seen in the Revolution that broke out forty years afterwards-a revolution at the horrors of which Pagans and Mahometans might well blush, had they perpetrated them.

We must compress, within a few lines, any further remarks on the works whose titles are at the head of this article. M. Cretineau-Joly's history, although he protests he is neither a Jesuit himself, nor one who has been educated by the Jesuits, is manifestly a Jesuit publication. The numerous facsimiles, if not the portraits, and the access he has had to unpublished documents, prove this. Nor have the fathers acted without their usual judgment in the choice of this modern historian. His narrative is clear, and his style has much of the softness and richness of Fenelon. He has, or affects to have, faith in the absurdest miracles ascribed to Francis Xavier, although the want of miracles was regretted during that famous missionary's life-time, and, unlike Sir C. E. Smith, he has no suspicion of the truthfulness of the evidence ludicrously submitted to a formal inquest and trial, on the advancement of a candidate to the honours of saintship. The whole work, we doubt not, has been suggested by the success of Dr Merle D'Aubigne's history. Unlike the Genevese historian's, however, the Frenchman gives very few footnotes with references to authorities; nor does he inform us where the numerous letters he quotes are to be found. We must say, however, that the extracts from the epistolary writings of Loyola, Lainez, &c., are so characteristic as fully to authenticate themselves. Should we have it in our power to return to the subject, our readers will, in some respect, be allowed to judge from translated extracts. Small as F. Ravignan's brochure bulks when compared with Cretineau-Joly's five handsome 8vos, our readers must have seen that it is a remarkably able abbreviate fully as seductive, too, as the history. Oddly enough, its very outer and inner title pages have a Jesuit mark on them, that speaks most expressively in its way. The words de la Compagnie de Jesus, immediately following Father Ravignan's name, are printed so very faintly as hardly to be legible, while all the rest is in bold relief. This is done, no doubt, lest such ominous words should at once repel anti-Jesuit purchasers. There could be no better token of the contents, seeing that, from first to last, true Jesuitism is hardly made to appear at all. Dr Duff's work is an admirable compendium, and ought to be widely dispersed. Last of all, we have Mr M'Crie's new translation of Paseal's Letters. It came so very late into our hands, that we have found no time to examine the translation critically. On a cursory glance it seems very fair. But we need not hesitate to recommend his historical introduction of about eighty pages, which is quite

what was wanted for a popular edition. Not encumbered with profound disquisitions or elaborate learning, it is replete with interesting facts and references to authorities, to which those who want more information may have recourse if they choose. On one or two points, indeed, we are disposed to differ from the learned editor. Thus we rather agree with those Jesuits who think that the Port-Royalists aimed at the subversion of the Popedom. A Popedom of a very innocuous kind comparatively, they could tolerate, and with it their theology might have co-existed, at least in the same system, though not harmoniously. But Mr M'Crie should recollect that the Popedom, as it has now for a long time been constituted-the Popedom of the Jesuits and anti-Gallicans was not, and could not be approved by the PortRoyalists, and their opinions, we rather think, with a greater or less consciousness on their part, went to sap and subvert such a monstrous spiritual despotism. Moreover, we desiderate in Mr M'Crie's introduction, what we are sure he might have given, a short and clear statement of the difference between the views of saving faith held by the Jansenists and those held by the Reformed Churches. This was the more necessary, as the PortRoyalists and their writings, however absurdly since the date of the bull Unigenitus, although they may not directly make converts to Popery, yet certainly tend to diminish a Protestant's honest abhorrence of the Papal Antichrist. We think the Jansenists have been a great deal too much over-praised in Protestant society. It ought never to be forgotten that, while the Reformed of France were passing through a long series of vexations, ending in fierce and bloody persecution, as witnesses to the truth of God, the Jansenists eagerly took part with their persecutors on the field of controversy, and though D'Aguesseau and some others endeavoured to turn the edge of the sword that was lifted up for their destruction, yet nothing was ever done effectually for the prostrate churches of the Reformation in France, until all parties of Romanists were involved in the common calamities of the Revolution. The ecclesiastical history of France, since the rise of the Port-Royalists, presents, indeed, a series of awful lessons to the rest of Christendom. First, the Reformed, on becoming prosperous, worldly, and unbelieving, are swept from off the face of the country; then the Jansenists are subjected to tortures of conscience as well as civil pains, for want of fidelity to what they knew of the truth; then the Jesuits, shorn of their vaunted glory and despoiled of their immense wealth, are ignominiously expelled; finally, the Gallicans are doomed to behold that superb institution which had so often waged doubtful battle with Rome, that temple of their idolatry, l'Eglise Gallicane, utterly subverted

never to revive again, and its priests massacred or dispersed as fugitives and beggars among the Protestants of England and Germany. O that such lessons-such terrible things done in righteousness, were duly pondered and improved!

How much need we have of really Christian historians to correct the inconceivable blunders even of authors having a high literary reputation and immense influence, may be seen from what follows from Mr M'Crie's introduction to Pascal.

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Following in the same line of defence, a certain class of Protestant writers, fond of historical paradox, and of appearing superior to vulgar prejudices, have volunteered to protect the Jesuits. No man is a stranger to the fame of Pascal, says Sir James Mackintosh, but those who may desire to form a right judgment on the contents of the Lettres Provinciales, would do well to cast a glance over the Entretiens d'Ariste et d'Eugenie by Bouhours, a Jesuit, who has ably vindicated his order. (Hist. of E., vol. ii. 359, note.) Sir James had heard, perhaps, of Father Daniel's Entretiens de Cleandre et d'Eudoxe, but it is very evident that he had never even cast a glance over that book; for the work of Bouhours which he has confounded with it, is a philological treatise, which has no reference whatever to the Provincial Letters!"

This is capital. Mark, too, that even Father Daniel's Entretiens present a very poor defence of the order.

ART. IV. Travels in North America; with Geological Observations on the United States, Canada, and Nova Scotia. By CHARLES LYELL, Esq., F.R.S., Author of "The Principles of Geology." John Murray, London. 1845.

The author of the two interesting volumes before us does not confine himself in his observations to his own peculiar walk. He discourses upon American slavery, gives the history of Pennsylvanian repudiation, and enters at some length into the state of the English universities, not forgetting by the way to bestow a little of his reprehension upon the scheme of education proposed by the Free Church. We shall, however, confine ourselves to his researches on American Geology, with the single exception of extracting some of his remarks upon slavery, which at the present juncture will be interesting to our readers.

"I often asked myself, when in the midst of a large plantation, what steps I would take if I had inherited such a property from British ancestors. I thought, first, of immediately emancipating all the slaves; but I was reminded that the law humanely provides, in that case, that I should still support them, so that I might ruin myself and family, and it

would still be a question whether those whom I had released from bondage would be happier, or would be prepared for freedom. I then proposed to begin with education as a preliminary step. Here I was met with the objection that, since the abolition movement and the fanatical exertions of missionaries, severe statutes had been enacted, making it penal to teach slaves to read and write. I must first, therefore, endeavour to persuade my fellow slave-holders to repeal these laws against improving the moral and intellectual condition of the slaves. I remarked that, in order to overcome the apathy and reluctance of the planters, the same kind of agitation, the same pressure from without,' might be indispensable, which had brought about our West Indian emancipation. To this my American friends replied, that the small number of our slaves, so insignificant in comparison to their two-and-ahalf millions, had made an indemnity to the owner possible; also that the free negroes, in small islands, could always be held in subjection by the British fleets; and, lastly, that England had a right to interfere and legislate for her own colonies, whereas the northern States of the Union, and foreigners, had no constitutional right to intermeddle with the domestic concerns of the slave States. Such intervention, by exciting the fears and indignation of the planters, had retarded, and must always be expected to retard, the progress of the cause. They also reminded me how long and obstinate a struggle the West Indian proprietors had made against the emancipationists in the British House of Commons; and they hinted, that if the different islands had been directly represented in the Lower House, and there had been Dukes of Jamaica, Marquises of Antigua, and Earls of Barbadoes in the Upper House, as the slave States are represented in Congress, the measure would never have been carried to this day.

"The more I reflected on the condition of the slaves, and endeavoured to think on a practical plan for hastening the period of their liberation, the more difficult the subject appeared to me, and the more I felt astonished at the confidence displayed by so many anti-slavery speakers and writers on both sides of the Atlantic. The course pursued by these agitators shows that, next to the positively wicked, the class who are usually called" well-meaning persons" are the most mischievous in society. Before the year 1830, a considerable number of the planters were in the habit of regarding slavery as a great moral and political evil, and many of them openly proclaimed it to be so in the Virginia debates of 1831-2. The emancipation party was gradually gaining ground, and not unreasonable hopes were entertained that the States of Kentucky, Virginia, and Maryland would soon fix on some future day for the manumission of their slaves. This step had already been taken in most of the States north of the Potomac, and slavery was steadily retreating southwards. From the moment that the abolition movement began, and that missionaries were sent to the southern States, a re-action was perceived the planters took the alarm, laws were passed against education-the condition of the slave was worse; and not a few of the planters, by dint of defending their institutions against the arguments and misrepresentations of their assailants, came actually to delude themselves into a belief that slavery was legitimate, wise, and expedient-a positive

good in itself. There were many, indeed, who thought differently, but who no longer dared to express their opinions freely on the subject." Vol. I. pp. 186-188.

America, although the most modern country of the world in one respect, is the most ancient in another; for nowhere do we see in such perfection the monuments of the earliest inhabitants who possessed the earth before man became its lord. The more ancient strata are there developed on a larger scale than elsewhere, while their horizontal position renders it comparatively easy to solve all questions as to the order in which they occur; and their gigantic proportions suggest explanations of geological phenomena which might never have occurred to an observer elsewhere. We do not pretend in this article to give a survey of the geology of the American continent, nor even to attempt to follow Mr Lyell's route. We shall merely select a few points, the discussion of which will, we think, be interesting to our readers.

The whole of the northern part of the American continent is covered with a deposit of drift, exactly resembling the formation which is met with in the northern parts of the old world. It consists of heaps of sand and gravel, sometimes stratified, but more generally not, red clay, and loam, mixed throughout with immense boulders and irregular blocks of granite, &c. Fossil shells occur in some parts of the deposit, although not universally diffused; and these are of the same species as now inhabit the arctic seas, and occur in a fossil state in Sweden at the latitudes 58° and 60°, while in America they are met with as far south as latitude 47°. Beneath the drift the rocks present the same appearance as those similarly situated in the other hemisphere. They are polished, and deeply furrowed with parallel grooves and scratches, presenting the same appearance as those rocks which are exposed to the action of the ice in the neighbourhood of the glaciers of Switzerland. We extract, in illustration, the description of the Upper Silurian limestone, on the shores of Lake Erie.

"It is very hard, contains many corals, and has nodules of flint or chert dispersed through it in horizontal beds. The upper surface of this rock, when the boulder clay is removed, appears smoothed or polished, and usually scored with long parallel furrows. But the nodules of chert, although much rubbed down and worn, stand out slightly in relief, while narrow elongated ridges of limestone are seen extending from the southern end of each nodule, marking the space where the softer rock has been protected for a short distance from the triturating action which ground down the whole."-Vol. II. pp. 97, 98.