evasive, and clearly shows, either that he has not formed definite opinions upon the most important positions connected with the subject which he discusses, or has not the manliness to avow them. One conspicuous instance of this cannot escape the most superficial reader. Chapter III. he devotes to the conversion of Rome, occupying one hundred and fifty pages exclusively with this subject, giving pause the meanwhile to the History of Morals in Europe. Most of this chapter is occupied with the consideration of the "Theory which attributes the conversion of the Empire to the evidences of Miracles." In the discussion of this topic he takes ground in regard to the influence and credibility of miracles which would be entirely incompatible with the truth of the gospel history. He takes it so broadly, and reaffirms it so often, and enforces and reënforces it by such a variety of considerations as to leave the impression that it would be the height of unreason for any saue man to believe that the gospel records are true. And yet he is careful to call the attention of his readers to the fact that the origin of Christianity does not come within the range of his argument; that he is concerned only with its progress in the third century, and the miracles by which some believe it to have been aided at that late period. But he does not remind them, that the positions which he has taken in respect to their credibility would be fatal to their reception when reported by any class of witnesses, and in support of any doctrines. At this juncture he treats his readers, on pp. 412-13, to one of the most eloquent, as it is one of the most truthful, passages of the work, on the manifold adaptations of Christianity to the moral and affectional nature of man. But that a system so wonderfully fitted to attract and move man could have had a human origin, he does not stay to demonstrate, nor does he make a suggestion to support the theory which he manifestly would have his readers receive by "induction," that its origin could not be supernatural. We are at a loss to understand why, in a History of European Morals, the question of the miraculous in Christianity should have been introduced at all, and more particularly why, if its supernatural origin should have been incidentally treated, the peculiarities of Christianity as a moral system, should not have been fully set forth and carefully discriminated from those of the Pagan system, and the bearing of these peculiarities upon its claims to divine origination squarely met and frankly disposed of. We respect the manliness if we do not share in the views of Theodore Parker, when he says of the

miracles of the Gospels, "I cannot receive such facts on such evidence;" as well as when he refers the marvelous moral superiority of their doctrines to the elevated and purified intuitional power of the great teacher. But we do not respect the indirection of a writer who drags in the question of miracles in the last century, and does not choose to face it as it presents itself in the first, and only casually notices the only aspect of Christianity with which he was directly concerned. Is it because the English pluck is dying out, or is it because the fear of social ostracism is so terrible to literary men, or is it because conscience and the traditions of childhood still retain so strong a hold, that the Rationalism of so many English writers is indirectly avowed and so sneakingly defended?

We observe, again, that in the prosecution of what we have stated to be Mr. Lecky's real theme, he dwells at great length on the frightful abuses both of doctrine and practice which prevailed in the Christian church, and were sanctioned by its leading teachers and rulers. The picture, as he presents it, is at once disgusting and revolting in the extreme. These details, we are sorry to say, are so presented, and the argument founded on them is so managed as to enforce the impression that the system and the society which could err so grossly and so perseveringly in respect to points of such great importance, could lay no claim to divine origination or superintendence. We would remind our readers, and would like to be able to suggest to all the readers of Mr. Lecky's History, that the moral perversions and corruptions of morals in the early Christian church, are as fully exposed and as impressively set forth by modern Christian writers as they are by this half paganized, ethical critic of the school of Shaftesburythat among others the well known Isaac Taylor has dwelt upon them as fully and as frankly as Mr. Lecky, but with a different application of the facts to the argument than that which is insinuated, but not avowed, by the latter.

Mr. Lecky belongs to a peculiar school of historical writers, whose numbers are increasing, and whose influence is rapidly augmented in English literature, of whom Buckle and Draper are representatives; who are enormous readers, hasty generalizers, superficial critics, credulous receivers of second-hand facts and inferences,-men who owe in part their ability to make an im pression as writers by the very recklessness with which they use facts, provided they are effective in an ambitious period, or round

out a defective argument. Their attitude toward Christianity is decorous and respectful-nay, it is emphatically such, because they conceal their real opinions, and rather insinuate than declare them out of the very excess of their candor and moral refinement. We do not know which to dislike the most, the infidelity which they hesitate to avow, or the want of manliness which they cannot conceal.

We ought not to omit the very long introductory discussion upon ethical theories with which the author begins his history. The author's want of critical ability and of philosophical discrimination is most obvious in his treatment of this topic. His failures to do justice to the doctrines which he rejects is very conspicuous, when it is compared with that of any able historian of ethical systems-whether English or German. Kant, for example, belongs to the same ethical school with Mr. Lecky, but Kant's representations of the doctrines of the opposite party are immeasurably more profound and just than those of the latter. While in the last there are abundant quotations, much parade of reading, and no little plausibility in the impression which he makes, there is the most decisive evidence that he is not at home in the field in which he so ambitiously bears himself with such assured confidence.

It is not to be overlooked, that Mr. Lecky, like Miss Cobbe, the author of the "Essay upon Intuitive Morals," really, though not avowedly, urges the Kautian theory in its Anti-Christian application in the introduction, and throughout his entire treatise.

PROFESSOR EVERETT'S "SCIENCE OF THOUGHT"* is not a System of Logic in the ordinary sense of the phrase as it is used by English students. It is not a treatise upon the Art of Deduction or the Methods of Induction, nor upon "the Science of the Laws of Thought as Thought," as Logic is defined by Hamilton. In the language of the author, it is the Science of Sciences-or "the Science of those generalized conceptions and relations which are present in all the Sciences." This Science, as thus treated, is coincident with Metaphysics whenever Metaphysics is either intelligently or carefully discriminated from Logic on the one hand, or the ultimate principles of a special Science on the other

* The Science of Thought; A System of Logic. By CHARLES CARROLL EVERETT. Boston: William V. Spencer. 1669.

hand. The abundant and varied applications of this First Science, first of all to the methods of reasoning, and next to the special Sciences which are arranged under its categories, is the justification of the author for calling his work "The Science of Logic." In this he follows Hegel, who has been followed by a great number of German writers. Not only does he follow Hegel in this respect, but he avowedly adopts his method of developing the Science, as well as in many of his special doctrines. That he does not do this blindly or implicitly, is manifest from his original method of treating many themes, and from some important deviations from Hegel's own doctrines. The work is admirably written, so far as simplicity and finish of style, variety of illustrations, and amplitude of knowledge are concerned. No reader who is competent to understand the volume, can fail to be delighted with much that it contains. The Hegelian method of beginning with the highest generalizations is, in our view, practically objectionable, because it frightens many a reader at the outset who is fully qualified to understand the subject when differently treated, and because it exposes him to be misled by fanciful analogies. No writer has the confiding reader so completely in his power as the dealer in nebulous abstractions, if only he can make them iridescent with the varied hues reflected from a brilliant imagination, and apparently real by the multiform shadows cast upon them by skillfully managed illustrations. Cloudland is thus not only made a gorgeous land to the admiring pupil, but it is easily confounded with solid land when it is passed off as such by dexterous manipulations which often may deceive even the magician himself.

We have neither room nor inclination for special criticisms upon the volume before us. To be at all satisfactory, they must be given at length. Reserving to ourselves the liberty to do this on another occasion, we have no hesitation in recommending the volume as one of marked ability and interest to the students of Philosophy.

HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL.

MOMMSEN'S HISTORY OF ROME.*-This work, at its first appearance, seventeen or eighteen years ago, took the German public by surprise. Its author was known as a learned and profound investigator in the fields of Roman law, history, and archæology. But few probably had suspected the force and fire that he had in him. The powers evinced in this history, the masterly grouping and massing of his material, the skill with which he subordinates details to general effects, the vivid reality of his conceptions, the glowing intensity of his language,-these are qualities very different from those which we are wont to associate with the legist and the antiquarian. The book was intended to be popular in the best sense of the word, one that could be read and understood by all persons of sufficient intelligence to feel a real interest in its subject. The author throws aside his whole apparatus of learned research, and addresses himself to the task of setting forth in the simplest, clearest, most effective way the results of his study, the view of Roman antiquity which he has been led to form in his own mind. He gives very few notes and fewer references to authorities. He carries on no polemic, either against prevailing opinions from which he finds occasion to dissent, or in vindication of opinions which are peculiar to himself. He trusts to the general impression of coherence, harmony, and probability which his views presented in order will make on the mind of the reader. It is not to be denied that this method has certain advantages over that of Grote and Arnold, who allow us to see something of the nature and degree of the evidence on which their statements are founded, and, where opinions vary, something of the arguments by which they are supported. Unity of effect and distinctness of impression are doubtless more or less impaired by this process of criticism. Yet we must confess a preference, on the whole, for the less brilliant and impressive method. We like to know the character of the ground which we have to traverse, whether it is a rock on which we may tread firmly, or a bog which may give way under our footsteps. We wish to have the means of distinguishing what

* The History of Rome. By THEodor Mommsen; translated, with the author's sanction and additions, by the Rev. WILLIAM P. DICKSON, D. D. With a preface by Dr. LEONHARD SCHMITZ, New Edition, in four volumes. Volume I. New York: Charles Scribner & Co., 654 Broadway. 1869. 12mo. pp. xix. 635.