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MISCELLANEOUS.

IN proportion to our pain at the deep and deliberate injustice with which our national struggle has been misrepresented, even by some of those in England whom we thought we had a right to regard as friends, is the satisfaction with which we greet any expression of intelligent sympathy there, and an honest wish to understand the merits of that cause for which our best and bravest are giving their blood so lavishly. Count Gasparin teaches us to think of England as consisting of "two nations." And while from one of these we get such curious evidences of amity as we find in the systematic and wilful falsehoods of the Tory press, the conscious falsehood that misstates and vilifies the acts of our government in its dealing with treason (as, for instance, in New Orleans), the subscription of “290" British merchants to outfit a piratical ship for the ruin of our commerce, and that sentimental "sympathy with the South" which affects a dainty "disgust at the follies and crimes of its RIVAL," and mocks a nation in its agony with pious platitudes of peace and nonresistance, - we turn with gladness and refreshment to such a manly and fair exposition of the whole matter as we find in the recent work of Professor Cairnes.* A fairer and friendlier statement of the general position we could not desire than the following:

"A community, the most eager in the world in the chase after gain, forgot its absorbing pursuit; parties, a moment before arrayed against each other in a great political contest, laid aside their party differences; a whole nation, merging all private aims in the single passion of patriotism, rose to arms as a single man; and this for no selfish object, but to maintain the integrity of their common country, and to chastise a band of conspirators who, in the wantonness of their audacity, had dared to attack it. The Northern people, conscious that it had risen above the level of ordinary motives, looked abroad for sympathy, and especially looked to England. It was answered with cold criticism and derision. The response was perhaps natural under the circumstances, but undoubtedly not more so than the bitter mortification and resentment which that response evoked.” — p. 30.

The work before us is less specially interesting and instructive, as to the immediate questions that have risen out of the war, than that of Count Gasparin; but it is an abundantly able, candid, and full treatment of the slavery question, as to all those points which concern its political bearings, its past history in this country, and the remorseless, insatiable ambition of those who have made it the stimulant of treason and rebellion. Besides the statement of the case with which the volume opens, and the "general conclusions" which sketch the outline of the policy to be pursued by this nation as in Europe, the topics which it treats are the following: the Economical Basis of Slavery; the Internal Organization of Slave Societies, their Tendencies, their Internal Development and External Policy; the Career of the Slave Power in the United States, and its Designs. A large portion of the volume is thus taken up with matters - such as the experience of the West

*The Slave Power: its Character, Career, and probable Designs. By J. E. CAIRNES. New York: Carleton.

Indies and the history of party conflicts in the United States — with which most readers among us are tolerably well acquainted already. This does not diminish, but rather enhances, its value, as an effort to dispel that dense ignorance, which to many persons appears to be far pleasanter than truth. The general conclusion at which Professor Cairnes arrives, as to the probable result of the struggle, is that the Slave Empire of the South will be narrowed to a comparatively scanty territory and feeble sway, with strict boundaries at the North and West; and that under such conditions the problem of slavery in this nation is likeliest to have a successful working-out. Such speculations are greatly baffled by the line of policy laid down in the President's Proclamation (which is copied in full in the American edition), which declares emancipation outright, first in those very regions which in theory should be the lasting and most obstinate strongholds of slavery.

THE great work of Victor Hugo * loses nothing in power as it goes on. Intensely exciting and powerful as the story is, we feel that the characters are only representative characters, and that behind all these characters and scenes is the moving ethical purpose. It is the poet's way of uttering his complaint upon the wrongs and the follies of the life of his nation. The story only gives unity to the series of sketches, which are in themselves sentimental disquisitions. Very different is Victor Hugo's exhibition of life in the nunnery from the glowing pictures of Montalembert. All the loneliness, all the gloom, all the dull, monotonous waste of brain and heart which the cloister requires, come out in his picture of the interior life of that Bernardine sisterhood. Its seeming piety becomes hideous, and it is seen to be a crime against reason and nature.

66

Les Misérables is certainly a morbid book. It exaggerates defects in the social state, and its tone is sad, desponding, and often bitter. Its humor is mocking, and even ghastly. But we cannot call it a wicked book, or see in it any attack upon the principles of order, or upon the doctrines of sound morality. Its tendency is very different from that of such novels as " Guy Livingstone," or the "Sorrows of Werther," or the "Mysteries of Paris," while it resembles all of these in some particulars; the first, in its bold defiance of public opinion and settled usage; the second, in its sentimental melancholy; the third, in its highly-wrought pictures of the wretchedness and wrong of civilized society. It is not a healthy book; yet its morbid sentiment is not of the kind which is contagious. The author is not to be classed with "the Pessimist School."

ALBERT DÜRER is one of the few celebrated men of past centuries around whom still gathers something of personal interest. This is the more remarkable, since so little is in reality known of his personal

* Victor Hugo. Les Misérables. Deuxième Partie. Cosette. Troisième Partie. Marius. 2 vols. 8vo. pp. 134, 122. New York: F. W. Christern. 1862.

history, that the affectionate regard in which his memory is held might almost seem to be traditional. A journal of his travels in the Netherlands, a few letters to his friend Pirkheimer and others, are the principal materials employed by the German novelist Schefer, in the wellknown romance,* of which we cordially welcome a new edition. The brilliant scenes of Albert Dürer's public life, the gorgeous festivities of the painters at Antwerp in his honor, his splendid reception at the court of Margaret of Parma, his presence at imperial banquets, all these gay pictures of Flemish luxury form a striking contrast to the sad colors of his domestic experience.

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The characters of the husband and wife are drawn by Schefer with that rare insight into the hidden springs of action and thought in which the German novelists certainly excel. Agnes, though wanting in a fine appreciation of an artist's needs, is not a woman of coarse or low nature, and the failure of the husband and wife to reach any mutual understanding is therefore only the more sad. The ministry of little Agnes to the unhappy parents, and her death, are touchingly described. Throughout the narrative there is a large allowance for errors, wise, philosophic, forgiving spirit, which makes this little story one of valuable counsel, warning, and comfort in the delicate relations of domestic life, as well as an interesting and graphic sketch of artist life in the sixteenth century.

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A FEATURE of marked interest and value, deserving special mention, is in the last published volume of Appleton's new Cyclopædia, - the paper, or series of papers, on the United States: first, a condensed summary of the Geography, Natural History, Productions, Political Condition, Military Resources, and Civil History of the Republic (all in one vast paragraph), filling seventy-one pages and a half; next, a series of Statistical Tables filling thirty-three pages, embodying, in a manner admirably compact and clear, the most important facts of the national census; and lastly, a sketch of American literature, occupying seventeen pages and a half, which would appear, on a cursory inspection, to include the name of every fellow-citizen whose ambition has led him so far as to write a pamphlet or make a speech. These one hundred and twenty-two pages are equal in amount of matter to a goodsized duodecimo; and very few books indeed, of similar bulk, contain so much evidence of labor diligently and usefully bestowed. The remainder of the volume is marked by the qualities which we have been glad to recognize from time to time. It is the last but one in the contemplated series.

*The Artist's Married Life; being that of Albert Dürer. Translated from the German by MRS. J. R. STODART. Revised Edition, with Memoir. New York : James Miller.

NEW PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.

THEOLOGY.

The Patience of Hope. By the Author of "A Present Heaven." With an Introduction by John G. Whittier. Boston: Ticknor and Fields. 16mo. pp. 171.

A Study of the Scriptures. Being Part II. of the Howard Sunday School Question Book. By S. H. Winkley. Boston: Walker, Wise, & Co. 18mo. pp. 68.

NOVELS AND TALES.

The Wife's Stratagem; a Story for Fireside and Wayside. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 12mo. pp. 336.

Like and Unlike. A Novel, by A. S. Roe. New York: Carleton. 12mo. pp. 501.

The Morgans. By Elizabeth Stoddard. New York: Carleton. 12mo.

pp. 259.

MISCELLANEOUS.

The Origin and History of the English Language and of the Early Literature it embodies. By George P. Marsh. New York: Charles Scribner. pp. 574.

8 vo.

The New American Cyclopædia: a Popular Dictionary of General Knowledge. Edited by George Ripley and Charles A. Dana. Vol. XV. Spiritualism — Uzziah. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 8vo. pp. 858.

The Slave Power, its Character, Career, and Probable Designs; being an attempt to explain the real Issues involved in the American Contest. By J. E. Cairnes, Professor in Queen's College, Galway. New York: Carleton. 8vo. pp. 171.

The Parish Will Case in the Court of Appeals. The Statement of Facts and the Opinion of the Court. 8vo. pp. 166.

The Tax-Payer's Manual, containing the Acts of Congress imposing Direct and Excise Duties. With References and Index. pp. 129.

Martin Van Buren, Lawyer, Statesman, and Man. By William Allen Butler. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 24mo. PP. 47.

The Stars and Stripes in Rebeldom. A Series of Papers written by Federal Prisoners (Privates) in Richmond, Tuscaloosa, New Orleans, and Salisbury, N. C. With an Appendix. Boston: T. O. H. P. Burnham.

pp. 137.

18mo.

The Poems of Oliver Wendell Holmes. Boston: Ticknor and Fields. 32mo. (Blue and Gold.)

Eyes and Ears. By Henry Ward Beecher. Boston: Ticknor and Fields. 12mo. (Pleasant table-talk and small-talk of an able man.)

Country Living and Country Thinking. By Gail Hamilton.

Ticknor and Fields. 18mo.

pp. 461.

Boston:

The Sylphids' School, and other Pieces in Verse. By Lewis C. Pray. Boston: John Wilson & Co. 18mo. pp. 291. (Printed, not published.)

INDEX

TO THE

CHRISTIAN EXAMINER,

NEW SERIES, VOL. XI.

JULY TO NOVEMBER, 1862.

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monologium, 172.

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Beethoven (Romance-Biography), 177–186.
Botta, Vincenzo. See Cavour.
Burckhardt on the Renaissance, 460.
Cairnes, Professor, on the Slave Power, 463.
Carlier on Slavery, 298.

Cavour, Discourses by V. Botta, 20-32

early life, 21- war of 1848, 24 - French
alliance, 27 Garibaldi, 29.
Christ the Spirit, 313- Gen. Hitchcock's
work, 313-theory of interpretation non-
historical, 315-322 Essenes, 318-329
-true signification of the Spirit, 330-
Christ in history, 331- pre-existent, 336
- undying, 339.

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Conway, M. D., the Golden Hour, 294.
Coppet et Weimar (Mad. de Staël), 85-9 96.
Crummell, Future of Africa, 152.
CURRENT LITERATURE, Review of. The
ology. Defence of Rev. R. Williams, 134
Taylor's Logic in Theology, 135-
Book of Vespers, 136 Sawyer's Re-
construction, 282 Renan's Discourse,
284- Lacordaire, 285 Facts for
Churchmen, 285- Döllinger on the Pa-
pacy, 286
Réville on the Gospels, 455.

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140-

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History and Biography. Herder, 137
Sybel's Crusades, 293- Smith's Ireland,
293 Sybel's Revolution Period, 457
Burckhardt on Renaissance, 460. Sci-
ence of Language. Müller's Lectures,
Wedgwood's Dictionary, 144
Tafel's Orthography, 144. Society and
Politics. American Disunion, 150
Trollope's North America, 151 The
Exchange, 152- Future of Africa, 152
The Golden Hour, 294- Among the
Pines, 295 America before Europe,
296- Carlier on Slavery, 298 - London
Labor, 298- - Cairnes on the Slave Pow-
er, 463. Geography and Travels. Girar-
din's Syria, 300 Oriental Harems, 301
Game Fish, 302- Underhill's West
Indies, 303. Novels and Tales. Mrs.
Stowe's Novels, 145- Ravenshoe, 146
The Master, 147- Les Misérables, 148,
464-Edwin Brothertoft, 304. Miscel
laneous. Harris's Captivity, 153-Jo-
mini's Art of War, 154- Tragedy of
Errors, 154
Clough's Poems, 307
Campaign of First R. I. Regiment, 308
Annual Cyclopædia, 309- The Ar-
tist's Married Life, 464 Appleton's
American Cyclopædia, 465.
Dante, Vita Nuova, 363-381.
Denison, Mrs., The Master, 147.
De Tocqueville, 381-402 - his life, 385
"Democracy in America," 389-395
marriage, 392-political life, 396 - the
coup d'etat, 398- L'Ancien Régime, 400.
Döllinger on the Papacy, 285.
Essenes, 318.

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