with them are associations of pride and wealth and triumph; the poor man's attachment to the tenement he holds, which strangers have held before, and may to-morrow occupy again, has a worthier root, struck deep into a purer soil. His household gods are of flesh and blood, with no alloy of silver, gold, or precious stone; he has no property but in the affections of his own heart; and when they endear bare floors and walls, despite of rags, and toil, and scanty meals, that man has his love of home from God, and his rude hut becomes a solemn place.

"Oh! if those who rule the destinies of nations would but remember this, if they would but think how hard it is for the very poor to have engendered in their hearts that love of home from which all domestic virtues spring, when they live in dense and squalid masses, where social decency is lost, or rather never found, if they would but turn aside from the wide thoroughfares and great houses, and strive to improve the wretched dwellings in bye-ways, where only poverty may walk, many low roofs would point more truly to the sky, than the loftiest steeple that now rears proudly up from the midst of guilt, and crime, and horrible disease, to mock them by its contrast." Old Curiosity Shop, pp. 213, 214.

How full are all Dickens's works of those traits of brotherly feeling, which go right to the heart, and appeal to whatever of good there is in us. How does he multiply illustrations of that true-hearted kindness, which can make the humblest gift or least office of love worth infinitely more, than the most bountiful hand-offering of the unloving heart! Perhaps there is no more touching example of this, than where the poor fireman at the forge lodges Nell and her grandfather on a heap of warm ashes, and then, in the morning,

"Before they had reached the corner of the lane, the man came running after them, and pressing her hand, left something in it, two old, battered, smoke-encrusted penny pieces. Who knows but they shone as brightly in the eyes of angels as golden gifts that have been chronicled on tombs ?

- p. 241.

We know of no author, who handles the pathetic with more art, or rather with less art, and more truth to nature, than Dickens. There is pathos even in his comedy; and with his sensitive reader smiles and tears chase each other, as showers and sunshine on an April day. And in this he gives us the true picture of human life; for in the most trivial incidents or in the gayest scenes, there is always an under current of the

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plaintive and the sad. But how powerfully does he move the feelings in those portions of his narrative, where scenes or events of deep solemnity or sadness are portrayed! How full of the most thrilling pathos is the account of little Nell's life about the old church, her sittings in the antique chapel, and her labors on the children's graves in the churchyard. Whoever has suffered by the early removal of the innocent and lovely will feel the blended truth and beauty of the following touching passage, that closes the account of little Nell's funeral.

They saw the vault covered and the stone fixed down. Then, when the dusk of evening had come on, and not a sound disturbed the sacred stillness of the place, when the bright moon poured in her light on tomb and monument, on pillar, wall, and arch, and most of all (it seemed to them) upon her quiet grave, in that calm time, when all outward things and inward thoughts teem with assurances of immortality, and worldly hopes and fears are humbled in the dust before them, then, with tranquil and submissive hearts, they turned away, and left the child with God.

"Oh! it is hard to take to heart the lesson that such deaths will teach; but let no man reject it, for it is one that all must learn, and is a mighty, universal truth. When death strikes down the innocent and young, for every fragile form from which he lets the parting spirit free, a hundred virtues rise, in shapes of mercy, charity, and love, to walk the world, and bless it with their light. Of every tear that sorrowing mortals shed on such green graves, some good is born, some gentler nature comes. In the destroyer's steps there spring up bright creations that defy his power, and his dark path becomes a way of light to heaven." pp. 352, 353.

Who can doubt that a writer so thoroughly imbued with the true spirit of humanity, so full of sympathy with every form of grief and of gladness, so susceptible to every shade and hue of kindness and of virtue, so tenderly compassionate towards the desolate, the lowly, the guilty, has formed his spirit in the school of him, who said, "All ye are brethren"? He shows us more clearly than any other author whom we can name, what Fancy, baptized into a truly Christian spirit, may achieve towards reconciling man to man, and, through love of the brother whom we have seen, towards leading us to the purer love of the Father, whom we have not seen. We close with

an extract from his beautiful apostrophe to St. Paul's Clock in the story from which all our quotations have been made, — an extract, which, we trust, expresses his own settled aim and purpose in his writing, as it most happily does their tendency and result.

"Heart of London, there is a moral in thy every stroke! as I look on at thy indomitable working, which neither death, nor press of life, nor grief, nor gladness out of doors will influence one jot, I seem to hear a voice within thee which siuks into my heart, bidding me, as I elbow my way among the crowd, have some thought for the meanest wretch that passes, and, being a man, to turn away with scorn and pride from none that bear the human shape." p. 361.

A. P. P.

7. E. Ellis.

History of the Great Reformation of the Sixteenth Century in Germany, Switzerland, &c. By J. H. MERLE, D'AUBIGNÉ, President of the Theological School of Geneva, and Member of the "Societé Evangeliqué." Vol. III. London. 1841. 8vo. pp. 653.

THREE years have elapsed since the publication of this work was cominenced, and two, since the second volume was issued. The third volume now in our hands has long been expected, and a perusal of it has satisfied us that the author sustains the intense interest, so characteristic of the earlier portions of his work. We know of no history, and certainly no ecclesiastical history, whose pages are so inviting as these. Instead of inflicting weariness upon the reader, it even revives the exhaustion brought on by much study. Its graphic and spirited descriptions, its perpetual variety of subjects, and its numerous choice morsels of quotation from works of the age, which it delineates, have afforded us so much pleasure, that we would advise any one, who has it in his power, rather to read the book than our further remarks upon it. The success it has met with justifies our praise The French original has been put into two, if not three, rival translations in England, several editions of which have been issued there, and one of which is now in the press in this country. Still another volume is needed to com

plete the work; but, as we have already offered to our readers an analysis of the two former volumes, we will present the one before us to their notice in the same manner.*

Referring to our former remarks we find that we epitomized the author's sketch of the Rise of the Papacy, of its corruptions extending with its enlarging power, of the attempts at Reformation made by its own disciples, and of the condition of the Church when Luther was enrolled among its humblest servants. We followed the great Reformer from his birth through his poverty-pressed education, when he found in the Library at Erfurth that unknown and mysterious book, the Bible, till, against the will of his father, he entered the cloisters and devoted himself to the study of his new treasure. Serving there at first in a most menial capacity, he was consecrated as a Priest, made Bachelor of Theology, and chosen Preacher in the Church at Wittemberg; already marked as one who would yet be mighty. We gave but brief space to the detail of those fierce inward struggles, and of those earnest cries of his for help from human comforters, which were convulsing his breast, till, when they could no longer be repressed, they shook the whole civilized world. Sent by his order on a mission to Rome, he was shocked and scandalized by the gross corruptions which did not even wear a veil. Hugging to his heart his newly discovered doctrine of Justification by Faith, he boldly attacked the sale of Indulgences, fixed his unanswerable Theses upon the door of the Church, and made his appeal to the Pope; confronting the Papal Legate at Augsburg, he learned to face the assembled dignities of the Empire. He was made, in the loftiest signification of the office, the Confessor, the spiritual director, the heart physician of his contemporary monks, who were groping their way forth from darkness. The Elector Frederick, his Sovereign, so far espoused his cause as to protect his life. Luther next entailed upon himself the ban of excommunication by appealing from the Pope to a General Council. In the discussion at Leipsic he discomfited his virulent enemy Dr. Eck. He had learned to despise the Papal Bull before it came forth to mark him with its dread The next scene, one of the most sublime which history records, was that in which the Reformer before the Diet

curse.

* Christian Examiner, No. 97. March, 1840.

at Worms, with the spirit of a confessor and the power of a host, told his stern mission and maintained it above his life. As he returned, placed under the ban of the empire, the Elector, concealing his friendly purpose under the guise of a ruffianly attack, seized upon the courageous monk, and bore him as if a prisoner to his castle of the Wartburg, leaving Luther's friends and enemies to account for his sudden disappearance as they might. At this stage we left the narrative.

The volume before us opens with a review of the aspect of the Church, and of the effects which Luther's preaching was producing while he was confined in the Wartburg. It is remarkable that for some time after the axe had been laid at the very root of the Popedom and of all its dependent branches, the external appearance of things remained unaltered. The mummeries at the altar were continued, the monastic vows were uttered, friars wandered like vagabonds and found hearers, the rule of celibacy was unquestioned, and there was no outward sign of the renewal which was working secretly. The appearance was deceptive. It was necessary that the minds. of the wise and of the ignorant, of the courageous and the timid should be wrought upon before peace was broken and tumult began. Yet there was vitality and intense excitement heretofore unknown; a strong under current with a resistless action was secretly working the revolution. Luther's seclusion was good for himself and for his cause; an all-wise Providence appeared in it. He had time to learn his own spirit and to study out the elementary literature of the Reformation. In the mean while he was missed and mourned by the nation. All sorts of rumors, respecting his fate by death or assassination, were repeated from mouth to mouth. The monks at first rejoiced in hoping that the worst fate had befallen him; but they soon found that the mystery which hung over his sudden and mysterious disappearance was the spring of a more dangerous agitation than any word or act of his had produced. A Roman Catholic, writing to the Archbishop of Mentz, said, “The only way of extricating ourselves is to light our torches, and go searching through the earth for Luther, till we can restore him to the nation that will have him." As our author adds, "It might have been thought that the pallid ghost of the Reformer, dragging his chain, was spreading terror around and calling for vengeance." While his friends were giving vent to their lamentations, tidings of his safety arrived. The Imperial