ness and compassion in proportion as I am able to behold nothing but himself. Alas for him who insults me, who maligns, and merits public execration! For the divine law not only shields me from injury, but almost renders me too sacred to attack, not indeed so much from the privation of my sight, as from the overshadowing of those heavenly wings which seem to have occasioned this obscurity, and which, when occasioned, he is wont to illuminate with an interior light more precious and more pure."

In the last English edition of Milton, published at Oxford, the following beautiful lines may be found, with the remark that they were among the late effusions of that master of English song. They are the property of an American writer, Elizabeth Lloyd, a Quakeress of Philadelphia. Their affinity with the above train of thought will easily account for the error of the compiler, while it does not in any measure lessen the compliment paid the poet in ranking her composition among the productions of Milton!

In a purer clime

My being fills with rapture-waves of thought
Roll in upon my spirit-strains sublime
Break over me unsought.

Give me now my lyre!
I feel the stirrings of a gift divine;
Within my bosom glows unearthly fire,
Lit by no skill of mine.

BLUE BEARD.-The original Blue Beard was Giles de Lavel, Lord of Raiz, who was made Marshal of France in 1429, and, in the reigns of Charles VI. and VII., distinguished himself by his courage against the English when they invaded France. The services that he rendered his country might have immortalized his name, had he not forever blotted his glory by murders, impieties, and debaucheries. Mezeray says

that he encouraged and maintained sorcerers to discover hidden treasures, and corrupted young persons of both sexes, that he might attach them to him, and afterward killed them for the sake of their blood for charms and incantations. At length, for some state crimes against the Duke of Brittany, he was sentenced to be burned alive in a field at Nantes, in 1443. Holinshed notices another Blue Beard, in the reign of Henry VI., in 1450. Speaking of the committal of the Duke of Suffolk to the Tower, he says: "This doing so much displeased the people, that if politike provision had not been made, great mischief had immediately ensued. For the Commons, in sundry places of the realm, assembled together in great quantities, and chose to them a captain, whom they called Blue Beard; but ere they had any enterprise, their leaders were apprehended, and so the matter pacified without any hurt committed."

VERY DEFINITE.-A writer in Bentley's Miscellany, reviewing Mr. Chambers's "Things in America," has occasion to advert to an affair of some little importance that transpired during the writer's peregrination through "the States." It occurred," says the erudite critic, "somewhere between Ohio and Cincinnati."

AN UNSENTIMENTAL JOURNEY.-Captain Chamier introduces a narrative of his travels through France, Switzerland, and Italy, by describing his companions in travel. Thus of his wife he says: "She was a pretty-faced woman enough, with large dark eyes. Sentimental humbugs would compare them to those of the wild gazelle or roe: they were nothing but eyes, large, black, and clear; her nose had a devotional inclination to heaven; her mouth was small and pretty, and her feet and hands gave the bootmaker and glover such trouble to fit her, that they charged her more than a woman with a mud-crushing foot or a scullery-maid's hands. As for my daughter, she was fair and comely enough, with a horror of a freckle, and who covered her face with vails and uglies, until the most piercing eye could never have ascertained if she were twenty or sixty. . . . She had the curse of sentimentalism and poetry: everything in her imagination was magnified into loveliness and ecstasy: the commonest donkey was promoted to the mule, and a high trottinghorse was a fit charger for Marmion."

FLOWERS AMONG RUINS.-An illustrated octavo volume, entitled "The Flora of the Colosseum," is in course of publication in London. The author, Dr. Deakin, tells us that four hundred and twenty plants are found growing spontaneously on the ruins of the Colosseum, and the object of the author in the present volume is to invite the attention of the lover of the works of creation to this most curious and remarkable fact. To the botanist, residing even temporarily on the spot, the knowledge of these floral productions, flourishing in triumph upon the ruins of a single building, must prove alike instructive and interesting; and even to those not yet acquainted with the glories of Ancient Rome, the simple history of Nature's children luxuriating in beauty amid the decay of man's vast ambition may not be without its charm.

SPOILED TUNES.-The Rev. Thomas Hill, of Waltham, writing on Church Music in the Christian Examiner, says :-" Sometimes an attempt is made to alter a secular air by changing the cadence to a religious form. We have recently heard tunes of this character, from some new collection of sacred music, popular Irish and negro melodies, being cut off in the last measure, and a chord of the sub-dominant introduced, as it were, to sanctify them. The result is, that the tunes are spoiled for whistling on a week-day, without being rendered fit to sing on Sunday."

"There is not, probably, a realm (endroit) in the world so well disposé, humanly speaking, as Turkey, at the present moment, for receiving the Gospel. The Armenian Church is already, as you know, in great agitation; and as the Koran loses each day its prestige and authority in the eyes of the people, all souls in the least serious will have to make the choice between Protestantism and Catholicism, since (desanti) strong and traditional antipathies separate (eloignat) them from the Greek Church. This, then, is the moment for making known, as much as possible, the true nature of the Gospel which we profess, and of multiplying publications which may make it known, and, above all, by the circulation of the Bible."

Many well-authenticated instances of conversion we find in various letters to the several

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missionary journals. The Turkish Missions Society reports that more Mohammedans have purchased Scriptures during the last year than during all the previous years of the existence of the missions. The war, as a recent writer remarks," appears to have made known one great fact to the Mohammedans, even that there is a Bible," and they have begun to manifest a remarkable desire to know what it contains. In support of this statement the following, from a letter from Constantinople to the editor of the Rock newspaper, may be quoted :

"The other day I was crossing the bridge over the Golden Horn, which connects Galata with Constantinople proper, and I noticed, on one side, a number of open volumes spread out for sale. I soon found that they were Scriptures in the different languages used here, and that the seller was an Armenian Protestant young man, who, some time since, was driven by persecution from Rodosta, his native place, and had come to Constantinople to secure the protection of the Porte against his persecutors. Not wishing to wait here in idleness, he had ken these rom the Bible depôt, and day after day did he come to this crowded thoroughfare to find purchasers. Nor did he come in vain. At the end of a week he had sold twenty-four copies of the Turkish New Testament, and eleven copies of the Turkish Psalms, besides several other books in other languages! It is marvelous with what new desire the Mohammedans are now seeking for the Ingil (Gospel). Such a thing was never known before. We can as yet call it only curiosity, in most cases, to see what the New Testament of the Christian contains, but even this did not exist before the war; and may we not hope that it is the precursor of a work of God's Spirit on many hearts? One of their own number has lately opened a book-stall in the center of the city for the sale of Turkish and Arabic Bibles alone-a thing which, if it had been told us ten years ago, we should have said is utterly impossible.

"I have a short but instructive sequel to my story about the bridge-pedler. I asked him if any of the Mohammedans, in passing by, had made any opposition to his work. He said that, up to that time, the only person out of all the crowds of every nation and faith that had crossed the bridge who had expressed any displeasure, or made use of any abusive language, was a Roman Catholic priest! Thus Rome is everywhere the same, and always true to her principles of unmitigated hostility to the word of God !"

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PROTESTANT HUNGARIANS IN CONSTANTINOPLE.-In Constantinople there is a large Protestant Church composed of exiled Hungarians, mostly converts from the Roman Catholic faith. Having been banished from their native land, they have found an asylum, with liberty to worship God according to the dictates of their own conscience, in the dominions of the Sultan. The Rev. Mr. Dundas, the pastor of the Protestant congregation in Constantinople, is now in this country soliciting aid to enable his flock to build a chapel where they may worship God, and a school-house where their children may receive a Christian education. Mr. Dundas is himself a native of Hungary, and was formerly a Romish priest; but, seeking refuge from oppression in the United States, he here became acquainted with the truth as it is in Jesus, and returned to preach the gospel to his countrymen. He comes among us with most satisfactory testimonials, and we trust his mission will be eminently successful.

SPIRITUALISM.- - Dr. Robert Hare, of Philadelphia, recently lectured upon this subject at the tabernacle, in this city, giving the results of his own experience. He quite confident that the spirits of the departed do communicate with mortals by rapping, tipping over tables, &c. The doctor is a well-known and accomplished votary of the Natural Sciences, now past the age of threescore and ten. So confident is he in the truth of the supernatural theory on this subject, and of so much importance does he deem it, that on the occasion referred to he declared his willingness to put his neck under the guillotine if thereby he could bring the world over to his own faith in this monstrous absurdity.

in the proceedings of that year, in which he took a prominent part, "Brother Syell" and "Brother Lyell" occur with about equal frequency, as if they were different persons.

God revealed in the Process of Creation and by the Manifestation of Jesus Christ, including an Examination of the Development Theory contained in the "Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation." By James B. Walker, author of the "Philosophy of the Plan of Salvation." 12mo., Pp. 273. (Boston: Gould & Lincoln.) Our author's former volume was published anonymously in 1845, and ably reviewed by the Rev. James Porter in the Methodist Quarterly for April, 1847. Notwithstanding several defects it was well received, and soon reprinted in England, and translated into the languages of continental Europe. The present work is intended as a companion to the former, extending and strengthening the argument, which is done skillfully, and the book cannot fail to benefit the candid inquirer, however skeptical. Our author, we judge, has been reading German, and has coined several new compounds which neither beautify nor strengthen his style. "Pseudo-thesis," of which he is very fond, may pass, perhaps; but then we have also " pirates," "race-feeling," "life-action," and, what grates most harshly, the "love-death of Jesus." But there are spots in the sun.

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Professor Hackett, of Newton Theological Institute, made a journey to Egypt and Palestine in the spring and summer of 1852. He has given us a condensation of facts which came to his knowledge during his tour, entitled Illustrations of Scripture, suggested by a Tour through the Holy Land. 12mo.; pp. 340. (Boston: Heath & Graves.) The book corresponds to the title, is a plain statement of facts, all bearing more or less directly upon allusions and occurrences found in the Bible, and well deserves the attention and will repay the study of biblical inquirers. It has a carefully-prepared index, and is neatly printed. With reference to the Mount of Transfiguration our author says:

"In sermons and popular works Tabor is often represented as the undoubted scene of the Saviour's Transfiguration. It may be well to correct that misapprehension. It is susceptible of proof from history that a fortress or town existed on Tabor from very early times down to 50 or 53 B. C.; and as Josephus says that he strengthened the fortifications of a city there about 60 A. D., it is morally certain that Tabor must have been inhabited during the intervening period, that is, in the days of Christ. This, therefore, could not have been the Mount of Transfiguration; for when it is said that Jesus took his disciples up into a high mountain apart and was transfigured before them, we must understand that he brought them to a secluded, solitary place, where they were alone by themselves. It is impossible to say certainly where this wonderful event was transacted. It may have been, judging from some obscure intimations in the New Testament, a little further north, in the vicinity of Mount Hermon."

Church Music, with Selections for the Ordinary Occasions of Public and Social Worship. (Rochester: Darrow & Brother.) A selection of familiar tunes for the use of a Presbyterian congregation, and designed to promote that most desirable object that all the people, and not a select choir merely, should unite in this most important part of public worship. The selec

tion appears to have been made with good judgment, and the work will be useful to other denominations than that for which it was more especially prepared.

Professor Longfellow's new poem, The Song of Hiawatha, will add nothing to his reputation. The scene is laid among the Ojibway Indians, to which tribe the hero belongs, and he sings this song, or preaches this sermon, to his redskinned brethren, dilating vapidly on the arts of peace and its blessings. The story, what there is of it, appears to have been taken from Schoolcraft. We give the opening lines, written in what may be called the rail-road meter, without rhyme:

"Ye who love the haunts of Nature,
Love the sunshine of the meadow,
Love the shadow of the forest,
Love the wind among the branches,
And the rain-shower and the snow-storm,
And the gushing of great rivers
Through their palisades of pine-trees,
And the thunder in the mountains,
Whose innumerable echoes
Flap like eagles in their eyries—
Listen to those wild traditions,
To this song of Hiawatha!

"Ye who love a nation's legends,
Love the ballads of the people,
That like voices from afar off
Call to us to pause and listen,
Speak in tones so plain and childlike,
Scarcely can the ear distinguish
Whether they are sung or spoken-
Listen to this Indian legend,
To this song of Hiawatha.

"Ye whose hearts are fresh and simple, Who have faith in God and Nature, Who believe that in all ages

Every human heart is human,
That in even savage bosoms
There are longings, yearnings, strivings
For the good they comprehend not;
That the feeble hands and helpless,
Groping blindly in the darkness,
Touch God's right hand in that darkness,
And are lifted up and strengthened-
Listen to this simple story,
To this song of Hiawatha.

"Ye who sometimes, in your rambles Through the green lanes of the country, Where the tangled barberry-bushes Hang their tufts of crimson berries Over stone walls gray with mosses, Pause by some neglected grave-yard For a while to muse and ponder On a half-effaced inscription, Written with little skill of song-craft, Homely phrases, but each letter Full of hope, and yet of heart-break, Full of all the tender pathos Of the Here and the HereafterStay and read this rude inscription, Read this song of Hiawatha."

Our esteemed friend and valued contributor, Dr. Whedon, was not less happy in the selection of his theme for an Address before the Literary Societies of Dickinson College than for his manner of treating it.

"Allow me," he says, after a few introductory romarks, "without being supposed to interfere with the prerogatives of your professors' chairs, to select a topic from your college course. Permit me to present for your contemplation the illustrious bard of antiquitythe laureate of the classic ages-the poet Homer.

"But who is this Homer? Here all erudition, ancient and modern, pauses. It interrogates historybut history is then in her childhood, and she prattles innocent incredulities about him. It opens his own wondrous works; but he is too wrapt with his own entrancing themes to tell one fact about himself. Plagued with the tantalizing problem of this great authorship-a problem before which the question, Who was Junius? is not fit to be asked-the ancient Greek epigrammatist resolved that Homer was Jove himself;

for none inferior could have produced those immortal works. If all other great creations, traceable back to an origin of mystery, were reverently attributed to Jove supreme, why not those mighty creations, the Iliad and the Odyssey? Were they not two miraculous worlds-a twin pair of universes in themselves? Not quite satisfied with this solution, modern erudition, German and skeptical, takes up her microscope; and, under its solving gaze, the solid person of Homer evaporates-gasifics into a myth! The mythic gas then evolves and convolves, and soon, under the incantations of the German magician, it begins to condense, solidify; and lo! instead of one, twenty Homers stand in goodly phalanx before us. But, verily, this is liberal. Who would cry for one Homer lost, when he is compensated by a brace of Homers restored? These mighty master-pieces, then, were not produced by Homer merely, but by Homer & Co.! It is altogether a company concern-the joint stock in trade of a corporation. And, then, the wonder of greatness and genius is entirely solved, by ingeniously distributing it among a number of proprietors, with each his fractional dividend. On such a theory I should be unscrupulous in using ridicule, since argument is almost out of place. One Homer seems to me quite enough to admit in all the rolling centuries; but our Teutonic cousins demand my faith in a score. They reduce the miracle by multiplication. Twenty Homers, all in one age, and all at work upon one job! O the omnivorous faith of skepticism-the credulity of unbelief-the superstition of infidelity! The human race never furnished twenty Homers. There is not sparkle enough in the current of human vitality to generate them. The rolling river of human blood has not fire enough. Besides, the Iliad is one-grandly one! One with all its free varieties: varieties of event-varieties of spirit. It is one with all its discrepancies and forgetfulness of itself. Its very varieties prove its oneness, since they speak for themselves as the varied unfoldings of one same boundless creativeness."

We have been greatly pleased with a very attractively-printed volume entitled, A Grammar of Com osition; or, Gradual Exercises in Writing the English Language, by D. B. Tower and B. F. Tweed, from the press of Burgess & Co., New-York. It is an attempt, which deserves to be successful, to teach the art of writing the English language on a plan very different from the usual stereotyped method of giving lessons in parsing, and burdening the youthful memory with definitions less easily comprehended than the things professedly defined. We could wish its general adoption in academies and common schools, and more especially is it admirably calculated for private and domestic instruction.

Carlton & Phillips have just published, for the Sunday-School Union, A String of Pearls, embracing a Scripture Verse and a Pious Reflection for every Day in the Year. The "pious reflections" are selected with good judgment from various authors,-the late Dr. Olin, Dr. Cumming, Dr. Cheever, Trench, Kitto, Southey, Watts, Charles Wesley, and others. The book is beautifully printed, and was prepared by the lady to whom we are indebted for a similar volume published some time ago entitled "Words of the Wise."

Our Country's Mission in History is the title of an address, delivered at the anniversary of the Philomathean Society of Pennsylvania College, by W. H. Allen, LL. D., President of the Girard College. It is a masterly production, creditable alike to the author's patriotism and classical taste.

The same publishers have also recently added to their collection for Sunday-School libraries three original volumes: Summer Memories, a pleasing and instructive narrative, from the graceful pen of the author of "Little Ella ;" The Herbert Family, descriptive of various characters in a series of imaginary letters; and The Contrast, a soul-harrowing account of a young man who went into the eternal world with the consciousness of being lost, relieved by the course pursued by one of his companions, who became a minister of the Gospel.

Christian Theism; the Testimony of Reason and Revelation to the Existence and Character of the Supreme Being, by Robert Achor Thompson, M. A. (Harper & Brothers, New-York.) We noticed some time ago the essay of Dr. Tulloch, to which was awarded the second Burnet prize. The volume here named received, on the same occasion, the first premium. The general opinion seems to be that, somehow, the adjudicators made a mistake, many of the critics contending that neither volume was worthy of the award, and others that the second ought to have been first. It is certain that Mr. Tulloch's is written with greater accuracy and carefulness as to style, and Mr. Thompson's is lacking in that first requisite for a work of the kind-perspicuity. We concur with the remark of a writer in the Bibliotheca Sacra, that such a prize "should have called forth something immensey superior." Both works will in all probability quietly glide into oblivion.

Similar in object and plan to the volume of Professor Hackett, above noticed, is Bible Light from Bible Lands, by the Rev. Joseph Anderson, of Scotland; reprinted from the British edition by Carter & Brothers. (12mo., pp. 344.) The author made the Bible his guide-book in all his wanderings in the East; and shows us, from his own experience, the verification of Bible predictions, and the explanation of many biblical allusions and descriptions. On the subject of the Mount of Transfiguration he

confirms Mr. Hackett's statement:

"Tradition says it (Tabor) was the 'high mountain apart which was the scene of the transfiguration. Could this tradition be shown to be well founded, a glory would rest on Tabor that does not circle the brow of any other of the Bible mountains. But it rests on no good authority."

Some popishly-inclined priest, or Jesuit in disguise, perhaps, like one of the predecessors of Dr. Tyng, in the rectorship of St. George's Protestant Episcopal Church, in this city, took the liberty of expurgating an edition of Seymour's Evenings with the Romanists. One-third of the book, being that part which more especially relates to the distinguishing doctrines of Protestantism as opposed to Popery, was cut out, and thus the volume was given, by a publishing house in Philadelphia, to the American public. We are glad that the Messrs. Carter, of this city, have issued in its integrity this admirable volume. It abounds in strong arguments and striking illustrations, and opens wider than we had dared to hope the prospect for the renovation and conversion of priest-ridden Ireland. In a conversation with a learned priest, surrounded by several inquiring Irish Roman Catholics, our author thus treats the sacraments of matrimony and extreme unction:

"The Church of Rome holds that celibacy is a stato more holy than matrimony-that unmarried people, as such, are more holy than married people as such. Now all this may seem to me to be very absurd, or very unscriptural, or very wrong, but still it is very