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throws upon the proper treatment of the mythological period, and for the due estimation of the political institutions, as for the narrative of the historical events; and which, after all the admirable special works on Greek antiquities, must be considered as forming an epoch in Grecian histories.

Acting on the principle, Boni judicis est ampliare jurisdic'tionem, Mr. Grote accompanies his political history with a survey of the contemporary movements in literature and science. In the volumes before us he accordingly describes the elegiac and lyric poets who intervened between the early epic poetry and Pindar; and he also devotes a chapter to the Ionic and Eleatic philosophers, and the obscure topic of Pythagoras. We trust that he will continue these surveys throughout the whole period of his history; and in particular that, when their time comes, he will give us not only an analysis, but an estimate of the political philosophy of Plato and Aristotle.

The recent histories of Bishop Thirlwall and Mr. Grote, together with the chronological work of Mr. Clinton, have gone far towards repaying the debt which we owe to Germany for so much light shed upon antiquity. We have seen likewise, with much satisfaction, the announcement of a new history of Grecian literature, by so judicious and accomplished a scholar as Colonel Mure. There is, however, one department of Greek antiquity which is still imperfectly explored, and which we would gladly see illustrated by an English hand. Greek literature and Greek philosophy have each found their historians; but the efforts of the Greeks in the physical and mathematical sciences, and their knowledge generally of outward nature, have never received a systematic treatment. Ample materials, indeed, exist in scattered works, and in commentaries upon single writers; but a connected view is still a desideratum. It is still from Lord Bacon's writings that the modern view of the Greek Physics is generally taken. Bacon had a great task to accomplish-to overthrow the defective method of investigating Nature, established by the prevailing scholastic philosophy, and to substitute an improved method. All existing sciences were, as he truly said, derived from the Greeks*; and he attributed to the same origin the barren and unprofitable mode of philosophising which had grown up under the empire of the scholastic system. Hence his attention was almost exclusively turned to the worst parts of Greek science-such as the Physics of Aristotle, which was the manual still used in the schools; and he did not attach

Scientiæ, quas habemus, ferè a Græcis fluxerunt. Quæ enim scriptores Romani, aut Arabes, aut recentiores addiderunt, non multa, aut magni momenti sunt: et qualiacunque sint, fundata sunt super basin eorum quæ inventa sunt a Græcis.' Nov. Org. i. 71.

sufficient weight to those branches of science, as geometry, mechanics, astronomy, medicine, and natural history, in which their positive researches had borne abundant fruit. His acquaintance, moreover, with the Greek language and literature was, like that of his most learned countrymen in the time of Elizabeth and James I., very limited. The same unfavourable view of the Greek Physics is however taken by the most approved modern writers on the history of the natural sciences. They represent the physical philosophy of the Greeks as an entire failure. It appears to us that this estimate of the Greek Physics is not founded on a just appreciation of the case. In the first place, it does not sufficiently recognise the important fact that the Greeks first conceived the idea of physical science, and laid the foundation of a system of positive researches into the different departments of outward nature. The observations of the Chaldeans at Babylon, though of very early date, had never, in their own country, been made the foundation of any astronomical science. In the next place, it takes no note of those branches of science in which the Greeks accumulated a store of observed facts, and reduced them to a scientific form. We are fully sensible of the immense progress which the physical sciences have made since the time of Bacon; and we are very far from undervaluing that philosophy which has so greatly enlarged our intellectual horizon in the realm of Nature. The moderns may, however, at the lofty elevation on which they stand, well afford to do full justice to the imperfect, though invaluable, efforts of their predecessors in the same field of inquiry.*

We subjoin, in a note, remarks on a few passages of ancient authors adverted to by Mr. Grote :

:

Vol. iii. p. 234. We suspect that the story as to the murder of the Carian men, cited from Herod. i. 146. is merely a legend explanatory of the real subsisting custom, for the Ionian wives not to eat with their husbands. Compare Mr. Grote's own remarks on a similar case, vol. iv. p. 268., where the legend is repeated by Justin, i. 7.

Page 312. The Cimmerians of the Odyssey appear to us to be purely mythical. They belong, in our judgment, to the same class as the Phæacians, Læstrygones, Lotophagi, and other imaginary races in that poem. See vol. i. p. 336.

Page 432. In the passage of Strabo, the words karà Kvažápŋ, ovтoS dè Toν Mýdwr, are, we think, an interpolation, suggested by the fact that Psammetichus and Cyaxares were cotemporaries. See Herod. i. 105, 106. Mr. Grote's explanation with regard to the name of Inarus in this passage is satisfactory.

Vol. iv. p. 170. We agree with Dr. Thirlwall in thinking that the passage of Aristotle cannot be construed as it stands. If Aristotle

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Currer Bell's Shirley.'

6

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ART. V. Shirley: a Tale. By CURRER BELL, Author of Jane Eyre.' Smith, Elder, and Co.

6

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THE HE gallant suggestion of our great Peasant Poet, that Nature tried her 'prentice hand' on Man, before venturing on the finer task of fashioning Woman, has not yet found acceptance otherwise than as a sportive caprice of fancy-the

had meant to say that slaves were made citizens, he would have used the word ἠλευθέρωσε, not ἐφυλέτευσε, which latter word is applicable only to freemen not yet admitted into a tribe. Slaves must be emancipated before they can receive political franchises. It appears to us that the word douλove ought to be expunged.

Vol. v. p. 63. If Mr. Grote is right in reading Kavaì in the passage of Herodotus, we would rather understand unarmed hands,'hands 'with nothing in their grasp.' In i. 73. the same expression is applied to persons returning empty-handed from the chase.

Page 150. We agree with Dr. Arnold about the meaning of ai dúo in Thucydides.

Vol. vi. p. 57. We think that in the passage of Thucydides dikat ¿ñò ovμẞóλv are meant, and in p. 132. we cannot accede to the proposed interpretation of Aristophanes. We agree, however, in rejecting the hypothesis that the words of Thucydides refer to the same incident as that mentioned in the jocular account of the comic poet.

Page 147. (cf. p. 104.) The remark of Pericles on the Mègarian decree is unjust. The Spartan xenelasia was inhospitable, but inflicted no positive harm upon foreigners. Their necessities could not take them to Sparta. But the Megarians, by being prevented from trading with all places under Athenian rule, were virtually subjected to a blockade,--they were half-starved: see p. 184.

Page 338. Dionysius de Thucyd. Jud. c. 17. cannot understand why Thucydides should report at length the speeches in the second debate on the Mytilenæan question, and not those in the first. Mr. Grote suggests that he may have been partly influenced in this preference by his dislike for Cleon. It appears to us that the superior importance of the second debate - which really decided the question -affords a natural and satisfactory explanation of the historian's choice.

Page 377. We cannot assent to Mr. Grote's construction of the obscure clause τὸ δ ̓ ἐμπλήκτως ὀξὺ, &c. We are disposed, to follow three MSS. which read ἀσφάλεια δὲ τοῦ ἐπιβουλεύσασθαι· τὸ and Tou were identical in the writing of Thucydides, and the passage may have been misunderstood by those who first modernised the orthography. Thus in Soph. Ed. T. 1279, aiμarovc is the right reading, where the MSS. read aïparos. These words form, we think, the subject of the proposition, and mean 'safety in concerting measures against an enemy.' How to construe the predicate is less obvious: we admit that ȧπоrρоn elsewhere always has an active sense:

sort of playful resignation of superiority which threw Samson at the feet of Dalilah, and made Hercules put aside his strength,

Spinning with Omphale,—and all for Love!'

Men in general, when serious and not gallant, are slow to admit woman even to an equality with themselves; and the prevalent opinion certainly is that women are inferior in respect of intellect. This opinion may be correct. The question is a delicate one. We very much doubt, however, whether sufficient data exist for any safe or confident decision. For the position of women in society has never yet been-perhaps never can be such as to give fair play to their capabilities. It is true, no doubt, that none of them have yet attained to the highest eminence in the highest departments of intellect. They have had no Shakspeare, no Bacon, no Newton, no Milton, no Raphael, no Mozart, no Watt, no Burke. But while this is admitted, it is surely not to be forgotten that these are the few who have carried off the high prizes to which millions of Men were equally qualified by their training and education to aspire, and for which, by their actual pursuits, they may be held to have been contending; while the number of Women who have had either the benefit of such training, or the incitement of such pursuits, has been comparatively insignificant. When the bearded competitors were numbered by thousands, and the smooth-chinned by scores, what was the chance of the latter? Or with what reason could their failure be ascribed to their inferiority as a class?

Nevertheless, with this consideration distinctly borne in mind, we must confess our doubts whether women will ever rival men in some departments of intellectual exertion; and especially in those which demand either a long preparation, or a protracted effort of pure thought. But we do not, by this, prejudge the question of superiority. We assume no general organic inferiority; we simply assert an organic difference. Women, we are entirely disposed to admit, are substantially equal in the aggregate worth of their endowments: But equality does not imply identity. They may be equal, but not exactly alike. Many of their endowments are specifically different. Mentally as well as bodily there seem to be organic diversities; and these must

but this circumstance is not of much weight, as the substantives of this form oscillate between the active and passive meanings. Thus τροπή, εκτροπή, and παρατροπή are both active and passive; ἀνατροπή, ἐπιτροπή, and προτροπή are active; while ἐντροπή, περιτροπή, and προστροπή, with its adjective προστρόπαιος, are passive. On the whole, we incline to believe that Thucydides here uses the word to signify detrectatio.

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make themselves felt, whenever the two sexes come into competition.

are

The grand function of woman, it must always be recollected, is, and ever must be, Maternity: and this we regard not only as her distinctive characteristic, and most endearing charm, but as a high and holy office-the prolific source, not only of the best affections and virtues of which our nature is capable, but also of the wisest thoughtfulness, and most useful habits of observation, by which that nature can be elevated and adorned. But with all this, we think it impossible to deny, that it must essentially interfere both with that steady and unbroken application, without which no proud eminence in science can be gainedand with the discharge of all official or professional functions that do not admit of long or frequent postponement. All women are intended by Nature to be mothers; and by far the greater number-not less, we suppose, than nine tenths called upon to act in that sacred character; and, consequently, for twenty of the best years of their lives-those very years in which men either rear the grand fabric or lay the solid foundations of their fame and fortune-women are mainly occupied by the cares, the duties, the enjoyments and the sufferings of maternity. During large parts of these years, too, their bodily health is generally so broken and precarious as to incapacitate them for any strenuous exertion; and, health apart, the greater portion of their time, thoughts, interests, and anxieties ought to be, and generally are, centered in the care and the training of their children. But how could such occupations consort with the intense and unremitting studies which seared the eyeballs of Milton, and for a time unsettled even the powerful brain of Newton? High art and science always require the whole man; and never yield their great prizes but to the devotion of a life. But the life of a woman, from her cradle upwards, is otherwise devoted: and those whose lot it is to expend their best energies, from the age of twenty to the age of forty, in the cares and duties of maternity, have but slender chances of carrying off these great prizes. It is the same with the high functions of statesmanship, legislation, generalship, judgeship, and other elevated stations and pursuits, to which some women, we believe, have recently asserted the equal pretensions of their sex. Their still higher and indispensable functions of maternity afford the answer to all such claims. What should we do with a leader of opposition in the seventh month of her pregnancy? or a general in chief who at the opening of a campaign was doing as well as could be expected'? or a chief justice with twins?*

* Plato, indeed, argues that women should be trained to exercises