And whence this radical change? Why is it that, for the first time in the history of the world, this new order of thought, if not yet of things, begins to exist, emerges, like the world in Genesis, from "chaos and eternal night"?

There is but one explanation, but one motive power of suffi cient magnitude to account for it, and that is Christianity—the Gospel of Christ. This is the root from which spring all our humanitarian and philanthropic purposes and progress. It is certainly no tree of man's planting, which bears such beantiful leaves, and gives promise of such goodly fruit.

This is our firm conviction, the expression of which, in this connection, is liable to misconstruction; but this liability shall not deter us from expressing it.

Confident that this impulse is Christian in its origin, and will be glorious in its consummation, we are far from indorsing all its manifestations as either genuine or judicious. The case is this. The doctrinal and devotional sides of our religion have often been developed at the expense or neglect, partial or entire, of the practical and philanthropic.

While attending to our own wants and ways, we have forgotten those of others. Anxious to save the souls of men, we have sometimes overlooked the present and pressing wants of their bodies. And all this, as well as many other things, we have done or failed to do, not from any fault of the Bible, but because of our own imperfection.

The Gospel has a fullness, an entireness equal to all the exigencies of mankind; but we are narrow, and are often so engrossed by a single object as to be blind to all others.

That we have erred in this direction is a deep and widespread conviction of the Christian world. This conviction, awakened in England by the preaching of the Wesleys and Whitefield, nearly a century ago, soon communicated itself to the Established Chuch, and was the cause of a true revival of religion there. Many fruits of that revival have been already reaped, not only by the Mother Church, but by her daughter in America as well. It has affected other Christian bodies no less, and has steadily diffused itself down to the present moVOL. VI.-43

ment, wherever the English tongue is spoken, or a pure Protestant Christianity preached. It has, as might have been expected, excited a powerful reäction, aiming to recover the spirit of the past, which has been vociferously summoned to appear, like "the spirits of the vasty deep," but which, like them, declines the call. Hence, its devotees, like those of Baal in a similar predicament, are voluble in their vain repetitions, and lacerate a little their flesh, though it must be confessed, they are not sufficiently possessed to carry this last to a dangerous extreme.

Nor is this the only counterfeit which has appeared. Infidelity has aroused herself to new conflicts with Christianity, and whereas she was formerly uniformly vanquished, when fighting with her own weapons, she has at last resorted to the desperate expedient of wresting weapons from the Gospel armory itself. The purpose of her votaries is to get possession, if possible, of those big guns yclept en français, "La liberté, l'égalite, et la fraternité," and in English known as "philanthropy, progress, and public spirit," and turn them against us, flattering themselves that by these they can sweep us from the field. But they will surely fail now as formerly. They really don't know how to work these guns to advantage, and would not relish the work long if they did. Foiled at this device, they will soon draw off, and contrive others.

Let us be thankful that apart from these reactions and perversions the revived spirit of the Gospel has diffused itself through a thousand legitimate channels. It has manifested itself not only in the pulpit and prayer-meeting, but also in missions home and foreign, the suppression of the slave-trade, the promotion of temperance, the establishment of schools, the circulation of books, and the gradual enfranchisement of the masses from ignorance and brutal vices. Its results are already seen in the halls of legislation and the courts of law. But its most striking manifestation has been, through the press, and in every form of literary composition. Poems, novels, tales, essays and orations have appeared in rapid succession, all armed with arguments against ancient errors and abuses, whether social, political, or religious, and all aiming to make it appear

that, however ignorant, vicious, or otherwise degraded, "a man's a man for a' that."

One of the most recent, as well as most able of these works, is that whose merits and demerits it is our purpose to descant on in this notice.

Adam Bede is a book of whose authorship no living writer would probably be ashamed. It is eminently a realistic production of the school of Goethe and Wordsworth, describing in prose scenes akin to those which Wordsworth loved to depict in poetry and writing in English, as Goethe did in German, of the homely relations, virtues and vices. The influence of both these great writers is visible, as well as, in an inferior degree, that of Carlyle, Dickens, Kingsley, Reade, and the other popular litterateurs of the day.

Not that these have been servilely copied, any of them, or that Adam Bede falls below any but the very highest works of its class. Wordsworth's Excursion, and Goethe's Wilhelm Meister have been, unquestionably, favorite studies of the anonymous author, whoever he or she may be. But beyond this we aver nothing, and least of all, question the originality of this work, in any proper sense of the term.

The idea we mean to convey is, that the author of Adam Bede shares largely in the so-called humanitarian and reforınatory spirit of the age, and so is in essential harmony with the writers we have named. He agrees with them further in a fondness for details, minute particulars, and exact descriptions.

In the execution of these details he equals a Dutch painter. But he differs from our popular writers in not mistaking changes for reforms, and in revering the customs and institutions of the olden times. He thinks he sees as much evidence of considerate kindness to the poor then as exists now. Though less ostentatious, it was not the less real. It professed less, but performed perhaps as much more. This is evidently the opinion of the author, which, however, he is quite willing to keep to himself, if the reader is not disturbed by it.

In fact, toleration of differences is the leading feature of the book. No matter whence they arise, or what occasions them, religion, society, nationality, trades or professions, the charity

of our author is sufficiently expansive to embrace them all. This many-sidedness is not of English growth. It is evidently derived from a German root--Goethe in particular.

A disciple, as we think, of this school, our Author, exempted, as he fancies, from all prepossessions, endeavors to describe all classes in society as he has found them, and especially to paint religionists of all sorts from their respective stand-points. To do him justice, he has been, in the main, as successful in this as in other parts of his work. Hence, in these pages, Mr. Irwine, an old-fashioned high-churchman, is sketched in terms which could not fail to please his friends. (The scene of the story is in the north of England, and sixty years ago.)

In like manner the early Methodists are made to appear as interesting as possible, through their representative, the fair female preacher. In social life, the esquire and servant, great and small tenants, artisans and work-people, are fairly and kindly dealt with. All these persons and parties are made to revolve in their respective orbits, without the slightest jar or jostle. It is a scene of Arcadian repose and simple sincerity, surpassing such glimpses of actual life as we have been favored with.

But as there is a skeleton in every house, so to this rosecolored picture of English society, our author makes a single exception, in the person and preaching of Mr. Ryde, the clergyman who eventually succeeded the Rev. Mr. Irwine. Mr. Irwine, be it remembered, is represented as a man of a remarkably fine personal appearance and address, a most dutiful son, and agreeable neighbor, equally the friend and favorite of high and low. But Mr. Ryde, his successor, though he has no proper connection with the story, and does not even come to the place till about twenty years after it is finished, is nevertheless foisted into the narrative by an episode in the form of an elaborate defense, not merely of the principles on which the book is written, but of the superior traits of its leading characters. This Mr. Irwine in particular is set off to great advantage, in comparison with Mr. Ryde, who is represented

as disagreeable in all respects; in his visage, person, and preaching; a man of sourish disposition, a busy-body, ambitious to rival the rich in show, and yet parsimonious to the poor.

Here is a singular exception, indeed, to the author's usual amiability. Affecting the character of "a wide liker," there is at least one style of manhecan not like at all, and sees in him nothing pleasing or praiseworthy. How shall we account for this sudden change in the tone which otherwise pervades the book. The case is this: Mr. Ryde was an "evangelical" minister of the Established Church-a character which, for the most part, meets with but little favor from the novelists of any school.

That Evangelical clergymen are not really so much more disagreeable than other men; that they are not necessarily ugly to look upon; of a sour disposition, ambitious temper, penurious habits, quarrelsome and litigious; that they do not invariably give their whole attention to dogmas and discipline; that they are not always harping on "the bulwarks of the Reformation;" that they are not the bitterest of all parties towards Dissenters; that they do not instinctively set people by the ears-all this is of but little consequence to writers of novels. Enough that there is an hereditary feud between the two; enough that ministers of this class have been known to dissuade their young people from indiscriminate novel-reading as an evil habit, and to doubt whether one is often made either wiser or better by the views of society presented in popular novels.

It is still more to the purpose that their stand-points are opposite.

The novelist can not endure "sound doctrines," does not believe in dogmas, has no faith in "the stated preaching" of the Gospel for the reformation of mankind. His faith is in sentimental virtue, and he has no reliance upon the inculcation of principles. His heroes and heroines were born such, and so were the villains of his story. With him, it is literally true, that "the crooked can not be made straight, nor the rough places plain." IIis one doctrine is, that every man has his