of a particular author, and of contemplating a subject in the aspects which he intended that we should contemplate it? On the contrary, do we not hasten to compare him with some preceding or contemporary writer, in order to bring them into collision, and affix upon one or the other the seal of condemnation? A more christian mode of procedure would be to put a charitable construction upon the language of both, and not charge heresy or absurdity upon either because their minds happened to be differently constituted, or their object in appearing before the public not identical.

Some students of mental philosophy impose on themselves by requiring a uniform style of writing in all treatises on the subject in question. They are warm advocates of simplicity, plainness, perspicuity, or, in other words, of Saxon monosyllables. The only criterion of the worth of a book is its instant and perfect intelligibility to them to them, in all states of their minds and of their bodies. It is not easy to see how they would grapple with Paul's epistle to the Romans. He deals in sounding polysyllables, as well as in particles of three letters. Yet, if he employed the latter alone, it would not follow that his reasoning would have been any better than it is now. Long words were made to be used. A due mixture of them is indispensable to a philosophical writer. There are trains of thought which cannot be enunciated without them. We are not aware that bishop Butler's language could be much altered for the better. In sitting down to a writer of any pretensions on philosophical subjects, we need patience, reverence for his understanding, and a desire, on our part, to listen, to digest, to be instructed. He may utter truth, awful and everlasting truth, which may be nearly unintelligible to us, because our minds are unformed and dark.

No thorough philosopher, no accurate observer of mental phenomena can for a moment doubt that human depravity has in some way affected the intellectual faculties of man. A candid observer must be as far from maintaining the dogma that these faculties have not been influenced by the fall of Adam, as he must be from asserting that they are themselves, in the strict sense, depraved. Do not debased affections, unworthy motives, vicious habits act at all on the intellect? Was Adam in Paradise and Adam in his apostasy precisely the same being intellectually considered? Certainly the human intellect is, in some sense, in a darkened and degraded state. It has lost something of its

original brightness. Ought not this fact, therefore, to be taken into the account both by the mental and moral philosopher? Otherwise, can he accurately and fully discourse of the mind of man? We do not vindicate the mode in which this subject has been sometimes treated. Christian morals and mental philosophy have been handled not with the most consummate judgment and taste. But the great truth that human depravity has seriously affected the mind, and that he must not overlook this fact, who would give a complete view of the physiology of man, no reasonable person can deny. May we not hope that the boundaries of mental, moral and theological science will be defined with more discrimination; that the influence which moral causes exert on the intellectual nature and faculties will be more clearly pointed out; and that a spirit of more entire self-diffidence and candor, in connection with enlarged conceptions and comprehensive views, will be hereafter characteristic of the researches and studies connected with the great department of mind and morals? If the periodical press can be made auxiliary to the effecting of such a result, its labors will not have been

in vain.

4. Political Economy. The student of this unsettled, yet fascinating and important study, should lay down, it is conceived, the following general principles, among others, for the guid

ance of his studies.

Divine revelation furnishes rules and maxims of the greatest value in this science. The book of Proverbs is the best statesman's manual which was ever written.

An adherence to the

political economy and spirit of that collection of apothegms and essays would do more to eradicate from a people the causes of extravagance, debasement, and ruin than all the contributions to political economy of Say, Smith, Malthus, and Chalmers to

gether.

The utmost magnanimity should characterize the doctrines and measures of the political economist. A selfish policy thing in individuals. All men ought to love all men. Every among nations is no more to be countenanced than the same part of the world ought to desire and promote, according to its opportunities, the highest well-being of every other part. Europe has no reason to say to America; I have no need of thee. Even the unseemly parts-the burning realms of Africa-are not to be shut out from the great fraternity of nations. The various parts and organs of the human body are not dependent

on each other in a higher degree, than the different regions of our globe. The statesman and economist are not authorized any more, by the soundest principles of legislation, than they are by the spirit of Christianity, to devise plans for the aggrandizement of their own government, whose execution will be the detriment or ruin of other nations.

A scriptural education of all classes of the people ought to lie at the foundation of every theory of political economy. Other proposed remedies, while this is neglected, will be totally unavailing. A mere intellectual education is not competent to remove the evils which are suffered. A thorough scriptural education, (not a theological, much less a denominational one,) will, sooner or later, be found to be indispensable in arresting the degeneracy of nations.

The temperance reformation, also, in this connection, is of fundamental importance. We want words to express our conviction of the benign influence of this great reform on the repose and happiness of the civilized world. The blindest opponent of the enterprise cannot but see that the use of intoxicating liquors and drugs is sapping the foundations of national prosperity, and even depopulating some of the fairest portions of the globe. All travellers agree that the aboriginal population of South America is fast withering away under its baneful influence. Every judicious measure, therefore, in promoting this reform, is drying up the sources of national decay, is removing the causes of disease and debilitated constitutions, is lifting up the lower orders of the people in all countries to which access can be had, and is thus gradually accomplishing a salutary revolution in human society, with which scarcely any thing in the history of the race can be compared.

5. Criticism of books. The late Dr. Thomas Brown has written a paragraph on this subject, which we cannot forbear to adduce: "If all other circumstances be equal, he will undoubtedly be the best critic, who knows best the phenomena of human thought and feeling; and without this knowledge, criticism can be nothing but a measurement of words, or a repetition of the ever repeated and endless common-places of rhetoric. The knowledge of nature, of the necessity of which critics speak so much, and so justly, and which is as essential to the critic himself, as to the writer on whom he sits in judgment,—is only another name for the knowledge of the successive transitions of feeling of the mind, in all the innumerable diversities in

which it is capable of being modified by the variety of circumstances in which it may be placed. It is for this reason, that, with so great an abundance of the mere art, or rather of the mere technical phrases of criticism, we have so very little of the science of it; because the science of criticism implies an acquaintance with the philosophy of thought and passion, which few can be expected to possess. Though nothing can be easier than to deliver opinions, such as pass current in the drawingroom, and even in the literary circle, which the frivolous may admire as profound, and the ignorant as erudite, and which many voices may be proud to repeat, yet, it is far from being equally easy to show, how the one passage is beautiful, from its truth of character, and the other, though perhaps rich in harmony of rhythm and rhetorical ornament, is yet faulty, by its violation of the more important harmony of thought and emotion,—a harmony which nature observes as faithfully, in the progress of those vehement passions that appear most wild and irregular, as in the calmest succession of feeling of the most tranquil hours."

From these discriminating remarks of the philosopher, it may be justly inferred, that the proper criticism of books, is an undertaking of no little magnitude. It requires, in many cases, a thorough study of the author's mind, as well as of his book, and the kindred treatises which have been published on the same subject. It demands the ability to enter into the author's feelings, and habits of thought. It is in perfect variance with all dogmatical assertion, wholesale denunciation, indiscriminate eulogy, and superficial analysis. The critic must be firm, candid, patient, unprejudiced, willing to labor, clear-sighted. He must not, on the one hand, indulge any private pique or personal enmity, in forming an estimate of a book; nor, on the other hand, sacrifice the interests of taste, good learning, truth, and righteousness, in order to gratify personal friendships, promote a pecuniary speculation, or please an interested bookseller. Of a large proportion of the books diffused in our community, both of the original and imported classes, no literary judgment is required. Some are entirely harmless, — incapable of producing good or evil. Others are mere transcripts of volumes whose character and tendency have long been settled in the reading world. Some will perish at once, and deservedly, unless a too forward exhibition of their faults and weakness raise them to a temporary notoriety. Others require no analysis or notice, from the fact that their publication was owing, very properly it

may be, to the grateful impulses of sorrow, or to some other limited and transient cause.

In respect to the course to be pursued in this publication, on this subject, we make no promises; we enter into no engagements. Our experience has made us fully aware of the great and intrinsic difficulties connected with periodical criticism. The public mind is not entirely sound in relation to the matter. Fulsome eulogy has nearly usurped the place of candid and discriminating criticism. The want of a disposition to labor on the part of the critic, the vanity of authorship, or the danger of the pecuniary shipwreck of the capital invested in a book, renders an impartial examination of many books nearly impracticable. Men of sense, if they have written a volume, seem to have forgotten, that a considerate review of that volume, even if it deals somewhat in censure, will ultimately be of more service to the author, as well as to the community, than a mere mass of tasteless compliment, or stereotyped flattery.

6. Voluntary Associations for the Spread of the Gospel and for the Promotion of Christian Morals. It is now between forty and fifty years since the various evangelical denominations of Christendom began to enter with some zeal on the great work of diffusing the gospel throughout the world. At first, the warm impulses of pious feeling seemed to prompt to the effort, and to supply the place of well-established principles and properly devised modes of operation. That spring time of hope and expectation is passed. The ardent feeling and the excited imagination, which threw so much interest over the commencement of these efforts, have given way to the sober reality of the work itself. With undimmed eye and with unexcited feeling, we can now look out on the vast and difficult enterprise before us. It is well for us to reconnoitre our position, and put up some landmarks for our guidance. A few simple, general principles are now to be settled. It is a fact admitted on all hands, that the gospel is to be diffused by human instrumentality. The question is: How shall this instrumentality be directed and employed? Who shall have the control and responsibility of the undertaking? By what agencies in christian lands can the great victory over sin and error be achieved? The question is not, whether all the denominations shall be consolidated into one vast association. Such a proposal would find few advocates. It has no concern with the discussion of the relative merits of different forms of church government. The high dignity and VOL. IX. No. 25.

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