tion of his time being occupied in teaching, he passed fifteen months in the island of Bermuda, where he established an English school. On his return he was admitted to the bar in December, 1808. He commenced the profession with good prospect of success, but was induced soon after, by the advice of his father and the effect of a sermon of the Rev. Dr. John M. Mason, from the text "To the poor the gospel is preached," to study theology. After a year passed at Andover, he was licensed to preach towards the close of 1809. In June, 1810, he accepted a call to the Brick church in the city of New York, where he has since remained, unmoved by invitations to the presidencies of Hamilton and Dartmouth Colleges, maintaining during nearly half a century a position as one of the most popular preachers and esteemed divines of the metropolis. He has for many years commemorated his long pastorate by an anniversary discourse. Dr. Spring is the author of several works which have been published in uniform style, and now extend to eighteen octavo volumes. They have grown out of his duties as a pastor, and consist for the most part of courses of lectures on the duties and advantages of the Christian career. The edition of his works now in course of publication, embraces The Attraction of the Cross, designed to illustrate the leading Truths, Obligations, and Hopes of Christianity; The MercySeat, Thoughts suggested by the Lord's Prayer; First Things, A Series of Lectures on the Great Facts and Moral Lessons first revealed to Mankind; The Glory of Christ, Illustrated in his Character and History, including the Last Things of His Mediatorial Government; The Power of the Pulpit, or, Plain Thoughts addressed to Christian Ministers and those who hear them, on the influence of a Preached Gospel; Short Sermons for the People, being a Series of short Discourses of a highly practical character; The Obligations of the World to the Bible; Miscellanies, including the Author's "Essays on the Distinguishing Traits of Christian Character," Church in the Wilderness," &c., &c. The Contrast, in press. "The These volumes have passed through several editions, and have been in part reprinted and translated in Europe, and are held in well deserved repute. In 1849 he published Memoirs of the late Hannah L. Murray, a lady of New York, distinguished in the wide circle of her friends for her benevolence and intellectual acquirements. She translated, with the aid of her sister, the whole of Tasso's Jerusalem Delivered, and many of the odes of Anacreon, into English verse, and was the author of a poem of five thousand lines in blank verse entitled The Restoration of Israel, an abstract of which, with other unpublished productions, is given by her biographer. Dr. Spring is an eloquent, energetic preacher; his style direct and manly. As a characteristic specimen of his manner we give a passage from his volume, The Glory of Christ. A POPULAR PREACHER. Nor may the fact be overlooked, in the next place, that he was an impressive and powerful preacher. In the legitimate sense of the term, he was popular, VOL. II.-6 and interested the multitude. He never preached to empty synagogues; and when he occupied the market or the mountain side, they were not hundreds that listened to his voice, but thousands. It is recorded of him, that "his fame went throughout all Syria;" and that "there followed him great multitudes of people from Decapolis, and from Jerusalem, and from Judea, and from beyond Jordan." On that memorable day when he went from the Mount of Olives to Juden, "a great multitude spread their garments in the way, and others cut down branches from the trees," and all cried "Hosannah to the Son of David!" After he uttered the parable of the vineyard, the rulers "sought to lay hold of him, but feared the people." When he "returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee, there went out a fame of him throughout all the region round about," and he “was glorified of all, and great multitudes came together to hear him." So much was he, for the time, the idol of the people, that the chief priests and Pharisees were alarmed at his popularity, and said among themselves, "If we let him then alone, all men will believe on him; behold, the world is gone after him." He was the man of the people, and advocated the cause of the people. We are told that "the common people heard him gladly." He was no respecter of persons." He was the preacher to man, as man. He never passed the door of poverty, and was not ashamed to be called "the friend of publicans and sinners." His gospel was and is the great and only bond of brotherhood; nor was there then, nor is there now, any other universal brotherhood, than that which consists in love and loyalty to him. He was the only safe reformer the world has seen, because he so well understood the checks and balances by which the masses are governed. His preaching, like his character, bold and uncompromising as it was, was also in the highest degree conservative. He taught new truths, and he was the great vindicator of those that were old. All these things made him a most impressive, powerful, and attractive preacher. His very instructiveness, prudence, and boldness, interested the people. They respected him for his acquaintance with the truth, and honored his discretion and fearlessness in proclaiming it. This is human nature; men love to be thus instructed; they come to the house of God for that purpose. A vapid and vapory preacher may entertain them for the hour; a smooth and flattering preacher may amuse them; a mere denunciatory preacher may produce a transient excitement; but such is the power of conscience, and such the power of God and the wants of men that, though their hearts naturally hate God's truth, they will crowd the sanctuaries where it is instructively and fearlessly, and discreetly urged, while ignorance, and error, and a coward preacher, put forth their voice to the listless and the few ANDREWS NORTON. ANDREWS NORTON was a descendant of the celebrated John Norton of Ipswich, of the old age of Puritan divinity. He was born at Hingham, Mass., the last day of the year 1786. Fond of books from a child, at the age of eighteen he had completed his course at Harvard, where he remained a resident graduate, pursuing a course of literary and theological study. In October, 1809, he was appointed tutor in Bowdoin College. At the end of the year he returned to Cambridge, where in 1811 he was chosen tutor in mathematics in his college, where he remained till 1812, when he engaged in the conduct of The General Repository, a periodical work on the side of the new liberal school, as it was called, which took position at Harvard shortly after the beginning of the century. He had previously written for the Literary Miscellany, published at Cambridge, in 1804-5, several reviews and brief poetical translations, and had been a frequent contributor to the Monthly Anthology. Andrews Norton From 1813 to 1821 he was college librarian. In the former year he also commenced the course of instruction through which he gained his greatest distinction in his entrance upon the lectureship of Biblical Criticism and Interpretation, under the bequest of the Hon. Samuel Dexter, in which Buckminster and Channing were his predecessors. He discharged this duty till a similar professorship was created in 1819, when he became the new incumbent, holding the office till 1830. He then resigned it with the reputation of having performed its offices with industry, selfreliance, and a happy method of statement. He had in the meanwhile published several works. In 1814 he edited the Miscellaneous Writings of his friend Charles Eliot, whose early death he sincerely lamented, and in 1823 published a similar memoir of another friend and associate, the poet and professor Levi Frisbie. He wrote several tracts on the affairs of the college in 1824-5. At this time he was a contributor to the Christian Disciple of several articles on theological topics. In 1826 he edited an edition of the poems of Mrs. Hemans, of whom he was an earnest admirer, and in the following year in a visit to England was rewarded with her friendship in a personal acquaintance. In 1833 he published a theological treatise, A Statement of Reasons for not believing the Doctrines of Trinitarians concerning the nature of God and the person of Christ. In 1833-4 he edited, in connexion with his friend Charles Folsom, a quarterly publication, The Select Journal of Foreign Periodical Literature, which contained, among other original articles from his pen, papers on Goethe and Hamilton's Men and Manners in America. In 1837 appeared the first volume of the most important of his publications, the Genuineness of the Gospel, followed by the second and third in 1844. It is devoted to the external historical evidence, and maintains a high character among theologians for its scholarship, and the pure medium of reasoning and style through which its researches are conveyed. He had also prepared a new translation of the Gospels, with critical and explanatory notes, which he left at the time of his death ready for the press. Besides these writings Mr. Norton was a frequent contributor to the Christian Examiner of articles on religious topics and others of a general literary interest, on the poetry of Mrs. Hemans and Pollok's Course of Time. He wrote for the North American Review on Franklin, Byron, Ware's Letters from Palmyra, and the Memoir of Mrs. Grant of Laggan. His poems were few, but choicely expressed; and have been constant favorites with the public. They are the best indications of his temper, and of the fine devotional mood which pervades his writings. Professor Norton died at Newport, which he had chosen for his residence in the failing health of his last years, Sunday evening, September 18, 1852.* SCENE AFTER A SUMMER SHOWER. The rain is o'er. How dense and bright The general blessing; fresh and fair, Then turn to bathe and revel there. With trembling drops of light is hung. Fresh in her youth, from God's own hand. Hear the rich music of that voice, Which sounds from all below, above; She calls her children to rejoice, And round them throws her arms of love. Drink in her influence; low-born care, And all the train of mean desire, Refuse to breathe this holy air, And 'mid this living light expire. ON LISTENING TO A CRICKET. I love, thou little chirping thing, But dimly shows the lettered page, And, musing o'er the embers pale, We have followed closely in this account the authentic narrative article, published after Professor Norton's death, in the Christian Examiner for November, 1853. I love the quiet midnight hour, When Care, and Hope, and Passion sleep, And Reason, with untroubled power, Can her late vigils duly keep ; I love the night: and sooth to say, Prefer the cricket's grating wing. But, see! pale Autumn strews her leaves, Her withered leaves, o'er Nature's grave, While giant Winter she perceives, Dark rushing from his icy cave; And in his train the sleety showers, That beat upon the barren earth; Thou, cricket, through these weary hours, Shalt warm thee at my lonely hearth. He has gone to his God; he has gone to his home; His eyes are no longer dim ; No grief can follow him, No pang his cheek can alter. There are paleness, and weeping, and sighs below; While old friends press to meet him. O honored, beloved, to earth unconfined, We will follow thee, by heaven's light, The souls whom God will unite. JOHN ENGLAND. JOHN ENGLAND, the Roman Catholic Bishop of Charleston, was born in Cork, Ireland, September 23, 1786. He was educated in the schools of his native town, and at the age of fifteen, avowing his intention to become an ecclesiastic, was placed under the care of the Very Rev. Robert M'Carthy, by whom he was in two years fitted for the college of Carlow. During his connexion with this institution, he was instrumental in procuring the establishment of a female penitentiary in the town. On the ninth of October, 1808, he was ordained Deacon, and the following day Priest, and was appointed lecturer at the Cork Cathedral, an office which he discharged with great success. In May, 1809, he started a monthly periodical, The Religious Repertory, with the object of supplanting the corrupt literature current among the people, by a more healthy literary nutriment. He was also active in various charitable works, and indefatigable in his attendance on the victims of pestilence, and the inmates of prisons. In 1812 he took an active part, as a political writer, in the discussion of the subject of Catholic Emancipation. In 1817 he was appointed Parish Priest of Bandon, where he remained until made by the Pope, Bishop of the newly constituted See of Charleston, embracing the two Carolinas and Georgia. He was consecrated in Ireland, but refused to take the oath of allegiance to the British government customary on such occasions, declaring his intention to become naturalized in the United States. He arrived in Charleston, December 31, 1820. One of his first acts was the establishment of a theological seminary, to which a preparatory school was attached. This led to corresponding exertions on the part of Protestants in the matter of education, which had hitherto been much neglected, and the first number of the Southern Review honored the bishop with the title of restorer of classical learning in Charleston. He was also instrumental in the formation of an "Anti-duelling Society," for the suppression of that barbarous and despicable form of manslaughter, of which General Thomas Pinckney was the first president. He also commenced a periodical, The United States Catholic Miscellany, to which he continued a constant contributor to the time of his death. "She The bishop was greatly aided in his charitable endeavors, and in his social influence, by the arrival of his sister, Miss Joanna England. threw her little fortune into his poverty-stricken institutions. Her elegant taste presided over the literary department of the Miscellany. Her feminine tact would smoothe away whatever harshness his earnest temper might unconsciously infuse into his controversial writings. Her presence shed a magic charm around his humble dwelling, and made it the envied resort of the talented, the beautiful, and gay."* This estimable lady died in 1827. In times of pestilence, Bishop England was fearless and untiring in his heroic devotion to the sick. He was so active in the discharge of his duties and in his ordinary movements, that on his visits to Rome, four of which occurred during his episcopate, he was called by the cardinals, il vescovo a vapore. It was on his return from the last of these journeys, that in consequence of his exertions as priest and physician among the steerage passengers of the ship in which he sailed, he contracted the disease, dysentery, which was prevalent among them. He landed after a voyage of fifty-two days in Philadelphia, and instead of recruiting his strength, preached seventeen nights in succession. His health had been impaired some months previously, and although on his arrival at Charleston he became somewhat better, he died not *Memoir of Bp. England prefixed to his works. long after, on the eleventh of April, 1842, in the fifty-sixth year of his age. The collected works of Bishop England* bear testimony to his literary industry, as well as ability. They extend to five large octavo volumes of some five hundred pages each, closely printed in double columns. They are almost entirely occupied by essays on topics of controversial theology, many of which are in the form of letters published during his lifetime in various periodicals. A portion of the fourth and fifth volumes is filled by the author's addresses before various college societies, and on other public occasions, including an oration on the character of Washington. These writings, like the discourses which in his lifetime attracted admiring crowds, are marked by force and elegance of style. THOMAS SMITH GRIMKÉ Thos, S. Tumk WAS born in Charleston, S. C., September 26, 1786. He was a descendant of the Huguenots. At the age of seventeen he was at Yale College, and travelled with Dr. Dwight during one of his vacations. Returning home, he studied law in the office of Mr. Langdon Cheves, and gradually attained distinction at the bar and in the politics of his state. His most noted legal effort was a speech on the constitutionality of the South Carolina "test oath" in 1834. As state senator from St. Philip's and St. Michael's in a speech on the Tariff in 1828, he supported the General Government and the Constitutional authority of the whole people. His literary efforts were chiefly orations and addresses illustrating topics of philanthropy and reform. Literature also employed his attention. He wrote several articles for the Southern Review. In a Fourth of July Oration at Charleston in 1809, by the appointment of the South Carolina State Society of Cincinnati, he supports union, and describes the horrors of civil war. Thus should we see the objects of these States not only unanswered but supplanted by others. They had instituted the civic festival of peace, and beheld it changed for the triumph of war. They had crowned the eminent statesman with the olive of the citizen, and saw it converted into the laurels of the warrior. The old man who had walked exultingly in procession, to taste the waters of freedom from the fountain of a separate government, beheld the placid stream that flowed from it suddenly sink from his sight, and burst forth a dark and turbulent torrent. His addresses on peace societies, Sunday schools, temperance and kindred topics, secured him the respect and sympathy of a large circle. He published and circulated gratuitously a large edition of Hancock on War, and at his death was republishing Dymond's Enquiry into the Accordance *The Works of the Right Rev. John England, First Bishop of Charleston, collected and arranged under the advice and direction of his immediate successor, the Right Rev. Ignatius Aloysius Reynolds, and printed for him, in five volumes. Baltimore: John Murphy & Co. 1849, of War with the Principles of Christianity, for which he wrote an introductory essay. In 1827 he delivered an address on The Character and Objects of Science before the Literary and Philosophical Society of South Carolina; in 1830, an address before the Phi Beta Kappa of Yale, on The Advantages to be derived from the Introduction of the Bible and of sacred literature as essential parts of all Education, in a literary point of view. His oration on American education before the Western Literary Institute and College of Professional Teachers at Cincinnati, was delivered by him only a few days before his death, which occurred suddenly at the house of a gentleman by the roadside, from an attack of cholera, October 12, 1834, while on his way to Columbus, Ohio. In a prefatory memorandum to this last address, the views of orthography which he had latterly adopted are clearly stated. 66 Having been long satisfied that the orthography of the English language not only admitted but required a reform; and believing it my duty to act on this conviction, I hav publishd sevral pamphlets accordingly." These are his several propositions, which we give mostly in his words, following the exact spelling. 1. He omits the silent e in such classes of words as disciplin, respit, believ, creativ, volly, &c. 2. Introduces the apostrophe where the omission of the e might change the sound of the preceding vowel from long to short, as in requir'd, refin'd, deriv'd. 3. Nouns ending in y added an s to make the plural instead of changing y into ie, as pluralitys, enmitys, &c. 4. In verbs ending in y, instead of changing into ie and then adding an s or d, he retains the y and adds s or d: as in burys, buryd, varys, varyd, hurrys, hurryd. 5. In similar verbs where the y is long, I retain the y, omit the e, and substitute an apostrophe, as in multiply's, multiply'd, satisfy's, satisfy'd. 6. In such words as sceptre, battle, centre, I transpose the e, and write scepter, battel, center. 7. He suppresses one of two and the same consonants where the accent is not on them; as in necesary, excelent, ilustrious, recomend, efectual, iresistible, worshipers. 8. In such words as honor, favor, savior, neighbor, savor, the u is omitted. 9. In adjectives ending in y, instead of forming the comparativ and superlativ by changing y into ie and adding er and est, I hav retained the y, and simply added the er and est, as in easyer, casyest, holyer, holyest, prettyer, prettyest. In quotations and proper names, I hav not felt call'd upon to change the orthography. This was not Grimke's only literary heresy. In his oration on the subject "that neither the classics nor the mathematics should form a part of a scheme of general education in our country," he condemns all existing schemes. “I think them radicaly defectiv in elements and modes." They are not" deAmerican." cidedly religious," neither are they " The latter, since the classics and mathematics being the same everywhere, are not of course distinctive to the country. "They do not fill the mind," he says, "with useful and entertaining knowledge." "As to valuable knowledge, except the first and most simple parts of arithmetic, I feel little hesitation in saying, as the result of my experience and observation, that the whole body of the pure mathematics is ABSOLUTELY USELESS to ninety-nine out of every hundred, who study them. Now, as to entertainment. Does more than one out of every hundred preserv his mathematical knowlege?" Ten thousand pockets," says he," might be pick'd without finding a dozen classics." "I ask boldly the question, what is there in the classics, that is realy instructiv and interesting?" He asks triumphantly -the ignorance is amazing,-"What orator ever prepared himself for parliamentary combat over the pages of Cicero or Demosthenes? "Having dispos'd of the orators and historians, let us now attend to the classic poets, of what value are they? I answer of none, so far as useful knowlege is concerned; for all must admit, that none is to be found in this class of writers. It is plain that truth is a very minor concern, with writers of fiction. * * * I am strangely mistaken, if there be not more power, fidelity, and beauty in Walter Scott, than in a dozen Homers and Virgils. *** Mrs. Hemans has written a greater number of charming little pieces, than are to be found in Horace and Anacreon." The activity of Grimké's mind was sometimes in advance of his judgment. He was a happy man in his life,-his benevolence, and the ardor of his pursuits filling his heart. His death was received with every token of respect at Charleston, the preamble to the resolutions of the bar declaring his mild face will no longer be seen among us, but the monuments of his public usefulness and benevolence are still with us, and the memory of his virtues will still dwell within our hearts."* The introduction of the Bible into schools was a favorite idea with him, which he urged in his Phi Beta address. He wrote occasional verses, and a descriptive poem on the Passaic, which is unpublished. As a speaker, he showed great readiness in a copious and fluent style. A brother of the preceding, Frederick Grimké, is the author of a popular political text-book, entitled The Nature and Tendency of Free Institutions, published in Cincinnati in 1848. SAMUEL FARMAR JARVIS. SAMUEL FARMAR, the son of the Rev. Dr. Abraham Jarvis, afterwards bishop of the diocese of Connecticut, was born at Middletown in that State, January 20, 1787. He was educated under the care of his father, and entered the Sophomore class of Yale College in 1802. He was ordained deacon March 18, 1810, and priest April 5, 1811, by his father, and became, in 1813, the rector of St. Michael's Church, Bloomingdale, New York. In 1819 he was appointed Professor of Biblical Learning in the recently organized General Theological Seminary, a position he retained until his removal in 1820 to Boston, in acceptance of a call to the rectorship of St. Paul's church, where he remained until July, 1826, when he sailed for Europe. He remained abroad until 1835, pursuing his studies and collecting books connected with ecclesiastical history. Six of the nine years of his absence were passed in Italy. On his return he filled for two years the professorship of Oriental Literature in Washington College, Hartford. In 1837 he removed to Middletown to take charge, as rector, of Christ church in that place. He resigned this position in 1842, and devoted the remainder of his life to a work which he had commenced immediately after his return from Europe. This was a history of the church, a work O Collection of Addresses, &c., by Grimké, and Obituary Notices furnished by his family in the Boston Athenæum. especially intrusted to his hands by a vote of the General Convention of the dioceses of the United States, constituting him "Historiographer of the Church." The first portion of his work published, appeared at New York, in 1845, in an octavo volume entitled, A Chronological Introduction to the History of the Church, with an Original Harmony of the Four Gospels.* A great portion of this learned volume is occupied with chronological tables, dissertations on the dates of our Lord's birth, which he places in the year of Rome 747, six years before the commonly received Christian era. In the Harmony of the Gospels the information the narratives contain is given in a consecutive form, embodying the facts but not the words of Scripture; while in four parallel columns at the side, reference is given to the chapter and verse of each of the Evangelists in which the event described is recorded. The first volume of the historyt itself was published in 1850. In it the author traces the course of the divine providence from the fall of Adam, the flood, the calling of Abraham, and the entire Jewish history, to the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus. While the same scrupulous regard to fact is manifested in this as in the introduction, the literary skill, for which no opportunity was afforded in the first, is used to good advantage in the second, the narrative being well written as well as accurate. In the author's own simile, the first volume is the rough stone-work of the foundation, the second is the elaborated superstructure which must satisfy, so far as it can, the eye of the artist as well as the mechanic. In addition to his history, Dr. Jarvis published, in 1821, a discourse on Regeneration, with notes; in 1837, on Christian Unity; and in 1843, a collection of Sermons on Prophecy, a work of great research, forming a volume of about two hundred pages. In 1843 he also issued a pamphlet entitled, No Union with Rome; in 1846 a sermon, The Colonies of Heaven; and in 1847 a volume containing a Reply to Dr. Milner's End of Religious Controversy. He also contributed a number of learned and valuable articles to the Church Review. His progress in his history, and the other useful labors of his life, was interrupted by his death, March 26, 1851. Dr. Jarvis was a fine classical as well as biblical scholar. He also took a great interest in Art, and collected during his European residence a large gallery of old paintings, mostly of the Italian school, which were exhibited on his return for the benefit of a charitable association, and were again collected after his death in the city of New York to be dispersed by the auctioneer's hammer, with the large and valuable library, which included a number of volumes formerly owned by the historian Gibbon. A Chronological Introduction to the History of the Church, being a new inquiry into the True Dates of the Birth and Death of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; and containing an original Harmony of the Four Gospels, now first arranged in the order of time, by the Rev. S. F. Jarvis, D.D., LL.D. New York: Harper & Brothers. 1845. 8vo. pp. 618. The Church of the Redeemed, or the History of the Mediatorial Kingdom, 2 vols. containing the First Five Periods; from the Fall of Adam in Paradise to the Rejection of the Jews and the Calling of the Gentiles. By the Rev. S. F. Jarvis, D.D., LL.D. Boston: Charles Stimpson. 1850. 8vo. pp. 662. |