view the subject. Her benevolence has deceived her penetration: her error is an amiable one, but still it is an error.

Throughout the remaining six chapters of this essay, the tendency of the master principle, the propensity to magnify the idea of self,' is examined in various relations, and much practical advantage results from the inquiry. Its operation in producing pride, ambition, and the spirit of party;-in originating and supporting the Pagan superstitions, and schools of philosophy;-in the opposite phenomena exhibited by the Jews, their early propension to idolatrous worship, and subsequent Pharisaic adherence to the external usages of their own ;-and in its uniform tendency to corrupt the purity of religious faith, by substituting for Divine truth the inventions of man, or, at least, by giving them a decided superiority in our regard, thus supplanting Christian temper by the spirit of bigotry and of intolerance: these diversified operations our author illustrates much at large; and in most instances, deduces the effect, with sufficient clearness, from this propensity as its remote or immediate cause. It would extend the present article to a disproportionate length, to follow her closely through this long chain of illustrative reasoning, and we hope that most of our readers will be disposed to pursue it for themselves. A few passages only may be selected to incite them to proceed.

It will be acknowledged by the most superficial, that vanity may spring probably enough from this evil propensity; but pride, and the love of fame, have contrived to assume a front so imposing,-to look, the one so dignified, and the other, so heroic, that some will be loth to ascribe them to the same unworthy principle. There are, indeed, few among the vices which have commanded so much respect, or have so completely imposed upon the penetration of the worldly wise. What mankind have termed glory, might well enough form the highest aim of Pagan heroism; but it is difficult to conceive that the love of it, should not have appeared to a thoughtful mind, even in those twilight ages, to be a selfish, and, therefore, an unworthy affection. But that it should have descended through the ages of intellectual refinement, into those of Christian. knowledge, and be allowed to stand as a generous, a noble principle, in the broad light of the Gospel, is credible only because it is undeniable, and could not have been foreboded by the Christian theorist of primitive times. Of these subjects Miss Hamilton is led naturally, in the course of her investigation, to take a more rational and more Christianized view. In tracing pride and the love of fame, ultimately, but fairly, to an evil principle, she ascertains their real character, and degrades them to a station, which, however appropriate, they have hitherto disdained to occupy. She observes hat,

-Through whatever channel we seek for fame, whether by the exertion of our intellectual faculties, the cultivation of our natural endowments, or by seeking opportunities to exhibit proofs of strength, valour, skill, or policy, in so far as we are actuated by the desire of fame, we are actuated by the propensity to enlarge and extend the idea of self. Nor is the nature of the propensity altered by the complexion of the action: for if the action be truly laudable and truly virtuous, and prove in its consequences beneficial to mankind, and if these considerations had any weight in impelling us to the undertaking, it follows, that the desire of fame was not the only motive, nor perhaps the predominant one. By mingling with others of a purer nature, its own nature is not altered, though its pernicious tendency must doubtless be thereby counteracted and diminished. It is from believing that the love of fame is the passion of great minds only, that it excites so much sympathy and admiration; but where it both originates in, and is governed by, the selfish principle, it appears not to have any greater right to esteem or approbation, than vanity, or avarice, or any other modification of the same principle.' pp. 328. 330.

The remarks on pride, though just and excellent, are too much diffused to afford a concise extract. The principles of arbitrary government are deduced, with little difficulty, from this common source, this magnifying propensity; and its invariable tendency to self-destruction, is ably exposed.

It is the will of the tyrant, that the nation he governs should maintain a superiority over rival nations; that it should be enriched by commerce and manufactures; be rendered plentiful by agriculture, and distinguished by the productions of genius in literature and the arts. But in order to magnify the idea of self, it is necessary that all this should be effected by his own individual mind. He therefore gives laws to commerce; prescribes rules to the manufacturer; issues edicts to the agriculturist; and points to science and literature the particular path in which he chuses them to proceed, And though he finds by experience, that all his labours are fruitless, and all his efforts vain, he perseveres in acting, as if it were impossible that, having made property of all the intellectual powers of his subjects, they should fail to operate through the medium of his single mind, as effectually as they would have operated in the minds of millions, where the ideas of each would, by communication, have tended to augment the aggregate of capacity and intelligence. Meanwhile, the nation thus governed sinks into contempt; and the sovereign who has gloried in absorbing all the mass of mind in the idea of self, finds, when too late, that the people he has thus degraded are no longer capable of supporting his throne. Thus has the end of all dynasties, established in despotism, been facilitated by the inordinate gratification of the desire to magnify the idea of self.' Vol. II. pp. 27. 29.

But there is no part of the work which will be found more just in its observations, more useful in its tendency, or more

elosely illustrative of the principle in view, than the chapters which treat of party spirit, bigotry, and intolerance; and we feel persuaded, that however free we may respectively be convinced our own party and our own spirit are from the charges here adduced, it will readily be admitted that to all other parties, they do, in a greater or less degree, justly apply: nay, that were it not for the real importance and unquestionable evidence that distinguish our own, the warmth of feeling with which, at times, we maintain its peculiar tenets, might well nigh expose even us to a part of the censure.

، On entering the examination of this point, says our author, it may be advisable, in the first place, to inquire, what are the nature, and what the strength of those emotions that are produced in us, on reading or hearing of the temporary triumphs of error and injustice, in instances in which we are not otherwise concerned, than as our love of truth and justice leads us to take part with the oppressed? In such cases, our hearts glow with indignation against the oppressor; we ardently desire to hear of his having received the punishment due to his offence; and feel dissatisfied until truth obtains a complete ascendancy over error and falsehood. But these feelings are unaccompanied by malice; they never exceed the bounds that reason warrants: the hatred produced in us by the contemplation of the wicked deed, seldom transports us into wrath, or, if it do, the wrath is but momentary. I believe it will be found ever thus, where no idea of self can possibly be connected either with the person who does the wrong, or with him who suffers.

The very different manner in which we are agitated, when the conduct either of the party we espouse, or the party we oppose, is called in question, clearly shows how completely we associate the idea of self with the party with which we are connected. In the ascendancy of our party, we consider ourselves to be triumphant, and small as is the weight that we perhaps can throw into the scale, we, when it preponderates, take to ourselves the glory. Every attempt to reduce the size to which we, in idea, swell, is resented as the most outrageous offence. Our wrath in such cases is not of the inoffensive nature of that which is called forth by the love of truth and justice: it is begotten by the selfish principle, and is, therefore, rancorous and malignant, and cruel and revengeful.' pp. 40. 42.

And as it is for our party that our feelings are thus excited, so is it those parts of its system that are the interpolations of our own wisdom, in support of which we are most strenuous.

We are, by the same propensity, compelled to mingle with the truth for which we contend, something of our own, something to which the idea of self can be correctly attached: and I believe it will, upon a strict examination, be found, that it is for this extraneous matter that we most obstinately fight; the truths to which it was originally attached serving only as a salvo to our conscience, for the

exercise of the malignant passions, which in the heat of combat, are produced.' pp. 43. 44.

These malignant passions, from which, unhappily, religious controversies have not been exempt, nay, which have often appeared with greater virulence in them than in other controversies, are thus distinguished in their origin from the pure doctrines among which they spring. When weeds so rank and poisonous, shoot up with the wheat, we may conclude, that hath done this."

an enemy

As nothing seems to have afforded greater subject of triumph to sceptical writers, than the proofs of pride and arrogance exhibited in the intolerating spirit which has, at some period of its history, prevailed in almost every Christian church, it is due to the truths of revelation to show, that the spirit alluded to has, in every case, and under all variety of circumstances, originated in a principle to which the Word of God is decidedly adverse; and that it has never been in zeal for establishing the authority of what has been revealed by the Spirit of God, but in zeal for establishing the deductions of human reason, that any of the malignant passions have been produced.' p. 164.

As the spirit of true religion produces the benignant spirit of toleration, the spirit of toleration has, by re-action, a tendency to extend the empire of religion. To the authority of the Supreme Being, all men are willing to submit. It is against the authority of man that the pride of man revolts. It is by a re-action of the selfish principle, that all revolutions in church and state are brought about. However men may, by the selfish principle, be led to argue with respect to others, with respect to himself, every man feels liberty of conscience to be his birth-right. His external actions may be controlled, but his mind can never be forced into bondage. All its operations are free. Placed by the Almighty beyond the power of human tyranny, the thoughts are never subject to violence. By no efforts can a man be convinced, unless his own judgment operate in producing the conviction; an operation of judgment which never takes place under the influence of external force.' pp. 178, 179.

It would appear unnecessary, if principles and efforts but slowly expiring even in in the 19th century did not prove to the contrary, to argue in favour of such truisms. The selfish principle, especially when armed with the sword of power, will no doubt struggle to the last, and die hard; but the most violent and overbearing exertions of it, when directed against opinion, are as impotent and self-destructive as the wrath of a tyger in a cage of iron. Man over man, has, in this instance, neither right nor power; and hence the equal injustice and absurdity of pretending to such a sway. The triumph of unlawful authority in silencing the external expressions of opinion, may be long; the cries of conscience may

ascend for ages in secret to the God of retribution, and seem to be unheard; but to Him, "one day is as a thousand years,-a thousand years, as one day;" and the downfall of usurpations so unhallowed, is as inevitable, in the nature of things-in that constitution which is appointed to execute his just designs-as is the succession of cause and effect, in the phenomena of the material world.

Having thus exemplified at large a propensity, which, from the extent and diversity of its operations, our author suspects at least of being the depraved principle of human nature,' she proceeds, in the fifth and last essay, 'to inquire whether any means, natural or supernatural, has been granted for diminishing its force, and counteracting its influence! In the benevolent affections, she conceives that a suitable remedy, and, if duly administered, an absolute specific are to be found: and for the cultivation of these, provision both of a natural and supernatural kind, appears to have been made; the former, in the domestic relations, which shed a sunbeam upon the heart from the moment in which the infant eye is sensible to a mother's smile; and the latter, in the sublime objects, the boundless perfection, which revelation affords to the eye of the mind.

But here, as in cultivating the intellectual faculties, attention is indispensable; and in proportion to the degree in which it is exercised upon those qualities that form the proper objects of benevolent feeling, will that feeling, in all its diversities, exist: it will be partial or universal, according to the direction and extent of their exercise.

We have not room to detail so fully as we could wish, or as the importance of the subject might well demand, the judicious observations which occupy this part of the work; and indeed we cannot deny ourselves the hope, that, at least, every mother who is anxious to devote the entire energies of her nature, the resources both of her mind and heart, to the well-being of her child, and into whose hand these volumes may fall, will be careful to peruse them at length. The view they here present of that kindly provision which has been made by the great Parent, the Father of all the families of the earth, for cultivating the benevolent affections, is equally lovely, salutary, and impressive. In those early sympathies which the relations of parent and child cannot fail, in some degree, to awaken, and which the judicious parent will make it the object of hourly solicitude, and of self-denying affection, to improve and confirm, are deposited the seeds of virtue and happiness; and according as they are permitted to expand, is the poison of the selfish principle counteracted. Like a grove of spice, they purify a tainted atmosphere, and destroy infection as far as their fragrance breathes. How beautiful is this view of Divine bene