leries, and worn by Friends of high standing and undoubted orthodoxy. But I attach comparatively little importance to dress, while there is enough left in the tout ensemble of the costume to give ample evidence that the wearer is a Quaker. So much for the waistcoat; now for the bell! I live in the back part of the bank premises, and the approach From the Spectator. DR. CHALMERS' PRELECTIONS.* THIS concluding volume of the edition of the Posthumous Works of Dr. Chalmers contains the lectures, notes, or commentaries, delivered by the great preacher of the Scottish Church from to the yard leading to my habitat is by a gate open- the Theological chair, on Butler's Analogy, Paing out of the principal street or thoroughfare ley's Evidences, and Hill's Lectures in Divinity. through our town; the same gate serving for an There are two modes, as Dr. Chalmers lays it approach to my cousin's kitchen-door, to a large bar-iron warehouse in the same yard, and I know down, of teaching that "most voluminous of all not what besides. Under these circumstances, some the sciences, theology." * "One method is notification was thought needful to mark the bell for the professor to describe the whole mighty appertaining to our domicil, though I suppose nearly series of topics in written compositions of his a hundred yards off; and the bell-hanger, without any consultation with me, and without my knowledge, had put these words over the handle of the bell, in a recess or hole in the wall by the gate side; and they had stood there unnoticed and unobserved by me for weeks, if not months, before I ever saw them. When aware of their being there, having had no concern whatever in their being put there, having given no directions for their inscription, and not having to pay for them, I quietly let them stand; and, until thy letter reached me, I have never heard one word of comment on said inscrip tion as an unquakerly one; for I believe it is well known among all our neighbors that the job of making two houses out of one was done by contract with artisans not of us, who executed their commission according to the usual custom, without taking our phraseology into account. Such, my good friend, are the simple facts of the two cases. We close our extracts from this agreeable volume with a story from the memoir, throwing light upon a prime minister as well as the poet. own." Another, and our author thinks a better way, is to take certain classics in theology, to prescribe a given portion to be read and digested by the students at home, to subject them to examination in the lecture-room on what they have thus perused and mastered, and then for the professor to give prelections" on the successive parts so read, as Dr. Chalmers has done in the volume before us. " The plan has this objection, if it is an objection-the student will not be surrounded by the theologico-literary atmosphere of his own day, nor will the latest novelties in theology be presented to his mind, unless the teacher add a kind of supplement to his commentaries. In other points of view the method is a very good one. The student has the printed text of an established classic before him to study at leisure, instead of listening to a spoken lecture that may be far from classical, and of which he, however attentive, can only carry a portion away. A full knowledge of his author will be secured by a proper examina tion of the pupils, especially if their teacher look into their note-books to see whether they have really made the species of analytical abridgment In 1845 came out his last volume, which he got permission to dedicate to the queen. He sent also a copy of it to Sir Robert Peel, then prime minister, with whom he had already corresponded slightly on the subject of the income-tax, which Mr. Barton Dr. Chalmers recommended to his class. Any thought pressed rather unduly on clerks and others whose narrow income was only for life. Sir Robert asked him to dinner at Whitehall. "Twenty years ago," writes Barton, such a summons had elated and exhilarated me-now I feel humbled and 66 depressed at it. Why, but that I verge on the period when the lighting down of the grasshopper is a burden, and desire itself begins to fail." He went, however, and was sincerely pleased with the courtesy and astonished at the social ease of a man who had so many and so heavy cares on his shoulders. When the Quaker poet was first ushered into the room, there were but three guests assembled, of whom he little expected to know one. But the mutual exclamations of "George Airy!" and "Bernard Barton!" soon satisfied Sir Robert as to his country guests feeling at home at the great town-dinner. On leaving office a year after, Sir Robert recommended him to the queen for an annual pension of 100l.; one of the last acts, as the retiring minister intimated, of his official career, and one he should always reflect on with pleasure. B. Barton gratefully accepted the boon. And to the very close of life he continued, after his fashion, to send letters and occasional poems to Sir Robert, and to receive a few kind words in reply. errors in the original author may be pointed out by the prelector, any obscurities cleared up, and any deficiencies supplied, even to the extent of whole topics if such should be omitted in the original. No objection can be taken to Dr. Chalmers' choice of books. Butler shows the consistency of revelation with creation such as we see it, and the probability of the scriptural revelation; thus placing Christianity on the basis of nature. Paley rightly comes next in order, with historical and logical evidences in support of that Christianity whose possibility Butler had argued for, while he had shown the probability of some revelation. Hill, unfolding a professor's system of what may be called clerical theology, properly closes the series, and winds up with the professional, as it were, in opposition to the general character of the preceding writers. In a scholastic sense, the execution is not equal * Prelections on Butler's Analogy, Paley's Evidences of Christianity, and Hill's Lectures in Divinity. With two Introductory Lectures, and four Addresses delivered in the New College, Edinburgh. By the late Thomas Chalmers, DD., LL.D. (Chalmers' Posthumous Works, Volume IX.) Published by Hamilton and Adams, London; and Sutherland and Knox, Edinburgh. now in which he and then needlessly heaps illustration upon illustration, and smothers an argument by avoidance or by words, rather than settles it in a close grapple. Occasionally he appears to be averse to "close quarters," and keeps firing long shots, as much round as at the mark. It should be observed, however, that these observations apply more to Paley's Evidences than to the other authors; and Dr. Chalmers' Notes on Paley are only fragments, the choicer matter having been used in other works. The peculiarities, though not adding to the value of the prelections in a scientific sense, have attraction from their display of the genius of the author, and his well-stored, various, and discursive mind. They also very often contain useful advice to the young divine; and, when impressed by Chalmers' earnest yet playful manner, they might be more serviceable in fact than they may seem in print. The following hints on preaching may be advantageously pondered by young pulpit orators; though they are not likely to repeat the good story that closes them. nor of servile compliance with authority; but a faith which has a substantial and vindicable ground of evidence to rest upon, and not the less substantial and vindicable though not one word about the vindication ever passes betwixt you and the people whom you are the instrument of Christianizing. The most striking example of the inapplicable introduction of an academic subject into the pulpit that I remember to have heard of, occurred many years ago in the west of Scotland; when a preacher, on receiving a presentation to a country parish, preached his first and customary sermon previous to the moderation of the call. The people were not, even from the first, very much prepossessed in his favor; and he unfortunately did not make ground amongst them by this earliest exhibition of by his gifts, he having selected for the topic of his pulpit demonstration the immateriality of the soul. This had the effect of ripening and confirming their disinclination into a violent antipathy, which carried them so far, that they lodged with the Presbytery a formal complaint against him, containing a series of heavy charges; where, among other articles of their indictment, they alleged that he told them the soul was immaterial-which, according to their version of it, was tantamount to telling souls or no. them that it was not material whether they had This passage is from the Notes on Hill; which are closer than those on Paley, probably for the reason already suggested. We, however, rate the commentary on Butler the highest. The clear, close logic of the bishop keeps Dr. Chalmers closer to his subject, and the Analogy may have been an old and familiar companion. He takes large views of its subject and treatment; his criticism is sounder and firmer; though he is more successful in impugning the evangelism than the logic of Butler. The last century was deficient, no doubt, in vital religion; but perhaps Dr. Chalmers may not have sufficiently discriminated between an argument addressed under an assumed I doubt if the literary or argumentative evidence is a befitting topic for the pulpit at all. The tendency of the youthful preacher, when warm from the hall, is to prepare and preach sermons on the state of things, and an opinion held absolutely. leading topics of the Deistical controversy, and At the same time, it must be allowed that Butler sometimes even to come forth with the demonstra- and many of his contemporaries (very pious men tions, the merely academic demonstrations, of nat- too) did not partake of the views of the Puritans, ural theology. It is not stripping the expositions or of the Methodists of the last century, and might ters of religion, and that does not obtain in the mat- the virtue of his atoning sacrifice, and the utter of the pulpit of evidence, and of sufficient evidence, even though the historical argument, or indeed any formal argument whatever, should form no part of them. If, as we believe, the main credentials of Christianity lie in its substance and contents, then you, in the simple unfolding of these contents, are in fact presenting them with the credentials, although you never offer them to their notice as credentials, but simply as truths which do in fact carry the belief by their own manifestation to the consciences of the people. In making demonstration of their guilt, in making proposal to them of the offered remedy, in representing the danger of those who reject the Saviour, in urging the duty of those who have embraced him when thus employed, you are dealing with what I would call the great elements of preaching; and it is a mistake, that because not formally descanting on the evidence, you are therefore laboring to form a Christianity among your people without evidence. In the language of the Apostle, what you thus preach can commend itself to every man's conscience, and the resulting faith is neither the faith of imagination not have gone the more sober length of some mod ern sects as to new birth and the instantaneous effects of grace. Butler, in one brief paragraph of this chapter, exceeds the usual aim and limit of his argument, and aspires to an absolute vindication of the ways of God. He tells us that, in regard to religion, there is no more required of men than what they are well able to do and well able to go through. We fear that he here makes the first, though not the only exhibition which occurs in the work, of his meagre and moderate theology. There seems no adequate view in this passage of man's total inability for what is spiritually and acceptably good; for, by the very analogy which he institutes, the doctrine of any special help to that obedience which qualifies for heaven is kept out of sight. We are represented as fit for the work of religion, in the same way that we are fit, by a moderate degree of care, for managing our temporal affairs with tolerable prudence. There is no account made here of that peculiar helplessness which obtains in the mat 1 ters of ordinary prudence: yet a helplessness which forms no excuse, lying, as it does, in the resolute and by man himself unconquerable aversion of his will to God and godliness. There is nothing in this to break the analogies on which to found the negative vindication that forms the great and undoubted achievement of this volume, and with which, perhaps, it were well if both its author and its readers would agree to be satisfied. The analogy lies here that if a man wills to obtain prosperity in this life, he may, if observant of the rules which experience and wisdom prescribe, in general make it good; and if he will to attain to blessedness in the next life, he shall, if observant of what religion prescribes, and in conformity with the declaration helplessness of man without the Spirit of God, not to reform merely but to renew, not to amend but to regenerate, not to fan into vitality the latent sparks of virtue and goodness which may be supposed originally to reside in the human constitution, but to quicken him from his state of death in trespasses and sins, so that from a child of the world he may be transformed into one of the children of light, who, aforetime alive only to the things of sense, becomes now alive to the things of faith-alive to God. There is nothing I feel less disposed to exercise than the office of a jealous or illiberal inquisitor upon one who has wielded so high the polemic arm in the battle of the faith. But I would caution you, when I meet with such an expression as that that he who seeketh findeth, he shall most certainly of the Holy Ghost given to good men, against the make it good. It is true that in the latter and larger case the condition is universally awanting; for man, in his natural state, has no relish and no will for that holiness without which we cannot see God. But to meet this peculiar helplessness, there has been provided a peculiar remedy; for God makes a people willing in the day of his power, and gives his Holy Spirit to them who ask it. Dr. Chalmers oftener than once recurs to the topic: the Anti-Calvinism of Butler finds no favor in his eyes; and at last he seems to intimate, that, however eminent as a defender of the faith, the bishop personally was in a dubious way. It were great and unwarrantable presumption to decide on the personal Christianity of Butler; but I may at least remark on the possibility, nay, I would even go so far as to say, the frequency of men able and accomplished, and zealous for the general defence of Christianity, being at the same time meagre and vague in their views of its subjectmatter. I might state it as my impression of our great author, that when he does offer his own representations on the form and economy of that dispensation under which we sit, he seems to me as if not prepared to state the doctrines of our faith in all that depth and peculiarity wherewith they are rendered in the New Testament. That man achieves a great service who, by strengthening the outworks of our Zion, places her in greater security from the assaults of the enemy without; but that man, I would say, achieves a higher service who can unfold to the friends and disciples who are within, the glories of the inner temple. Now I will say of Butler, that he appears more fitted for the former than for the latter of these achievements. I would trust him more on the question who the letter comes from, than I would on the question what the letter says; and I do exceedingly fear, that living, as he did, at a period when a blight had descended on the church of England-at a time when rationality was vigorous but piety was languid and cold-at a time when there had been a strong revulsion from the zeal and the devotedness, and withal the occasional excesses, of Puritanism-I do fear, I say, that this illustrious defender of the repository which held the truth would have but inadequately expounded in all its richness and personal application the truth itself. I think it but fair to warn you, that up and down throughout the volume there do occur the symptoms of a heart not thoroughly evangelized, of a shortness and a laxity in his doctrinal religion, of a disposition perhaps to nauseate as fanatical those profound impressions of human depravity and the need of a Saviour, and delusion of this preternatural aid being only given for the purpose of helping further onward those who have previously, and by dint of their own independent exertions, so far helped themselves. I would have you to understand that the intervention of this heavenly agent is the outset of conversion, and accompanies all the stages of it. He is not only given in large measure to good men, but He makes men good. LIFE AND PEOPLE AT THE BERMUDAS. THE Bermudas, named from Juan Bermudas, are thus described in a letter from Mr. Foote to the Buffalo Commercial Advertiser: Great Britain has neglected nothing to increase their natural strength, and make the islands perfectly secure as a naval station. Every height or projecting headland is fortified and bristles with cannon; but the reef that encircles the whole group at the distance of from one to ten or more miles, constitutes their real substantial defence. There is but one entrance within this reef, practicable for sea-going vessels, and even when within, if the buoys marking the channel were removed, a vessel, unless enjoying the advantages of the very best pilotage, would almost inevitably strike on some sharp coral bank. As it is, no one ever thinks of taking in a vessel in the night. Ireland's Island is a mass of soft white limestone, with an area of perhaps fifty or seventy-five acres, the whole of which is nearly covered with barracks for the troops, governmental offices and storehouses, and a few shops and dwelling houses. A mole, beautifully made of the limestone, about one thousand feet in length and a hundred yards or so from the shore, makes a small harbor, within which lies the hulk for the convicts. The precise number of the convicts now here, I could not learn; but there are probably over a thousand. They do not look like very desperate characters, and appear to have a pretty easy time. Their chief employment is getting out and dressing stone, at which they work in squads, under the eye of an overseer, about eight hours a day. They are lively and chatty, and many of them, I dare say, are better off than they ever were before in their lives. In their leisure hours they occupy themselves in reading such books as are furnished them, or in making toys and ornaments of various kinds, out of coral and a beautiful species of spar that is found abundantly in the hollows and cavities of the rock, and bears a very high polish. These they sell slily to visiters at a moderate price. The troops stationed here are the 42d Highland est white villas everywhere gleaming through the ers a fine body of men, but not as stalwart nor so martial in their bearing as the 93d, stationed in Canada a few years since-and two or three companies altogether of artillery and sappers and miners. Strict discipline is maintained, and the utmost vigilance is at all times observed. Some months ago, when Mitchell, the Irish patriot, was here, and there was insane talk in the States about rescuing him-a job that would have proved about as possible as sculling a boat up Niagara Fallsthe guns were all shotted and manned, with fires lighted, ready for instant service if needed, on the approach of any vessel in the offing. Defended as the Bermudas are by nature and high art, they may be considered almost impregnable. Fortunately, war between the U. States and England is an wheels. A man came out of a neighboring house almost impossible event, but if, by any misfortune, it should occur, these islands would be a perfect hornet's nest to us. With the exception of St. Helena, they are more isolated, that is, further removed from any other land, than any spot on the globe. The nearest land is Cape Hatteras, which is five hundred and eighty miles distant. The precise number of islands and islets composing the group has never been distinctly ascertained, but is popularly said to be three hundred and sixty-five. Many of them, of course, are nothing but mere points of rock, a few yards square, Bermuda, the principa island, is some six or eight miles long, with an average breadth of perhaps a mile. The chief town or capital of the group, Hamilton, is on this island. We ran up to it, about six miles from our anchorage, the day after we arrived. The boats in use here are of a very peculiar construction, built of cedar, exceedingly light and buoyant, excellent sea-boats and sail like witches. The run up to Hamilton was delightful. The morning had been very warm, thermometer at 80° in the shade, but about 9 o'clock a fresh breeze sprung up, bringing with it light fleecy clouds, covering the whole group and the encircling reef, as if a vast pavilion had been specially raised, and radiant at times with the most gorgeous colors, as the sun's rays were refracted by the masses of vapor. The island, as we sped merrily up the sound, was dotted all over with neat houses, all built of the soft limestone, and all, with scarcely an exception, of the most intense, brilliant white, even to the roofs, which were composed of thin slabs of stone. Some of these houses in the vicinity of Hamilton, embowered in shade, would be considered charming villas in any country. The town of Hamilton may have fifteen hundred inhabitants. The buildings make no architectural pretensions, but look comfortable, and altogether the town has a very inviting appearance. I saw here a very beautiful shrub that attains about the same height our lilacs do, bearing a very large flower, of the purest snow white in the morning. At noon the flower changes to a delicate pink, and at sunset it changes again to a crimson, shrivels up and falls. I did not hear its name. The oleander flourishes magnificently-some of them, in fact, are almost trees. The great lion of the islands is a small pond artificially stocked with fish, about six miles from Hamilton. The drive to it is the most delightful that can be conceived. Imagine a road perfectly white and as smooth as the most nicely tended walk in a gentleman's garden-the walks within the fort at Michilimackinac are just like it-shaded by every variety of luxuriant semi-tropical vegetation, mod We drew up by the side of a low stone structure about fifteen yards square, and here our driver told us was the pond. On the other side of the road the tiny waves of a shallow cove were leaving a light line of foam almost against our carriage unlocked a door in the wall, and we entered. Within the enclosure was a hole in the rock about thirty feet long by twenty wide, and twenty or thirty feet deep. Into this hole the sea found its way by fissures in the rock, and this was the famous pond. The water was clear as crystal, and floating in it were eight hundred groopers, of from five to fifteen pounds' weight each. The average, I should think, was not far from eight pounds. They rose to the surface of the water as we stepped upon the rim of their cup, and with prominent, codfish-like eyes and open mouths garnished with ugly looking teeth, watched all our movements. If one of our party made a splash in the water with his hand, instead of retreating, the fish would make a dash to seize his fingers. One gentleman drew out a fish that would weigh ten pounds, that had seized the crooked handle of his cane. A man's life, if in the pool with them, would be worth less than if thrown into a den of ravening panthers. The fish are caught off the shore, which they visit at irregular intervals, and thrown into the pond, whence they are taken when required. When in the pond, there is no difficulty in catching any one that may be pointed out. All that is necessary is to wait till he is a little separated from his fellows, and then cast the hook before him. It matters little whether the hook be baited or not. It is sure to be caught at greedily. We saw several so caught, and for flavor and texture we can vouch that they are not surpassed by any fish that swims. We returned by a different road, one that skirted the sea nearly the whole distance, passing by the governor's house, the Lunatic Asylum, and many other places of local note. There was a gay party that evening at dinner at the Yacht Hotel in Hamilton. DEVOTION. I NEVER could find a good reason Why sorrow unbidden should stay, Our cares would wake no more emotion, To Providence leaves all the rest. And sets like the sun in the ocean, From the Examiner. writer combines a craving for stronger and rougher Shirley. A Tale. By CURRER BELL, author of stimulants. She goes once again to the dales and "Jane Eyre." Three vols. Smith and Elder.* fells of the north for her scenery, erects her "con THE peculiar power which was so greatly fessionals" on a Yorkshire moor, and lingers with evident liking amid society as rough and stern as the forms of nature which surround them. She has a manifest pleasure in dwelling even on the purely repulsive in human character. We do not remember the same taste to the same extent in any really admirable writer, or so little in the way of playful or tender humor to soften and relieve the habit of harsh delineation. Plainly she is deficient in humor. In the book before us, what is stern and hard about Louis Moore is meant to be atoned by a dash of that genial quality. But while the disagreeable ingredient is powerfully portrayed in action, the fascinating play of fancy is no more than talked about. admired in Jane Eyre is not absent from this book. Indeed, it is repeated, if we may so speak of anything so admirable, with too close and vivid a resemblance. The position of Shirley and her tutor is that of Jane and her master reversed. Robert and Louis Moore are not quite such social savages, externally, as Mr. Rochester; but in trifling with women's affections they are hardly less harsh or selfish, and they are just as strong in will and giant in limb. The heroines are of the family of Jane, though with charming differences, having wilful as well as gentle ways, and greatly desiderating "masters." The expression of motive by means of dialogue is again indulged to such minute and tedious extremes, that what ought to be developments of character in the speaker become mere exercitations of will and intellect in the author. And, finally, the old theme of tutors and govern- acter a character, we mean, in which the natural esses is pushed here and there to the tiresome point. The lesson intended is excellent; but works of art should be something more than moral parables, and should certainly embody more truths than one. While we thus freely indicate the defects of Shirley, let us at the same time express, what we very strongly feel, that the freshness and lively interest which the author has contrived to impart Is there, indeed, in either of these books, or any of the writings which bear the name of " Bell," one really natural, and no more than natural, char is kept within its simple and right proportions! We suspect it would be hardly an exaggeration to answer this question in the negative. The personages to whom Currer Bell introduces us are created by intellect, and are creatures of intellect. Habits, actions, conduct are attributed to them, such as we really witness in human beings; but the reflections and language which accompany these actions, are those of intelligence fully developed, to a repetition of the same sort of figures, grouped and entirely self-conscious. Now in real men and women such clear knowledge of self is rarely in nearly the same social relations, as in her former work, is really wonderful. It is the proof of gen- developed at all, and then only after long trials. ius. It is the expression of that intellectual faculty, or quality, which feels the beautiful, the grand, the humorous, the characteristic, as vividly after the thousandth repetition as when it first met the sense. We formerly compared the writer to Godwin, in the taste manifested for mental analysis as opposed to the dealing with events; and might have taken Lord Byron within the range of the comparison. As in Jane Eyre, so in Shirley, the characters, imagery, and incidents are not impressed from without, but elaborated from within. They are the reflex of the writer's peculiar feelings and wishes. In this respect alone, however, does she reseinble the two authors named. She does not, like Godwin, subordinate human interests to moral theories, nor, like Byron, waste her strength in impetuous passion. Keen, intellectual analysis is her forte; and she seems to be, in the main, content with the existing structure of society, and would have everybody make the most of it. We see it rarely in the very young-seldom or ever on the mere threshold of the world. The sentient and impulsive preponderates, at least in this stage of existence; at the utmost, the intellectual only struggles to emerge from it. It is impossible to imagine that Shirley and her lover could have refined into each other's feelings with such keen intellectual clearness, as in the dialogues and interviews detailed, yet remained ignorant so long of what it most behooved them both to know. But even in the children described in this book we find the intellectual predominant and supreme. The young Yorkes, ranging from twelve years down to six, talk like Scotch professors of metaphysics, and argue, scheme, vituperate, and discriminate, like grown up men and women. Yet in spite of this, and of the very limited number of characters and incidents in this tale as in the former, the book before us possesses deep interest, and an irresistible grasp of reality. There is a vividness and distinctness of conception in it quite marvellous. The power of graphic delinea As well in remarking on Jane Eyre, as in noticing other books from the same family, if notition and expression is intense. There are scenes from the same hand, we have directed attention to which for strength and delicacy of emotion are not an excess of the repulsive qualities not seldom transcended in the range of English fiction. There rather coarsely indulged. We have it in a less degree in Shirley, but here it is. With a most delicate and intense perception of the beautiful, the * Reprinted by Harper and Brothers. is an art of creating sudden interest in a few pages worth volumes of common-place description. Shir ley does not enter till the last chapter in the first volume, but at once takes the heroine's place. |