for inordinate and unlawful influence may haply be just as rife among the quiet and modest English women of our day, though they would shrink in horror from being led thereby into such excesses as degraded the court of Louis XV.

There are two channels of influence most unhappily (as we think) open to our countrywomen in the present day whereby they may gratify the same unnatural love of power, whose evil effects we have been contemplating in France, and in its gratification work an amount of mischief nearly as great, though less revolting in its nature. The first of these is to be found in the vast preponderance of female writers in this country. No small share of the literature of these times is the production of women, especially that species of lighter compositions, which is by far the most universally read; and it is impossible to conceal from ourselves that by this means women do exercise a very important influence on the public mind. We have a fearful example of this within the last few years in France, where the writings of one womanthe celebrated George Sand-(Madame Dudevant)-have done more to corrupt society, than all the works more glaringly gross and profane of male writers.

It is in England, however, that this means of working on popular feeling is so completely at the mercy of feminine ambition; and it may be well to see whether it can in any case be a safe or legitimate exercise of their influence.

We must confess, at the risk of seeming prejudiced, that we have ourselves a strong antipathy to female writers. Without seeking to detract from the good intentions of many excellent women who have produced what are called "moral works" with untiring, we might even say with unsparing zeal, we do most positively hold as a theory that female authorship is a decided anomaly; there may of course be exceptional cases where, as a means of subsistence for themselves or others, writing may be an obvious duty in women; but in the abstract we assert that it is not, and cannot be, their legitimate province.

Woman has neither the clear intellect nor the sound judgment of man, and where she does possess these qualities in any eminent degree, they will be too completely under the ascendancy of her imagination, and, above all, her feelings, to admit of her conveying truths to the mind of others with any degree of justice or impartiality. But it is not so much that we judge women to be incapable of writing beneficially, which disposes us to maintain that the privilege of so doing is neither right nor fitting for them, as that we conceive it to be proved by demonstration, plain as any mathematical rule, that no such office was ever intended for them. This, we say, is plain from the fact that they must generally abandon their own proper duties in their households before they can even attempt to fulfil the requirements of authorship.

It is scarcely possible that a woman, in whatever station of life, should attend properly to her domestic concerns, giving that minute attention of every hour and moment to the enforcement of order and punctuality, so essential to a well-regulated house, and carry on at the same time the labours of the intellect. These last do not admit of being bound down to stated hours, nor may the even tenor of them be interrupted without great risk. How is it possible that the mistress of a household can obtain the time and the freedom requisite, without an obvious and pernicious neglect of the family, who depend on her for their comfort and well-being? the two offices are wholly incompatible; and the attempt to unite them has been proved to be too much for the strength even of the woman's bodily frame. Nor is it of wives and mothers only we would speak: it almost always happens that single women also, unless they live entirely alone, have some relations who look to them for the daily works of home charity, requisite to the peace and happiness of every household. It seems, however, a hopeless task to argue against female authorship in the present condition of English society. The leaven has spread too widely, and there remains but to seek at least to restrain it within close bounds. We should say then that if women must write, their most legitimate work would be in providing suitable reading for young children; although we would shrink from seeming to lessen the exceeding greatness of these little ones in His Eyes Who once lay a Holy Child upon His holy mother's knees, yet it does seem an unnecessary expenditure of masculine learning and vigour that it should be given to prepare the light food necessary for these innocent minds; and women may possibly, with some advantage, spare them a species of labour to which they will find it hard to bend their stronger minds. The writing of light works, designed solely to afford amusement, may also be in some respects a harmless channel for female talent. But this we do positively maintain, that they must in no case attempt either these or any other branches of literature, excepting under proper spiritual direction.

We have yet to speak of another medium of the abuse of female influence, but too sadly prevalent in England, is that the most presumptuous and reprehensible interference of women with the priest's office as regards the spiritual condition of the poor. It is an evil chiefly rife in country parishes, but by no means confined to these alone; and we verily believe there is not a corner of our land exempt from the influence of these self-elected female preachers, as the Quakers would aptly term them, who go about delivering amateur sermons to the wonderful havoc of ideas in the minds of their illiterate hearers, and without a thought as to whether the priest, the appointed shepherd of these sheep, is likely to approve their mode of teaching, or feel gratified by their unasked

assistance.

We have said elsewhere that it is a legitimate employment for women to attend to the temporal wants of the poor, but those ladies, so ecclesiastically ambitious, of whom we are speaking, seem generally to disdain this branch of usefulness, or at least to treat it quite as a secondary consideration, whilst they devote themselves with a most lamentable zeal to the spiritual necessities of their poorer brethren. We are fully convinced that all members of society will bear us witness to the extraordinary manner in which women arrogate to themselves duties devolving on the clergy only, and which no system of legislation, Divine or human, could ever have assigned to them.

We admit that this species of feminine and lay preaching is generally allied to sectarianism, because wholly opposed to Catholic teaching. But it is nevertheless most wofully prevalent amongst members of our own communion, and we are glad to have this opportunity of openly and utterly condemning it, whilst at the same time we would anxiously impress on our countrywomen that a blessed and holy work is open to them amongst the poor in the tender nursing of the sick and aged, and the solace of their bodily infirmities; this is essentially within their province, because not being the fitting work for a man, the priest will gladly place it in their hands, under due regulation.

We have left ourselves but little space to notice the second volume of this work, which, as we have said, presents to us the sentimental perversion of female influence, whilst the first displays its total abuse. It embraces the period of the revolution, and gives the lives of Marie Antoinette, Madame Roland, &c. Our author evidently thinks that the instances she gives us in this part of her book of the exercise of power by women may excite our admiration and approval, but we cannot admit that their influence was one whit more legitimate in the public field of action, in which we now find them engaged, and consequently it could not be more beneficial. The difference between them and the women of the preceding age was, that these were only mistaken, whilst the former were guilty; but their errors were not less errors because they expiated them on the scaffold, and we still find them here working out of their proper sphere and with other objects than the one which we have spoken of as alone lawful for them, which is to labour for the cause of truth by the gentle means entrusted to them by nature.

Our author would have us admire the women in the revolutionary prisons, because of the boldness with which they went to the death, and exhorted men to imitate their constancy and firmness; but she does not hide from us that they were thus brave before the guillotine, not like the virgin martyrs of old, because of the bright crown upheld by angels' hands which shone behind it, but from a vain ostentation of courage, truly heartsickening to contemplate in such an hour. Nor do we find them ever winning those men whom they

piqued into dauntlessness by their example, rather to seek the

κτημα ες αεί.

However much individually we may admire such women as Madame Roland, when considered as an example of female influence, we can only condemn the false and unduly active enthu siasm which made her the instigator of republicanism. Such interference on the part of a woman in the government of a people can never be justifiable. We do not exclude them from the feeling of patriotism, but it must be wholly passive; the result of its becoming a principle of action in the female mind is shown us in one terrible example-that of the murderess Charlotte Corday. To the honour of Religious Orders, be it noted that the noblest trait recorded in the book, is the anecdote of several nuns who preferred death to falsehood.

As a whole, the work is decidedly clever and interesting, full of research, and containing withal traces of very deep thought; but scarcely in its tone such as we should have expected from the author of "Madeleine."

PAMPHLETS OF THE MONTH.

IN returning to the notice of the various Publications called forth by the case of Mr. Gorham, the first place is due to Dr. Pusey's long expected treatise, "The Royal Supremacy not an arbitrary authority but limited by the laws of the Church of which kings are members" which, we regret, is still incomplete. One part only has appeared, containing a collection of ancient precedents, followed by two chapters on "the late judgment and its remedy," and "the Supreme Court and its remedy," together with a postscript in answer to Mr. Dodsworth and Archdeacon Hare. Mr. Dodsworth has since replied in "a letter to Dr. Pusey on the position which he has taken in the present crisis." He professes himself not satisfied with Dr. Pusey's postscript. He says, "I must express my decided belief that no one who has examined the matter for himself will venture to say that the only doctrine or portion of a doctrine impugned by this judgment is, that original sin is remitted to all infants in and by the grace of Baptism. In your recent publication, p. 226, you challenge me to show that more than this has been denied." We think this challenge unfortunate, for we are unable to affirm that more has not been denied; although we do not see that Mr. Dodsworth has proved anything further than that it is doubtful whether more has been denied or not, and Dr. Pusey says, p. 181, that his view is true, in the judgment of eminent lawyers. But, to our apprehension, this is not exactly the ques

tion; and we still maintain that those "who ought to know better" actually do know better than Mr. Dodsworth. We cannot assert that more has not been denied, because this denial involves the denial of more by necessary consequence; but we can assert that, if this be affirmed, all Mr. Gorham's statements are so absurdly inconsistent with it, that a Bishop would be as able as before to refuse institution to a Clergyman who adopted as his own doctrine any one of Mr. Gorham's heretical statements. To us Dr. Pusey's original statement is clearer than his reply to Mr. Dodsworth's objections. He says, p. 182, "The Privy Council did not even consider the subject of the grace of Baptism. It recites as Mr. Gorham's statement that he explicitly and expressly denied that he either held or persisted in holding that infants are not made in Baptism members of CHRIST, and the children of GOD, [his statement is even more than this; he denied that he did maintain that spiritual regeneration is not given or conferred in the holy Sacrament of Baptism, or, &c.] The point upon which the whole judgment turns is, whether the gifts bestowed by GOD in holy Baptism are given to all Infants. The question raised has not been as to the gift but as to the receiver. It is still to be true that some Infants coming to His holy Baptism, receive remission of their sins by spiritual regeneration; only, to some original sin in which the child is born, under which it lies, of which it is unconscious, is to be an obstacle to its own remission."

We are satisfied that an authoritative affirmation of the one point insisted on in the "Resolutions" would be sufficient to annihilate this judgment. It is true we should have afterwards to combat the strange misapprehensions (to use the mildest word we can) by which Mr. Gorham (or his defender, Mr. Goode), reconciles the statements he made on oath in both Courts, with the statements of his book, but then it was only contended that this one point was sufficient for the present. This judgment has been made the occasion for the public discussion of a vast number of questions, both of doctrine and practice, which can never be set at rest, except by being authoritatively determined or at least satisfactorily answered: but these must not be confounded with the effects of the judgment itself; and if our friends will not confine their exertions to the remedy of these in the first instance, we see no possibility of doing anything at all. Why should it be thought that we make light of evils, which it is the business of our life to contend against, because we are convinced that it is simply impossible to remedy them all at once? The effects of the judgment are two:-1. It has an effect on our doctrine which will be fatal if not remedied, and would be so by whatever authority it were introduced. 2. It is repugnant to the law of CHRIST that such an authority as the Queen or her privy council should be able to alter our doctrine at all, whether for better or for worse. This