passage, he might perhaps present the book for the amusement of his children. I have made Martial the godfather of this my native collection by giving my bantling his name; and if I have uniformly studied to avoid his grossness and indecency, it was no part of my design, I do assure thee, to declare war against wit and humour, as far as they were strictly compatible with morals and religion, for which I not only profess, but feel a devout regard, as must be visible to thy perspicacity. I have rejected very many smart things, solely because they seemed to my sober and chastised taste to border too much on forbidden ground. Now if indecency be forbidden ground, we do hereby declare the above assertion to be false. As reviewers of style and of argument we may sometimes be caught napping, but as custodes morum librorum, we should deem it a most foul disgrace to be found asleep on our posts.

The following epigram is placed as a FINALE at the end of the second volume:

Those epigrams my friends commend,
That with a turn least thought-of end;
Then sure a tip-top one they'll call

This, which concludes with none at all.'

For the above we would substitute four lines, which, like Ben Jonson's reply to Silvester, if not witty, are very true:

Of epigrams full fifty score

Are printed in these volumes twain:
This half we've often read before,

And that we 'll never read again.

ART. 21.-Nelson's Tomb, a Poem. By W. T. Fitzgerald, Esq. 4to. pp. 18. Price 2s. 6d. Mawman. 1806.

A bare list of the various productions of the Muses to honor the memory of our departed hero, would fill a very large volume; they were of course written on the spur of the moment, and are to be treated with that indulgence, which is due to extempore effusions. We must not therefore be too strict in examining such lines as those, with which this poem commences.

'Oh! did a muse of fire to me belong

Like Shakespeare's ardent, and like Dryden's strong,
I'd snatch a feather from the wing of fame,
And write immortal verse on Nelson's name.
Then should my muse obtain the poet's crown,
And share some portion of his high renown.
But since an humbler lot attends my fate
I will be natural if I can't be great!
And if the critie should refuse his praise,

The heart's applause shall consecrate my lays.'

The eight first lines are the worst in the whole poem, andwe do not wonder that in the ninth and tenth. Mins to shrink from

examination, and to deprecate the severity of criticism. As we are not fond of the smell of burnt feathers, Mr. F. must not be surpriz ed, if we view the attempt of a muse of fire to make a pen quill from Fame's wing, " cum naso adunco,'

- We particularly admire the two following lines:"

The flags of empires are the victor's pall,

1

Won from the Dane, the Spaniard, and the Gaul." The following lines also are good, mutatis mutandis :"

Egypt's prond pyramids, for ages found
An useless wonder on a barren ground,
Now stand the monuments of British fame,
Inscribed by glory with her Nelson's name;
These, on the tomb must rise in lofty pride,
Sca-marks of triumph! peering o'er the tide.

with a

Mr. Herschell's telescope is not portable, and, if it were, we bës lieve that the pyramids could not be seen through it from the quar ter-deck of a man of war. We recollect to have seen an idea somewhat similar, but more correctly appropriate, in a song which was written on the victory at Aboukir :

Why seven mouths He gave the Nile, your wonder does it raise? He knew the Nile must one day speak the British seaman's praise.

The distinguishing feature of Mr. F.'s poetry is energy; it is indeed oratory in verse abounding with emphatic point, and laboured antithesis. His imagination is subservient to his ear.

ART. 22. On Earth Peace. An arvocation to Truth, upon a desirable Event supposed to be near at hand. Second Edition. By John Duncan, D.D. Rector of South Warnborough, Hants. 8vo. pp. 24. Cadell and Davies. 1805.

OUR contemporaries and our predecessors have generally concur ted in bestowing due encomium on the laudable spirit which has actuated the writings of the venerable Dr. Duncan. His arguments have chiefly been employed in urging the reconciliation of christians 10 each other, of whatever denomination they may be; in exhorting and convincing the infidel; and in preaching both in prose and verse, throughout a long life, peace upon earth and good-will_towards men.' We have been delighted by finding his efforts crowned with this success at least, that he has received in several instances the tribute of praise from the pens of sectaries, widely differing from each other on doctrinal points. We trust indeed that his pious labours have met with a farther reward; and that the consciousness of a life dedicated to acts of benevolence, has already whispered to him the earnest of eternal peace.' We give our author's reasons for writing his Rhapsody' in his own words.

A scanty outline of the following Rhapsody, as it may not impro perly have been styled, (though not without a plan) found its way to

the press in November 1804. It was faintly trace, at the impulse bccasionally made on the mind of an old admirer of peace, particular ly of the conciliatory influence of calm impartial reasoning, in opposi sition to the violence of controversy, religious or political. He was induced, at that distracted period, to express his genuine independent sense of the gross offences against truth, peace, and good order, notoriously current in all ranks and from almost every press at home and abroad. Some recent circumstances had just then turned his thoughts to a subject more consonant to his natural disposition. They had impressed him with a strong presentiment that the desirable event, indicated in the title-page, must of necessity be near at hand. He has had the mortification to lament the subsequent occurrences, which have thrown the accomplishment of his soothing prediction to a remoter`distance.' P. 1.

Notwithstanding the reasonable pleasure we must feel in hailing these professions, and however we approve the loyal and useful tendency of the whole of Dr. Duncan's pamphlet; unwilling, moreover, as we are to exert the severity of criticism on subjects exclusively dedicated to the cause of moral truth,' we cannot but express a wish that the author of this second edition had been contented with the sale of the first. Such verses as the following should not have escaped the precincts of the bureau :

Thence his goodness o'er numberless worlds we proclaim,
Thro' all change, in grace, harmony, order, the same;
There explain'd we discern of the woes we endure,

Of our crimes, errors, wars, the permission, tire cure.' P. 11

These the glory to God, peace and good-will to man,

Turn to malice, war, blasphemy, curse, all they can ;

Reason, conscience, the miscreant fanatics desert,
Holy love to unnatural hate they pervert.

When the dastardly bullies thus blust'ring assume

In God's name to denounce of their brethren the doom,
We, afflicted thy gospel's plain tenor to see

Thus disgrac'd, turn to right-honest reason and thee.

Man, his prime work, our Maker proclaims very good,'

They, a sad foolish riddle, no more understood;

God and man they calumniate alike. The Supreme

As defective in word as in deed they misdeem.

Impious?-No-They 're but crazed. What? if they shun the light,

Must the gospel's last glimmer be vanishing quite ?

Truth divine, thou hast sworn, that as righteous the cause,

It shall ever maintain its beneficent laws.

Dimm'd by fits, lo! relumed in miraculous day,

They our Maker, our Judge, Father, Saviour display.
What but good can betide us from God's holy mount
Be it thine, Truth, his mercies o'er all to recount. P. 14.

We have done. From this specimen the whole Invocation to Truth' may be judged. We shall pass no farther sentence: and we think ridicule herself will repent, when she reads the close of the preface:

From these superficial remarks, no pretension to the display of political sagacity must be imputed to the writer. All who know him well, will do him the justice to believe his assertion, that his purpose was of infinitely higher importance. The establishment of such fixed principles, religious and moral, as no vicissitude of outward circumstances can ever cancel or impair, as have respectably stood the severest scrutiny of every intelligent and liberal censor, has alone tempted him to resume a pen, which time admonishes him to discard. He resigns it now with this last intimation : that in delivering to oblivion what claims regard only as a sort of posthumous tract, the reader will consult his highest interest, if led piously to keep in mind the eternal truths there inculcated, which in all party controversies, have almost always unconsciously been, are still, and while man is man, will continue to be unaccountably violated.'

NOVELS.

ART. 25.-Belville House, a Novel, 2 vols. 12mo. Chapple. 1805,

THIS novel does not keep the curiosity of the reader awake by intricate plot, or surprizing denouement. It is rather a collection of desultory sketches, in which there are many instances of good writing. The characters are drawn with a slight, but discriminat ing outline, partaking sometimes of the nature of caricature. The moral is good; because vice is punished by deep remorse, and consequent misery. Henry Dormer's visit to the place of his nativity, which he had not seen for sixteen, years, is feelingly described: we could with pleasure have quoted the whole letter, but shall content ourselves with referring to it as a specimen of interesting description. The sensations of the philomisanthropic Montford in retirement, after quitting the bustling gaiety of dissipated life, are well expressed.

'When I resided in town, my senses were in continued agitation; but of what could really be called pleasure, I experienced little. When I was at length settled, my constant feelings were those of quiet, calm content; but a susceptibility of enjoyment soon followed which I had thought the exclusive privilege of youth, and had lamented as gone for ever. To those who pass their time amidst the vortex of worldly pleasures, the delineation of my sensations can raise no idea; they have no correspondent feelings. To me existence itself became happiness: without the aid of external influence, I felt life itself a luxury :-it was neither reflections on the past, nor hopes for the future, which caused the delicious emotions I am stating. They seemed to form a part of my nature, to emanate from my being.'

This pleasure, which arises from life itself, has been stated by Paley. It is an idea which every reader imagines that he has seen before; but we never remember to have met with it in any other writer.

The names of Non Ens,' 'Junior Sopb,' Wrangler,' &c. arevery familiarly used by this author, but we will venture to assert, (and we stake our critical sagacity on the assertion) that he never was a member of the University of Cambridge: we judge from internal evidence. Could the following passage have been written by a Cantab?

To expect the notice of a Soph or even a Junior Soph was, as yet, above my hopes. I waited, however, patiently: the hour would one day come when I, like them, should be deeply imbrued with mathematical lore.'

It is very common to see people most exposing their ignorance where they wish to be thought particularly wise.

Our author is no friend to a pipe.

I quietly followed Dr. Somerville to his beloved little arbour. Was it with Aristotle and Thucydides, and Xenophon, and Virgi!, and Pliny he there communed?-No such thing-a pipe-a mug of

excellent ale.'

Both very excellent things in our opinion; but our author is so offended with Dr. S. for sometimes quitting the pages of Aristotle to indulge in a pipe, that he determines not to be pleas ed with works which gave rise to such affectation and hypocrisy. What! are classical taste and learning incompatible with a whiff of tobacco? Certainly they are not. Among a host of smokers! we appeal to the manes of Paley, of Toup, of Milton, and of Raleigh, We appeal to the two greatest scholars of the present age, who are very fond of a pipe, and who regard it as the sceptre of criticism, as the purifying alembic of the brain. For ourselves-we explicitly avow, that a whiff of tobacco inspires us, as the Delphic vapour did the Pythian priestess of old; that, as she could not prophesy, we cannot, criticize, till we have inhaled the miraculous fume; and that the motto of our club-room is, EX FUMO DARE LUCEM.

ART. 24.-Deeds of Darkness, or the Unnatural Uncle, a Tale of the Sixteenth Century, by G. T. Morley. 2 Vols. Tipper.

'WATCHING with straining eyes the painted canvass her fears were at last confirmed, and, dreadful to behold, it was slid back, and a man, masked and armed, stepped softly through the aperture, followed by three others!

'The terrified and trembling Josephina could scarcely believe her eyes, and with difficulty drew her breath. The men, all of whom were masked, beckoned silence to each other, and advanced towards the bed, when our heroine, giving a faint scream, fainted. Lifting her up, they seized upon their prey, and bore her through the pannel, closing it after them, and extinguishing the lamp."