NOTICES OF BOOKS. CHARLES ELWOOD: or the Infidel Converted. By O. A. Brownson. Boston: Little & Brown. 1840. pp. 262, 18mo. THIS little work seems a hearty utterance of the author's mind and heart. He says in the Preface, that it has been written "in an earnest spirit and for a serious purpose." Those to whom some of the views advanced may be distasteful, cannot but admire the union of so much strength and clearness of thought with such warmth and tenderness of feeling. The book is evidently not written for a mere story. The narrative is but a thread to string the thoughts upon. Charles Elwood is a young man of strong sense and deep feeling, who has been educated under strict and rigid religious influences, who finds when he begins to think for himself, that what he had revered as religion was in spirit inconsistent with true benevolence, and in doctrine without any rational foundation. The selfishness of the Church, the base passions so often appealed to from the pulpit, disgust his heart, the arbitrary assumptions of the champions of the prevailing faith provoke the indignation of his reason. The narrative opens with a conversation between the young infidel and a rather ignorant and intrusive though well meaning clergyman, who called one morning to bring, as he said, a message from God. Elwood asks him for his proof of being sent by God, and will not acknowledge another man's feelings, however ardent, as any proof to him of a commission from Heaven, nor will he admit that the Bible is a sufficient credential of a Divine ambassador. Then follows a long discussion of the evidence necessary for a revelation, in which the prominent objection to its claims is drawn from the lack of any certain test of a communication from God. The argument from miracles is opposed, on the ground of its being of no avail to one who does not previously believe in a God, and of there being no sure proof that he who works miracles comes from God or speaks the truth. Mr. Smith leaves the infidel without much progress towards his conversion. Then Elwood meets a more potent antagonist, in the fair girl to whom he was betrothed. She was under strong religious convictions, whose purity and fervour he admired while he could not share her enthusiasm. He attends an inquiry meeting, which is excellently described. He converses with one of the clergymen present, who seems a model of a designing, cold-hearted, yet shrewd priest. He argues with this Mr. Wilson on the being of God, and endeavours to show the insufficiency of the common argument of design in creation as proving a designer, and treats Paley and the school of Theologians of nature with little respect. His infidelity brings him into social disgrace. His betrothed is alienated from him, and poor Elwood is exiled from his home. Embittered by injury, he becomes a furious radical, and sets out to rid the world of priestcraft and tyranny. He finds the world too strong for him to lead it his own way, and is disgusted at the grossness of many who clamour forth their praises of his harangues. Poor, sick, and disheartened, he at last finds a friend, who acts the good Samaritan, and takes him to his home-a Christian home. Here true Christian kindness warms the infidel's heart with admiration and love, and rouses his interest to know more of a faith that is united with such charity, such rationality and refinement. Through the heart he is drawn towards religion, and the affections of his early days of childish spontaneous faith are revived. He enjoys the society of his benefactor, Mr. Howard, and the preaching and conversation of Mr. Morton, the minister of his kind host. Mr. Morton's argument meets the infidel's difficulties on the side of the intellect, as potently as the kindness of the Howards met the difficulties brought by the affections against Christianity. Elwood adopts Christ, as the inspirer of the true social and humane principle, and as the manifestation of the eternal reason. He is led to look upon his former opposition to Christianity as an honourable protest against a spurious substitute, an uncharitable and superstitious device of man. The arguments employed by Mr. Morton are such as are drawn from the spiritual or transcendental philosophy. The being of God is demonstrated to follow from the very nature of truth, beauty, goodness. The book closes without showing the sequel of the hero's life, and leaves us in doubt how far and in what manner his conversion affected his conduct. Herein lies its greatest defect. The author portrays with a master hand the infidel's doubts and struggles, but fails to show the state of his mind after these doubts were removed and these struggles over. He leaves Elwood an admiring listener to a philosophical argument, but does not show him to us a tenderhearted Christian sitting at the feet of him who is the Truth and Life. The infidel is hardly converted. All reflecting men have doubtless head in passing from childish creThe great crisis in our religious We doubt not, that this work will have its mission of usefulness, and will meet the wants of many. many struggles both of heart and dulity to manhood's rational faith. being is the most interesting crisis in life, and is a fit theme for the pen of genius. It would be well, if works of imagination would deal more with the most exalted subjects of the imagination, than they do. The Germans, with whom religious feeling enters so largely into life, have theological romances not a few. De Wette's "Theodore" is the best of the kind within our knowledge. Mr. Brownson's work is an American "Theodore." We much prefer the German romance, saying nothing of other particulars, for its deep sympathy with all religious sentiment, and especially with the symbols and hallowed rites of the Church. But such a comparison is unfair, for the little work before us makes no pretensions to excellence as a romance; and moreover we dare say, that with many it will have more power from what seems to us the too abstract and impersonal exhibition of Christianity. If we were to find fault with the writer's moral tone, we should say it lacks humility. The infidel is too proud a man throughout. He justifies his whole life, and says little of his sins, as affecting his faith. Yet the moral tone is high. The author need not doubt, that he has written to some effect. He will find fit audience, and not a few. Two DISCOURSES, delivered September 29, 1839, on Occasion of the Two Hundredth Anniversary of the Gathering of the First Congregational Church, Quincy. With an Appendix. By William P. Lunt. Boston: J. Munroe & Co. 1840. pp. 147, 8vo. We have carefully read these two Discourses, and cannot but consider them among the most elaborate, accurate, and valuable of all the compositions of this class which have lately been issued, numerous and important as they are. The author has apparently a good deal of the peculiar spirit, which is needed to do them justice, and he has taken a genuine, reverential, antiquarian pleasure in pur suing the researches which are so plainly and plentifully indicated by his addresses, and especially by the appendix attached to them. Filled with the right temper for his enterprise, he has completed it with corresponding fidelity; and his labours, like those of one of his venerable predecessors often cited in these Discourses, will be perused and studied, with equal pleasure and benefit, by many a member of the Quincy generations "yet unborn." We the more rejoice to notice Mr. Lunt's qualification for the kind of work of which he has given us such a specimen in these pages, inasmuch as his theme was a conspicuous and important one; few more so among us, of the same class. Mount Wollaston is famous ground. Says Governor Winthrop, September 17, 1639, “it had been formerly laid to Boston: but many poor men having lots assigned them there, and not able to use those lands, and dwell still in Boston, they petitioned the town first to have a minister there, and after to have leave to gather a church there, which the town at length (upon some small composition) gave way unto. So this day they gathered a church after the usual manner, and chose one Mr. Tompson, a very gracious, sincere man, and Mr. Flynt, a godly man also, their minister." This was the fifteenth church in the order of time which was gathered in the Massachusetts colony, and we do not go too far in saying that it has generally held a rank, and exercised an influence, beyond even what might have been sustained by this respectable seniority among the churches. Even at the outset, few as its members were, the case was so. It was owing to the character of those members, and especially of the ministers they employed. Few religious societies in this country, we apprehend, have been more favoured in this respect. Most of them would find it much to say, in reviewing so long a history as this, that their clergymen had brought no reproach on Christianity or the Church. The clergy of Quincy must receive much higher praise, as the most summary notice of them will be sufficient to show. Mr. Tompson, who lived and laboured till 1666, Mr. Lunt tells us, is spoken of by those who have written of our early history, as a "powerful and successful preacher," and quite a pillar in these New England churches. He is also said to have been in his day an author of some repute. and had preached in Lancashire. is to be fairly inferred from Cotton they are: He was English-born, and bred, That he was educated liberally Mather's hexameters, lame as "Oxford this light with Tongues and Arts doth trim; Mr. Flynt, who lived till 1668, was grandfather of the celebrated. Henry Flynt, tutor at Cambridge over fifty-five years. He appears to have filled his place to the satisfaction of his people, and this is something to say for him, for they were, as we have hinted, rather distinguished for intelligence and spirit, among the societies around them. Our annalist records, as a fact honourable to the disposition of the inhabitants of this town, during the period we have just been passing over, and some indication too of the growth of the place, that among the contributions made in various places towards the erection of a new edifice for the College at Cambridge, (which was completed in 1677,) the town of Braintree furnished the sum of £87. 14s. 6d., there being only four towns in the colony that contributed a larger sum for the same purpose. Another of the Quincy succession was Rev. Mr. Hancock. In his case eulogy would be superfluous; the character, which he may be said to have given his illustrious son, speaks sufficiently for him, though he did not live to witness its brilliant results. He however discharged his sacred duties nearly eighteen years. His successors we are compelled by our limits to pass over, noticing only a remark made on Mr. Briant, in connection with the earliest preacher at Wollaston. Mr. Lunt says, "in point of intellect, they stand in the first class of the New England clergy. They were very different, I am well aware, in the structure and tendency of their minds, and quite at variance in the creeds which they adopted and advocated, each with so much acuteness, force, and persuasiveness. But it is for this very reason that they deserve to be studied in connexion. They were placed in somewhat similar circumstances, during the respective periods in which they lived. They were both of them, bold, and candid, and of course [?] imprudent, in the statement of their honest thoughts. They were both of them specimens of minds that resisted the current notions and prejudices of their times. They both of them incurred odium by the Christian manliness with which they opened |
