poetry over the sceneries of our own virgin land as could Theocritus over the plains of Arcadia. But the wonderful resemblance to the style of Halleck, and the close similarity of the very volume of his poems with that of Halleck, produced in our wits the ineradicable crotchet that they were but two volumes produced by the different sides of the same soul.

The beautiful versification of Halleck, the most delicate and dreamy imagery, the satire that wakens not a pang but a smile in its object, the power not only of creating in the reader's mind a poetic conception, but of entrancing him with a poetic frame of feeling, are surpassed by no living poet. His "Marco Bozzaris" is none the less excellent because it has so touched the popular heart as to become trite. His "The world is bright before thee," is exquisite feeling in the most inimitable language. . . . We have the heart but not the room to say more.

(44.) "The Golden Age. By LUTHER W. PECK, A. M." (16mo., pp. 208. New York: E. Goodenough, 122 Nassau-street. 1859.) We have here a new and promising candidate for the poetic laurel, exercising his gift, in rich and copious style, upon one of the noblest subjects. The old Anacreontic poets chanted their uproarious eulogies of wine and revel. Yet they never made the nine Muses quaff the purple stream, nor tinged the cheeks of the Graces with an alcoholic glow. The true inspiring draught from the Castalian fount was "the bright and the sparkling water." And as his theme is thus exhilarating, our young author has expanded it with perhaps something of the true inspiration of the poet. The topic is wrought into a narrative and dramatic form of no little interest.

Here is a description scarce unworthy of the poet of the Seasons:

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Upon the evening breeze a whisper came

That answered Nay! 'Twas but the rising storm,
For soon an ashy cloud, that turned to black,
O'erspread the sky. The rapid lightning sprang
From peak to peak along the mountains blue,
And shook his quiver in his thunder-home.
The big drops fell, and wet with copious shower
The blooming gardens and the sheltered lawn,
And cooled the sultry street. The sun smiled out
As if through tears, and on the distant mist
A rainbow threw, one end of which did rest
Upon the battlement of heaven. And there
Cloud-wrapped, and gazing on the earth, appeared
An angel being with folded wing of fire,
Just come perchance from far Orion's suns,

Or flaming Sirius, to pause awhile

Within the orbit of our earth. And now

He seemed to stand, observant of the roar

Of river and distant cataract, and hum
Of cities teeming with a busy life,

Marked clearly by an angel's thrilling sense."

(45.) "Hypatia; or, New Foes with Old Faces. By CHARLES KINGSLEY, JUN., Rector of Evesley. Sixth Edition." (12mo., pp. 487. Boston: Crosby, Nichols, & Co. 1857.) In this, perhaps the most brilliant of Mr. Kingsley's productions, he maintains a triple aim; namely, to furnish the attractions of the ordinary romance in a skillful and well-managed narrative, to give a vivid

and truthful representation of a remarkable historical period, and to develop an exhibition of a great principle.

The first of these objects he attains by the display of an inventive power in the plot and incidents, by a racy dramatic life, by a vividness and burnish of style, and the most perfect mastery of all the resources of our flexile English tongue. Works like these are, in ordinary parlance, classed in the genus novel. But their species is widely divergent from that Rosa Matilda class which, with but the first of the above triple aims, rests satisfied with playing upon the fancy through the idle hours. To depict a remarkable age, and illustrate a master principle in a high-wrought fiction, is to furnish no ordinary product of intellect and no ordinary instrument of power.

The principle which Mr. Kingsley seeks to impress in this work is, that Christianity is, in its intrinsic character, truly adapted to meet the demands of our nature, and to secure a social well-being. This is precisely the reverse of the impression which the History by Gibbon, of the same period, is calculated, and was no doubt intended to produce. The heroine selected by Mr. Kingsley was not, apparently, the subject from which his lesson was most likely to be educed. Hypatia was the very queen of the Pagan Neo-Platonic philosophy, who embodied that error in all the attractions of rank, talent, and beauty, and fell a martyr to the rage of the Christian Bishop Cyril. Whether, then, so far as the due inculcation of the principle is concerned, the work is a success or, as Mr. Bayne maintains, a failure, we leave to the decision of its readers.

(46.) "Sir Walter Raleigh and his Time. With other papers. By CHARLES KINGSLEY, Author of Hypatia," &c. (12mo., pp. 461. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 1859.) Of Charles Kingsley, as a spirited essayist, an eloquent preacher, a brilliant novelist, and a bold doctrinary, we had occasion to speak in the Quarterly Synopsis of a former number. The present selection from his miscellanies is characterized by the striking qualities of the author's mind, and are eminently redolent of the spirit of our day. Mr. Kingsley's feelings and principles have been powerfully influenced by the writings of Carlyle and Coleridge, and the mannerism of the former, in a mitigated degree, can occasionally be traced in the style of the present productions.

With Walter Raleigh and the great spirits of the Elizabethan age, Mr. Kingsley cherishes a warm sympathy. Originally contributed to the North British Review, this article draws, with an enthusiastic pencil, a life-sketch of that hero. But to us the most attractive part of this volume is the Four Lectures on "Alexandria and her Schools." Indeed Alexandria, in the days of her intellectual renown, was a striking type of our own age. In the general commixture of nations, the meeting face to face of opposite opinions, the excitement, political and religious, the eager stretch after gain, and the confident hope of a better future, Alexandria was very much a miniature picture of our nineteenth century. From the reformed pagan philosophy of Alexandria, Coleridge & Co. have borrowed their Neo-Platonic philosophy. From the Christian philosophy of Alexandria, as held by Origen and Clement, Rev. Mr. Kingsley is inclined to import an alterative for our more Romanic orthodoxy, which may save our falling age.

(47.) "Bitter-Sweet: a Poem. By J. G. HOLLAND, Author of 'The Bay Path,' Titcomb's Letters,' etc. (12mo., pp. 220. New York: Charles Scribner. 1858.) The author of " Bitter-Sweet" has felicitously caused the sweet to predominate in his poem; and yet not so exclusively as to pall upon the taste. We might take the liberty to differ from the author in his theological views of the position of moral evil in the Divine plan of the universe, yet he maintains his peculiar views with earnestness and ability. There is a healthful glow of sentiment, and a presentation of pleasant pictures of rural life, which could only have been given by one who has beheld and admired the beautiful scenes of nature. The first line of the speech of Ruth, on page 76, we think hardly in keeping with the general good taste of the book. The reader will, however, find on almost every page of "Bitter-sweet" passages of great poetic beauty, gems of the glorious art to which the author not immodestly aspires. So many books of a doubtful or positively bad character are daily issued from the press, it is gratifying to meet occasionally with one so pure and vigorous in its tone. We predict for this book a decided success.

P.

(48.) "The Pilgrim's Progress from this World to that which is to come. Delivered under the Similitude of a Dream. By JOHN BUNYAN. With Twenty Illustrations, drawn by George Thomas, and engraved by W. L. Thomas." (4to., pp. 223. New York: Carter & Brothers. 1859.) Here comes the immortal tinker of Elstow in blue and gold! His fine old Saxon words are stamped in liberal type upon the broad quarto page. His live conceptions, once "delivered under the similitude of a dream," are here delivered under the similitude of a score of colored pictorials. The Carters have had a presentiment that Christmas is ahead, and that Santa Claus may wish to come into your premises with Bunyan in his wallet.

(49.) "New England's Chattels; or, Life in the Northern Poor-House." (12mo., pp. 484. New York: H. Dayton. 1858.) We understand this not to be a Southern retort upon the North for Uncle Tom; but a bona fide effort to expose real abuses in the pauper houses in New England. If such abuses exist we trust the author and his coadjutors will press their exposures until they are fully reformed. We are happily not afraid that he will be lynched for his vivid pictures or his bold invectives. No politician will make it a matter of state pride to defend the cruelties of New England's "peculiar institutions." No grave professor in a scientific treatise will, in a rabid moment, charge him with "wicked fanaticism." He will be patiently heard, and if he make out a case the evil will be reformed. If he prove incorrect, he will simply be left "solitary and alone."

(50.) "Blonde and Brunette; or, Gothamite Arcady." (Pp. 316. New York: Appleton & Co. 1858.) A very pretty-looking novellette. What is its merit we know not, not having penetrated its interior. We judge by its title that it is a discussion of the comparative merits of two rival classes of feminine complexion; a point of physiology we prefer to leave to our juniors.

VII.-Miscellaneous.

"Bertram Noel. A Story for Youth. By E. J. MAY." (12mo., pp. 359. New York: Appleton & Co. 1859.)

"Meta Gray; or, What makes Home Happy. By M. J. M'INTOSH." (12mo., pp. 207. New York: Appleton & Co. 1859.)

"Legends and Lyrics. A Book of Verses. By ADELAIDE ANNE PROCTOR." (12mo., pp. 264. New York: Appleton & Co. 1858.)

"Mensuration and Practical Geometry. By CHARLES HASWELL." (12mo., pp. 322. New York: Harper & Brothers. 1858.)

"The Power of Prayer, Illustrated in the wonderful Displays of Divine Grace at the Fulton-street and other meetings in New York and elsewhere in 1857 and 1858. By SAMUEL IRENEUS PRIME." (12mo., pp. 373. New York C. Scribner. 1859.)

"Story of Bethlehem. A Book for the Young. By J. R. MacDuff, D.D." (18mo., pp. 202. New York: Carter & Brothers. 1859.)

66

Night Caps. By the author of Aunt Fanny's Christmas Stories." (18mo., pp. 171. New York: Appleton & Co. 1859.)

"Jessie; or, trying to be Somebody. By WATLER AIMWELL. With illustrations." (18mo., pp. 320. Boston: Gould & Lincoln. 1859.)

Of the following, notices will appear in our next number:

"Rational Cosmology; or, The Eternal Principles and the Necessary Laws of the Universe. By LAURENS P. HICKOK, D.D., Union College." (12mo., pp. 397. New York: Appleton & Co. 1858.)

"The Emancipation of Faith. By the late HENRY EDWARD Schedel, M.D., Laureate of the Hospitals of Paris, etc. Edited by George Schedel." (2 vols. 8vo., pp. 470, 482. New York: Appleton & Co. 1858.)

We are not of course expected to limit our contributors to the expression of opinions coinciding with our own, nor are we to be held responsible for all the opinions expressed by our contributors.

The place occupied by the child in the Christian Church is matter for fair and fraternal discussion. By an almost unconscious movement of sentiment we have come to a unanimity upon the principle that all infants are saved; but the question how saved, and what is their precise moral condition, is nearly a casus omissus, a blank spot, in our theology. Are they saved without justification or regeneration before death? Are they simply justified by a separation of regeneration from justification? Can they properly receive the being "born of water without being previously "born of the spirit."

We do not think that many will agree that infant communion logically follows from infant regeneration, or from infant baptism. Baptism, like circumcision, may be a mere receptivity. But communion, like the passover, is a responsible act, requiring a responsible agent to "show forth the Lord's death," and to meet the other prescribed requisites in the ritual for all recipients. We think that the advocate of infant regeneration weakens his cause by appending to it the sequence of infant or childhood communion. But as the latter does not logically follow, so its deduction by a particular advocate is no legitimate argument against the former.

The article upon Jefferson furnishes the favorable view of his character. There is another phase, held as the truer one by many observers, and which will be pronounced the true one, perhaps, by the severe pen of history.

In our last Quarterly we extracted from the North British Review part of a notice of a poetic work by an unknown Canadian poet, entitled "Saul, a Drama in Three Parts." This poem is described as truly Shakspearian in its masterly development of mental nature, and its power of supernatural creativeness. We learn by the Canadian correspondent of the Zion's Herald, that this rare unknown is Mr. Heirsache, a mechanic of Montreal. He has written also "The Revolt of Tartarus," and a little volume of sonnets, both printed for private circulation only.

THE

METHODIST QUARTERLY REVIEW

APRIL, 1859.

ART. I.-SOME ACCOUNT OF COKESBURY COLLEGE.

THE General Conference of 1784, which gave to the Methodist societies in America an independent Episcopal Church, also gave to that Church her first literary institution. We have thought that a brief account of Cokesbury College might not be unacceptable to the readers of the "Quarterly," nor, we hope, altogether unprofitable. At any rate, to such as delight to look back on the early days of Methodism, to survey the infant in its cradle, and trace its progress from childhood to comparative maturity, articles of this sort will not be found wanting in interest.

The general history of the Methodist Episcopal Church has been well cared for, and may now be considered safe, at least sufficiently so to satisfy all reasonable demand for the present, and also to allay any apprehension of neglect in the future. Much credit is due to Dr. Bangs for the able and careful manner in which he has examined the stream of Methodism from its source, as far down as to 1840. Besides we have now the promise of another from a different quarter, which, taking still a wider range, and coming to us with the prestige of the well known ability of the author, will receive a cordial welcome from every Methodist, and leave but little to do for those that may come after. Local histories of places remarkable for the success of Methodism, and individual memoirs of men eminent for piety and influence in those early times, are still too few; these will continue to multiply, however, as the general subject becomes exhausted, and men continue to feel a more lively interest in things nearer home. And as for autobiographies, there are enough, we should think, to satisfy every felt want in the Church, FOURTH SERIES, VOL. XI.-12