and after seeking him in all the French settlements, from the great lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, becomes a sister of charity in Philadelphia. She discovers him in a hospital, sick, and too feeble to speak. He dies in her arms, and she soon joins him in the world where there is no separation.

The poem is full of beauties—now of description, or of senti

ment, and occasionally of thought. The rhythmic movement is generally slight, but sometimes more emphatic, and sometimes sinking almost to prose. The measure seems wholly congenial to the author's mind; the sound "an echo to the sense." We give a few specimens.

Many a farewell word and sweet goodnight on the door-step
Lingered long in Evangeline's heart, and filled it with gladness.

Carefully then were covered the embers that glowed on the hearthstone,
And on the oaken stairs resounded the tread of the farmer.

Soon with a soundless step the foot of Evangeline followed.
Up the staircase moved a luminous space in the darkness,

Lighted less by the lamp than the shining face [form?] of the maiden." — p. 46.

"Friends they sought and homes; and many despairing, heart-broken,
Asked of the earth but a grave, and no longer a friend or a fireside.
Written their history stands on tablets of stone in the churchyard,
Long among them was seen a maiden who waited and wandered,
Lowly and meek in spirit and patiently suffering all things.
Fair was she and young; but, alas! before her extended,
Dreary and vast and silent the desert of life, with its pathway
Marked by the graves of those who had sorrowed and fallen before her,
Passions long extinguished, and hopes long dead and abandoned,
As the emigrant's way o'er the Western desert is marked by
Camp-fires long consumed, and bones that bleach in the sunshine.
Something there was in her life incomplete, imperfect, unfinished;
As if a morning of June, with all its music and sunshine,
Suddenly paused in the sky, and, fading, slowly descended
Into the East again, from whence it late had arisen.

Sometimes she lingered in towns, till, urged by the fever within her,
Urged by a restless longing, the hunger and thirst of the spirit,

She would commence again her endless search and endeavour;

Sometimes in churchyards strayed and gazed on the crosses and tombstones,

Sat by some nameless grave, and thought that perhaps in its bosom

He was already at rest, and she longed to slumber beside him." —p. 84 – 86.

"STILL stands the forest primeval; but far away from its shadow, Side by side, in their nameless graves, the lovers are sleeping, Under the humble walls of the little Catholic churchyard,

In the heart of the city, they lie, unknown and unnoticed.

Daily the tides of life go ebbing and flowing beside them,

Thousands of throbbing hearts, where theirs are at rest and for ever,
Thousands of aching brains, where theirs no longer are busy,

Thousands of toiling hands, where theirs have ceased from their labors, Thousands of weary feet, where theirs have completed the journey." - pp. 161, 162.

We would only remind the author that the chestnut-tree does not grow in Acadie, that hoop-tire was not known among its inhabitants, and that no orchard is found bending with golden fruit," in that region, in the month of November. American readers may well thank the author for a poem so wholly American in its incidents, its geography, and its scenery. We cannot but think it will add to the well-earned fame of its accomplished author. It has reached three editions in a few days, and we trust will soon reach many more.

14.

Essays by R. W. Emerson. First Series. New Edition. Boston: James Munroe & Company. 1847. pp. vi and 333.

12mo.

THIS new edition contains some poetic matters not in the earlier impression.

15.- The Principles of Nature and her divine Revelations, and a Voice to Mankind by and through Andrew Jackson Davis, "the Poughkeepsie Seer" and "clairvoyant." In three parts. New York. 1847. pp. XXIV and 782.

THIS book consists of three parts. 1. "The Key," containing several remarks on the condition of society in past and present times. 2. "The Revelation," containing an account of the origin and nature of the Universe, including man, and 3. "The Applica tion," which contains an "analysis of society," a statement of its evils, and their remedy. The work treats of many important matters in physical, social, and theological science. If it had appeared as the production of some scholar, writing after much reading and careful study, it would be thought a remarkable production. Very remarkable, considering the variety of matters discussed, the boldness, largeness of mind, and general intelligence displayed therein. Many things in the book are fantastic, many statements incorrect. If it were the work of any man not twenty-one years of age, composed under the most favorable circumstances, it would still be an extraordinary book, perhaps the most extraordinary in the world. But the lectures of which the work is composed were delivered by Mr. Davis while in a state of mesmeric excitement, written down and published from his dictation while in that state. The only alterations made by the scribe were the omission of redundant words, and corrections of false syntax, for Mr. Davis is an uneducated man, who cannot speak his native tongue with common accuracy. What adds to the wonder is, that the author had no acquaintance with literature or science. The editors claim that he had access to the "second sphere of human existence," and there in part obtained his knowledge in a manner not possible except in this state of trance. We see no reason for doubting the integrity of the author or his editors; they may be mistaken. They can hardly be dishonest. Shall we suppose Mr. Davis had read Dr. Lardner's Lectures, the "Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation," the works of Swedenborg and Fourier, which have been circulated so extensively and in a form so cheap-and that in the intense excitement of the mesmeric state he reproduced what

he had formerly read, in this strange form, and with additions of his own? Shall it be said that the minds of living men through sympathy impressed themselves upon him in that excitement, and he in that manner acquired his information? His editors deny both of these suppositions; they do not claim that he is infallible-and there are many and great errors in the book; they claim nothing miraculous in his case-only that his ideas came from "the second sphere of human existence." It is certainly extraordinary that so young a man, with no education, who had never attended any school half a year in his whole life, without acquaintance with scientific works, should dictate so remarkable a work. It must then be referred to the same class with the works of Böhme, Fox, Swedenborg, and the whole host of mystical writers who wrote, more or less, in the state of ecstacy or trance. Very little is known respecting that state, and we hope the appearance of this work, and the frankness and coolness with which its claims are made to so remarkable an origin, will provoke a discussion of the whole matter. Viewed as one will, the book is one of the most remarkable literary curiosities ever heard of.

16. A Summer in the Wilderness; embracing a Canoe Voyage up the Mississippi and around Lake Superior. By CHARLES LANMAN, Author of " Essays for Summer Hours," etc. York: D. Appleton & Co. 1847. 16mo. pp. 208.

New

THE subject of this book is sufficiently explained by the titlepage. The ground passed over, it will be seen, is most interesting. We are sorry, however, that Mr. Lanman, in writing his travels, has chosen rather to indulge in general reflections and sentiment, than to bring before his own mind, and thus before his readers, the characteristic features of the country and its inhabitants.

17.- Two Years in the Ministry; or, Farewell Discourses, comprising, 1. Views of the Nature and Sources of true Christian Theology; and 2. Views of the Nature of the Christian Religion, and Salvation by Christ. By JAMES RICHARDSON, JR., A. M. Boston: Crosby & Nichols. 1847. 8vo. pp. 58.

THE object of the first of these discourses is to show "the necessity of making Theology an exact science, based upon Reason and Nature, accordant with the facts and realities of the Universe," and that there is no incompatibility between Religion and Science. The second, on the other hand, guards against the

danger of supposing Religion and Salvation thereby to be "a mere intellectual belief in certain doctrines," and insists "that Religion is wholly a practical matter- a thing of the life."

Zeno

18.—ΖΕΝΟΦΩΝΤΟΣ ΑΠΟΜΝΗΜΟΝΕΥΜΑΤΑ. phon's Memorabilia of Socrates. With notes by R. D. C. ROBBINS, Librarian of Andover Theological Seminary. Andover. 1848. pp. x and 417. 12mo.

In the text the industrious and accomplished editor has followed mainly the valuable edition of Kühner. The text occupies one hundred and sixty-eight pages. The notes and indices two hundred and forty-seven pages. The text is printed in a neat and clear type. The notes are full and minute, indicating careful and exact study on the editor's part. So far as we have been able to examine them they are accurate and valuable, but rather too full and learned for the use of lads in the lower classes at college, while they contain mere grammatical remarks, which the advanced scholar will not need. However, if this fulness of annotation be an error it is one on the right side. There is an English and a Greek index-both of which are mainly designed to guide the reader to a knowledge of the grammatical peculiarities of the author. This volume, so carefully prepared, is one of the numerous signs of the increased attention paid to the study of the classics.

19 - Human Knowledge: a Discourse delivered before the Massachusetts Alpha of the Phi Beta Kappa Society, at Cambridge, Aug. 26th, 1847. By GEO. P. MARSH. Boston: Little & Brown. 1847. 8vo. pp. 42.

THE subject of Mr. Marsh's address is the position and duties of the American Scholar. "With us," he says, "the pursuit of knowledge is the task of youth, or the recreation of maturity and age, rather than the stated occupation of a class." In contrast with the scanty period usually allotted to its pursuit, he reviews the immense extension of the field of science in our day; the advances made in Philology, Mathematics, Physics, History, Politics, Art, Philosophy, and Theology. In spite of improved methods, "the patrimony of knowledge has now become so wide, that none can hope to possess it in its full extent." We are reminded, however, that knowledge is not a mere aggregate of facts. "It is a mistake to suppose that all mental acquisition implies mental culture. Facts without end may be learned, familiarized, forgotten again, and leave the mind at last more inept than they found it.

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