Second Memoir of the Rev. Edward Bickersteth, late Rector of Walton, Herts. NONE can read this ably written Memoir without the highest order of instruction and refreshment. It delineates the character of one of the most beloved of men, who maintained an eminent spirituality with rare practical sagacity and benevolent activity. Differing widely as we do both from Mr. Bickersteth and his biographer in ecclesiastical questions, and in some points of Christian doctrine, and entertaining our own views of the comparative excellencies of the particular type of character to which the late rector of Walton belonged, we can assure our readers that in in these volumes they will find much to admire, and more to love. The earlier portions are highly instructive to parents; and they present a fine model for young men employed in offices and chambers. Much of the calmness and real power of Mr. Bickersteth's influence was secured by the habit, commenced while young and carried on through life, of acting by method, and faithfully reviewing his course. We have seldom read so well-written a biography, or one which so well deserved to be written in the best manner. The last chapter, headed 'Last Illness and Death,' is a lovely picture of an English Christian family watching the departure of of its revered head into the world of spirits. We greatly admire the modest and chaste simplicity with which the character of Mr. Bickersteth is summed up, and the faithfulness of the biographer to his last injunction-Let it be made clear that my only ground of confidence is the Lord Jesus Christ-Christ first, Christ last, Christ all in all'-words of deep significancy as the dying wish of one who knew so well what they meant, and who himself meant so much by using them. The Ragged School Union Magazine, Vol. III. London: THIS magazine is one of the most truly noble monuments of wise and practical philanthropy of which our country can boast. We rejoice to observe that at the close of last year there were, in London alone, 102 schools, having under instruction 10,861 Sunday scholars, 6021 weekday scholars, 5572 in evening classes, 2062 in industrial classes; instructed by 1341 voluntary and 180 paid teachers, and having room for 17,010 scholars. The increase in five years has been most remarkable— from 20 schools, 200 teachers, and 200 children, to the large number we have just stated. Nearly 400 boys and girls have emigrated, and accounts of the most satisfactory kind have been received of their proceedings in the colonies. Many other efficient provisions for destitute children have sprung from this institution. Similar schools and unions abound in Liverpool, Manchester, Edinburgh, and most of our large cities and towns. We sincerely hope that this publication, which is full of interest to the Christian and humane, will be so encouraged as not only to defray its own expenses, but to leave a surplus for the funds of the union in its self-denying labours. It is conducted in a very able manner, and we most cheerfully give it our best commendation. The Gospel and the Great Apostacy; or, Popery contrasted with pure THIS essay is well fitted to answer the design of the Society by which it is published. The arrangement is skilful; the tone calm, sober, and serious; and it differs advantageously from many publications on the same side of the grand controversy, by promoting self-reflection as to the extent in which we may be entangled in these errors.' The writer analyzes and defines Popery with care; intelligently traces its historical origin; lucidly states the conditions of the argument between Popery and pure Christianity; ably refutes the main errors of the Roman Church; denounces its maxims and practices as opposed to the moral law; and portrays its character and its doom in the language of inspired prophets. His positions are ably maintained and supported, both by texts of Scripture and by passages in the original languages from historical authorities. The work is written in a plain perspicuous style, and forms an admirable guide for those who desire to have at hand a compendious, simple, and trustworthy manual of Protestant principles. By John Divine Mercy; or, the Riches of Pardoning and Paternal Love. The Jerusalem Delivered of Torquato Tasso. Translated in the Metre of the Original. By the Rev. Charles Lessingham Smith, M.A., late Fellow and Mathematical Lecturer of Christ College, Cambridge. In two volumes. London: Longman and Co. 1851. THE admirers of Tasso will be glad to possess this skilful translation of his immortal poem in the metre of the original. The translator mentions Hoole and his Successors,' and renders full justice to the ancient structure,' and spirited and easy versification of Fairfax as a work never likely to vanish from English literature. That version, which Dryden pronounced superior in harmony to Spenser, and which Waller studied for its melodious numbers, was republished with a life of Tasso, and likewise a life of Fairfax, some years ago. Since that time, an elegant version in English Spenserian verse has been produced by Mr. Wiffen, librarian to the Duke of Bedford, of which Mr. Smith, in his preface, makes no mention. We regret the absence of a biography of Tasso, of notes, and of an index. The attempt of the translator to give the Gerusalemme Liberata' in Tasso's metre, and in such language as the great Italian poet would have used had he been writing English, appears to us to be justified by success. The verses flow on with easy music in harmonious numbers, and in gracefully selected words, sufficiently modern to forego the need of a glossary, yet tinged with as much of the antique as well beseems so old a poem. The Shrines and Sepulchres of the Old and New World: Records of Pilgrimages in Many Lands, and Researches connected with the Histories of Places remarkable for Memorials of the Dead, or Monuments of a Sacred Character; including Notices of the Funeral Customs of the Principal Nations, Ancient and Modern. By R. R. Madden, M.R.I.A. volumes. London: Newby. 1851. In two HOWEVER funereal the title of these volumes, the author's intention is not to minister to a morbid melancholy, but, by bringing together the sepulchral rites of various nations, to make literature the vehicle of wholesome thoughts amid the absorbing cares which are too continuously bowing down men's hearts beneath the load of material and momentary interests in their hasty journey to the grave. He has yielded to the propensities of early life for ramblings among tombs and ruins, indulged in later years in wanderings of a wider range, and with ampler opportunities for making researches of this kind than fall to the lot of the generality of men to do.' The qualifications which he is conscious of bringing to this work may be said to end there. The book is badly arranged, and the composition is worse than the arrangement. As a compilation of extracts, it evinces some diligence but not much judgment, and more supersitition than good taste. It is, perhaps, not unnatural in a gentleman of the author's country and religious profession to believe the trumpery which he sets forth in these volumes as authentic history, to trifle with the masculine free spirit of the British nation as though it were a mere party prejudice, to bewail the departure of medieval reverences for the dead, and to hope for the revival of such obsolete modes of honouring virtue and religion. It is too late. The institutions, creeds, ceremonies, and priesthoods of superstition have passed away, and are passing away. It is a vain thing to enshrine their memory, to adorn their sepulchres. The world will forget them as it becomes wiser, or look upon them as the fallen leaves which prepare the soil for healthier growths. It is with men's works, and not with their graves, that enlightened humanity will sympathize; with the immortal, rather than the mortal; with the spiritual in preference to the picturesque; not with dust, and tombs, and epitaphs, but with souls, and principles, and deeds that cannot perish. Bible Fruit for Little Children; gathered by the Rev. E. Mannering. London: J. Snow. AN excellent little book, intended for those who are beginning to think, and admirably suited for their instruction. The lovely spirit of the Christian parent breathes in every page, while the elements of true wisdom are ministered in their simplest and most intelligible form. Louisa. From the German of Voss. By James Cochrane, translator of 'Herman and Dorothea,' from the German of Goethe. Edinburgh : Johnstone and Hunter. London: Theobald. 1852. A PLEASING translation of a charming poem universally admired in Ger many. The Tagus and the Tiber; or, Notes of Travel in Portugal, Spain, and Italy, in 1850-1. By William Edward Baxter. In two volumes. London: Bentley. 1852. Two MR. BAXTER is an experienced traveller and writer of travels. years ago he published his Impressions of Central and Southern Europe,' and now he has improved the leisure hours of winter evenings in embodying the recollections of another long journey. The variety of the scenes -the graphic descriptions-the lively anecdotes-the acute and just observations which fill these volumes render them very attractive; and the social and political reflections contained in the last six chapters on the Papal Territories, the Political Condition of Italy, the Political Influence of Roman Catholicism, The Land Question at Home and Abroad, and on the Education of the People, make them as practically instructive as they are rationally entertaining. We can readily forgive a little occasional fine writing in volumes with which we have been so much pleased and instructed. We hope they will be widely circulated. Discourses on Some of the Most Difficult Texts of Scripture. By the Rev. James Cochrane, A.M., &c. Edinburgh: Paton and Ritchie. WE are far from thinking that all Mr. Cochrane's explanations are the best that could be given; most of them are mere reiterations of the usual arguments on behalf of the rigid Calvinism of the Westminster Confession. In the last three discourses, there is an oversight of the particular kind of sin declared to be unpardonable-blasphemy-which, if examined, would have prevented much commonplace obscurity and unsatisfactory exposition. Those who desire a critical, exegetical, and independent discussion of the difficulties surrounding the texts on which the discourses of this volume are based, must seek them elsewhere. For popular preaching, especially in Scotland, these discourses are fair specimens of the mode in which such matters are dealt with, and they will, on the whole, be edifying to a large class of readers. A Dictionary of the French and English Languages. In Two Parts. I. French-English.-II, English-French. With a Vocabulary of Proper Names, for the Use of Schools and for General Reference. By Gabriel Surenne, F.A.S.E., &c. &c. Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd. London: Simpkin and Marshall. A GOOD Companion, not only to the student, but to the traveller in France. Poems illustrative of Grace, Creation, Suffering. By the Rev. Richard Sinclair Brooke, A.B. Dublin: McGlashan. London: Seeleys. 1852. THESE poems are of varied merit, yet all imbued with a cultivated taste, and many of them animated by a fine national spirit. They exhibit traces of delicate observation, tender sentiment, felicitous command of language, and a healthy tone of religious feeling, without any tinge of sectarian bigotry. A Vindication of the Church of England, in reply to the Right Hon. Viscount Fielding, on his recent secession to the Church of Rome. By the Rev. R. W. Morgan, Perpetual Curate of Tregynon, Montgomeryshire, author of The Verities of the Church,' &c. London: Rivington. 1851. AN able vindication of what is true, somewhat enfeebled, in our eyes, by a vein of theological error, which is one of the surest tendencies towards the Church to which Lord Fielding has seceded. Let our readers judge by such sentences as the following:-The vicegerent of Christ is the Holy Ghost, sacramentally given-first, in holy baptism, once for all, for justification from original sin, through the blood of Christ; secondly, as a perpetual fount of remission of personal sin and renewal of life in the Holy Eucharist.' The ecclesiastical, or outward Church, consists of all persons rightly baptized, holding the apostolical Scriptures for the canon of faith, and living under the sacramental ministrations of the apostolic succession.'! With the exception of these notions-common to the Church of England with the Church of Rome-we are bound to speak with commendation of this volume, as ably sustaining, in the way of argumentum ad hominem, the superior claims of the Church of England. The author avowedly treats this question 'entirely in an ecclesiastical point of view,' in a calm, courteous, and respectful tone, which we cannot but admire. Analysis and Critical Interpretation of the Hebrew Text of the Book of Genesis, preceded by a Hebrew Grammar, and Dissertations on the Genuineness of the Pentateuch and on the Structure of the Hebrew Language, By the Rev. William Paul, A.M., Minister of Banchory Devenick, N. B. London and Edinburgh: Blackwoods. 1852. THIS beautifully printed volume has received our most careful attention. It is a great improvement on Robertson's Clavis Pentateuchi,' and constructed on the same plan with Bythner's Lyra Davideis.' It will be found very helpful to the student of the Hebrew Scripture, especially to such as do not enjoy the instructions of a living teacher. The grammar is based on that of Dr. Lee. The Dissertations prefixed are much more satisfactory, both in their spirit and in their conclusions, than many of the same order exhibiting a greater parade of scholarship. We shall be glad if this brief notice, which is all that we have room for, should secure for it the attention it so well deserves from Christian ministers of all denominations, on whom we shall not cease to urge, as is our wont, the earnest prosecution of these strictly Biblical studies. A Latin Grammar, containing: Part I, The Eaton Grammar, revised and corrected. Part II. A Second or Larger Grammar in English, for the Higher Classes in Schools, &c. By the Rev. J. T. White, A.M. of C.C., Oxford, &c. London: Longmans. 1852. MR. WHITE is the Junior Upper Master of Christ's Hospital, London, and favourably known as the able editor of Xenophon's Anabasis,' and other classical books. We could scarcely desire a more complete grammar for the work of teaching, or of private study, than the one now before us. The Syntax and the Prosody are both remarkably clear and full. |