hibits a judicious medium between the diffuseness of the lecturer, and the condensation of the scientific writer.

But, after all, his great excellence lies in bringing out strongly and justly the moral bearings of the science on the peace and virtue of nations. We conclude with a quotation justifying this praise: 'While the science of political economy is adapted to shed a kindly and peaceful influence at home, upon the mutual relations of the different classes of society; it is equally adapted to exercise a beneficial influence on the mutual relations of the different countries of the civilized world.' 'Finally, I may observe, that the whole spirit of political economy, like that of christianity itself, is a spirit of peace and good will to all mankind; and if civil contentions, or foreign warfare, shall hereafter occur less frequently than they have heretofore done, or when occurring shall be carried on with a greater degree of respect to the rights of individuals in their persons and property; all this will be owing, next to the wider diffusion of christian principles and practice, to the more general acknowledgment of the truths of our science.' F. 406.

In this light, political economy is indeed a high science; and we hail with pleasure all who thus teach it.

9.-Elements of Moral Philosophy. By the REV. JASPER ADAMS, D. D., President of the College of Charleston, South Carolina, and (ex officio) Horry Professor of Moral and Political Philosophy, &c., &c. Cambridge: 1837. 8vo. pp. 492.

We have copied the titles of the reverend author far enough to bring us to that ("Horry Professor") out of which the present work originates. An endowment of ten thousand dollars was made in the year 1828, by the late Elias Horry, of Charleston, who died September, 1834, for the maintenance of a chair of moral philosophy in the college of that city. Such has been the laborious diligence of the ex officio incumbent since that time, that he has already prepared and put forth the present ample volume as the first of a series which he has chalked out for himself, in accordance with the views of the founder. The second, “A Constitutional History of the United States," is, as he informs us in his preface, already completed, and only wants room to come forth. While of the fourth in the series, "A Treatise on the Law of Nations," he observes, some small progress too has been made; the rest are as yet" in petto." Now, we notice this diligence without praising it, for two reasons: First, that the author has already sufficiently lauded it in his own statement, and the flattering extracts he has given from his friends' letters; but secondly and chiefly, we do

not praise it, because his diligence has in truth become haste, and induced him, in the words of Johnson, to bring "more grist to his mill than he can grind." Indeed, it may be said without much figure, that the grain comes forth from Dr. Adams' boulter pretty much in the same state as it went into his hopper. One half of his book, at least, being the product of others' brains, and his own only in so far as scissors and paste make them so. One promise at least, therefore, as given in his preface, he has faithfully kept: namely, "to reproduce and incorporate into his work, whatever is most valuable in the works of preceding writers on the same science.” But further, and beyond all this, we much doubt our author's fitness for the task he has undertaken—with all appliances and means to boot. His argument is one mightier than he can handle; like an over weighty club, it is ever sinking on the ground of authority, instead of resting poised on the strength of his own arm. He wants altogether, we would say, that analytic power, without which all moral reasonings are verba, et præterea nihil"-a defect of thinking which shows itself manifestly and throughout the volume, in the vagueness and un-precision of his language. What, for instance, can be said of such a position as the following?

"The science of practical morals is not stationary, much less is it incapable of advancement. Like other sciences it depends to a certain degree on experience, and successive writers ought to aim to collect and register in their works the well matured results of experience." Preface, p. 10.

Now we have neither time nor space to enter into the exposition of the manifold and fundamental errors involved in this short passage; but we assert fearlessly, and we stake our critical reputation upon it, that it is, and cannot but be, a damning sentence to the scientific reputation of any writer who puts himself forth as a moral reasoner. He may swim well enough with corks on the surface, but he cannot dive and bring up pearls from below. But further, not content with this general assertion of (what we do not hesitate to term) the most glaring and practically dangerous of all absurdities in moral teaching-we mean the possibility of evolving in it new truths by experience, our author goes on modestly to add, "this volume seems to me to contain a considerable number of new results of this kind." Now, to such a claim, we are almost tempted to reply in the contemptuous language of D'Alembert on a similar occasion-"Decouvertes dans la metaphysique! Diable!!" But, raillery apart: such positions and such pretensions are to be met with high reprehension. It is no credit to the moral teacher, who, from haste, inadvertence, or intellectual dulness, lets fall such language, however innocently intended, even from his lips, much more from his pen, and what is worst of all, from the press!

We have already intimated that Doctor Adams' reading is wide, and his quotations numerous. We fear we cannot add deep; at least we have noted, that all his Greek references are drawn from English authorities, an acknowledgment more creditable, we think

to his candor than to his scholarship. It would have done him no harm, in our judgment, to have been for a while under the teaching of Aristotle. We should be glad, for instance, to hear him justify, upon any rules of logic either ancient or modern, his fundamental law of conscience, as given in capitals, (p. 28;) to us it appears both vague and contradictory in a supreme degree.

But we have a further objection to our author. He has laid himself open to the suspicion at least of tampering with moral principles in favor of local prejudices and temporary interests. His argument on the question of slavery goes to its maintenance not as a temporary but as a permanent state of humanity. (See pp. 170, 174, &c.) Now, such argument we assert to be false, and contrary alike to the spirit of christianity and to the first principles of moral truth; and if such argument be made from any fear of man, then we cannot but deem it also base, and unworthy as well of the moral as the christian teacher. Far be it from us to stir this as an actual question, or to hold slavery such an unmitigated evil as that, per force, and at all hazards, it must at once be abolished. Far from it. We hold domestic slavery to be one of the forms of pupillage in which it has pleased Divine Providence to place, in turn, with a view to the final good of all, nearly every race and tribe of man—that it is therefore a step in the advancing civilization of the world—a step in which God turns man's interest to man's advancement; and which, however long or wide it may be, is still to be regarded by the moralist and the christian as but a step; and their duties, while in it, measured accordingly. It is thus, we firmly believe, that African slavery, however deformed by evil, has been and is working out good, under the gracious designs of Him 'who maketh even the wrath of man to praise him' - and that Africa will eventually be blest by that which has hitherto been proverbially and unquestionably its curse. Such is our creed.

Among other twistings of principle to suit sectional feelings, we regard as such our author's decision (p. 135) touching the "officious and unwarrantable interference of individuals, and more especially of self-constituted societies"-" designed to affect, perhaps to destroy, the institutions of other states." As to these, he asserts, "it seems to be the duty of the states in which they exist, to suppress them by the strong and decisive arm of the law"!! Our author, it appears, has to thank Mr. Justice Story for many "constitutional hints." This, at least, we are sure he did not learn in his school: we grieve at the blind fanaticism of the leading abolitionists as much as our author can; but we cannot go with him in this view.

But we have done:-Our opinion of the work is plain, and has been as plainly expressed; not in malice, for we know not the author but by his high professional standing, and wish well to all such labors and laborers; but we have done it from the deep conviction of our critical duty in reference to all works that bear on moral

principle; and in this case more especially, as his recent appointment to the only chair of moral teaching in the gift of the general government, in the military school at West Point, will doubtless give both authority to Doctor Adams' opinions, and currency to his work. In that school at least it will unquestionably become the text-book: -neither there nor elsewhere may its errors find currency.

10.-Great Britain, France, and Belgium, a Short Tour in 1835. By HEMAN HUMPHREY, D. D., President of Amherst College. New York: Harpers. 1838. 2 vols.

THESE volumes are from the pen of a clever, and generally rightminded man; intelligent, candid, and independent on all new questions, but bound up with many prejudices and narrow notions on all old ones. Where he is right, we see much to admirewhere he is wrong, we see the error springing, not from malice, but ignorance, and therefore good cause for pardon. Such is our general opinion of the work. For how well, pleasingly, and justly he can write, we refer our readers to chapters fifteen, sixteen, &c. on the national character and social habits of England: for how blindly he can appreciate things, when he looks at them through the veil of prejudice, we refer to his set chapter and occasional flings at the Established Church and its influence; and lastly, for how wildly he can sometimes rave, we recommend them to his unbounded admiration, when compared with English coldness, of the glorious revivals of religion in his own country, "those extraordinary outpourings of the spirit (to use his own language) which have so often been enjoyed, within the last forty years, almost throughout the length and breadth of this land.' (p. 84.) And to this latter category we must add his "tee-totalism" mania; "therefore it is," says he, "that we go for tee-totalism, the whole of teetotalism, and nothing but tee-totalism." (p. 40.) It were not easy to believe, except from the frequent instances we have of monomania, that the same pen endited such sentences as the frequent, just, and beautiful ones in which he depicts the quiet domestic virtues and good sense habits of our common "father-land." To us, at least, such furnishes the only explanation. In this matter, we would not be harsh; but what other language can be held towards a man of sense and a christian minister, who dares to claim for such measures of man, as that just lauded by him, the high attributes of revelation. "The old pledge," that is of total abstinence from distilled spirits, except for medicinal purposes-this has become, in his eyes, but a preparatory ordinance, a covenant This," says he, of works;" he has got beyond it. was the

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first temperance dispensation, and I have no doubt it was from heaven;" (p. 32;) and again, (p. 35,) "the first temperance dispensation in Great Britain seems, if it has not waxed old,' to be 'ready to vanish away;' " and before, (p. 6:) "I was soon convinced that the great majority of the clergy in England were still under the first dispensation." Now, if this be serious, it is nothing short of blasphemy and insanity; or if meant but as a flourish of words, save us, we say, from the taste that can relish it, or the piety that can approve it. Among the inconsistencies of christian practice in England, in the matter of temperance, he observes, that "it is no uncommon thing for one part of a family to be seated at a communion table, whilst another part is engaged at home serving out intoxicating liquors to their professing brethren, (p. 25.) We have underscored the word which saves the established church from having furnished him with this censure. But to look a little at his

direct and intended censures of that church, these evince with evident honesty of purpose, as already hinted, much pardonable ignorance, and still more of very natural, but not very creditable, prejudice. "I feel constrained to say," is his language, "that my visit to England confirmed the impression which I had long had, that in breaking off from popery, Elizabeth and her successors stopped half way between Rome and Geneva. I may be mistaken, but, &c." (p. 25.) Now, in the name of common sense, we ask, what kind of reasoning is this? Has he proved Geneva to be heaven, or Calvin to be Christ, that he would make that our haven, and him our conclusive teacher; and yet all this must be done, "before stopping half way" is to be charged, as he charges it, with being grievous error. Such is the logic of those who begin with prejudice-who take for granted the very thing to be proved. It is, indeed, the natural logic of ignorance and weakness it should therefore not be that of Dr. Humphrey. One of his questions to the church savors of the ludicrous, coming as it does from the mouth of an independent preacher: "Is it apostolical in its ministry?" What! he who maintains his own ground to be "suo jure," does he ask for title deeds? If, indeed, he is willing to put it on that plea, the question would soon be settled. We should be glad to see, in that cause, his own "deduction of title." His last objection to the church, which, as he observes, is "of a more general, but not of a less serious, character," relates to its old customs and ancient usages. "It preserves its ancient edifices, the names of its ancient parishes, priests, and deacons, and forms of conferring orders, which agree in most respects with the form prescribed by the Roman pontifical. It preserves also the clerical habits and gowns, the pastoral crooks and crosses," (p. 65.) Now, if Dr. Humphreys will explain to us where he was troubled with "pastoral crooks and crosses" in the ceremonial of the English church, we will take the trouble to explain to him how innoNO. V.-VOL. III.

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