MISCELLANEOUS.

ON THE CAM.*-These Lectures were delivered in the hall of the Lowell Institute in Boston during the months of January and February, 1864. They must have been very entertaining, to the "Boston audience" who heard them, from their accessories, if not for their substantial excellencies. The author is the son of the honored sire in whose reputation and memory every citizen of the modern Athens feels so just a pride. Having graduated at Harvard in 1859, he entered the University of Cambridge, in England, as an undergraduate, and spent in it nearly four academic years. Hence he could speak from personal experience of the mother and daughter university in terms of comparison and contrast which his hearers could not fail to appreciate. He resided abroad during the excitements attending our national contest, a reference to which and to the state of feeling in England furnished abundant opportunities for very glowing rhetoric, of which the young graduate did not fail fully to avail himself.

There is in this volume a great deal of interesting information, not so much nor so well communicated as we can find in Mr. Bristed's "Five Years in an English University," but still, as it comes many years later, and from another witness, it is not the less welcome. There is also, at the present time, a deal of writing on the part of old and young in respect to the ways of foreign universities, as well as not a little earnest inquiry among the friends of edu‐ cation, as to how far we ought to copy these ways in our colleges. These Lectures of Mr. Everett will stimulate, as well as in part satisfy this curiosity; and it would not be surprising if it should open anew discussions and controversies in respect to the merits of the college system. As a book for the hour, "On the Cam" is very readable, notwithstanding the luxuriant juvenilities of opinion and language in which it abounds. As a contribution to our permanent literature, it may perhaps be superseded by other works. Inasmuch, however, as it is not often that an American graduate becomes an undergraduate in an English university, it may not

On the Cam. Lectures on the University of Cambridge, in England. By WILLIAM EVERETT, A. M. Cambridge: Sever & Francis, 1865. 18mo. pp. 890.

happen very soon that we shall have a third work to add to the two which we already possess.

We notice that Mr. Everett speaks very depreciatingly of Oxford, in comparison with Cambridge, and charges upon Oxford many of the defects in English opinion and in English culture to which we have of late become so sensitive. This is perhaps very natural for a four-year resident on the Cam, but it seems to us neither well-founded nor in good taste.

CLASSICAL AND SCIENTIFIC STUDIES.*-Apropos to Mr. Everett's Lectures, but in the opposite direction, comes this very spirited pamphlet from Mr. Atkinson. It would seem at first sight as though the one had excited or provoked the other. The lectures of Mr. Everett are indirectly a defense of the English University system with its devotion to classical studies. It is true Cambridge pays large, perhaps the largest honors to the mathematical and physical sciences, but still the proportions are after the old traditions, and the methods would by no means satisfy the modern devotees of reform. Mr. Atkinson moves entirely in the opposite direction, and his strategy is very ingenious and effective, supposing him to have Mr. Everett in his mind. He takes, like him, a text from England. But instead of reciting his personal observations of the working of English institutions, he employs the testimony of the Parliamentary Commission which was appointed to examine into the condition of the great public schools of England, as published in their bulky reports. He gives a sketch of their testimony in respect to their method of teaching the classics, their neglect of the modern languages, including the English, as also of the mathematics, and the physical sciences and natural history. The case which the commissioners make out against these public schools had already been acknowledged in England and in this country to be very damaging long before Mr. Atkinson seized upon their report to turn it into an argument in support of the introduction of scientific studies in much larger measure into our academical schools and colleges.

We observe that Mr. Atkinson is not so copious in the applica

Classical and Scientific Studies, and the Great Schools of England. A lecture read before the Society of Arts of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, April 6th, 1865. By W. P. ATKINSON. With an addition and an appendix. Cambridge: Sever & Francis. 8vo. pp. 117.

cation of his facts to sustain his argument as he is in stating the facts themselves In the brief argument which he presents, he conceeds the point that the test of the value of either class of studies is that they should be disciplinary, but he contends that the physical sciences may be turned to as important service in this respect as the classics, and that for many minds they are more eminently adapted to serve this end. Moreover, he urges that for all minds at a certain age the study of Natural History is better fitted to excite interest and awaken mental activity, than the study of grammar or of language. Both these positions he asserts repeatedly, but the arguments by which he enforces them are very little expanded, and the testimony which he quotes from Carpenter, Owen, and Faraday will scarcely be regarded as decisive. He urges, also, but does not prove, that the study of modern languages may be made as efficient instruments of mental discipline, as that of the ancient. The report of the Parliamentary Commission, as well as Mr. Atkinson's argument, are certainly decisive against the methods of studying the classics which are bigotedly adhered to in the English schools. So far also as the report and his own remarks apply to any methods which resemble them in the schools and colleges of this country, we would speed them to their mark. We have no objection to a free agitation of all the other questions opened in this lecture. It is inevitable that the value of physical studies in our preparatory schools, and the place which they deserve to hold in the curriculum of the college, should become subjects of earnest discussion. We only desire that no petty dogmatisms from either party be taken for more than they are worth, but that the whole subject may be thoroughly examined.

PARSON AND PEOPLE.*-We could desire that some friend of Christ and his church would send a copy of this spirited and touching little volume to every pastor in the land, so well fitted is it to awaken the true pastoral feeling in the soul of every minister who reads it. It is, as the well-written introduction describes it, a precious fruit and token of the good work that is going on at

* Parson and People: or incidents in the every day life of a clergyman. By the Rev. EDWARD SPOONER, M. A., vicar of Heston and Middlesex. From the second London edition. With an introduction by an American clergyman. New York; F. J. Huntington. Bruce & Huntington, 540 Broadway. 1865. 16mo. pp. 260.

present in the English church, through which the hearts of so many are turned to the hitherto neglected classes and carrying them what they need so much, and have wanted so long, the Christian sympathy of the Christian church, the personal attention and friendly aid of one who professes to be set apart to the work of ministering to the spiritual and temporal wants of man. There is need for much of the same work among ourselves. The laity can do much and they are doing much in these efforts, but in this, as in every good work, the minister should be an example to the flock, or at least he should lend to such efforts his active counsel and his warmest sympathy.

THOREAU'S LETTERS.*-Mr. Thoreau was so peculiar a person that everything that relates to him must be read with interest by any one who likes to study what is abnormal in human development. The private and confidential letters of such a man, we should expect, would in some way explain the secret of some of his idiosyncrasies. But the idiosyncrasies of this hard favored mortal are not explained, they are only more fully exemplified by his private correspondence. He is ever the same, positive, hard, nature-worshiping and man-repelling mortal. His letters read precisely like his books,-the eye is as clear, the heart is as unsympathizing, the thoughts are as pure as his published volumes express him. There is now and then a passage strangely attractive, which reveals a capacity for tenderness and love that surprises the reader almost to tears.

It is strange that a man who professed to live so near to nature and to God should have made himself so unnatural and have contrived to hide his manifold sensibilities even from himself.

SECOND SERIES OF "GRAVER THOUGHTS OF A COUNTRY PARSON."-The "Country Parson" seems to find no difficulty in keeping his large congregation around him. This new volume contains eighteen sermons, which bear all the marks of that characteristic style which has rendered his various writings so attractive. The themes are quite varied, and all are of general interest.

* Letters to various persons. By HENRY D. THOREAU. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 1865. 16mo. pp. 229.

The Graver Thoughts of a Country Parson. Second Series. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 1865. 12mo. pp. 332. New Haven: T. H. Pease.

LOOMIS'S ASTRONOMY.*-A text-book on astronomy for a college class should have so much of the mathematics on which this science must always rest, as can be mastered by those scholars who are not specially apt in the exact sciences. This work is designed to meet the wants of the college course. A knowledge of those branches of mathematics which form an essential part of the course in every college is pre-supposed. In the relation of the facts of the science, special prominence has been given to several points which have not usually received attention. The constitution of the sun, the condition of the moon's surface, the phenomena of total eclipses of the sun, the laws of the tides, the constitution of comets, and the motion of the binary stars have been specially dwelt upon. The work is thus rendered not only inore attractive to the student, but it becomes a manual suited to those who wish to revive their knowledge of astronomy and become ac quainted with some of the recent additions to this noblest of the physical sciences.

PROF. GOODWIN'S SYNTAX.t-We cordially welcome this second edition of Prof. Goodwin's manual. As the first edition was noticed in terms of praise at the time of its appearance by the New Englander, (Jan. 1861, p. 237), we need refer now only to the improvements made in this revision. The book has been entirely reprinted, with many changes in the arrangement of the matter, as well as in the matter itself. A full index of the examples has been added, besides two appendixes and much new matter, yet by compression and re-arrangement, the book is reduced from 311 pages to 264. Prof. Good win adheres to his former opinions in the points wherein he differed from the views commonly taught. In some of these, especially the principal one, his classification of conditional sentences, we cannot agree with him, while yet we are glad that so new and radical a view of that topic of grammar, should be thus fully presented and strongly urged. It will cer tainly do good by stimulating the study of that subject among American scholars We are better pleased with his explanation

*A Treatise on Astronomy. By ELIAS LOOMIS, LL. D. Harper & Brothers. 8vo. pp. 300.

Syntax of the Moods and Tenses of the Greek Verb. By WILLIAM W. GOODWIN, Ph. D, Eliot Professor of Greek Literature in Harvard University. Cambridge: Sever & Francis. 1865. 12mo., pp. 264.