III.

SCHAFF'S HISTORY OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHI.*

Dr. Schaff is now distinctly recognized as possessing many of the highest qualifications for a church historian. Trained in the school of Neander, he seems to have been fully alive to the defects as well as to the great excellences of his master, capable of recognizing the true spirit of Christianity under every disguise, he is yet more cautious and watchful than Neander against a false sympathy, and is accordingly a safer guide amid the early records of the Church. He never, like Neander, merges the objective church in the subjective spirit of an age. Indeed, in his first volume on the "Apostolic Church" he was justly amenable to the charge of high Churchism. There is almost nothing of this in the present volume, which is the first of the regular history. To our mind the work comes nearer a model history than any yet given in the English language. The arrangement strikes us as clear and comprehensive; and the style as lucid, racy, graphic, and often elegant.

The practical spirit of our American life has evidently been of great service to the author in the use of his German learning. It is also clear that, while familiar with original sources, he has been at great pains to aequaint himself with English writers in the same department, whom the Germans have hitherto overlooked or ignored. With his many and rare qualifications, we are disposed to regard him as specially raised up to give to English readers a better history of the Church than we have yet had. We anticipate for the work a very wide circulation.

MARSHMAN'S LIVES.*

The enterprising house of Sheldon & Co. have done a very creditable thing in introducing this work to the notice of the American public.

Mr. Marshman's volumes are an admirable addition to our Missionary literature. Viewed as the history of a sublime enterprise in its experimental state, they are freighted with invaluable instruction to every Christian philanthropist, whatever may be his denominational affinities. The author, by virtue of his long residence in India, his intimacy with the Serampore Missionaries, though not himself a Missionary, possesses facilities for doing his work well. He has made admirable use of these facilities. No extraneous matter is introduced. The continuity of the story is not interrupted by exhortations. The analyses of characters blend two qualities rarely found united-humor and kindness. The style is clear, straightforward, unpretending, vigorous, and often piquant. The work is very apropos to the present juncture in the history of our denominational missions. Whoever wishes to avail himself of the historical light that may be shed on the questions which are distracting the peace of our American Antioch, by an acquaintance with the principles which guided the establishment and conduct of the first Christian Missions of modern times, and the results to which those principles led, cannot do better than to peruse these instructive volumes of Mr. Marsh

man.

[It is our intention to recur to the subject-matter of these volumes in a future number.]

*HISTORY OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH. By Phillip Schaff, D D., From the Birth of Christ to the Reign of Constantine, A. D. 1-311. New-York: Charles Scribner.

THE LIFE AND TIMES OF CAREY, MARSHMAN AND WARD, embracing the History of the Serampore Mission. By John Clark Marshman. 2 vols. 1859.

MASSON'S LIFE AND TIMES OF JOHN MILTON.*

The appearance of such a work as this is a notable event. No period in English history has been more thoroughly investigated than that in which Milton lived, and yet Prof. Masson has opened new paths to even the best read-has disclosed new treasures along the most beaten tracks. There is no topic connected with Milton's ancestry, his early education and university life, or with the political, ecclesiastical, or literary history of his time, which has not been thoroughly re-examined and illumined by the learning and genius of this author. The Life, if completed on the scale of this first volume, will be a new, complete, and original history of one of the most important periods, as well as of one of the most remarkable men in English annals. Prof. Masson is evidently master alike of the learning, the enthusiasm, and the taste, requisite to his task.

TRIALS OF A PUBLIC BENEFACTOR.†

One object of the author of this volume, is to establish the claims of Dr. W. T. G. Morton to having made the first application of anesthetic agents to practical purposes; a labor apparently unnecessary, as all persons, out of Boston at least, acquainted with the history of remedial agents, accord to him this honor. Another object, is to secure for Dr. Morton, in his relation to this subject, the sympathy of the public. This object, notwithstanding some tediousness of detail and infelicity of expression, the author, we think, has attained.

THE HISTORY OF THE BONAPARTE FAMILY‡

Has been for some years before the public, and for general readers is an instructive book.

WILSON'S MEXICO.§

We were

It happened to us before the appearance of Mr. Wilson's book, to devote the leisure time of a series of weeks to the subject of the Mexican Conquest, during a period of access to the two best libraries of our State. Our special object was to satisfy ourselves how far the histories of Cortez and Bernal Diaz could be fortified from collateral sources. surprised at the abundant "sources from which to collect and collate." From these sources we became satisfied that not a material fact is stated by Cortez which does not meet most abundant corroboration; and that, it being once granted, which no one denies, that his despatches were written at the time they bear date, it is impossible that the great mass of facts

*THE LIFE OF JOHN MILTON; Narrated in Connection with the Political, Ecclesiastical and Literary History of His Time. By David Masson, A. M., Prof. of English Literature in University College, London. (With Portraits and Specimens of his Handwriting at different Periods.) Vol. I., 1608-1639. Boston: Gould & Lincoln.

TRIALS OF A PUBLIC BENEFACTOR, as Illustrated in the Discovery of Etherization. By Nathan P. Rice, M. D. New-York: Pudney & Russell.

THE NAPOLEON DYNASTY; or, the History of the Bonaparte Family. An entirely new work, by the Berkeley Men. With Twenty-two Authentic Por

traits.

New-York: Sheldon & Co.

A NEW HISTORY OF THE CONQUEST OF MEXICO: in which Las Casas' denunciations of the popular historians of that war are fully vindicated. By Robert Anderson Wilson, Counsellor at Law, Author of Mexico and its Religion. Philadelphia: James Challen & Son.

stated by him should not be true. Most of this material lay unpublished for hundreds of years in the European archives. The censorship of the Inquisition" did not reach it; lately it has come to light, a series of mislaid photographs of perished scenery. Of all these treasures Mr. Wilson professes his ignorance; but no part of them escaped Mr. Prescott, who mentions and characterizes them all, although he often disdains the display of citing them.

We have not space to follow Mr. Wilson through his book. Any one who will do so, and compare his citations with his authorities, and consult Mr. Prescott on the same topics, will be astounded at the author's audacity. Not a citation, not an engraving which he professes to republish, not an assertion that he makes, can be trusted, without recourse to the original. And even where Mr. Wilson has the merit of being probably correct, he has not the credit of being original. Mr. Prescott was the first to "vindicate Las Casas' denunciations of the popular historians" of the Mexican Conquest. Mr. Wilson gives out the idea that Mr. Prescott adopts the exaggerated numbers of the early writers. But he does not do so in a single instance. His careful conscientiousness led him to other results. When Cortez, on one occasion, estimates the Indian auxiliaries who flocked to his standard at 120,000 warriors, Mr. Prescott merely writes "flocked by thousands," and adds: "when the conquerors attempt anything like a precise numeration, it will be as safe to substitute ‘a multitude,' a great force,' &c., trusting the amount to the reader's own imagination." Conquest, vol. ii., page 431, and note 16. He does not once vary from the opinion here expressed, and the very phrase, Falstaff's "men in buckram," applied by Mr. Wilson to one of these computations, p. 363, had been previously used for the same purpose by Mr. Prescott. Conquest, vol ii., page 376-7, note 26. One only needs to run over Mr. Prescott's notes the light labor of two hours-to see how groundless are these imputations upon him, and to be satisfied that charity demands the belief that Mr. Wilson has never read Prescott's Conquest carefully.

At page 519-20, Mr. Wilson speaks of "the lofty pyramid of hewn stone," which "previous historiographers" had described as existing at Cholula, and the absence of which dissipated all his faith in HispanoAmerican history. But who, before Mr. Wilson, ever mentioned this 'pyramid of hewn stone?" Cortez did not, nor Bernal Diaz, nor Robertson, nor Humboldt, nor Prescott. This is Mr. Wilson's pyramid; he has, therefore, a right to demolish it, but deserves small credit for the exploit. So of the charge of cannibalism made against the Iroquois, which he imputes to Dr. Robertson, and indignantly repels. But that eminent historian does not make this charge, but classes the Iroquois among the nations who are not now cannibals, but in whose language probable traces of that custom are found. We cite these instances as cautionary to the reader to first satisfy himself of the origin of the fables which Mr. Wilson explodes, before much attention is given to the catastrophe.

THE EMPIRE OF AUSTRIA.*

This is the first volume of a series contemplating "The Biography of the Monarchies of Continental Europe." Though not the result of original research, it is, nevertheless, a reliable, well-authenticated history Marked by the same ease and grace of style that have characterized the previous works of the author, it is just the book for parents to place in the family library as a decoy for their sons and daughters from the seductions of lighter literature.

*THE EMPIRE OF AUSTRIA: its Rise and Present Power. By John S. C. Abbott. New-York: Mason & Brothers. 8vo, pp. 519. 1859.

BEAUTIES OF RUSKIN.*

The

With many of our readers Ruskin is already a household name. modest "graduate of Oxford," whose new theories in art met with the usual cry of "heresy," survived the chastisements of the reviews, and converted his critics into admiring friends. A certain profound faith in the truth of his principles gave to him an assurance of utterance which compelled attention and commanded success, His plea is always for nature; and he inculcates a reverence for her and for the old masters only so far as they are faithful to her, with the simplicity, confidence and ardor of a single-minded worshipper. He strives by going back to first principles to bring those who have been fettered by forms, rules and masters, into the liberty of true art. Somewhat as Luther, believing the Gospel of Christ to repose neither in convent, nor Vatican, but in the very Word of God, preached a pre-papal Christianity; Ruskin believing the evangel of art to repose neither in academies nor with old masters, but in the very bosom of nature, teaches the simple doctrines of Pre-Raphaelitism.

Along with a few conceits, a few extravagances, and a little indiscreet glow of feeling and fervor of style, Ruskin betrays in all that he writes a sincerity, a goodness, an earnestness and a truth, which win at once the confidence and respect of the reader; and as the student follows his guide up the mountains, down into the valleys, across the hills, through the woods, into ravines, over the meadows, along the banks of deep rivers, by the side of cascading brooks, and finds himself discovering beauties. where he had never dreamed of them before, finding new revelations in the skies, on the earth, in creeping shadows, in old brown stumps, in the least as well as the largest of nature's works, he becomes conscious of a gratitude to his leader as to one who has endowed him with a new sense, or discovered for him a new world. Underneath, and pervading Ruskin's love and reverence for nature, is a deeper love and reverence for the God of Nature. A quiet undertone of religious feeling runs through all his works, investing them, for the Christian reader, with a charm rarely found in treatises on art. A thorough detestation of all shams, pretences, all mere seemings, is also so characteristic of them, that the moral feelings almost as much as the taste of the reader, are stimulated and refined,

We are not particularly in favor of culling the "beauties" of any author. In general, a writer who is worth studying at all, is worth posssessing entire. But Mrs. Tuthill, who has shown an admirable judgment in these selections from Ruskin's works, says very reasonably in a prefatory note, that "being voluminous and expensive, they are beyond the means of many who could appreciate and highly enjoy them; moreover, some of the topics discussed are merely local (English), and not specially interesting to the American public."

* THE TRUE AND THE BEAUTIFUL IN NATURE, ART, MORALS, AND RELIGION. Selected from the works of John Ruskin, A, M., with a notice of the Author by Mrs. L. C. Tuthill. New-York: Wiley & Halstead. 12mo, pp. 452. 1859.

Literary Intelligence.

SINCE the issue of the last number of the REVIEW, we have received the final instalment of the seventh edition of " Tischendorf's New Testament.” It contains his prolegomena, and bears date Leipsic, 1859.

We hope ere long to procure a critical article on the basis of this and some other recent publications, on the present state of the Greek text of the New Testament. Meantime, we take occasion to say that this edition, the first part of which was published about three years ago, and the last part of which has just come to hand, is in the best style of recent typographical art in Germany, and is the fruit of great industry on the part of its distinguished editor, With the most unwearied and pains-taking diligence he has brought together, from every available source, means for the determining and settling of the text. In this particular no other edition of the Greek Testament can be compared with it. It furnishes ample material, in most cases, for the critical student to sit in judgment on the text which the editor himself has adopted. As that text will doubtless be largely used in our theological seminaries, and will be adopted as the basis of many critical commentaries, the critical apparatus by which it is formed ought to be made generally accessible. The whole work can be imported bound for eight dollars. A smaller edition containing the same text, most of the prolegomena, and a large selection of the authorities contained in the large work, can be furnished, unbound, for $2 38. This is sufficient for all ordinary purposes of the New Testament student.

The New Testament portion of the "Codex Vaticanus," as published by Cardinal Mai, has been advertised as in press by several publishing houses in this country and in England. Of the precise character and value of this publication we have not been able to obtain satisfactory information. We shall spare no reasonable pains to procure for the readers of this Quarterly a just, critical estimate of the Cardinal's work. If only it were an accurate and faithful transcript of the original manuscript, what a treasure it would be for sacred criticism! And great will be its value even now, if the places where it deviates from the manuscript are reliably indicated. It is to be hoped that some enterprising publisher, who wishes to use his facilties for advancing the science of Biblical criticism, will, ere long, give us an edition of "Cardinal Mai's Greek Testament," with the various readings of all the collations hitherto made of the codex, so far as they are procurable. This would be a work of great value, and would meet with a remunerative sale. It would go far, we think, with the materials already available, toward enabling us finally to settle the probable text of the New Testament.

In addition to the two abovenamed works, which may be had at a moderate sum, we are soon to have published, and rendered accessible at a reasonable price, the excellent critical commentaries of Alford and Ellicott, and also a translation of the last edition (the sixth), of Winer's Granimar of the New Testament Idioms."

This last work will be an invaluable acquisition to all American students of the New Testament who are not familiar with the German language. It will be found by them to be a kind of thesaurus on the language and idioms of the New Testament. It will be almost a new lexicon to them. And in this last particular it will be a prize to all who are now limited to "Robinson's Greek Lexicon." Special explanations