(practice) of weighing his meals, will generally find that they lie heavy on his stomach. If he take a walk or a ride with no other view than to pick up health, he will seldom meet with it on the road. If he enter into company, not from any social sympathy, or relish for interchange of thought, but merely because company is prescribed for his disease, he will only be more deeply depressed by that cheerfulness in which he cannot compel himself to participate, and will gladly relapse into his darling solitude, where he may indulge his melancholy without risk of interruption or disturbance. "The countenance of a friend doeth good like a medicine," but not if we merely look upon it with a view to its medicinal operation. The consti. tutional or inveterate hypochondriac is apt to view every thing only in the relation it may bear to his malady. In the rich and diversified store-house of nature he sees merely a vast laboratory of poisons and antidotes. He is almost daily employed either in the search after, or in the trial of remedies for a disease which is often to be cured only by striving to forget it. But even if such a plan of life were really calculated to lengthen the catalogue of our days, it would still be equally wretched and degrading to the dignity of our nature. Nothing surely can be more idle and absurd than to waste the whole of our being in endeavours to preserve it; to neglect the purposes in order to protract the period of our existence-propter vitam, vivendi perdere causas.'

Art. VIII. Looking unto Jesus, as carrying on the great Work of Man's Salvation; or a View of the Everlasting Gospel. By Isaac Ambrose: Abridged by the Rev. Robert Cox, A.M. 8vo. pp. 284. Price 7s. 6d. Sherwood and Co. 1815.

THE excellency of the writings of the Puritans who flourished

during the seventeenth century, has long been acknowledged by the religious world. The fervent piety and deep spirituality for which they are so eminently conspicuous, cannot fail to recommend them to devout and contemplative Christians of every denomination.

Of these truly valuable publications, none perhaps has been more deservedly admired, than Ambrose's" Looking unto "Jesus." This, however, as well as most of the other writings which appeared at the same time, may justly be charged with a tedious prolixity; an imperfection the more to be regretted, as it has a peculiar tendency to diminish its usefulness in an age when indolent habits and an indisposition to exert the faculties of the mind, have become so lamentably prevalent. We cannot therefore but rejoice, when any efforts are made to render such writings more palatable to the public taste; and we think Mr. Cox's endeavours promise in a great measure to answer that purpose, so far as it regards the work which he has abridged.

He has compressed it into somewhat less than half its original size, and neither the bulk therefore nor the price will now prevent its being better known. We subjoin the following

extract as a fair specimen of the work in its present appearance, and trust it will be an inducement to many of our readers to procure the book itself.

What a variety of excellency is comprised in Jesus! A holy soul cannot tire itself in viewing him. He is all and in all-all belonging to being, and all belonging to well being. What variety is in him!Variety of time, He is Alpha and Omega-variety of beauty, He is white and ruddy;-variety of quality, He is a lion and a lamb, a servant and a son ;-variety of excellency, He is a man and God.Who shall declare his generation? All of the Evangelists exhibit unto us the Saviour, but every one of them in his particular method. Mark describes not at all his genealogy, but begins his history at his baptism. Matthew searcheth out his original from Abraham. Luke follows it backwards as far as Adam. John passeth further upwards, even to the eternal generation of this Word that "was made flesh." So they lead us to Jesus: in the one we see him only among the men of his own time; in the second, he is seen in the tent of Abraham; in the third, he is much higher, namely, in Adam; and finally having traversed all ages, through so many generations, we come to contemplate him in the beginning, in the bosom of the Father, in that eternity in which he was with God before all worlds.'

Mr. C. intends to prefix a table of contents to his little publication; which will be a great improvement to it.

Art. IX. The Panegyric of Samuel Whitbread, Esq. M. P. By the Rev. J. Whitehouse, formerly of St. John's College, Cambridge. Rector of Orlingbury, Northamptonshire. royal 8vo. pp. 38. price 2s. 6d. Northampton printed, Conder, London. 1816.

MUCH good sense, unaffected warmth of feeling, and truly

patriotic sentiments characterize this tribute to the memory of Whitbread. The loftier requisites of poetry, are not, it is true, exhibited in the composition; and the Author does not appear to have an ear sufficiently tutored, to enable him to work up his blank verse into metrical harmony. Still, he has produced what will be found more interesting than many pages of well-poised couplets, and it is only to be regretted that sentiments like the following should not have the advantage of the utmost power of language.

There was a time

When Englishmen were proud of being free,
And justly valuing liberty themselves,
Dispensed, with careless prodigality,

The welcome boon to others; they stood forth
The champions of the rights of other men,
They had so much to spare: but, now, instead
Of this high feeling, and self-reverence
Which once ennobled us, we are become
The builders up again of dynasties

VOL. VI. N. S.

Q

It was our boast to humble, in the days
Of England's glory; when her sun shone clear,
And shed dismay on arbitrary thrones.' p. 21.
Even now the Gothic night

Seems hovering o'er us, and the vampire-brood
Priestcraft, imposture, and cowled ignorance
Sail in the twilight! In the southern gales,
Borne in low murmurs from the neighbouring shore,
What shrieks arise! what heart-appalling shouts
Of massacre! while PERSECUTION bathes

Her steps in blood,—the blood of Innocents!-
Does justice slumber? Is the assassin's life
Held sacred and protected? and are these

The first fruits of our victories?' p. 23.

Mr. Whitehouse, it is evident, is zealously attached to the political sentiments of which the distinguished subject of his "Panegyric" was the steady, consistent, and overpowering champion. The spirit of party is not, however, chargeable on his production: on the contrary, the feeling which pervades it, is worthy of the sacred function which the Author exercises as a clergyman of the Church of England.

After expatiating on Mr. Whitbread's political character and his senatorial exertions, his Panegyrist touches on that unremitting attention to the wants and interests of the lower classes, which constituted a striking feature of his private character. His intimacy in early life with Howard is alluded to; a circumstance, which it is not improbable, may have contributed to the formation of those habits of philanthropic exertion in Mr. Whitbread, which render his loss in his immediate sphere irreparable. The Infirmary, the Lunatic Asylum, and other public institutions at Bedford, employed his constant attention. The education of the poor was an object which deeply interested him; and his speeches at the anniversary meetings of the Bedford Auxiliary Bible Society, evinced that the subject was one which ealled out all the ardour of his feelings. An impetuosity of manner, a constitutional vehemence that ill brooked control, in some instances perhaps indulged from the consciousness of integrity of design, but in great measure attributable to a morbid sanguinous temperament,-gave to Mr. Whitbread's manners at times a repulsive and even an arrogant character: but his frankness in acknowledging himself to have been in the wrong, the unsuspected benevolence of his motives, and the usefulness of his whole life, more than counterbalanced those infelicities of manner in the estimation of all connected with him. In the despatch of business he was unrivaled alike for promptitude and for correctness: few men have ever sustained with so exemplary regularity the varieties of official function, and got through

such a multiplicity of detail. It is the more worth while to notice these minuter traits, because they serve to throw out to greater advantage his parliamentary character, and to shew that it is was not assumed for the purposes of party ambition, but had for its basis, solid intellectual and moral qualities. He was as a man all that he appeared or professed to be as a senator; and with whatever error or pertinacity he was chargeable, there could exist no doubt that in his opinions he was as sincere as he was earnest, and as independent as he was sincere. If he was fallible, he was at least consistent; and those against whom his opposition was directed, knew that they were opposed not merely by an able, but by an honest man. Such a man, surely, might deserve a panegyric that would outlast the memory of his usefulness, but Mr. Whitehouse does not aim at superseding the historian's task. We shall make room for the following apostrophe.

Thou art gone,

Great Spirit! and thy works have followed thee.
Thy country owes thee much, a large arrear
Of services, beyond the power of gold
To purchase, or compensate. Thou hast been
The watchful guardian of her liberties,
The intrepid champion of her chartered rights,
And in the perilous time her fastest friend:
Alas, that thou should'st of her love so well
Have merited, and she so ill of thine!
Yet let not conscious worth and talent faint
In their exertions for the common weal,
Because of men's ingratitude, nor deem
Their efforts useless. In such exercise
Of virtuous hardihood, superior minds

Grow up and ripen. Hence our SIDNEYS rose,
Our RUSSELS and our HAMPDENS, names revered,
The friends of human kind: and WHITBREAD, thou,

The last, but not least honoured of the band

Of British patriots; o'er whose honoured grave
The holy form of freedom bends and weeps!
O far more envied lot, departed shade!
Is thine, though mingled with the silent dead,
Thy sad remains; more dignified thy dust
Than their's-the gilded pageants of a day,
The sons of pride and pleasure, who walk forth
Beneath the warm bright sun, and kindly showers,
Yet feel no love to God, nor care for man!
Better be with the dead, than thus to live
In cold, sepulchral apathy: For such
May never minstrel wake the dulcet lyre
In hall or bower, nor picture round them throw
Her rainbow glories in proud portraiture.

The man of worth, of merit, him alone
The muse forbids to die, and writes his name
In his good deeds, his wide beneficence,

And warm philanthropy. Round WHITBREAD's brow
Lo, she entwines her civic wreath, and brings
These simple offerings of the flowers of song,
To bloom awhile, then fade upon thy shrine,
Immortal Liberty! p. 33.

Art. X. The Lay of the Laureate.
Southey, Esq; Poet Laureate,
Academy, &c. 12mo. pp. 78.
1816.

TH

CARMEN NUPTIALE, by Robert
Member of the Royal Spanish
Price 4s. Longman and Co.

THIS is a poem worthy of the Poet Laureate of England. Mr. Southey has endeavoured to justify the choice by which he has been honoured, not by emulating the courtly lyrics of Mister Pye, but by making poetry the vehicle of sentiments which could in no other shape be offered, and by giving to occasion a voice both of emphasis and of melody.

The Poem is divided into three parts. In the Proem, Mr. Southey indulges in a strain of egotism, which an author may expect that his contemporary critics will resent, but which is sure to prove interesting to the next generation of readers, when the poet only, surviving in his works, is able to tell his own tale. There are no passages in our best poets, that engage our sympathy more than those references to their personal feelings or history, which at the time, perhaps, were charged upon their vanity; but they wrote for friends, rather than for critics; or for that futurity which is sure to participate in the feeling of friendship towards a poet that has deserved its esteem.

Mr. Southey alludes, in the following stanzas, to the obloquy which has been cast upon him, on account of his acceptance of the Laureateship.

'Yea in this now, while Malice frets her hour,

Is foretaste given me of that meed divine;

Here undisturbed in this sequestered bower,

The friendship of the good and wise is mine;

And that green wreath which decks the Bard when dead,
That laureate garland crowns my living head.

That wreath which in Eliza's golden days

My master dear, divinest Spenser wore,

That which rewarded Drayton's learned lays,

Which thoughtful Ben and gentle Daniel bore,..

Grin Envy through thy ragged mask of scorn!

In honour it was given, in honour it is worn!' pp. 7, 8.

In the subsequent stanzas, the Poet urges the difficulty which the occasion presented to one so unaccustomed to touch

'the sweet dulcimer and courtly lute.'