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through. I passed swiftly onward among the Ah! I can never forget my holy and humble trees, and soon entered a little verdant plain, partly Gertrude. I had long ceased to pray for myself, overshadowed by lofty trees. The moonshine then but when I beheld my young and timid wife alone made the spot almost as light as it was during the in a strange land with a husband who was too vile day. A considerable part of this little plain was to be allowed even a corner of this fallen world; fully revealed, and I saw that the herbage beneath when I beheld her perfect and confiding faith in my feet had been crushed down, apparently by the me, I shuddered at her danger-I prayed for her, weight of some burden which had been dragged though I did not then dare to pray for myself. with difficulty over it. Years seemed to fly back, have lain prostrate on the ground in prayer for her, and to restore a time which it tortured my soul to heart-broken and speechless, for I seldom presumed remember. I stopped again, and would have turned to address with words the Being whom I had forback, when the shrieks, which had ceased for a lit- saken. I could not weep for myself, but for her tle while, burst out again close to me; and amid my eyes would become rivers of tears Her calm them I could distinguish the sound of my own name. unsuspecting affection, the mild humility, the simple I turned-ah! how can I describe the scene! A truth of her character, the heart that was so evident tall man stood before me-he looked round on me in all her conduct, endeared her to me--I had never with a horrid glance, as if furious at the interrup- met with such a person before--yet from the motion of my presence-I saw my own face-I saw ment that I called her mine, one thought had been my own arm raised, a hunting-knife was clasped in present with me-that I should lose her. Graduthe hand, reeking and dripping ith blood-a young ally, every power within me had been drawn over girl was struggling at the knees of the phantom, to this thought, and hung riveted upon it. The clinging to him with frantic gestures, and gasping nourishment of every hope I cherished was drawn and shrieking by turns, as she strove to restrain or from the presence of my wife with me For a tine to avoid the forceful gashes of the gory knife.-II almost forgot the phantom. Had he appeared, I sprang forward-I flung myself upon the murder- sometimes thought I should have scarcely heeded ing fiend-with all the strength of my powerful him. The dreaded time drew nigh: my wife was limbs I tore him from his victim-I wrenched the about to become a mother. I seldom quitted her knife from his hand-but I--I myself was in his side, and if I saw her cheek change colour, if place--Christina was really struggling with me.--I perceived a slight expression of pain on her lip, I felt the knife in my own hand, I felt her soft hands was wretched. How often would she take my striving with me; and her wild frantic shrieks were fevered hands in her own, and look up in my face only less appalling than the laugh of the fiend, with her calm sweet smiles, and tell me not to fear which I heard behind me. All this lasted but a for her! Her look, her words, were but another few moments--I had fled away--But ere I had left pang for me. I could only see in her a victim, a the plain, the shrieks had stopped me again--What fair innocent lamb about to be sacrificed. On the could I do but turn back? The same bloody slaugh- evening before the birth of my child, I was, as ter met my sight: I rushed forward again, and again usual, in the apartment of my wife. She had never found myself in the place of the fiend, with Christina appeared to me so cheerful, so healthful, so entirely dying beneath my hands. I tried to escape again, but a creature of hope. I could not help frequently I strove in vain. I was forced, by some irresistible gazing on her, and saying to myself, It is impospower, to stand close to the murderer, who once sible that she can be suddenly taken from me. It turned round, looked full on me, and said very will need months to break up, to disunite all that calmly, We are one.' I was forced to see myself intermingled life of mind and body.'-My Gertrude commit over again the horrid murder which I had seemed on that evening to open all her heart to me. in fact perpetrated seven years before, at that very With modest and confiding tenderness, she spoke spot, on a wretched girl, whose fidelity to my illicit of her plans for her child. She told me how she passion I had suspected. I would not willingly longed to go with her husband and his child, to dwell on such disgustingly dreadful details, but I her own green, happy England. She spoke of the will conceal nothing from you.-All that in the days of her childhood. All her conversation seemed blind, mad fury of my rage, I had before scarcely to breathe of hope, till suddenly observing my grave perceived, all that I remembered not till I beheld it countenance, she stopped, and the tears rose into repeated, every look, every gesture of my fury did her eyes. She wept very quietly for a few minutes, I behold acted over again by that form which was and then said in a softer and sweeter voice, without indeed mine-but I saw it all in cool blood--I stood raising up her meek head, Do not think, dearest, almost as a calm spectator beside Christina and her that I have forgotten the blight which may fall upon murderer. I saw her white rounded shoulders all my earthly hopes. I do not think a day has passed gashed with wounds-I saw one of her small hands since I first looked forward to the time which is split, literally split up from the fingers to the slender now so near, no, not a single day in which I have wrist, as she struggled to keep back the knife-I not prayed fervently to be prepared for a sudden saw her flashing eyes shrink and close beneath the call to another world. I think my prayers have smoking blade; and the dark gore bubble out over been heard, for I only prayed that God's will might her bosom; and her long hair cling dabbled together be done with me, and I prayed in His name by in the pool of blood. I saw-No, no-I can write whom alone we can come into the presence of Our no more of it-And all the while the eye of Him Father. Nay, my own husband, you must not be who died upon the cross to save iny soul, was fixed thus agitated! Indeed, I am never less melancholy upon me-O! as I write I can scarcely believe that than when I speak of my religion, my hope, my I have been what I was! O my friend, if your feel- peace I should call it. All my cheerfulness flows ings are now frozen with horror, if my own soul is from that one purest source,-I am rather wearied now stupified within me at the recollection of my now,' she added, and would sleep a little while in infernal guilt, what must that forgiving Saviour your arms; but first,' she said solemny, dear have felt, who is of purer eyes than to behold Lorenzo, do kneel down beside me, as I cannot now iniquity! O branded and miserable Cain, my fel-kneel myself, and offer up a short prayer for me. I lowship is with thee!

When my wife opened her eyes, she beheld me still sitting near the open lattice, with the volume of Ariosto in my hand; but dark clouds had gathered over the moon, and my features were not visible.

I believe that my gentle wife never discovered the cause of my wretchedness. Her health was so extremely delicate, that the bare idea of her being acquainted with the state of my heart was anguish to me. Had she known that the stem round which she had entwined so closely, to which she clung with every fibre of her devoted affection; had she known how deadly, how cankered that stem was, surely she would have withered there at once!

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shall be calmer and happier, as I hear your voice,' I could not reply to this entreaty. I was silent. and my wife said timidly, I fear my request has displeased you, but I thought you would forgive it. I have never breathed the wish till now.' I felt my heart melt with tenderness and shame, as I silently pressed iny cheek to that of my gentle Gertrude, and then knelt down close beside her. Had I been alone, I think I could have prayed without difficulty for her; but I now was as one deprived of speech, I could only cover my face with my hands and weep like an infant. Nay, my beloved Lorenzo,' exclaimed my sweet wife, and stooping down, she kissed my forehead, I was wrong to distress you thus. Rise up: your tears will ascend to heaven

for me: they have a better eloquence with God than the best words. Oh! my Heavenly Father,'-as she spake she raised her soft eyes towards heaven, What a happy wife I am! I rose up, humbled in my soul, humbled to the dust, feeling the deep bitterness of my own heart, my face all crimsoned with shame. I felt then ashamed of even the height of my figure. I felt that my head was too near the throne of Him whom I had insulted and despised. I heard something move behind me in the dead silence--I looked round-The fresh evening breeze had merely overset a crystal vase too full of flowers. Again I started, for I thought I could distinguish the phantom approaching from the farther end of the chamber-I gazed steadily-I had merely seen my own shadow on the wall.

My wife slept for some hours very calmly; but before she awoke, I observed her whole countenance change, and at last she started from her sleep, and cried out with the pangs which had already overtaken her. I called hastily to some of her attendants who were in the antechamber; and resigning my place to her nurse, I stole softly from her room. Hour after hour passed away, and I was at times obliged almost to rush from the antechamber, to conceal from my wife the bursts of passionate grief which overwhelmed me. At last I heard them move about quickly in the chamber: I distinguished low and shivering groans; once I heard the voice of my wife: Oh, do not think of me,' she cried faintly, save my child! Think only of your lady,-of saving my wife!' I called out with a low but firm voice. At that moment a piercing shriek thrilled through my whole frame: I heard onlyShe is safe,' and rushed wild with joy from the room. I soon returned again, I stole on tiptoe into my wife's chamber, she seemed asleep, her face was turned towards me. The nurse looked at me, and raised her hands, as if to say, 'There is now no hope.' I gazed again on the pallid and exhausted sleeper; once or twice she attempted to open her eyes, but she was too feeble. I whispered who was near her, and something like a smile faintly flickered over her features, and disturbed their fixed repose. I whispered to her again. I laid my face close to the pillow. On my knees I remained I know not how long, watching for a stirring of life upon her face. Sometimes I thought I could perceive a light breathing between her lips, a twinkling in the lustre of her half-closed eyes. At last I touched her lips with mine, they were cold and stiff. My child had lived only a few minutes.

Many days had passed over me before I awoke from this last affliction; awoke in soul, I should say, for to all appearance I suffered little. I gave orders for the funeral of my wife and child with a calmness that astonished those about me; I followed their lifeless bodies to the grave; I gave directions to an artist of great celebrity for their monument. I sketched the figures which I determined should be placed over the tomb; my wife in almost the same simple attitude as when I first beheld her sitting in the portico of my palace, except that her little infant was lying in her arms. I paid as immense price t. the artist on the condition that the monument should be erected in a few weeks. I saw the tomb finished, and placed above the bodies just as I had directed, with the few words, Thy will be done,' graven deeply into the cold hard marble, and I was satisfied. I then determined to leave Italy. I gave a general order that my palace in Naples and all my other property should be sold.

had locked up the chamber of my wife as soon as they had removed her beloved corpse; and having arranged every thing for my departure, I resolved to spend my last evening in that apartment; I or dered that every visiter should be refused admittance to me, and I then entered that dear chamber: the very air within it seemed still to breathe of her presence, it seemed yet fragrant with that delicate purity which had been as peculiar to her person as to her mind. The loose dress of white mustin, which she had last worn, lay as when it had been carelessly thrown off, on a low sofa. I remembered that she had been sitting on that same sofa the evening before her death: that she had risen from it as I appeared. I sat down there and wept, for

the first time since I had lost her. My tears seemed been opened. No man can now elevate great men found it expedient to vary from to freshen the feelings of my grief; every little himself by the most elaborate imitations, their predecessors. Indeed we do not recolcircumstance which had been half-obscured, half- and Mr Campbell unhappily belongs to the ect a single great poet who has not a verforgotten, in the late dull and stupined state of my class of imitators. We do not know but sitication peculiarly his own. Byron, in mind, now came forth in vivid colouring. I continued to weep, and to press the light dress which we may shock the prejudices of some of our his dedication of the "Corsair," talks about my Gertrude had last worn, to stop my ears. While readers by this assertion, nor do we mean his having attempted "the good, old, and now sitting there, I discovered a small volume lying beto make it without some qualification. His neglected heroic couplet;" but the coupneath one of the cushions of the sofa, and I recol- lyric poetry is his own, pure and unming-ets of the "Corsair" are no more like the lected that I had often seen it in the hands of my ied, and noble; but his longer works-those couplets of Dryden, or of Pope, or of Goldwife. The book was lying open, as if it had been just laid down. I was struck by the peculiar rich- to which his odes are but appendages-ail smith, than they are like the couplets of ness of the binding: the sides and back were cov- discover mannerisin and imitation strongly Chaucer, or than the blank verse of Thomered with green velvet, thickly bossed with pearls marked. This will not do now, and cannot son is like the blank verse of Milton or and rubies, and its clasps, of pale virgin gold, were do hereafter. The master poets of the age Young. It is curious to see that in the also studded with valuable gems. I expected to find have broken down the barriers of preju-lyric poetry of Campbell,-that part of his some rare and richly ornamented manuscript, some painted missal: I was disappointed, for the volume dice; they have moulded anew the public works on which his fame must ultimately was a small plainly printed English Bible. I hastily taste, and stamped it with an original im- rest, he has invented new measures of turned over the leaves: on the title page my wife press. No revival of an obsolete school of verse. had written with an unsteady hand these words- poetry, no direct imitation of a new one, My last prayer will be that my husband may regard this book as his best treasure-it has been can now win the applause of the public, ever mine. From the grave, from another world, though it may exact the approval of critics. I beseech him to search this message of God him- Campbell was happy in the time at which self. O let him not dispute over this sacred volume, "The Pleasures of Hope" was published; but pray in a childlike and teachable spirit for the a few years later, and it would been praisknowledge of himself, of the truth, of eternal happied by critics and neglected by readers, if ness! For your sake, my blessed love,' I exclaimed fervently, I will read this little volume! It shall lie next to my heart, which your image shall never leave.' At that moment the phantom stood before me, and the book dropped from my hand.

All about me seemed to undergo a gradual change, and the presence of the phantoni is no longer dread ful to me. He still appeareth often, but not to tervify, not to wither my heart within me. I have learned to bless his appearance, for he now cometh rather as a friendly monitor. In the hour of danger, of temptation, of trial, I see his look of agonized entreaty, I hear his solemn voice of warning, deploring my past guilt, and pointing to those mercies which have blotted out the sentence of condemnation pronounced against all sinners. His form I can still recognise, but it seemeth like one that is transfigured, and the garments that he wears are white and glistening.

indeed his good sense would not then have entirely suppressed it. Brown's "Paradise of Coquettes" and "Bower of Spring" were praised in the Edinburgh Review; but we may retort on the critics their own words, "Who reads them?" They slumber with Hayley's "Triumphs of Temper." Truly the Scottish critics have been very unhappy in their remarks on poetry, in the subjects which they have selected either for praise or blame. They seemed to have put down Wordsworth for a time; they ridiculed Byron and Coleridge; they bestowed mingled praise and censure on Southey;-look at the result! Those pas sages of Southey which they condemned are admired, and the judges are condemned for those which they absolved. Coleridge is now confessedly "a singularly wild and beautiful" poet, the most original perhaps that ever wrote.* The superior excellence of some of Byron's later performances are thought by good judges to be due to his New having been "dosed with Wordsworth."

Here I conclude You say that you must return to England. My true friend, I would go thither also. I would no longer defer my departure from Naples for whither thou goest I will go; and where thou lodgest I will lodge: Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.

Theodric; a Domestic Tale; and Other

Poems. By Thomas Campbell.

And, in Wordsworth's own language, who
does not observe to what a degree the
poetry of the Island has been coloured by
his works?

As to this recent publication, we do not think it will increase the fame of Campbell; neither do we think it will shake his well established reputation. It comes too late to effect this; but had it appeared immediately after "The Pleasures of Hope," it would have needed something better than "Gertrude of Wyoming," highly polished as that is, to have placed him on his former level in public estimation.

Theodric is a short tale, and, as it seems to us, carelessly told. It opens with a description of Alpine scenery, conveyed from Wordsworth, and sadly marred in the transversion. The poet imagines himself standing by the tomb of a Swiss maiden, whose story is told him by his companion: that she fell in love with a colonel in the Austrian army from the enthusiastic descriptions of her brother, who was a cornet in his troop; and learning that he was about to marry another woman, she died of love;

that the colonel having one day scolded a little, because his wife stayed too long on a visit, she died of grief thereupon just about the same time. What became of the colonel and cornet afterwards, our author says not. Now any man who is conversant with the Lake poets, must know, that a fine superstructure of poetry might have been built on such a plan as this. We ourselves, ad

mirers as we are of another school than his, York. 1825. 18mo. pp. 116. did believe that Mr Campbell could have MR CAMPBELL'S fortune as a poet has been worked up this simple tale powerfully; but singular. The fame of other poets fluctuhe has failed. The style is a strange medated during their whole lives, and their For one who loves literature well enough|ley-some passages are of the versification niches in the Temple were assigned to to trace its history in its minuter points, it is of Mr Campbell's earlier works, some of them by posterity; but he seems many interesting to notice the changes in the that of Lord Byron's, and now and then a years ago to have attained a station, from versification of our language since the days dash of Crabbe's; and we could not feel which no subsequent performances have of Queen Elizabeth, from the ruggedness affected by the incidents, however much we removed him; and he is now arrived at an of Donne and Cowley, through the affect- tried. We quote the opening lines. age which renders it improbable that he ed airiness of Waller, the stateliness of will produce any work to alter the judg- Dryden, and the flippancy of Pope, to the ment of the public. He has always been, smooth flow of Goldsmith and his followers; and from the nature of things always must and then to turn to the rich and varied harbe, a popular poet, but, as it has been de-mony that wells forth from the pages of cided, a poet of the second class. There Walter Scott and of Byron, and the poets are passages in all his works which appeal of the Lake school. We have not adverted directly to feelings inherent in human na- to the less marked differences which may ture, passages which will awaken respon- be found in some of the intermediate poets; ses in the breast of every reader. but we have cited enough to show, that, even in the trivial point of form, these

His first work, "The Pleasures of Hope," was, according to the notions of the leaders of the public taste in its day, a work of *Why are not Coleridge's Poems republished high promise. But better and more exalt-in this country? We have but few of thein, and ed views of poetical excellence have since those not the best.

"Twas sunset, and the Ranz des Vaches was sung,
And lights were o'er th' Helvetian mountains flung,
That gave the glacier tops their richest glow,
And tinged the lakes like molten gold below.
Warmth flushed the wonted regions of the storm,
That high in Heaven's vermilion wheeled and soared.
Where, Phoenix-like, you saw the eagle's form,
Woods nearer frowned, and cataracts dashed and

roared,

From heights brouzed by the bounding bouquetin;
Herds tinkling roamed the long-drawn vales be-
And hamlets glittered white, and gardens flourished

tween,

green.

Some of our readers may not have had an opportunity of seeing the original of these

344

lines; and to such of them as have seen it, love of ordinary mortals, than that which is
we presume no apology is necessary for re-expressed in Byron's. "The Ritter Bann"
calling to their recollection such finished
poetry of so high an order.

'Tis storm, and hid in mist from hour to hour,
All day the floods a deepening murmur pour;
The sky is veiled, and every cheerful sight;
Dark is the region as with coming night;
But what a sudden burst of overpowering light!
Triumphant on the bosom of the storm,
Glances the fire-clad eagle's wheeling form;
Eastward, in long perspective glittering, shine
The wood-crowned cliffs that o'er the lake recline;
Wide o'er the Alps a hundred streams unfold,
At once to pillars turned that flame with gold;
Behind his sail the peasant strives to shun
The west, that burns like one dilated sun,
Where in a mighty crucible expire
The mountains, glowing hot, like coals of fire.
Wordsworth's Descriptive Sketches.

There is another passage of English poetry which we doubt not owes its origin to this. We mean the opening of the third canto of the Corsair; but no trace of imitation is to be found there. Byron was a mas ter of his art; he did not borrow another man's lamp and pour out the oil; but when he had caught light from it, the flame which he kindled was his own, and supplied from an inexhaustible fountain. We have not found in Theodric any other passage of such palpable imitation as that which we have quoted; but we think that the whole poem evinces, that it is the work of one who draws sometimes from one and sometimes from another, without relying upon his own collected and concocted resources. Like all the works of its author, it has passages of tranquil beauty. The following description is of this kind:

and to know her well
Prolonged, exalted, bound, enchantment's spell;
For with affections warm, intense, refined,
She mixed such calm and holy strength of mind,
That, like Heaven's image in the smiling brook,
Celestial peace was pictured in her look.
Hers was the brow, in trials unperplexed,
That cheered the sad, and tranquillized the vexed;
She studied not the meanest to eclipse,
And yet the wisest listened to her lips;
She sang not, knew not Music's magic skill,
But yet her voice had tones that swayed the will.
There are lines in which the author's wish
to snatch, like some of his cotemporaries,
"a grace beyond the reach of art," has be
trayed him into a meanness of expression
that sorts but oddly with the others around
them. Such, for instance, as these:-

'His ecstacy, it may be guessed, was much.'
But how our fates from unmomentous things
May rise, like rivers, out of little springs.'
'The boy was half beside himself.'

Of the smaller poems contained in this volume, none are equal to some which Campbell has heretofore written; several of them were first published in the New Monthly Magazine. Some of the contributors to that Magazine are, however, better poets than its editor, if we may suppose that the poetry there published, and not republished here, was the work of others. The love songs are about as good as love songs commonly are. They are more true to nature than Moore's, and the feeling which they express is much more like the

has been sufficiently ridiculed, so we will not
join in the chorus. "Reullura" is as tame as
the Ritter. The Song-"Men of England"
is more in the style of Campbell's best
efforts than any thing else in the volume,
and is worthy of a place not far below "The
Battle of the Baltic."

SONG-MEN OF ENGLAND.'
Men of England! who inherit

Rights that cost your sires their blood!
Men whose undegenerate spirit
Has been proved on land and flood!-
By the foes ye 've fought uncounted,
By the glorious deeds ye 've done,
Trophies captured--breaches mounted,
Navies conquered-kingdoms won!
Yet, remember, England gathers
Hence but fruitless wreaths of fame,
If the patriotism of your fathers

Glow not in your hearts the same.
What are monuments of bravery,
Where no public virtues bloom?
What avail in, lands of slavery,
Trophied temples, arch, and tomb?
Pageants!-Let the world revere us
For our people's rights and laws,
And the breasts of civic heroes

Bared in Freedom's holy cause.
Yours are Hampden's, Russell's glory,
Sydney's matchless shade is yours-
Martyrs in heroic story,

Worth a hundred Agincourts!
We're the sons of sires that baffled
Crowned and mitred tyranny:
They defied the field and scaffold

For their birthrights-so will we!
Perhaps the following ode-if ode it be—
exhibits as much power and originality as
any thing in the volume; but it is difficult
to forget, while reading it, some poems of
modern date, which we cannot but think
that Mr Campbell remembered while writ-
ing it.

THE LAST MAN.

All worldly shapes shall melt in gloom,
The Sun himself must die,
Before this mortal shall assume
Its immortality!

I saw a vision in my sleep,
That gave my spirit strength to sweep
Adown the gulf of Time!

I saw the last of human mould,
That shall Creation's death behold,
As Adam saw her prime !

The Sun's eye had a sickly glare,
The earth with age was wan,
The skeletons of nations were
Around that lonely man!
Some had expired in fight,-the brands
Still rusted in their bony hands;

In plague and famine some!
Earth's cities had no sound nor tread,
And ships were drifting with the dead
To shores where all was dumb!

Yet, prophet-like, that lone one stood,
With dauntless words and high,
That shook the sere leaves from the wood
As if a storm passed by,
Saying, We are twins in death, proud Sun,
Thy face is cold, thy race is run,

'Tis Mercy bids thee go;
For thou ten thousand thousand years
Hast seen the tide of human tears,
That shall no longer flow.

What though beneath thee man put forth
His pomp, his pride, his skill;
And arts that made fire, flood, and earth,
The vassals of his will;—
Yet mourn not I thy parted sway,
Thou dim discrowned king of day:
For all those trophied arts
And triumphs that beneath thee sprang
Healed not a passion or a pang

Entailed on human hearts.
Go, let oblivion's curtain fall
Upon the stage of men,
Nor with thy rising beams recall
Life's tragedy again.
Its piteous pageants bring not back,
Nor waken flesh upon the rack
Of pain anew to writhe;
Stretched in disease's shapes abhorred,
Or mown in battle by the sword,
Like grass beneath the scythe.
Even I am weary in yon skies
To watch thy fading fire;
Test of all sumless agonies,
Behold not me expire.

My lips that speak thy dirge of death-
Their rounded gasp and gurgling breath
To see thou shalt not boast.
The eclipse of Nature spreads my pall,—
The majesty of Darkness shall

Receive my parting ghost!
This spirit shall return to Him
That gave its heavenly spark;
Yet think not, Sun, it shall be dim
When thou thyself art dark!
No! it shall live again, and shine
In bliss unknown to beams of thine,
By Him recalled to breath,
Who captive led captivity,
Who robbed the grave of Victory,-
And took the sting from Death!
Go, Sun, while Mercy holds me up
On Nature's awful waste
To drink this last and bitter cup

Of grief that man shall taste-
Go, tell that night that hides thy face,
Thou saw'st the last of Adam's race,
On Earth's sepulchral clod,
The dark'ning universe defy
To quench his Immortality,

Or shake his trust in God!

A Comparative View of the Systems of Pestalozzi and Lancaster: in an Address delivered before the Society of Teachers of the City of New York. By Solyman Brown, A. M. New York. 1825. 8vo. PP. 24.

THE title of this pamphlet excited our interest to a high degree, but we were not a little disappointed on being obliged to read to the seventeenth page before we found the subject again alluded to. The preceding part consists of judicious remarks upon the importance of education, and the value of good instructers. The most important observations occur on pages 21, 22.

The difference between these two systems of Pestalozzi and Lancaster, I have said, is great— greater, perhaps, than we have been accustomed to imagine. In the one, [that of Lancaster] where a multitude of words are read, and perhaps committed to memory by the pupil, a great quantity of the signs of ideas is acquired; while the ideas themselves, and the things of which they are the images, are totally unknown. If words were the natural signs of things, or even the natural signs of ideas, the case would be reversed; but so long as language consists of conventional and artificial signs, having no analogy with thoughts or things, a mere reliance

upon books in elementary instruction, will be little
better than a nostrum of paper and of ink.
In the other system, on the contrary, where books
are introduced only to embody the elements of sci-
ence, and where able teachers are employed to
illustrate, to amplify, to infer; to elicit thought and
excite reflection; to encourage inquiry and engage
curiosity; to teach practice, and explode theory,
either things themselves are presented directly to
the mind, by the aid of analogous images already
the senses, or their appropriate ideas are excited in
there, and the mere words which signify the one
and the other, follow of necessity. In this case we
secure the reality, instead of the transient shadow
which flits across the mind only to leave it in
greater darkness and more deplorable sterility. In
short: the one system imparts IDEAS, and the other

WORDS.

In the statement of the difference between the two methods of teaching, the author is perfectly correct; but we regret that he did not exclude less important matter, and give a more full exposition of the Pestalozzian system. We know of no other subject so important to all who have any concern with the business of instruction-from the mother who sows the seed, to the instructer of ripening youth, who aids in the expansion of the branches, the leaves, and the flowers, and prepares the tree to bring forth fruit. We do not ascribe to Pestalozzi the sole merit of reviving the system of analytical instruction. It is a striking characteristic of the present age, that men are unwilling to believe any thing on authority; it must. be explained and illustrated so that it can be understood. The mind revolts from a dogmatical mode of teaching. We love to feel that we are free and rational agents, as well while acquiring, as while using, knowledge.

All the causes which have combined to produce this character in the present age, have tended equally to introduce that method of instruction which Pestalozzi has done so

It

East.

345

a degree of disgust which proves a great im- | the developement of the mental powers. He re-
pediment to the acquisition of knowledge in flected, that in those ancient days, the art of print-
any way. The best part of all that children ing was yet unknown, and hence, that the diffusion
learn, is caught in casual moments, when of Aristotle and Plato, of Socrates and Pythagoras,
of knowledge by books was impossible. He read
facts happen to be illustrated in a familiar among the Greeks; some of whom removed to Italy,
and interesting manner, and especially when in order to disseminate among the Roman youth,
they chance to see a simple truth explained the knowledge they had gained in Egypt and the
be said, that this is all the knowledge that
by being applied to its proper use. may
scholars can obtain, which is legitimate.
Whatever is not so acquired, is unaccom-
panied by love of knowledge for its own
sake, or the proper use which it is designed
to effect. It is altogether factitious; and
when the spurious motive which excited the
mind to the exertion by which it was ob
tained, ceases to operate, then all interest
in the knowledge ceases, and it is generally
forgotten.

The acquisition of knowledge is not in itself unpleasant to any mind. A love of knowing, a pleasure in receiving information, is proper to the nature of all children; and there is always something which is precisely adapted to the capacity of every child, and in which he will feel a strong interest when it is presented to his mind. To obtain what is now suited to the state and powers of the intellect, will infallibly prepare the way for the truth next in order; and the mind may advance by this regular gradation towards the illimitable measures of eternity.

pher, after comparing all the data derived from
The comprehensive mind of the Swiss philoso-
history, resulted in the conclusion, that the great
diversity of elementary books employed in the
schools of modern times, is destructive of the best
interests of early education; especially when those
books are voluminous and prolix-calculated to
enlighten, and expand the mind.
burden, perplex, and stupify, rather than exhilarate,

were employed by ancient instructers, he was ena-
The character of those elementary treatises which
bled to infer from a single splendid example which
had survived the conflagration of the library of
barians in the Western Empire. This was the
Alexandria, and all the ravages of the Gothic bar-
Geometry of Euclid, the preceptor of the Ptole-
mies:-a book which has been found so complete
in itself; so free from redundancy and defect; so
perfectly inclusive and exclusive, that no geometri-
cian in any age, has been able to add or diminish,
only are the books which Pestalozzi and his follow-
without creating an evident imperfection. Such
ers believe to be suited to the minds of youth.

Greeks, and Romans, intrusted the education of

But this philosopher ventured even farther, and suffered himself to conjecture what was the character of those instructors to whom the Egyptians, their children. He was able to demonstrate, beyond contradiction, that many of the first names We know that this theory, when pre- which history has transmitted, were teachers of the sented definitely, still appears to most per- youth of their country: and he found no trifling sons wild and extravagant. The truth is, we number of examples of a fact still more to his purcan form no idea of this orderly, analytical countries to be taught by these great masters. pose-that young men were sent from remote arrangement of the facts or truths in sci-Hence he very logically inferred, that the most ence, because we were not thus instructed. approved instructors were MEN of learning, expeAll our knowledge consists of truths ob-rience, and character. tained with little regard to method, and stored in the mind with almost no reference to orderly arrangement.

The greatest difficulty which this system much to illustrate and recommend. The presents, is that of determining the proper Reformation, the works of Bacon, of New- arrangement of the several sciences. Probton, of Franklin, and many others, and all ably it should be different with different that has been done to encourage and culti- scholars. In any single science, there is vate experimental science, have contributed no great difficulty in arranging the truths to the same end. The tendency of the whole, is to abolish the system of dogmati- Euclid's Elements in Geometry and ColWe mention, as examples, analytically. cal teaching, and to substitute for it a sys- burn's First Lessons in Arithmetic. Upon tem of learning,-a system by which the some other occasion, we may endeavour to scholar shall, at all times, have that pre-show, that the same system of arrangement sented to his mind which he is capable of comprehending, and of applying to some use. This is the way in which all real knowledge is obtained, and it is because our elementary books and our common modes of instruction are so imperfect, that so very little is done at school to improve any other faculty of the mind than the memory. The memory is continually stuffed with natural images, while the affections are uninterested in them, and the understanding takes no cognizance of their application or

use.

can easily be applied to the other sciences;
and shall conclude this notice with an ex-
tract from the Address of Mr Brown, which
contains some just observations respecting
the systems he is comparing.

Among the variety of suggestions in relation to
the best method of inculcation, those of Pestalozzi
public consideration. But while cach has found its
and Lancaster, have secured the greatest share of
advocates, no two systems are more diametrically
opposed.

Pestalozzi seems to have reverted his eye upon Foreign motives-as fear of punish- and, after admiring the perfection of the respective the brightest pages of Grecian and Roman history, ment and hope of reward-must be contin-languages of these two august nations, to have inually urged in order to encourage the mind quired into the causes of their literary and intelto this almost useless mode of acquiring lectual greatness. By a natural mode of argument, knowledge. We call this species of knowl- from effect to cause, he was led to suspect, that the edge almost useless, because it proves of comparatively little practical advantage, and the acquirement of it is accompanied by

eminent historians and poets, orators and statesmen,
states, must have acquired the first rudiments of the
military chieftains and scientific artists of those
sciences under circumstances peculiarly adapted to
44

By this process of investigation, corroborated by tradition among the descendants of these two nations, resident in the mountains of his country, tiquity could supply, and reduced to practice in his Pestalozzi gathered all the assistance which annative Switzerland, the result of his inquiries. His plan has been successfully pursued in Europe and America; and the institution of Fellemburgh in Switzerland, and the Polytechnic school of France, have given celebrity to his principles.

Franklin, to practise much, and trust little to These principles are at once natural and simple, and in perfect harmony with the philosophy of theory. The simple elements of science are presented to the learner, and he is led to all the minute ner the pupil is induced to confide little in a mere particulars, as if by actual discovery. In this man. tenacity of memory, but to repose with all its powers on the decisions of an active understanding.

hazarding a mere experiment, without the least auLancaster, on the other hand, was desirous of thority from the practice of any age or nation.

A philanthropist, no doubt, he desired a more general diffusion of knowledge than the condition of the poorer classes of the community, in every on books, with the bare rehearsal of lessons to those country, had hitherto admitted. By a sole reliance who were ignorant of their meaning, he hoped that such children as were deprived of higher advantages, might receive, at least, tolerable instruction.

considerable patronage, it has sunk into general In England, where this system received at first neglect; and in these States, where Lancaster travelled long, and laboured with indefatigable industry to impress the public mind with the sense of the importance of his new discovery, the schools and must eventually share the fate of their predeestablished on this plan have gradually dwindled, cessors across the Atlantic. I have witnessed the

living pranks of very few of these monsters; but I have attended during the funeral obsequies of several, in different states, and have seen their remains, unattended by a solitary mourner, committed to everlasting forgetfulness.

MISCELLANY.

AUTHORS AND WRITERS.

AUTHORS never die. The good and the evil they do, alike live after them. The body may be dead, but the mind lives; on earth too; and will live. Men's minds, as others know them, are known by what they say, do, and write. We have had men amongst us who never wrote any thing, but who, nevertheless, acted widely upon others by conversation alone. They thought as deeply, and as accurately, and talked with the same precision and order, as if they were thinking for writing, or were actually writing. Their opinions were sought for, where they might be useful, and were as accessible as if they were on the bookseller's counter, or in the library. These were strictly authors. They are, however, necessarily short-lived. Their records are not permanent. They are not the property of the whole, and which the whole will find a common pride and interest to preserve, and to preserve unadulterated. They are the property of a few, which the few will appropriate, and may alter and deform without mercy, and without fear. It is melancholy to see the mind thus dying to its own age, and to the future. If we have felt safer while such a mind was with us and near us, when danger was abroad, or anticipated, we have lost much when we have lost it. We have acquired a habit of dependence, and have felt it to be the direct and useful product of the greater and better power of another. It has been a useful dependence, for its quality has been to make our own minds stronger and better. There has been an advantage to us, perhaps, that these men have not written. Their honest and sound views have not been submitted either to vulgar impertinence, or party malevolence. The sharp, and sometimes effective, criticism of lesser minds, or the encounter of as strong, differently, and, it may be, less prudently directed, has not hurt our faith, or diminished our confidence. We have reposed delightedly and usefully beneath the protection of a fine mind, and, it may be, for the time, have not been disquieted, that we have had so few with us. The influence that has been so limited and personal, however, might have been felt every where. In its degree perhaps less vividly, but in its amount far greater. Above all, if these men had written, they would have survived the grave.

Men are known, it was said, by what they do. The men about whom we have written, were known in this way, and a wide and useful influence was exerted by their actions. It is a property of such minds to be consistent with themselves. They have been cautious in their decisions, and what is truth with them, is not unfrequently one

of its nearest approximations. Theirs has they have detected motive, where other
been a study of human experience in its men have only been taken with the con-
varieties and causes. The distinctions they duct. They thus take us in their works to
have made, have proceeded out of the ac- the deep springs of human action, and show
tual differences of things. What such men to us all its sources, whether pure or im-
were or thought years ago, or yesterday, in pure, however wickedly selfish, or honour-
regard to the great questions of human con- ably disinterested. These men are authors,
cern, they would be, or think to-day. They for they are eminently producers; for when
have taught us what, and how they are; they have written, the world has got some-
and if they have seemed different beings to thing which it had not before. These are
us at any time, the change has most proba- rare men. Ages have passed away without
bly belonged to our own minds, not to them. When they have appeared, it has
theirs.
been sometimes accidentally, and the world
has not known its own; and they have had
no other reward but the incommunicable
one, which a fine mind always has, and al-
ways must have, in the noble company of
its own thoughts. The works of such men
have been a legacy to all posterity. And
how sacred has been the entail; how care-
ful have we been of the patrimony, and how
jealous lest its fame should become the
property of another.

Such men are inestimably valuable at all times, and in all ages. They are especially so to our own. We are in a stirring world, and are for turning it upside down. The change, even for the worse, is not altogether the matter of doubtful choice it was once thought to be; or we are willing to change what is well, for the chances of the better. Some of our most gifted talkers have taken the word of the time, or put it into the time's mouth, and little now is, but what is not. In the men of whom we write, there was a saving leaven of human prudence. They had learned caution in the experience of every hour. They had learned it as well in the slow and wise progress of nature, as in their profound observance of human conduct. They talked deliberately, as if in harmony with this progress. I have known instances of peculiar melody of voice among these men, as if moral beauty, and a fine intellect, gave character to their expression. If these were in any degree taught caution and wisdom from nature, by the operation of its ordinary progress upon their minds, they were especially taught the self-same by its occasional deviations. They had seen ruin in the track of the storm, and in the flood of intolerable light from the clouds of heaven. They had seen the fair face of earth smiling in the calm sunshine, and its best fruits in the safe shower.

But these men have not written. They gave their minds to perishing records, the memories of men. A few years, and it will be difficult to remember their faces. If we remember their thoughts, it may not be to better our own, or to act by them.

Men, in the third place, are known by what they write. This remark wants large qualification. Writers are authors by emphasis, in common speaking. But all who write are not so. Few men give us what others have not given us before. Other men's thoughts have passed through their minds, it is true, but they have come out as as they went in. It is rare that they get even a new costume, and if they do, how frequently are they only deformed by it. These are writers. An author is one whose mind has not been the highway of other men's thoughts, but a soil into which they have been cast, like seed into the good ground, and where they have died in the upspringings and full harvest of higher and brighter thoughts. The observation of men and of nature has done the same thing. An affinity, if the term be allowed, has, in these men, subsisted between their own minds and the minds of other men. And

The authors of whom we write never repeat themselves. Let characters or incidents be as numerous as they may, a real individuality is preserved every where. You constantly perceive that the various beings created are conscious of their own identity, and act in consequence of it; and that the distinctions between them belong as naturally to this consciousness as they do to the same thing in actual life. Shakspeare was pre-eminent in this character of original authorship. His dead, and equally his living, never appear again when he has done with them, either to push us from our stools, or jostle us in our way. The ghost of Banquo appears indeed to the disturbed imagination of his own Macbeth; but it had no form or being to Shakspeare's mind any more than it had to the vision of the royal guests. When Hostess Quickly tell us that Sir John is dead, and how he died, the association of the winding-sheet, the coffin, the pall, and the grave, is inevitable, and we no more look for his return on earth again, than we should for an acquaintance, or accustomed neighbour, after he is buried.

Some writers who have been once original, seem to have fallen in love with their first fine conception, and ever after banker for it as for a first love. Let now the variety be intended to be never so great, and names, ages, and temperaments differ as they may, we always detect some limb, some feature, or some peculiarity of the first, given or transfused into all its successors. Their minds are like the philosopher's stone, whatever is touched becomes gold.

Great authors have, finally, a property in their own minds, which other men have not. Other men, and their thoughts and doings, and all external nature, it is true, have their effects upon them. But they have minds too, and in virtue of the very superiority of these over others, bring more to pass of a strictly original character, than the com bined suggestions, and other operations, of all the matters of mere observation.

Writers have been divided into various classes. We have spoken of two;-those who are authors and those who are not.

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