posed the third forlorn hope led by me, not one returned to reap the proffered reward of the Commander-in-Chief. Add to this, the loss of one of the best officers in our army, Captain Menzies, of the 22d Grenadier Company, Aid-de-Camp to Lord Lake. He fell endeavouring to rally some Native troops that were exposed to a galling fire, and began to give way. In this heroic attempt he lost his life, regretted by the whole army. Of our two companies, scarce a soul escaped uninjured. Near the breach, the dead, dying, and wounded, would have melted the heart of the most callous wretch; and, had not the little party who stormed the elevengun battery proved successful, few, if any, would have escaped the dreadful carnage. You must permit me to draw the gloomy shroud of mourning over this scene of misery and terror. The sad details of this siege have years ago been before the public; and here my personal services at Bhurtpore ended, leaving impressions, both on mind and body, that can never be obliterated.

'In the course of the siege, frequent overtures were made from the fort, but of what nature I do not pretend to know. They were at last, however, obliged to come to our terms, which compelled them to pay all the expenses of the siege, &c., after which we raised the siege, and returned to camp. The loss of the enemy must have been immense; report said, five thousand men, women, and children; and, from the immense concourse of inhabitants in the town, with their families, that number does not appear to be at all improbable. Certain it is, that they must have been as heartily tired of it as we were.'—pp. 106–108.

It is difficult for men of peace to imagine, that the advantages acquired in war by a nation or by individuals, are anything like equivalent to the misery which it causes. The cost of it is

seldom, if ever counted; and indeed it is not easy to estimate the value of life and limb, to measure pain of body or anguish of mind, to determine the precise amount of groans and tears, which may be balanced by the joy of victory, the pride of glory, or the more substantial rewards of power and profit. As the sufferings, therefore, which are the result of this scourge of nations, are, in their nature, inappreciable, we conceive that the only good cause of war, the only reasonable or plausible justification of a people or an individual, for engaging in the desperate struggle, is the acquisition or defence of rights, of powers, or of possessions, the value of which is equally above estimation. We are not, and we would not be thought to be, so foolishly recreant as to say there is nothing worth contending for. There is much with which God has blessed us, which we would defend at all hazards, and which can be enjoyed on no other terms.

VOL. VII.-N. S. VOL. II. NO. III.

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Personal liberty and rights, the welfare of those who are dear to us, and the independence of our country as the means of possessing these, are to be struggled for, if need be, at the risk of life, because life, without them, is of little worth. These are things which the best men in all ages have thought worth fighting for, and which those who have learned to value them by their own experience, will surely never give up from fear of what man can do unto them. They are our birthright, and we trust none are to be found among us, who would not defend them at the same cost and risk by which they were won. They are well worth the purchase. But here we stop. There is nothing else in the wide circle of human motives which we can regard as a sufficient cause, either in an individual or a community, for incurring the tremendous risks and sufferings which war renders inevitable. Language is too feeble to express the feelings with which we think wars of ambition and conquest should be regarded; yet these have constituted by far the greatest portion of the wars which have desolated the world. Contests for national or personal independence, have been, and, one would think, must naturally be of rare occurrence, and as the world grows older and wiser, it is to be hoped they will become less and less necessary. Liberty will be achieved by less violent methods. If, then, men could be persuaded to regard with a just abhorrence, those wars which have for their object the acquisition of territory, and the aggrandizement of a nation or an individual at the expense of others, there would be an encouraging prospect of comparative repose to the world. And we cannot believe it impossible that men should learn to prize what is really valuable, and to avoid what is really pernicious. If there be anything more desirable than liberty and peace, or more hateful than oppression and war, we have it yet to learn; and we are far from despairing or even doubting that the time will come, when nation shall not rise up against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.' We think we can discern, in the course of God's providence, strong symptoms of the gradual, and therefore sure approach of such a period. We can only glance at a few of the indications of this result; it would lead us too far to follow the subject in detail.

Vast empires, founded upon force, and held together by fear, have always crumbled into pieces as rapidly as they have risen and just in proportion to the oppression with which their power has been exercised, has been the suddenness and appalling

character of their overthrow. On the contrary, possessions obtained without violation of the rights of others, and supported by the determination of men who respect themselves as well as their neighbours, have been confirmed by time, and strengthened by the course of events. Warlike ambition must receive a check by the establishment of republican governments in so large a portion of the civilized world as is now either in possession of them, or struggling to acquire them. By republican forms men are enabled to govern themselves, and however strongly they may desire to see others in the same circumstances, they will surely not undertake to force them to adopt the means of self-government by warlike aggression. The arts of peace and of self-defence are almost necessarily those which distinguish free governments. Every day is confirming the strength of such as already exist, and brightening the prospect of those which are forming. If we look, therefore, to the past, we find a valuable lesson from experience; and if we look to the future, we see new prospects opening upon the world of liberty and peace, which are, in the highest degree, consoling and delightful. We know that the progress of mankind in this, as in all other good, must be slow; it is enough for us that it is

certain.

We look upon such books as the one which we have mentioned, as accessories of no mean value to the good work cí improvement. The memoirs of Shipp are not the labored production of a student in his closet, but the vivid descriptions of a man who has been strongly impressed with what he has seen. There is sometimes a tone of exaggeration, but we feel little doubt that the work is, in the main, a faithful picture of the life of a soldier and a subaltern. We have seldom read such horrid narratives of wholesale destruction of friend and foe, or seen so bare an exhibition of inadequate motives, as in this book. Our readers have had a specimen of the descriptions, though we assure them, by no means the most dreadful, and we shall not pain them by presenting the most shocking. Our author says, in one place, on the occasion of receiving some commendation from his superiors, Glory had been my motto; laurels were my crown! And what, after all, was the amount of his glory and his laurels? Distinguishing himself by his boldness in battle, he twice rose from the ranks to a lieutenancy. The first time, he sold out, to raise money to pay for some foolish extravagances; and the second time, he was

dismissed the service in disgrace. What a glorious reward for years of alternate ennui and violent excitement, for wounds, danger, and toil. And how flattering to others of similar character, that a man who had acquired so large a share of the glory they seek, should be unable to keep the commission he had obtained; that a cashiered officer should surpass them all in the pursuit of honor.

One other remark is suggested to us by a passage of this book. The intense excitements of war are often alleged as a sort of apology for those who devote themselves to the profession. Doubtless the love of excitement is very powerful in all men; but we think it will admit of a question whether the lives even of foxes and hares ought to be sacrificed to that passion; and we conceive there can be no question that a rational being should find some other way of gratifying it besides taking the life of his fellow men. Who can wish to be in the condition described in the following sentences?

:

'In action man is quite another being the softer feelings of the roused heart are absorbed in the vortex of danger and the necessity for self-preservation, and give place to others more adapted to the occasion. In these moments there is an indescribable elation of spirits; the soul rises above its wonted serenity into a kind of phrenzied apathy to the scene before you, a heroism bordering on ferocity; the nerves become tight and contracted; the eye full and open, moving quickly in its socket, with almost maniac wildness; the head is in constant motion; the nostril extended wide, and the mouth apparently gasping. If an artist could truly delineate the features of a soldier in the battle's heat, and compare them with the lineaments of the same man in the peaceful calm of domestic life, they would be found to be two different portraits; -but a sketch of this kind is not within the power of art, for in action the countenance varies with the battle: as the battle brightens, so does the countenance; and, as it lowers, so the countenance becomes gloomy.'-pp. 86, 87.

Does any man wish to look and act like a maniac? Is it any justification of war as a trade that its excitement is great? Surely not. It is the cause, it is the cause!' alone, which can incline any wise man to the infliction or endurance of its evils.

ART. V. Sources of Infidelity; the Tenth Discourse, in the new Volume of Buckminster's Sermons. Boston. Carter & Hendee. 1829.

We have lately taken notice of this volume of sermons, and we now single out one of them and place it at the head of the discussion which we propose to ourselves in the following article, partly because it falls in with the general design of the observations we have to offer, and partly because it suggests a remark naturally prefatory to our present undertaking. For it is a singular fact, and if the matter were not one of very grave import, we should say it is curious, that while the publications of no class of Christians contain more frequent and earnest defences of Christianity against unbelievers, while we constantly maintain that our own views, as we think, are, for inquiring minds, a safeguard from skepticism, we are nevertheless, in the teeth of all this evidence to the contrary, and in spite of all the disclamations that language can utter, pertinaciously and perpetually charged with being ourselves infidels. Is this a day when Christianity can so easily afford to part with whole hosts of its professors and defenders? For, in truth, if unbelievers were disposed to take us at our word, they might allege that not much less than half of Christendom is either already infidel, or rapidly hastening to the denial of its faith; for the one or the other of these allegations Protestant sects are constantly making against each other, or Catholics are making against them all. It is indeed a sad state of things, but it yields one comfort; for we think that the weakest member of our denomination must feel relieved from all anxiety about these gratuitous and gross charges which are brought against us, save that which he feels for the honor of Christianity itself.

We have now made the remark suggested by the sermon before us, and, we might add, by other productions bearing the same hallowed name, as well as by the current and cherished works of the christian apologists that are constantly recommended and circulated among us. It is when we think of the blessed spirits that have departed from us in the faith of Jesus, it is when we call to mind, too, that many and many a one whom we know, is resting an aching head and a broken heart on that precious reliance, that we are tempted to write words of indignant remonstrance against such attacks as have lately been made