DR. WILLIAM SMITH'S DICTIONARY OF CHRISTIAN ANTIQUITIES.* -The first volume of this important work, which is now published, professes to be a continuation of the editor's well known "Dictionary of the Bible." Dr. Smith says: "It elucidates and explains, in relation to the Christian Church, the same class of subjects that the Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities does in reference to the public and private life of classical antiquity. It treats of the organization of the Church, its officers, legislation, discipline, and revenues; the social life of Christians; their worship and ceremonial, with the accompanying music, vestments, instruments, vessels, and insignia; their sacred places; their architecture and other forms of art; their symbolism; their sacred days and seasons; the graves or Catacombs in which they were laid to rest.' It commences at the period at which the Dictionary of the Bible leaves off, and ceases at the age of Charlemagne; and is soon to be followed by a "Dictionary of Christian Biography, Literature, and Doctrine." The present work has been prepared with the assistance of a very large number of the first scholars of England, and in accordance with the general plan which was followed in the Dictionaries which have preceded it. The name of each contributor is attached to his work. Some of the subjects are very fully illustrated by wood cuts; as Church architecture, the Catacombs, and the article which treats of the rise and progress of pictorial decoration in the religious buildings of the early Christians. Among the "Festivals of the Church," of course, in this first volume, there is to be found a very elaborate discussion of the various historical questions which are connected with the origin of the celebration of the 25th of December as the birth day of our Lord; and the following statement of the writer of the Article may be of interest to some: "How far the church was led by the possession of actual historical evidence to assign, as it has done, Dec. 25, as the date of the Nativity, is a matter on which it is impossible to speak otherwise than most doubtfully." The experience of Dr. Smith as an editor, and the ability of his various collaborators, are a sufficient guarantee that this Dictionary will be of great and permanent value.

* Dictionary of Christian Antiquities. Being a continuation of the " 'Dictionary of the Bible." Edited by WILLIAM SMITH, D.C.L., LL.D.; and SAMUEL CHEETHAM, M.A. In two volumes. Vol. I. Boston: Little, Brown & Co. 8vo, pp. 898.

KURTZ'S CHURCH HISTORY.*. -A revised edition of this standard history has just been published. The principal feature in the new work is the introduction, in an Appendix of fourteen pages, of the most important part of the material which Dr. Kurtz has added to his seventh German edition. Some errors of translation, which have been found in the first American edition, have also been corrected. Prominent in the Appendix, is an account of the conflict with Ultramontanism in the new German Empire; a criticism of the proceedings of the Vatican Council; and a statement of the position of the "Old Catholics."

THE STORY OF THE HYMNS.t-The press bears its part annually in the preparations for Christmas and New Year's day, by issuing new works and new editions of old works, with contents so solid or pleasing, and such external attractions as to entice buying, in order to giving. Religious themes and associations fitly predominate in the selections, and sacred poetry is duly honored. One of the most elegant and suitable of these volumes is this "Story of the Hymns," from the American Tract Society. It brings together more than one hundred of the best and most noted hymns, with brief accounts of their authors, and incidents of their origin and history. It is embellished with nine engraved portraits,—of Kenn, Luther, Doddridge, Heber, Lady Huntingdon, John and Charles Wesley, Watts and Montgomery. Our readers have only to look at it in their selection of gifts.

VEST-POCKET SERIES.-Messrs. James R. Osgood & Co., have commenced the publication of some of the choicest of the shorter publications of American writers, in volumes of so diminutive a size that they may be carried without inconvenience in the pocket. The type is of so legible a description that it will not injure the eyesight of the reader, and the volumes are beautifully illustrated. Longfellow's "Evangeline," and Whittier's "Snow-Bound," have already appeared.

* Text-Book of Church History. By Dr. JOHN HENRY KURTZ. Two volumes in one. Revised, with corrections and additions from the Seventh German edition. Philadelphia: Smith, English & Co. 12mo.

The Story of the Hymns; or Hymns that have a History. An account of the Origin of Hymns of Personal Religious Experience. By HEZEKIAH BUTTERWORTH. American Tract Society. pp. 256.

These

ENGLISH RADICAL LEADERS.*-The second volume of "Brief Biographies," which is devoted to the English "Radical Leaders" of the present day, is now published by Messrs. G. P. Putnam's Sons. It is even more valuable and interesting than the first, of which we have already given some account, for the reason that it takes up a class of men who are just now conspicuous for the influence which they are exerting, but about whom it is not so easy to obtain reliable information. In the first place, there are six "Biographies," grouped together, of well known Members of Parliament who are characterized as "Independent Members;" Professor Fawcett; Sir Charles W. Dilke; Peter A. Taylor; Sir John Lubbock; Joseph Cowan; and Robert Meek Carter. are followed by five "Biographies" of men who have taken a lead in "Labor Agitation;" Thomas Hughes; Anthony J. Mundella; Alexander Macdonald; Thomas Brassey; and Samuel Morley. Then such "Parliamentary Agitators" are taken up, as Samuel Plimsoll; Sir Wilfred Lawson; Edward Miall; and Henry Richards. And the volume closes with an account of some of the "Popular Leaders;" George Jacob Holyoake; Joseph Arch; Charles Bradlaugh; George Odger; and Joseph Chamberlain. At the present moment, so soon after the horrible crime of Thomassen, at Bremerhafen, special interest will be felt in the account which is given of Mr. Plimsoll, who has devoted his life to the exposure of the men who make a regular business of sending overloaded and unseaworthy ships to sea which they have previously over-insured, and thus sacrifice the lives of the seamen on board, in order that they may get the insurance. Mr. Plimsoll is a wealthy coal-merchant, who once came near losing his life by shipwreck, and in gratitude for his escape undertook the present agitation. He accumulated an immense amount of evidence on the subject, which he published at his own expense, with the following Appeal to the reader. "Somebody shall read this book, if I have to give away the whole edition. Will you help me to put these things right ?" Mr. Plimsoll went into Parliament for the express purpose of laboring to secure the legislation on the subject which was needed. In one of his speeches at Liverpool he said: "There are people who buy old ships, and only old ships, -who never had a good ship and never meant to have a good ship, and send them to sea; and the public curiosity is excited to know what the government means to do to stop this kind of

*English Radical Leaders. By R. J. HINTON. New York: Geo. P. Putnam's Sons. 1876. 12mo, pp. 374.

thing; and who the people are who can sleep in their beds, when their bread is, so to speak, made out of dead men's bones." The whole chapter deserves to be read, and in fact every page of the whole book, if for no other reason than to see how men thoroughly in earnest are taking up in England the great social questions of the day.

JOB'S COMFORTERS.-This is an amusing satire, of the nature of a reductio ad absurdum, on Prof. Huxley, Mr. Mill, and Prof. Tyndall, and is written in imitation of the language of the Bible. A follower of Jesus Christ, in these latter days, of the name of Job, is described as grievously afflicted. "Now when the new leaders of human thought heard of all the evil that was come upon Job, they came every one from his own place; Huxley the Moleculite, John Stuart the Millite, and Tyndall the Sadducee. And when they lifted up their eyes afar off, and saw Job more a shadow than a man, they whispered to each other: This comes of religious faith,' and they hastened towards him with swift feet. So they set down beside the shattered man, and in less than seven seconds Stuart the Millite began metaphorically to throw stones at his bewildered head." He is followed by Huxley, and he by Tyndall, who says "Prayer is wasted breath. Let him read Fichte in the morning, and commit Emerson's poems to memory on Sundays, and always keep by him a good translation of Plato." Dr. Parker of London is the author; and Mr. Randolph of New York the publisher. Price 25 cents.

NOTE.

PROF. ALEXANDER MACWHORTER requests that the readers of the Article upon "The Statue exhumed Oct. 16, 1869, near the Onondaga river, in the town of Lafayette, opposite the village of Cardiff, in the State of New York," which was published in the October No. of the New Englander, 1875, may be referred to a communication upon the subject of this Statue, by Dr. Constantin Schlottmann, Secretary of the German Oriental Society, to the Philological and Oriental Congress at Innsbruck, Oct., 1874-and published in the Official Report of the Transactions of that Congress, Leipsic, 1875-also to some further remarks by Dr. Schlottmann upon the same subject, at the meeting of the Oriental Congress at Rostock, October, 1875, published in the Official Report of Transactions of that Congress, Leipsic, 1875.

THE

NEW ENGLANDER..

No. CXXXV.

APRIL, 1876.

ARTICLE I.-REASONED REALISM.

Problems of Life and Mind. By GEORGE HENRY LEWES.

"I WALKED down Regent Street some time ago," says Prof. Tyndall, in his Fragments of Science, "with a man of great gifts and acquirements, discussing with him various theological questions. I could not accept his views of the origin and destiny of the universe, nor was I prepared to enunciate any defi nite views of my own. He turned to me at length and said, 'You surely must have a theory of the universe.' That I should in one way or another have solved this mystery of mysteries seemed to my friend a matter of course. 'I have not even a theory of magnetism,' was my reply." It must be now some eight or ten years ago that the universe found Prof. Tyndall unprepared with a theory, on Regent Street. The President of the British Association, assembled at Belfast, in 1874, was better equipped. Whether he had solved the mystery of magnetism in the mean time we do not know, but he had discerned the promise and potency of all kinds of life in matter, and as to the mystery of mysteries this was what he said: "The inexpugnable position of Science may be stated in a few words. We claim, and we 14

VOL. XXXV.