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aim to expound or defend any of the prophetic theorics which divide apocalyptic expositors, nor to treat the entire work-only to give some of the "leading strains in the magnificent melody." The book is characteristic of the author-fervid, eloquent, stirring, full of the life of the Divine Word, and rich in experimental and devotional thought.

Presbyterian Board of Publication. We have received the following books from our own Board, and regret that we can do little more than give their titles at present: Light Shining in Darkness, or Illustrations of the Power of the Gospel. 12mo. pp. 447. Lessons from Experience, or Tales from Real Life. pp. 383. The Way to Mount Zion, and other Tales. pp. 348. The Story of a Pocket Bible. pp. 472. Theodore, a Story about Baptism. By a True Baptist. pp. 374. Republics; or Popular Government an Appointment of God. By Rev. JOHN CROWELL, D.D. pp. 238. The Way Lost and Found, a Book for the Young. especially Young Men. By JOSEPH F. TUTTLE, D.D., of Wabash College. pp. 285. We rejoice to note a decided improvement of late in the character of the works issued by the Board, and we bear this testimony the more willingly because we have felt constrained at times to criticise them somewhat severely. We think there is still demanded a more rigid scrutiny and discrimination in selecting the books, and more skill and taste in the mechanical execution. As a whole, in both particulars, they are still inferior to the issues of the Messrs. Carter, for instance. It is a miserable policy, both in a literary and a commercial seuse, to lumber the catalogue and shelves of our Board with a large number of books that are not worth the paper they are printed on The selection of books, especially books that are to constitute an important part of the religious literature of the Presbyterian Church, is a most delicate and responsible task-infinitely more so than is generally supposed-and demands a rare judgment, and great patience and pains-taking-the insight and tact of the business man, as well as the highest order of mental and spiritual discernment. Our Publishing Board will never attain to a great success-such as we all desire it should, until it combines these highest qualities, as they are to be found in connection with some of our wellestablished publishing houses. It would be enough for any one man to do, to perform the labor involved in the examination of MSS., in selecting from the numerous new issues of the Old World, and in carefully and thoroughly editing the works adopted. A literary editor, if of the right stamp, devoting his time and thoughts wholly and untiringly to the task, would render a most valuable service in connection with the Board, which it is simply impossible for our worthy and excellent Secretaries to perform fully, and which ought not to be laid upon them with their other numerous cares. Personally we have never been in favor of Publishing Boards, believing that the object could be more economically and as well secured through special arrangement with private publishing houses; but since the present policy has been adopted and is likely to be persisted in. we go in for making our Publishing Board every way worthy of the object and worthy of the Presbyterian Church; for putting it on a business and literary basis equal to that of other publishing houses, so that it can compete fairly with them and present a catalogue that in no particular shall suffer in comparison

with the catalogue of private enterprises of a similar kind. And such a course is the more imperative, since the Board is expected to go largely into the creation of a Sunday-school Literature for the denomination, - the most important, delicate, and difficult task imposed upon it, and in a department that needs a thorough reform more than any other.

HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY.

Memoir of the Life and Character of Rev. Lewis Warner Green, D.D., with a selection from his Sermons. By LE ROY J. HALSEY, D.D. Charles Scribner & Co. Crown 8vo. pp. 491. Dr. Green served his generation well, and attained to a purity and elevation of character not often surpassed. "He lived in an eventful period of the American Church, and filled successively many important positions in the central and western portions of our country." The estimate here given of Dr. Green's ability, both as a teacher and as a preacher, is a very high one, but we believe it will be sustained by those who knew him best. His ministerial life was divided between the pulpit and the professor's chair. He was licensed in 1833, and spent the succeeding five years as a Professor in Centre College and in travels in Europe. On his return he was elected to a chair in the Theological Seminary at South Hanover, Ind., but after a brief season was induced to return to Danville and divided his time between Centre College and, as a colleague with Dr. Young, in the pastorate of the Presbyterian Church. In 1840, the General Assembly elected him to a professorship in Allegheny Seminary. where he remained for seven years and won golden opinions. But his preference for the pastoral work led him to resign this position and accept a call from the Second Presbyterian Church of Baltimore. After a brief pastorate, however, he accepted the presidency of Hampden Sidney College, the duties of which he discharged with ability till 1856, when he accepted the presidency of Transylvania University; but disappointed by untoward legislation in his efforts to resuscitate that institution, he, the next year, accepted the presidency of Centre College, in whose service and also as colleague-pastor of the Second Church of Danville, he ended his days. He died in the midst of his work, soon after the terrible battle of Perryville, when the college and churches of Danville were turned into hospitals for the sick and wounded soldiers to whose relief he devoted much of his time and strength.

The Journal of John Woolman. With an Introduction by JOHN G. WHITTIER. James Osgood & Co. 16mo. pp. 315. Charles Lamb expressed his appreciation of this writer when he said, "Get the writings of John Woolman by heart." One of the leading British reviews a few years ago, referring to this Journal, pronounced "its author the man who, in all the centuries since the advent of Christ, lived nearest to the Divine pattern." Mr. Whittier claims that the abolition of human slavery "owes much of its original impulse to the labors of this poor, unlearned working man of New Jersey." Certainly he was a most remarkable man, "one of the kings and priests of Humanity," specially anointed, as was Francis of Assisi, for their mission. The lengthy Introduction supplies much interesting historical data, as well as an appreciative estimate of his lovely character and noble life.

A Manual of Ancient History from the Earliest Times to the Fall of the Western Empire. By GEO. RAWLINSON, M.A. Camden Professor of Ancient History in the University of Oxford. New York: Harper & Bros. 1871. This Manual is prepared on the general plan of Professor Heeren's "Hand-Book," which has so long held its ground. It comprises outlines of the history of Chaldea, Assyria, Media, Babylonia, Lydia, Phoenicia, Syria, Judea, Egypt, Carthage, Persia, Greece, Macedonia, Parthia, and Rome— excluding Arabia and India, and the history of the Sassanidæ. In a complete work, these, it seems to us, should have been included; Professor Rawlinson excludes Arabia and India, because he does not regard the sources as trustworthy; but the business of a historian, and one of his most difficult tasks, is to sift the sources and give the results; and, certainly, Arabia and India-to say nothing of China—did have a history in ancient times. Apart from this, the Manual is excellent-concise, clear, well arranged -a book for students. The references to the sources and literature are sufficiently full, and an important help. This work, in connection with Lenormant's Manual, which includes Arabia and India, supplies the longfelt need of a compact outline of ancient history, abreast of the recent investigations. The author of the Five Great Monarchies" is the man for such a treatise. He gives ascertained facts, and does not lose himself in fanciful theories or conjectures.

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A History of the Christian Councils, from the Original Documents, to the Close of the Council of Nicæa. A. D. 325. By CHARLES JOSEPH HEFELE, Bishop of Rollenburg, formerly Professor of Theology in the University of Tübingen. Translated from the German and Edited by WILLIAM R. CLARK, M.A., Oxon, Prebendary of Wells and Vicar of Taunton. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark. Published in this country through Messrs. Scribner, Welford & Co., New York. 8vo. pp. 592. Bishop Hefele, although a Roman Catholic, is no Ultramontanist. At the Vatican Council, on the question of Infallibility, he was one of the non placets. His theory of the Church does not necessarily require him to pervert the truth of history, or give a one-sided view of ecclesiastical transactions. Doubtless a Protestant scholar would have paid more attention to some things over which he has lightly passed, or placed some matters upon which he has dilated in a somewhat different aspect. Yet his general accuracy and fidelity will not be impeached. and in this volume, the first portion only of his extended work on Church Councils, he has presented us with the history of a period of deepest interest to all who distinguish between the comparative purity of the first three centuries of the Christian Church and subsequent corruptions. The importance of such a volume as this is seen from the fact that it gathers up within reasonable compass, and makes accessible to scholars generally, what must otherwise be laboriously sought in various authorities, or such voluminous Histories of the Councils as contain-like Mansi their interminable proceedings or conclusions. Such a work as Bishop Hefele's is therefore a real desideratum for students of Church history, and they will find in it much that they would search for in vain in other quarters. We need only add that in a thick 8vo., typographically unexceptionable and attractive, it presents such temptations to the historical student as he will find it difficult to resist.

GENERAL LITERATURE.

Papers for Home Reading. By Rev. JOHN HALL, D.D. Dodd & Mead. 12mo. pp. 365. Thousands will welcome this volume to their homes. The name of its author is already a household name in this land of his adoption. Those who have seen him will at once recognize his striking features as they are reflected from the excellent steel engraving; and those who have heard him from the pulpit or platform will feel the power of his great heart and stirring words as they read these papers. They are unpretending, and on the common topics of home life; but they possess that rare and subtle essence which lends such a charm to his preaching, and yet has never been described by one of the many who have made the attempt. We are not surprised at the popularity of the book: and so long as such a kind of a book, and such a style of preaching as the author's are received with marked favor, we know that the age is not given over to utter frivolity and sensationalism in its literature, or to charlatanism, or rationalism, or effeminacy in its mode of pulpit instruction.

The American Cardinal. Dodd & Mead. 12mo. pp. 315.

Strife: A Romance of Germany and Italy. By Mrs. E. D. WALLACE. Claxton, Remsen & Haffelfinger. 12mo. pp. 335.

The first of these works of fiction does not meet the expectation created by its announcement. It is written with some ability; its aim is praiseworthy and its tone unexceptional. Many will be particularly interested in it, because of its bearings upon the Romanist tendencies in certain quarters, and the illustration it affords of the spirit and wiles of that politicoreligious power, whose jesuitical and perverting influence we have reason to guard against with sleepless vigilance. Still it shows very little skill or power in delineating character, or in sketching the artful and subtle infiuences by which Rome achieves her purpose.

"Strife" is a work of decided merit, written in a sprightly and animated style, and conveying excellent moral and religious lessons. It is from the pen of one who bears a name familiar to the readers of this REVIEW. Mrs. ERNEST C. WALLACE, whose husband, the son of the late Dr. B. J. Wallace, was a well-known journalist of Philadelphia, prematurely cut off. Mrs. W. rendered valuable aid to both while they lived, and uses her pen to good purpose still in the walks of literature. This is the latest of her books. and we take pleasure in commending it to our readers, not only for its own merit, but on the ground of its authorship.

A Handbook of Legendary and Mythological Art. By CLARA ERSKINE CLEMENT. With Descriptive Illustrations. Hurd & Houghton. 12mo pp. 497. This is beyond all doubt a book that will interest and instruct the class for whom it was specially written. It is a work that must have cost a good deal of study and research in the preparation. Undertaken at first for her own children, and for her personal gratification, the author now seeks to turn it into the channel of usefulness to others. The legends of place have been principally drawn from German literature. The mythological portion embraces all subjects of that character which are illustrated in painting or sculpture in the galleries of Rome, Florence, the Louvre, Munich, Vienna. Dresden and Berlin. The numerous illustrations are intended as a key or guide in the consideration of their subjects. The aim has been to make the book compact and useful as a hand-book in traveling.

AMERICAN

PRESBYTERIAN REVIEW.

OCTOBER, 1871.

THIRD SERIES.-NUMBER 11.

ART. I.-FAITH,-ITS PLACE AND PREROGATIVE. FIRST PAPER. THE FIELD OF THE PHILOSOPHIC AND FINITE. By Prof. R. B. WELCH, D.D., Union College, Schenectady, N. Y. SHALL faith be ruled out? This is not exclusively a question between philosophy and theology, but also a question of philosophy with philosophy. It has of late been fashionable in certain quarters to satirize Christian faith as folly, to admit nothing but "positive knowledge," to sneer at belief as irrational.

One class of these pretentious foes to faith, who occupy the realm of sense, assume the modest appellation of philosophers, yet magisterially limit all knowledge to this realm. What appears to sense they know. The phenomenal is the real-the only real. Just what it is, they are not able to say; but that it is, they know. The senses are the media of communication, and the senses are the source of knowledge—the source of all knowledge.

Another class, in the same field of the sense, despising the appearance of modesty, reject the name philosopher; affirm the paradox that "there are more false facts than false theories" (Lewes' Biographical History of Philosophy, etc.); and resolutely press their theory to its legitimate conclusion, "that a valid philosophy is impossible," "that science is radically opposed to and excludes all philosophy and theology." As said the sophists, so say they, that nothing is truly known;

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