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markable for Miss Sedgwick. Still it has her great excellencies of perspicuity, directness, naturalness, and pleasant illustration drawn from real life. It touches almost every branch of educa tion and living, self-training and the training and treatment of others. Of course, it is very general on all topics, and on some very imperfect. There is less originality than common, though enough for the character of the work. Of narrative and fiction, there is almost none; but the use of brief anecdotes and actual experiences is most pertinent and practical. The chapter on Manners and the use of the Tongue ought to be read, and reread, by every man, woman, and child, that knows how to read, especially in our own strange country. And the chapter called Sine qua non (we are surprised to see this printed Sine que non, in the contents of every edition,) short as it is, is enough to pay for the volume. The whole should be read with the recollection that it is dedicated by the author to her "young country-women," and is designed "for girls from ten to sixteen years of age."

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This book is to make the first volume of the Juvenile Series of the School Library. It will be followed in that Series by New England Historical Sketches, by N. Hawthorne, versations and Stories by the Fireside, by Mrs. S. J. Hale, Failure not Ruin, by Horatio G. Hale, Tales in Prose, by Miss Lee, of Charleston, S. C.,- The Poor Scholar, by Mrs. Embury, of New York, - Biography for the Young, by Miss E. Robbins. Separate volumes of Selections from the writings of Jane Taylor, Miss Edgeworth, Mrs. Barbauld, Mrs. Holcroft, Dr. Aikin, and others already engaged, -enough to show what we may expect from this second department of the plan we have presented.

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The Rollo Books. A new and uniform Edition, in six volumes. Boston: Weeks, Jordan, & Co. - These are little books, but they already fill a large place in the reading of that large portion of the community, whom we call children, some of whom may be pretty old, if we can judge from the pleasure we ourselves have taken in looking over these volumes. Their author is well known as Jacob Abbott, and that alone has found, or will find, for them a reception in most families. They deserve it of all families. As a whole, they make the most important series of Juvenile books that have appeared, to our knowledge, since Miss Edgeworth. They are very unlike those, and yet they resemble them in some prominent features; especially in making it their chief object to be pleasing, and thus gently and imper

ceptibly opening a way for instruction to the mind and morals, without obtruding or forcing it in the least. For this the books before us are remarkable. They are entertaining throughout. The interest never flags, and yet there is no seeming attempt to sustain it. There is little continuous story, and no plot or romance, or grown-up folly, such as fills half of the young novels now made for children. Here is a little boy, who is first induced to learn to talk; and in order to this, he is made to see objects for himself, and think about them, and ask questions. Next he is taught to read; to effect this, he is candidly told that learning to read is not play, but work, and at first dry and hard work. It soon becomes easy, however, because it is undertaken in earnest, and then it becomes pleasant; and parents may take a hint from this, when they are afraid to allow letters and learning to wear any form but that of playthings and pastime to their children. In the third volume, Rollo is at work, in the fourth at play; and the morals of both play and work are as easily and pleasantly insinuated as we have often seen. There is constant occupation in both, and constant natural opportunities of learning the duty and the advantage of feeling and doing right, and thus seeing the evil of feeling and doing wrong. For Mr. Abbott fully carries out, in these books, the great principle which we rejoice to see advanced in the Preface to one of them, namely, "that it is generally better, in dealing with children, to allure them to what is right by agreeable pictures of it, than to attempt to drive them to it by repulsive delineations of what is wrong." The fifth volume presents Rollo at School, and the last his vacation. They keep up the interest, and advance in maturity of thought and illustration, as the boy advances. The School is, we think, decidedly the best volume of the course, and one of the best of the kind in the language. Teachers and parents may well take a lesson from it, in the management of children.

If we were to find any fault with these books, it would be, that they are too minute and diffuse, errors to which their author is prone. There seems sometimes rather an excess of mere play, and too much time spent in descriptions of common implements and the most familiar events. This error, however, is better than the opposite. We are particularly glad to see that, in the use of words, the writer does not sacrifice everything to childish simplicity, like many of our juvenile works, but leaves something for the reader to ask and to learn. We recommend the entire series cordially, and this edition particularly; for, unlike former editions, and unlike most books in the beautiful but perishing binding of the day, these are strongly bound, neat, and well embellished. They are suitable for all places and all classes.

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Sabbath Recreations, or, Select Poetry of a Religious Kind; revised American edition. Edited by JOHN PIERPONT. Boston: 1839. It is becoming common to publish selections of poetry. Many of these selections the world would be quite as well without; but from the sweet songs and rich lyric pieces, which abound in our language, all will allow, a rare and valuable volume might be collected. Such a volume, in many respects, is the one before us. It is simple and unpretending; and though some of the pieces are probably familiar to most readers, and some are not remarkable for their excellence, yet they all breathe a pure and elevated spirit, and here and there is an exquisite effusion of genius, which answers to the holiest wants of the soul. It would have been well, if some of the noble sentiments of the earlier English poets could have been inserted, and it is a little remarkable, that, while there are several common-place pieces by modern writers of ordinary merit, there is not one line from either Brainard, or Dana, or Hillhouse. Still the volume is, on the whole, good, and contains much that must be satisfactory to the lover of sacred poetry.

Not only great pleasure may be derived from such a volume, but lasting and useful impressions. Many are keenly alive to the harmony of verse, and the fresh outbursts of poetic feeling, who would pore with delight over such a volume, and many might thus be won to high thought and serious reflection. There are hours, when the soul is peculiarly alive to the soft and melodious strains of true poetry, and such hours often occur on the Sabbath, when the very works of Nature seem to partake of holy influences. At these times, when the mind longs to see its own glowing emotions worthily expressed, such a volume as the Sabbath Recreations might give refreshment and delight.

The History of Greece, by THOMAS KEIGHTLEY, to which is added a Chronological Table of Cotemporary History, by JosнUA TOULMIN SMITH, &c. Boston: Hilliard, Gray & Co. 1839. pp. 490.—The whole aspect of the history of Greece has been changed in many important respects, within the last quarter of a century. The researches of historical inquirers, particularly in Germany, where every topic arising out of every part of the subject has been discussed with unparalleled industry and learning, have called many traditional views in question, thrown light upon matters formerly obscure, and subjected the political institutions, the philosophical systems, and the leading characters of the Greeks to the closest scrutiny, and the severest skepticism. The poetical enthusiasm of Gillies, the agreeable superficiality of VOL. XXVII.-3D s. vol. ix. No. I.

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Goldsmith, and the crabbed toryism of Mitford, to say nothing of his bad spelling, have been alike set aside. These works are read, it is true, and new and handsome editions are published every year, but for other than historical purposes. Mr. Bulwer has also spared some time from the composition of bad novels, shining with false glitter, and filled with the fantastic conceptions of worn-out sensuality and hypocritical liberalism, for the writing of what he affects to call a history of Athens, in the worst style of his novels. It is really surprising, that even so absurd and affected a creature as Bulwer should have failed so completely of giving his work the faintest tincture of historical truth, and of breathing into it the slightest inspiration of the classical spirit. His language is tawdry, his learning is picked up for the occasion, his translations from the Attic poets are in his most meretricious manner, and his discrimination and taste in judging the historical phenomena of the great "Democratie" of antiquity, are precisely what might have been expected from the radical dandy who wrote Paul Clifford.

No attempt was made in English literature to write the history of Greece in a proper spirit, until it was taken up by Mr. Thirlwall. His work is rich in learning, but defective in lucid arrangement. He pauses in his narrative to discuss the pros and cons of disputed points, of which, since the credulous age of Goldsmith and Gillies, a countless multitude have sprung up; and, though he always shows extraordinary ability, yet the impression left on the reader's mind is, on the whole, unsatisfactory. We can hardly tell whether we have been reading a history, or an antiquarian discussion, when we get, if we ever do get there, to the end of the chapter. Still, a great advance was made, or rather will be made, whenever his work is completed, towards supplying the long felt want of an authentic history of Greece.

In this state of the matter, Mr. Keightley has undertaken to draw up a summary of Greek history for the use of schools, and mere general readers. He has drawn from the original sources, and turned the learning of the Germans to good account, in illustrating them. His work is too brief to present a satisfactory solution of all the knotty questions in Greek history; but, as far as he goes, he gives faithful and clear views of the matter in hand. He divides the whole history into three parts, which he denominates the Aristocratic, the Democratic, and the Monarchic periods. This division is not strictly accurate, inasmuch as the term aristocratic does not well characterize the Heroic age, nor does monarchic apply very well to the period of the conflicts between Philip, and Alexander, and the Athenians, the period of

the great Attic orators and statesmen. The intervening period is more correctly designated by the epithet, Democratic; and yet, the modern notion of a democracy of equal rights must be wholly discarded from the term, as applied to any of the states of ancient Greece. Taking this division, however, as a mere convenient arrangement for the classification of the facts in Greek history, it answers well enough; and by means of it Mr. Keightley has, as we said above, given us a very intelligible outline of the marvellous picture of ancient Greece.

The work, it must be confessed, sometimes shows a little of the patchwork character. We see here and there the seams, where the different historical pieces are sewed together. A little more skill and labor in reducing the whole texture to uniformity, would not have been misapplied. The narrative is not always clear, as it ought to be. Incidental or secondary matters are thrust into the text, which might have been thrown into notes, with more propriety. A great many terms are taken bodily out of the Greek language, and give the English page an anomalous and foreign aspect; sometimes where there is little or no necessity. The Greek orthography of names is adopted, instead of the Latin or Anglicized forms, which have been familiarized by custom. We do not think there is much advantage gained by thus departing from established usage, in unessential particulars; but, if such a principle is once adopted, it ought to be adhered to. If we copy the Greek dipthong &, we might, with equal propriety, represent the dipthong ou in English. Keightley has done the former, but omitted the latter. The sketches of Greek literature, at the close of the chapters, are quite too meagre, to answer any good purpose. They might have been essentially improved, without materially increasing the size of the book; but, faulty as the book is, we might go farther and fare worse for a manual of Greek history.

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The Northmen in New-England, or, America in the Tenth Century. By JOSHUA TOULMIN SMITH, author of "Progress of Philosophy among the Ancients," etc. Hilliard, Gray & Co. 1839. pp. 364. It is the object of this volume to show that New England was discovered and explored in the tenth century, that is, about five centuries before the voyage of Columbus, by a colony of Northmen, or Norwegians, settled in Iceland. The original documents, on which this conclusion is founded, are contained in a work put forth in 1837, under the auspices of the Royal Society of Northern Antiquarians of Copenhagen. This is a ponderous work, in Danish and Latin, accessible, therefore,

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