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Leader (1850-1860), 17th April 1852, Edition Town of 1, Page 375, Igflrtfnlrn.

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      inevitably displace Opinion , and jret disclai m ing its poorer over Ms opinion * declaring your creed to pe a , •• ' * mere , opinion , " whereas his creed iDrtist be accepted as demonstrable truth . * ' It is an illusion to imagine that any scheme of religious belief can now maintain itself inthei minds of instructed men , under the enormous pressure of the com pacted mass of our modern sciences . A ^ ost misjudging course , therefore , have those w riters adopted who , of late , have threatened Christianity with extinction , which t hey say is to be effected by the , hand of the Physical sciences 1 . Do they not sec that there is a victim that stands first to be immolated- —to wit , their own baseless theology ?

      « But why may hot Christianity itself share this same fate ? Is it not itself anopiniont This will be the end of every one of those modifications of Christianity which have been devised for the purpose of escaping from Its extreme consequences , or of mitigating its supposed severity , or of winning the favour of those who reject it . These varieties of what we must call an abated Christianity , are opinions only j and they entirely lack intelligible evidence , as well as substance and motive force : they stir np ^ affections ; they fix no resolves ; they breathe no such energy into the souls of men as should strengthen them in a course of real sufferings for the Truth ' s sake . " What is it then that may , and that will , hold its ground against the everincreasing momentum of our modern philosophy ? It is that ChbistiaNitt , whole and entire , which , filling as it did the mind and the heart of the Eaelt Chttech , carried it through its day of trial . "

      Now , we call upon him to accept combat in the field chosen by / himself ; we throw down the gauntlet , and these are our words of defiance : —You have declared that what is certain must , from the nature of things , displace all that is vague , that Science in its progress must trample down Opinion ; and you hare thereby declared that Christianity rests on certain foundations ( tnefefore implicatethat it is Pemonstrable ) , and cannot be set aside as opinion . Prove this declaration , and the victory is won ; prove Christianity to rest upon demonstrable certitudej and not on " opinion / ' then is your cause / gained ! Indeed , throughout this eloquent and interesting Essay , the preliminary assumption of the very point in dispute renders all its argument useless when addressed to those who will not grant the assumption . •; arid the series ought certainly to have commenced with a distirict announcement

      of the evidence on which the whole rests . It is of no avail to say , as so many iterate , that the objections urged against Scriptures are all substantially the same as those which Origen and . the early Apologists encountered and reflated . We have read Origen , and declare the assertion preposterous ; nay , its waint of probability may be inferred from this one indubitable fact , —viz ., our scientific and moral conceptions are : so widely divergent from those prevalentin the time of the Christian fathers , that the objections we draw "from the discrepancy of those conceptions with scriptural conceptions must necessarily be unlike the objections there made and refuted . Moreover , if Origen and others have " refuted " objectors , may we not also say . that the Apologists themselves have been often " refuted" P This one-sided view of two-sided questions we see illustrated again in the following passage : —

      " It is much to be wished that those who at this moment are assailing Religious Belief , -would deny themselves the poor and cheap gratification , in which they almost all of them give themselves free leave to indulge , that of calling the adherents and advocates of Belief—' fanatics / " And yet , perhaps , this seemingly arrogant practice should be pardoned hi those guilty of it , inasmuch as it does not necessarily spring from an intolerant temper , or personal malignity ; but comes only from the felt necessity of the position in

      which those , on that side , have placed themselves : for if indeed those whose belief these writers assail are not ' fanatics ; ' if , on the contrary , they , or many of them , are as well informed and as highly cultured and as capable of reasoning as themselves , if they are equally serious and honest , and in a word , are everyway as ' good men , ' and all the while are beiievees , then is Belief proved to be reasonable ; for reasonable men profess it , and the contrary assumption falls to the ground ; then is Belief that conclusion which will be accepted and rested in , after fiill inquiry , by the great majority of minds in a sound state . "

      Let but the word " fanatics" be replaced by " infidels , " and the word " believers" replaced by " non-believers , " and this passage will be as applicable to the one class as to the other ; and we should see heterodoxy proved to be true by orthodox logic ! We look forward to the continuation of the series with interest , and meanwhile heartijy commend this Essay to our readers .

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      ADAM Gtt-ZEME OF MOSSGKRAY . Memoirs and Resolutions of Adam Orame of'Mossgray , including some Chronicles of the Borough oftfendie . In 3 vols . Colbum & Co . -No reader of Margaret Maitland ofSwinyside , or ofMerkland , can forgjot the admirable talent of the authoress . We have been loud enough in its praise to be permitted an expression of regret at finding that talent making no advances through experience . Her third novel is worse than her first . v . ° * ' ku * " * ns are greater in that very quarter where practice should havo effaced them . She may not bo able to master I'art de conter ; that is a talent some never acquire ; but practice in the art of novelwr i 5 L n K should have made her avoid the erreat mistakes of Adam Grceme .

      Wo will be frank with her . Beautiful as many passages are , with the beauty of a tender melancholy soul brooding over the vanished past , seductive as the mere Btyle often is ^ her book foiled to lure us through it tV -nt" ^ ' ' ^ n (* *^ e 8 ecre * ° . ftue failure , as far as wo understand it , is V . f ather in the substance nor in tho form has Adam Grceme the first « ondifcionB of art . jf j ° write a . novel is something more than to fill throe volumes . The author has this obligation imposed , that ho must either embody in fiction » ome actual experience of life , or must havo an interesting story to tell . Wherefore pile Polion on Ossa in Great Marlborough-street , when both e « on and Oasa are of the common stones with which we macadamize our roada P Wherefore this incessant winnowing of the old chaffP Wheroiore three volumes that are not new ? If any writer has seen , or thought , or sultored—if life , in any of its myriad aspects , haa to him presented a

      new revelation ,. be it merely a bit of character , by all means let us have it ; and let us have it as lie sees it , not as it has been seen for years an Great Marlborough-street . . If not , then let him be silent . There is no hurtfulness in silence . Writing is not a necessity ; rather let us say the mere itch of writing ( caco ' eihes it is named ) is rather symptomatic of d [ is-. ease than of health . A reading public and a greedy public will welcome with applause any good story , or anjr real bit Of life , first known in actual experience , and thence translated into fiction . But no public will give more than a languid hour to a novel deficient in both these qualities ; and thus deficient we

      must pronounce Adam Grceme . We must say it without softening the sentence , for the authoress might assuredly achieve a fine novel , if she would sternly impose upon herself the conditions ; and it is a pity to see such remarkable faculties thrown away upon works that will not even , become a nine-days' wonder . Let her distinctly ask herself , " Wliat is it I am about to set forth in this my new novel P "—and then let her rigorously examine that purpose as to its truth and her experience of it . Saving thus settled the idea of her book , and selected the characters that are to embody it , let her plan the story—construct it as she would the skeleton of a house—and when once that is done , she need be under no disquietude as to the furniture .

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      BOOKS ON OUR TABLE . The Portrait Gallery of Distinguished Poets , Philosophers , Statesmen , Divines , Artists , Physicians , Ziawyers , $ c . With Biographies . Originally published by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge . Parts III . and IV . W . S . OrrandCo . The third and fourth parts of Messrs . Orr ' s republication of the Portrait Gallery , published by the Societ y for the Diff usion o Knowledge , contain severally , Titian , Xuther , Raphael , Cortez , Raimondi , Cranmer , iLoyola and Correggio , Melancthon , Charles "V ., Knox , L'Hopital , Buchanan , Par& As each part is complete in itself , we specify the contents . The Solar Systems or , the Sun , Moon , and Planets . By J . It . Hind . W . S . OrrandCo . A flTM-AT . T , volume , published in the series of Headings in Popular Science , by the foreign secretary of the Royal Astronomical Society , is assuredly well worth its shilling j but although to those familiar with astronomical works , it will , be very useful for its account of the recent discoveries , and for its "latest intelligence " from the heavens , yet it wants the art and clearness requisite in works so professedly " popular . " It is a book for students , not for tyros . The Night Side of Natuii . By Catherine Crowe . ( Railway IAbrary . ) Intwovola . . George Iloutledge and Co . Mes . Ceowe ' s interesting collection of Ghost Stories , theories of Apparitions , and pther terrors of the Night Side of Nature deserved reprinting , and we venture to predict that the present cheap reprint will be extremely popular . During the winter it will be invaluable ! What stories to relate over the evening fire , as th « cinders drop with ghostly sound on to the hearth ! What " night-caps" for imaginative and nervous young gentlemen and ladies !

      Panorama of Saint Petersburg . By J . Gt . Kohl . ( The Book-Case . ) Sims and Me Intyre . The second volume of the Book-case contains Kohl ' s lively and irresistible picture of St . Petersburg , a pleasant variety after Kelly ' s ramble Across the RocJcy Mountains . We must say that the extra elegance of this series warrants the extra sixpence ; and we believe if somewhat less matter were given , in somewhat larger type ( or the same type leaded ) , the public would appreciate the change , and purchase more largely . It is one of the paradoxes of our railway literature , that almost all the books are printed in a type which renders them unreadable on the rail !

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      On Legislative Expression . By George Coodo . T . Turpin ., Ihe Daltons ; or , Three Roads in Life . By Charles Levor . Chapman and Hall . { Truths Illustrated by Great Authors . W . White . Devotions for the Daughters of Israel . By M . N " . Breaslaw . J . Vallentino . Physiology applied to Mealth and Education . By Andrew Combe . Maolachlan and Co . Encyclopedia Metropolitana . By 8 . T . Coleridpo . Griffin and Co . The Illustrated London Cookery Book . By F , Bishop . London , 227 , Strand . Blaoktcood's Edinburgh Magazine . W . BJackwood and Son . On the Past and Present State of Intramural Surging Places . By G , A . Walker . Longman , Brown , Groen and Co . History of Physical Astronomy , from the Earliest Ages . By B obert Grant , F . K . A . 8 . Bobert Baldwin .

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      We should do our utmost to encourage the Beautiful , for the Useful encourages itself . —Gobtuk .

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      COMTE'S POSITIVE PHILOSOPHY . * By G . II . Lewes . Part III . — What is Philosophy ? We shall find some obscurities cleared up , if we can master an accurate and comprehensive definition of philosophy . The definition I have finally settled upon is this : —Philosophy is the Explanation of the Phenomena of the Universe . By the term Explanation , the subject is restricted to the domain of the Intellect , artd is thereby demarcated from Religion , though not from Theology : a reservation which will be more fujly appreciated ,

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      ¦ ¦ , ' ^^ . 1 ^ -185 $ , ] ,. ¦ V THE IJ A DIE . 0

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      ? My appeal to generously disposed readers , in favour of a subscription lor M . loft destitute by the French Government , has , I fear , boon forgotten . Only tliroo have responded : but M . Comto will bo highly gratified to learn that , of tho three first ro-Bpoiidents , two wore working-men , —( John Ivory and Charlou Clojmonts , )—who forwarded two shillings in poshigo-stumps , —a sum to lio valued , ( is wus tho widow a nnto ; nnd tho third , W . K . B ., who , in a nohlo letter addressed to mo , myo :-- " I belong to tho wovkinc-elass , and urn not very ablo to assiBt . lean only send herewith a sovereign , and feel how littlo I look in doing so . If those who can and ought do not send adequately to your views , pray say in tho Leader , ( I tako it regularly , ) W . M B . —smd , and I will manage to send more . There are goneroue ways of being gonorous , ana that w one I

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), April 17, 1852, page 375, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1931/page/19/