ciently numerous, it is engrafted on the nearest consistory, and thenceforth receives a grant from the public treasury.

"The Wesleyan Methodists have, for some years, been labouring as valuable auxiliaries. That body made an attempt to establish public worship in 1791, when Dr. Coke and two other ministers visited Paris for that purpose; but the endeavour completely failed. M. Mahy, ordained by Dr. Coke, persevered for some time in the neighbourhood of Caen, where he had to contend with much jealous opposition from the Consistory: he withdrew to Guernsey, and afterwards to Manchester, where he died in 1812.

"Pierre du Pontavice, a noble of Brittany, after self banishment to escape the terrors of the revolution, returned to France in 1802, and entered upon the pastoral office. He translated many theological works into French; and was usefully engaged as a preacher, in various parts of Normandy, until his death in 1810.

"The successful results of preaching on board the prison ships in the Medway, encouraged the society to renew their efforts at the peace of 1814. Their congregations are now considerable; and the number of their French preachers is fourteen.

"5. The Church of England also contributes to the important work of extending the light of the reformation. The Society for promoting Christian Knowledge, has in Paris a foreign district committee, under the direction of Bishop Luscombe. None but members of the established church can take any part in the direction of its proceedings; the object of which is 'to collect and transmit information respecting the best means of promoting Christian knowledge in its district-to establish, enlarge, or superintend schools to supply settlers and natives with the books circulated by the society to promote translations, when necessary, into the language of the country-and, lastly, to make collections in aid of the society's funds.' In pursuance of these designs the Bishop has, for some time, been engaged in superintending a new translation of the Bible and Liturgy; in which he has had the assistance of several learned persons, whose knowledge of the ancient languages ensures a faithful version of the original idea, in the purest style of modern French. This important undertaking has, for some cause, been recently laid aside; yet a large portion being completed, the friends of revealed truth may still hope to see it resumed.

"6. The Eglise Catholique Française must be mentioned as a co-operating means for promoting the reformation. The Abbé Chatel founded this church in 1831; and although his tenets do not at all resemble Protestantism, they are caleulated to induce investigation-a tendency necessarily obnoxious to a body, which denies the right of private judgment.

"With respect to collegiate education there is a faculty of Protestant theology at Montaubon; another at Strasbourg; and a college established in Paris, by the Société évangélique. Application has been made to the chambers, during the present session (1838), for a Protestant faculty in the capital the result was not favourable; but its necessity is generally admitted, as well as that of a change in legislation for public worship, which is found to be as galling to the Catholics as to the Protestants."

:

ART. XXVI.-Hannibal in Bithynia: a Play. By H. GALLEY Knight, Esq. M. P. London: Murray.

SIMPLICITY and a studious avoidance of every sort of rant, sentimental, and verbal, melodramatic and passionate, distinguish this production. There is indeed a want of fire in its poetry, and even a frequent infusion of colloquial and familiar phrases that hide from the reader the classic purity of the diction and the real elevation of sentiment that pervades the more serious parts. Hannibal comes out with true dignity; his is the composure of a great mind when, deserted by Prusias, and on the eve of being betrayed to the Romans by that weak and suspicious monarch, he, after the fashion of ancient heroes, anticipates at Brusa the violence of his enemies. The following is a short specimen, where the Carthagenian and two real friends discourse of the wrongs heaped upon him by those whose kingdom he had saved shortly before :

"Perdiccas.

I cannot bear

Such outrage, and ingratitude, to thee.

Han. Thou'rt young, Perdiccas! therefore art surpris'd;

Art young, and therefore mov'd.-I only wonder

When men keep faith, and fortune lasts a day.

Hyp. Thou hast redeem'd the kingdom-risk'd thy life;
Made victory the handmaid of Bithynia-

For this art thou disgrac'd!

Perd.

Oh, vile reward!

Astounding wrong that angers me to madness!
Canst thou be patient?

Han.

I should think as soon

To lose my patience if the wind did change,
Or if the springs were dried by summer's heat,
Or winter brought us hazy weather. Prince!

I stood upon the pinnacle of fame;
Rome trembled, and the world was in amaze—
Nations observ'd my steps with anxious eyes-
Armies, before me, melted like the snow-
Conquest obey'd my voice-think of all this!
Then think of Zama! think of Carthage too!
My country, that I serv'd from my youth up,
That turn'd me out, like a vile criminal,
To beg and wander.-What can happen now
To change the steady motion of my pulse,

Or my cheek's colour? What has chanc'd to-day

Is usual, and the customary course.

Baseness is human nature-and this world

A stage for knaves to act upon and prosper."

The Roman envoy who hoped to have conducted Hannibal alive and in triumph to Rome, thus questions and thus reasons with himself on first beholding the dead body of the hero :

"And is this Hannibal?

Our mighty enemy? and now-what? nothing!
The restless, strife-exciting Hannibal ?

So pale, so still, so motionless! Oh, death!
Thou read'st a lesson e'en to Roman pride,
That, in an instant, bring'st to this, the frame,
The potent mind, that could disturb a world.
This was the Chief, so oft by glory crown'd,
Who, for so long, resistless, kept his way,
Holding, as two leash'd greyhounds, in his grasp
Fortune and Vict'ry; who, oppos'd in vain
By nature's barriers, to our very doors
Brought dire defeat and terror, vanquishing
All our best captains, all but Scipio ;
And, for a season, kept the world in doubt
Who, for the future, was to be its master.
Nor could reverse or danger, grief or age,
The stirring spirit tame, that, to the last,
Its purpose
still pursued, and, at the last,
Resolv'd on freedom-ages shall roll on

And not produce a greater than lies here."

ART. XXVII.-The Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley. Vol. IV. London: Moxon. 1839.

THIS edition, and decidedly the best that yet exists, of the works of a genius who will ever hold a place in the first rank of poets, is now complete. The notes and illustrations contributed by the widow of the most sensitive of all dreamers, the wildest and yet often the loftiest of all speculatists, assist very considerably to render the perusal of the collected poems a more touching and affecting affair, than it would be without such aids and intimations. Our chief regret or disappointment has been that the whole taken together are by far too scanty for a memoir. We even feel that towards the conclusion of his career the illustrative notices are fainter and more vague than in the earlier volumes,-the state of the editor's health in part depriving us of what might have been most gladly received, and probably most advantageously remembered. As it is, however, we are thankful for the contribution; and perhaps the day may arrive when no delicacy or obstacle shall interpose, in this case where a man set a mark upon the literature of his country, to prevent an impartial and full disclosure of his entire history.

We learn from a note that Mrs. Shelley has not interfered to alter or expunge any part of the poems excepting of Queen Mab, of which proceeding we have, in a former notice, given our opinion. We extract one specimen and portion of her contributions to the present volume :

"Shelley did not expect sympathy and approbation from the public; but the want of it took away a portion of the ardour that ought to have sustained him while writing. He was thrown on his own resources, and on the inspiration of his own soul, and wrote because his mind overflowed, without the hope of being appreciated. . I had not the most distant wish that he should truckle in opinion, or submit his lofty aspirations for the human race to the low ambition and pride of the many; but I felt sure, that if his poems were

more addressed to the common feelings of men, his proper rank among the writers of the day would be acknowledged; and that popularity as a poet would enable his countrymen to do justice to his character and virtues; which, in those days, it was the mode to attack with the most flagitious calumnies and insulting abuse. That he felt these things deeply, cannot be doubted, though he armed himself with the consciousness of acting from a lofty and heroic sense of right. The truth burst from his heart sometimes in solitude, and he would write a few unfinished verses that showed that he felt the sting!

"I believed that all this morbid feeling would vanish, if the chord of sympathy between him and his countrymen were touched. But my persuasions were vain; the mind could not be bent from its natural inclination. Shelley shrunk instinctively from portraying human passion with its mixture of good and evil, of disappointment and disquiet. Such opened again the wounds of his own heart, and he loved to shelter himself rather in the airiest flights of fancy, forgetting love and hate, and regret and lost hope, in such imaginations as borrowed their hues from sunrise or sunset, from the yellow moonshine or pale twilight, from the aspect of the far ocean or the shadows of the woods; which celebrated the singing of the winds among the pines, the flow of a murmuring stream, and the thousand harmonious sounds that Nature creates in her solitudes."

ART. XXVIII.—The Vegetable Cultivator. By JOHN ROGERS. London.

Longman.

THE title in full of this work sufficiently explains the nature of its contents: these consisting of "a plain and accurate description of all the different species and varieties of Culinary Vegetables; with the most approved method of cultivating them by natural and artificial means, and the best mode of cooking them; together with a description of the Physical Herbs in general use, &c. Also, some recollections of the life of Philip Miller, F. R. S., Gardener to the Worshipful Company of Apothecaries at Chelsea. Few men have been more serviceable in the walk which the aged and respected author of this complete and explicit manual has pursued. Of his various publications, his "Fruit Cultivator," &c., there is no one that will be more generally useful than, in all probability, this last. Every one who cultivates or possesses a patch of garden-ground should have it always at hand. The culture of vegetables or a knowledge of the numerous interesting processes essential to this branch of economy is inseparable from the culture of heart and mind, and the growth of virtuous habits.

ART. XXIX.-Geraldine: A Tale of Conscience. By E. C. A. Vol. III. London. Dolman. 1839.

THE two former volumes of this religious novel were intended to delineate the progress of an earnest and gifted mind in its search after the true faith, the inquirer at length landing in the bosom of the Catholic Church, anxieties no longer harassing her, and, perfect confidence being realized, that she has discovered the sure way to preserve her innocent and holy on earth, and

guide her to heaven. There was more displayed in the manner as well as purpose of the previous volumes than an attempt and desire to write a beautiful and powerful tale. There was an object much at heart of the accomplished and able writer. Nor will this for a moment be questioned, when we mention that E. C. A. (Miss Agnew) has lately become a hearty convert to the religion of that communion whose doctrines and mysteries she so warmly expounds and admires; eagerly desiring that others would accompany her while she endeavours to trace the convert's career.

In the present volume the tale conducts the reader to further stages of the soul's approach to God while on earth than even a full acquiescence in the doctrines of the Catholic Church, a life consistent therewith, and an assurance of the perfect safety inseparable therefrom, supposes: for now we find the convert in Rome, and in Holy Week, when the awakening and mystic symbols and ceremonies of the Church begin to be appreciated by her. Marriage puts Geraldine in the way of still riper tuition, till at last her religious and holy feelings are so sublimated that nothing created can satisfy her soul; so that for anything we can discover in the sentiment or current and design of the tale, husband and wife, had not an opportune accident removed the former from this scene of probation, would and must have become strange to one another, unthought and unremembered but as they should hope for ever to associate in the land of eternal bliss, love, and thanksgiving.

The death of Sir Eustace removes whatever obstacle earthly feelings would have interposed to the exercises of Geraldine's sanctified and devoted soul. Accordingly she becomes a nun, and after a due period of initiation founds a new convent.

In the course of the work the doctrines, creed, and ceremonies of the Church of Rome, to which Protestants principally object, are, without the least reserve, and with an undaunted earnestness, avowed and maintained; and while we abstain from offering any opinion on such serious and delicate matters, we freely accord to the authoress the praise which candour, Christian charity, pious sentiments, acute reasoning, and elegant writing must ever command. The work will no doubt have a wide circulation among the members of the communion which Miss Agnew so sincerely adheres to; but even to Protestants it will afford much and varied information; while as a novel it is excellent.

ART. XXX.-Ianthe. By NUGENT TAYLOR. Saunders and Otley. THE poetry of this small production is of the Byron school; the story is one of love, disappointment, and despair. The sentiments are too morbid for our approval; the diction often, we suspect, a studied interference with the parts of speech, creating verbs out of substantives, for the sake of striking the ear with what the author considers the gems of poetic phraseology, and the fineries among words. We do not know how often, in the course of the twenty-three pages, the term halcyon occurs. Then we have shrined by his hopes, gemmed, passion'd soul, truth'd by time, and many similar liberties, which Mr. Galley Knight, at least, would be loath to take. We quote some specimens ;