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PELLEW'S "IN CASTLE AND CABIN"* is a book which every one should read who wishes to understand the state of feeling in Ireland with regard to the various public questions that are being discussed there. The author, with plenty of the best introductions, spent some months in visiting every part of the island, and sought every opportunity to make himself acquainted with the facts. The book is made up of reports of a very large number of conversations that he had with people of all shades of opinion; from the Lord Mayor of Dublin to "drummers" whom he met in the railroad cars, and to working people in their cabins. He has collected a mass of information with regard to "Home Rule," the recent Land Acts, the feelings of the Roman Catholics, the subject of Protection, the "Bounty System," the hopes and expectations of the people, the value of which cannot be overestimated.

LETTERS FROM WALDEGRAVE COTTAGE form a collection of the "reminiscences" of an accomplished Episcopal clergyman, who during a long life has known many distinguished public men. Among these are Chief Justice Jay; Bishop Brownell; Bishop Hobart; Bishop Onderdonk, of New York; and Dr. Haight. The book has a special interest from its many allusions to New Haven, and to the surrounding country, to the University, and to its Professors. A chapter on college life at Yale, fifty-seven years ago, is valuable for its descriptions, and its allusions to Professor Silliman, Professor Olmsted, Professor Goodrich, and others. Mr. Nichols was a classmate of the late Professor Thacher, and an appreciative tribute to his memory which the book contains is specially interesting as coming from one who knew him as a student. The book is illustrated with the portraits of many of the distinguished men whom he has known.

THE ART AMATEUR for January contains two attractive colored studies, one of "Daffodils " in oils, and the other a portrait of a young woman, in water colors. The designs in black and white include a double page of birds (magpies and fly catchers), a lamp vase decoration (jack-in-the pulpit), decorations for a plate

*In Castle and Cabin, or Talks on Ireland in 1887. By GEORGE PELLEW, of the Suffolk Bar. G. P. Putnam's Sons. New York. 1888. 12mo. pp. 309. Letters from Waldegrave Cottage. By Rev. GEORGE W. NICHOLS, A.M. 1888. 12mo. pp. 253. Price $1. To be obtained by addressing the author, Rev. George W. Nichols, Norwalk, Conn.

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(orchids), a fish-plate and a Royal Worcester vase, a design for an embroidered chair-back and one for a pede-cloth, a page of Gothic bands for wood-carving, and two carved mirror frames. The frontispiece is a study of " Winter in the Woods." The specially practical articles are those on flower painting, tapestry painting, and water color painting, and a useful "Letter to a young lady who asks if she can learn China Painting." The department of amateur photography is of interest. The series on "Home Decoration and Furniture " is resumed, and there are numerous other articles and illustrations relating to similar topics, including needlework both church and secular. Important current events specially noticed are the opening of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Academy and Architectural League Exhibitions. Price 35 cents a single number. Montague Marks, publisher, 23 Union Square, New York. $4.00 per year.

THE JANUARY MAGAZINE OF ART contains a full page engraving of the statue of Gen. C. G. Gordon, by Hamo Thornycroft, R.A., in Trafalgar Square, London. A photogravure of the picture "Saving the guns at Maiwand," by R. Caton Woodville. A very instructive Article on " Expression in Drapery," by Miss Annie Williams, illustrated with four original studies of drapery by Sir Frederick Leighton, for his picture "Captive Andromache." A descriptive Article on "Salisbury Hall," with five illustrations, after drawings by W. E. Symonds. Four engravings from the Liverpool Corporation Collection: the Walker Art Gallery. An Article on the Portraits of Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Four illustrations after the works of the French artist Gustave Boulanger; together with American art notes. (Cassell & Co., Limited. New York City. Yearly subscription, $3.50. Single number, 35 cents.)

PHILOSOPHY AND PSYCHOLOGY.

LEIBNITZ.* The different numbers of the series of Philosophical Classics, to which this book belongs, differ in merit; but among the more excellent none is better than this one by Professor Dewey. The difficulties, or, rather the temptations, which stand in the way of any writer who aims at the critical exposi*Leibnitz's New Essays concerning the Human Understanding, A Critical Exposition, by JOHN DEWEY, Ph.D., Chicago: S. C. Griggs and Company. 1888.

tion of a philosophical master-piece, are many and subtle. Few are able wholly to resist them. Nor are minds fitted to the work of interpretation at all frequently to be found.

After three introductory chapters on Leibnitz, "the Man," "the Sources of his Philosophy," and "the Problem and its Solution," his controversy with Locke is presented, as it concerned the questions of "Innate Ideas," "Sensation and Experience," "The Impulses and the Will," "Matter and its Relation to Spirit," "Material Phenomena and their Reality," the conceptions of "Substance," and "Infinity," and "the Nature and Extent of Knowledge." After this comes a chapter on "the Theology of Leibnitz"; Professor Dewey finishes his work with a brief criticism of certain fundamental points of Leibnitz's philosophy.

We consider the work of interpretation in the chapters composing the body of this book to be uncommonly well done,-so well done, indeed, that it would be quite feasible to take a class of seniors in college through this critical exposition and bring them out upon its farther side with a somewhat clear conception of the real opinions of the great German thinker.

The excellence of clear exposition renders this book particularly valuable; for Leibnitz himself produced no body of philosophical writings, which set forth his views in a systematic way; and even the "Nouveaux Essais," as Professor Dewey says, "is a compendium of comments, rather than a connected argument or exposition." Leibnitz, then, has peculiar need of popular and yet critical exposition.

As might be expected, we find in the closing chapter, which criticises Leibnitz's positions, several points to be called in question, and one or two from which we dissent. To mention only one of the latter, we cannot think that Professor Dewey is right in ascribing to Leibnitz's views so much positive influence upon Kant's position in the Critique of Pure Reason. One has only to read carefully Kant's remarks on the "amphiboly of the conceptions of reflection " to see how completely he intended to cut up, root and branch, both Leibnitz's method and also all his principal conclusions. When Kant, in replying to Eberhard's claim that the Leibnitzian philosophy contained a critique of reason just as well as the modern, rejoined that he was himself the true continuator of Liebnitz, "since he had only changed the doctrine of the latter so as to make it conform to the true intent of Leibnitz," he was speaking ironically. At Eberhard's time it was not

the first or the last occasion when the old orthodoxy, after vainly combating the new criticism has at last turned about and claimed the conclusions of their criticism as essentially its own.

The writer of this notice remembers how complete a failure was the result of his own attempt to use for this purpose a similar "critical exposition" of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. Statement and interpretation of Kant's views had been so blended with the interpreter's criticism, personal opinions, and philosophical "stand-point," that the class could not be taught to distinguish which belonged to the doctrine of the great teacher they were studying, and what to the opinion of his expositor.

POETRY, COMEDY, AND DUTY.*-Under this title Professor Everett has given us a series of delightful essays on "the Imagination," "the Philosophy of Poetry," "the Poetic Aspect of Nature," "Magic Forces in Life and Literature," "the Philosophy of the Comic," the "Ultimate Facts of Ethics," and "the New Ethics." In a concluding chapter he considers Poetry, Comedy, and Duty, in their relation to one another. The author has that blending of the power of reflective thought with a fine sense of the beautiful which constitutes peculiar fitness for the work of dealing with such themes. We find little attempt at strictness of definition; but the light is thrown upon the subject from various and changing points of view.

Professor Everett treats the imagination as the power which creates and reveals the ideal. The highest truth is in the ideal, whether it be truth of science, truth of experience, truth of art. If, then, we would attain the truth, "the imagination, the discerning and creating power of the soul, should rouse itself to a higher work. Poetry, like painting and sculpture, is a representative art." "Even in its lyrical form, it does not directly express passion; it represents passion." It deals, then, not with individual and actual life, but with life become universal and ideal. Rhyme and rhythm form the material with which poetry works. It is the power of nature also to represent this universal life which gives it the poetic aspect which it wears.

The secret of tragedy is that it shows us personality struggling with the destiny it has drawn upon itself. The tragic elements

* Poetry, Comedy, and Duty. By C. C. EVERETT, D.D. Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin and Co.

of necessity, blindness, and retribution, "form the great roof of life." Hence the life-likeness of true tragedy. But, as has been almost uniformly recognized, there is a close kinship between tragedy and comedy. How shall, then, their likeness and their differences be described? Professor Everett's reply is, in brief, as follows: "Both the comic and the tragic are based upon incongruities; the difference between them lies in the fact that the comic is found in an incongruous relation, considered merely as to its form, while the tragic is found in an incongruous relation taken as to its reality. It is interesting in this connection to refer to Lotze's view. "Tragedy and comedy," says he, "have, fundamentally considered, the same end;-namely, to show that it is the general metaphysical weakness of every finite creature to come to harm, as soon as it deems itself capable of playing the part of Providence, and of laying hold on the coherent system of the world's course, as a formative and guiding principle. Only that in tragedy, great and powerful characters, with plans of much moment, are shattered, being overthrown by the vast forces of the world's ongoing course, while, in comedy, insignificant figures with their petty intrigues are overthrown by the ordinary accidents of life."

In the two essays on ethics, Professor Everett contrasts and, in a measure, attempts to harmonize the new and the old. The consciousness of human responsibility is the chief characteristic of the old morality; a certain practicality, that comes from the development of the science of political economy, characterizes the new morality. The old principle of personal relationship must find expression in methods that accord with the practical wisdom derived from statistics, social data, etc. Thus will harmony result between the two types of ethical theory and conduct.

It would be difficult to find a more refreshing and quickening little book among those of the year past than this collection of essays by Professor Everett.

THEOLOGICAL AND RELIGIOUS.

DODS' NEW TESTAMENT INTRODUCTION* is one of a series of theological hand-books which are appearing under the title of the "Theological Educator," and are edited by Rev. W. Robertson Nicoll of the " Expositor." The book limits itself to special in* An Introduction to the New Testament. By Rev. MARCUS DODS, D.D. Thomas Whittaker, New York: 1888. pp. 247.

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