disciples who believed that he was the Messiah whom the Hebrew poetical legends had taught them to expect. These legends announced that the period of the Messiah was to be signalized by signs and wonders; and the hopes and expectations which had been thus aroused, were simply transferred to the person of Jesus by the eager credulity of his adherents. The miracles ascribed to the Messiah, thus, instead of being narrations of what actually took place, were only what the heated imaginations of his followers taught them was to have occurred. This work of Strauss produced a marked sensation in Germany. It was proposed by government to refute its heresies by the stringent logic of a legal prosecution, by a prohibitation of its sale, and a confiscation of the book. The opinion of Neander was asked, and his answer is worthy of a place by the side of Milton's Areopagitica. Though, said he, the views of the book are inconsistent with the truths of the Scriptures, yet as they are calmly and seriously propounded, in the spirit and form of scientific discussion, at the tribunal of science they must be left to stand or fall. We certainly cannot doubt the wisdom as well as justice of this reply; but it was so far in advance of Neander's country that he was most unsparingly denounced for it by the prominent periodical of the evangelical party there. The Life of Christ, which Neander produced in consequence, has passed into the rank of a standard work both in German and English. And it is a matter of congratula

tion to the lovers of sacred literature, that this, as well as his History of the Church, has been made accessible to readers of English, by admirable versions made by American scholars; the former by Professors MCCLINTOCK and BLUMENTHAL, the latter by Professor TORREY. We also perceive that the commentaries upon Philippians and James, mentioned below, are announced as in process of translation by Mrs. H. C. CONANT, whose acquirements render her fully competent for the task.

The following is a list of Neander's published works: The Emperor Julian and his Times, 1812; Bernard and his Times, 1813; Genetical Developments of the Principal Gnostic Systems, 1818; Chrysostom and the Church in his Times, 1820, 1832, and 1819; Antignosticus: Spirit of Tertullian, 1826 and 1848; Memorabilia from the History of Christianity, and of the Christian Life, 1822 and 1825-26; A Collection of Miscellanies, chiefly exegetical and historical, 1529; A Collection of Miscellanies, chiefly biographical, 1840; The Principle of the Reformation, or Staupitz and Luther, 1840; History of the Planting and Training of the Christian Church, 4th ed., 1847; The Life of Jesus Christ in its Historical Connection and its Historical Development, 4th ed., 1845; General History of the Christian Religion and Church, 1842-47; The Epistle to the Philippians practically Explained, 1949; The Epistle of James practically Explained, 1850; besides a number of smaller occasional essays.—A. H. G.

DAY is past, and night is creeping

Softly o'er the summer sky,

Flower and bird alike are sleeping,
Soothed by Nature's lullaby.
Come, ye weary sons of labor,

Who have toiled the live-long day, Cast away your cares and sorrows,

Mingle with us blithe and gay.

Let us leave the town behind us, With its crowded streets and courts, Change its tumult for the music

Of the stream that freely sports: Till the time of rest approaches, Let us gayly pass each hour, Owning that "the voice of Nature

Is a glorious voice of power."

See the beauties that surround us,
In the sky, and on the sod!
'Tis the temple wherein Nature
Bids us worship Nature's God:
In this hour of holy silence,
Pure and sacred thoughts will rise,
Lifting us from earthly visions,
To communion with the skies.

And when stars look down upon us,
With their radiant watchful fires,
When the silver moonbeams glisten
On the distant city spires.
We will homeward bend our footsteps,
With a calm and peaceful breast,
And awake upon the morrow,

For our daily toil refreshed.

Ir makes but little difference what color or cut of a coat a man wears, so long as he has a heart beating beneath it, and that heart happens to be in the right place. He may dress in the last Paris fashion, or he may ensconse himself in corderoys with brogans to match, it will be all the same: for, in all probability, neither are the garments in which his soul (if souls wore any other garments than those of clay) would be the most appropriately dressed. Let us for a moment suppose that every man, woman, and child were properly dressed, what would be the result? why, that everybody would be changing clothes: you would have my coat on, I, your pantaloons, and our next neighbor perhaps have a pair of old boots belonging to both of us. The fine lady of fashion, (dressed according to the complexion and cast of her mind,) would go down into her own kitchen and exchange with the cook; while her seamstress would wear the costly satins she fits, bastes, sews and finishes for seventy-five cents per diem; the statesman would often change his coat (how many do!) with his secretary, for he it was who penned the electrifying speeches, that the great man delivers extempore at the shortest notice; or it may be the parliamentary reporter would stand a chance of a better suit, than his seedy and wellworn relict of better days. There would be a great difference in our appearances generally,there is no doubt of that; and many strange and unfashionable garments made that no respectable tailor would own: the man that would be popular then, would then be tempted to exclaim with Jacques

mentally-a spiritual fighting quaker, a man of bone and sinew, ready to do battle at any time and place, with the slight understanding beforehand, that he has truth and justice on his side. He is, mentally, be it understood, a powerful fellow; the Elliot of America. Show him a wrong to be redressed, and he thunders away in behalf of it like a man with a fiery heart and a strong arm; not like many modern reformers, gentle, soft, pensive sentimentalists, like Lamartine for instance, or poets, like Swain and Tupper, who "roar like sucking doves." He is a man of another and better stamp.

It is a glorious thing in this age of time-serving and vice-pandering, to see a true, honest, sincere man: and truth, honesty, and sincerity, however they may be slighted and scoffed at, are their own "exceeding great reward." Here is a world of some hundred millions of human beings, immortal souls-children of time journeying to eternity; great interests are at stake here-the interests of two worlds; every man should be up and doing-life should be thought and labor: there is much to be performed, and but little time to perform it in. Liberty, equality, and religion have equal claims upon the consideration of all men; but how many think of either? How many are willing to make any sacrifices for the sake of principle The world is sunk in a state of dullness and apathy; who shall arouse it? The great and mighty: kings, heroes, statesmen, and poets; that should be their mission, but is it, is it their mission? "Ay, there's the rub." The word King is synonymous with all things tyrannical, foul, and base; the word Hero, with bloodshed and wholesale murder; the word Statesman, with trickery, shifting, and the arts of Machiavelli; the word Poet, with everything fanciful, beautiful, wonderful, and strange. These are the men that should save and regenerate mankind; but how do they perform their work? As Jonah performed his, when he fled to Tarshish. How few great men are ever good men: self steps in between them and duty. When they might benefit mankind, they curse it, to become famous. An honest, great man-a simple, sincere, unaffected great man, has

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nearly become a paradox; but such a man was George Washington, such a man is Kossuth, and such a man, in a different sphere of thought and action, among many that we could name, is John G. Whittier. Life is not a dream to him : he was never made to loll away his hours in ease and quiet; "the burden of the mystery" presses too hard upon him: he has work to do, and must be up and doing. He puts this motto to his poetry:

"Was it right,

While my unnumbered brethren toiled and bled,
That I should dream away the intrusted hours
On rose-leaf beds, pampering the coward heart
With feelings all too delicate for use?"

Rare and brave John, it was not right, and you knew it from the first; and not only knew it, but did it not you have worked a good work, and fought a good fight, though we differ from you a little in our opinion of the best and true way of doing it. We have high notions of what Poesy should be, and think that you have not used her fairly; not intentionally, but erring from the depth of your love and feeling. We have neither the time nor inclination to investigate the cause and cure of the social evils of society. We believe (as who does not?) that sectarianism and slavery are evils, but do not believe that Poesy can ever cure either. Poetry is not political economy, philosophy, or religion. It may embody either or all of these sciences-in fact, the best poetry does; but that is the least part of the matter,the dimmest phase of its many forms of brightness the soul of all is a spiritual essence of the beautiful, which wraps and folds it in its embrace, and animates and pervades every part, as the air pervades the sky, bright with day or gleaming with the starlight.

We do not mean to deny the name of poetry to much that Whittier has written; but it is not poetry of the highest order; it is strong, nervous, and manly, but it lacks spirituality. When we speak of spirituality, we have not reference to the cant phrases of the day,-" spirit-life," "duality," and the twaddle of the transcendantalists; but to the presence of the beautiful and ideal. Whittier's ideal is not high enough. He writes too many occasional and fugitive poems-verses on reading such things, and elegies on the death of so and so. This habit of ready composition is one of his worst faults. Congress may pass laws against anti-slavery, meetings may be called, secretaries of colonization societies may die, and the poet be blameless of neglect, if his lyre remain suspended on the willows. Poets should never lightly esteem and use their high and holy

celling

places of life. The real must be elevated befo it can become a fit subject for the sympathies the ideal.

But says some one, "what can be greater tha Nature? what is deeper than the human heart Wordsworth, my dear sir, made the human hea "the haunt and main region of his song," an to this we are indebted to him for Betty Foy an Peter Bell. "Ay," says somebody again, “bu look at Shakspeare." 'Well, sir, look at Shak speare! compare him with Wordsworth, or an one who cants of simplicity and unadulterate nature, and it is the old story of

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"Hyperion to a Satyr."

The human heart is idealized, and passions are elevated in Shakspeare-not that he does not embody the commonest characters and passions but he throws such a halo of poetry around them, that they are lifted above their ordinary spheres. Macbeth is not a mere kingly murderer, Richard a humpback, Othello a jealous blackmoor, nor Lear a crazy old monarch—but each and all are great tragic creations, because they are lifted above the reach and sway of the common passions of common men.

The human heart, as it exists in the world, with all its pettiness and littleness, is not a fit subject for poetry; but the heart of suffering, and genius elevated by suffering, and love, and sorrow, lift themselves into its sphere, and reign for

ever

"With the kings of Thought!"

But it is time to leave this generalization, and come to the subject. The following poem, which embodies a softened and chastened sorrow for the early dead, is very sweet and touching:

GONE

Another hand is beckoning us,

Another call is given;

And glows once more with angel-steps

The path which reaches Heaven. Our young and gentle friend, whose smile

Made brighter summer hours,
Amid the frosts of autumn time

Has left us, with the flowers.
No paling of the cheek of bloom
Forewarned us of decay;
No shadow from the Silent Land
Fell round our sister's way.

The light of her young life went down,

As sinks behind a hill The glory of a setting starClear, suddenly, and still.

As pure and sweet her fair brow seemed,Eternal as the sky: