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    ECCENTBIC LITERATURE.*

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    natural miracle ; and when , as Faraday explained to his young auditors , the same paper is pulled or pushed by the invisible agency of electricity , our minds , less accustomed , to this method of exercising force , cannot help being astonished at the result . The forces operating in nature are extremely few , compared with the multiplicity and variety- of their results , and it is impossible to get a philosophical conception of any one of them unless their connection or correlation is understood . These ideas may seem too profound , and too far removed from ordinary conceptions to be made intelligible to the young , but Faraday accomplishes the task with ease and simplicity , and any thoughtful boy or girl can , by means of these lectures , readily follow the thread of a scientific , investigation , commencing with gravitation , and running through cohesion , and the principal

    phenomena of H ^ ht , heat , electricity , and chemical affinity . Very few men could have put so much information in so intelligible a form , and in so small a space , or have chosen with such consummate judgment the most apt methods of illustration ; but the lectures are not valuable only , or chiefly , for the communication of actual knowledge—they have a deeper importance in their power of stimulating philosophical thought , arid leading to the habit of associating ideas according to the principles of accurate science . We c : m imagine the delight of the juvenile audience to whom they were delivered . "Here is a boy ' s experiment—md I like a bov ' s experiment , " exclaimed their teacher , as lie told them how to melt j « ad in a tobacco-pipe , and by pouring the fused metal upon a stone , get smooth clear surfaces , that would unite with a little pressure , and strikingly illustrate the attraction of cohesion . His readiness to look at things from their point of view commends itself to all boys and girls . And when the grey-haired philosopher proceeded to blow real soaphad beforethe

    bubbles , and give them a significance they never , charm must have been complete . Most of the experiments described in these lectures are within tlie reach of an ordinary family ; and it would be a good plan if some enterprising purveyor of scientific apparatus fitted up a small box as an accompaniment to the cheap volume , and thus brought an admirable course of iustructum within the reach of a large number of juveniles , or those who have to discharge the duty of teaching them . To the benevolent mind of Faraday , his success with children must be a source of delight , and he evidently experiences as much pleasure : ; in planting tueir steps firmly upon some of-tlie lower founds of the" ladder of Truth , as in his own more lonely wanderings to its Alpine heights . In later limes the worth-. of such teaching will become apparent , and some of the youngsters , who found these lectures among the pleasantest incidents in their Christinas holidays , may liave unconsciously carried away impulses that will urge them to intellectual distinction , aud beneficially influence the whole current of their lives .

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    which we are acquainted , " Miranda" aoproaches the nearest to a Neo-Ciiristian extravaganza . For to pretend for a moment to . look upon his arguments as sound , and his conceits as confirmations of the Christian religion is a profanation and a farce . We do not deny that here and there in the work we fall upon a . statenent with which the logician may be satisfied , a fancy with which the poet may be pleased , and a sentiment of which the saint may approve , but these occasional merits only make the concoction of such a work the more to be lamented , inasmuch as it displays an evident misuse and waste of erudition and superior talents . Tiiere is hardly an extravagance in human conception that it does not dignify by the name of truth , hardly an error in- heathenism that it does not try to sanctify in the holy font of Cnristianitv . Au-1 this fact alone is unanswerable evidence of the absurdity of its entire mass of assumptions .

    That the reader may be satisfied that the book we are remarking upon has an actual existence in good readable typj , though the revising and correcting of the author's pet work has , from the numerous errors we discover in it , been sadly neglected , we will lay before him a few passages by which he may obtain a fair view of the whole . On the divine l . iw of eternal and universal progress , the writer begins by remarking , that " The Infinite goodness of G >> d would f ; iin have created all things as perfect in their limited nature , as He is immense in all His eternal attributes . This being impossible b y an intrinsical contradiction , He did what was next , desirable , that is to say , He made all capable of an indefinite and never-to-be-stopped improvement and progress . " He then declares that the actual world is still in its vouth , and that it is destined to live many

    hundred thousand years . If it be , Dr . dimming and our anonymous author are sadly at variance in their calculations , and it requires no great gif t of prophecy ou our part to say , that the author o " Miranda , " , alas ! we ourselves , will be utterly obliterated from the memory of men at that time . " But , " he continues , " the , old age and . decay of the world , though it live many hundred-thousand years , will inevitably come . The sun shall be queuehe ... 1 , the centripetal and centrifugal forces shall lose their equilibrium , and the reign of chaos shall begin anew . But a short reign it will be . Out of the seeds and materials of the dissolved Cosmos God will malte another ; physically and -morally better than this , which , in Its turn ; will be dissolved to make room for $ .-still more beautiful order of thingsand so on With an endtess succession . " This writer

    , is not quite a Pantheist , though he says there must be some truth in a doctrine that " lias been believed by some of the most powerful human minds > and by nearly one-half of mankind , namely , the Hindoos and Cinnese . _ - He says , however , that the " Universe , or aggregate of all material things , is not ^ God j for God , " he declares , " is an Infinite Spirit , omnipresent , all-powerful , and all-seeing ' . Yet , in the next paragraph but two that follows this declaration , his philosophy becomes muddled , for he says , that " the union of the Spiritual God with the material Universe , constitutes the Owe , Infinite , Divine , and Supreme Being . " In spite of his love of clearness , however , he acknowledges that there are two terms especially which he must use with some obscurity and confusion , " not

    voluntarilyj but because the confusion and obscurity are inherent in the ideas which all human minds associate with them . These two te 7 rn 1 TarrSpT 5 if ~ aTr ^^^ What is Spirit P I am equally at a loss how to define it . " We are here irresistibly reminded of the answers which " Punch" lias given to these famous questions ; and as philosophers despair of ever bein «* able to give better , we are tempted to repeat them for the benefit of the author of " Miranda , " , should the perplexing question , " what is matter P" ever recur to annoy him , would do well to keep in remembrance the sensible and witty answer of " Punch "—" Nevermind ; " nor should he forget the soothing and comforting reply— " No matter , " when he is next puzzled by the question— " What is spirit P' »

    The reader , however , may be not a little surprised to find a writer who can answer questions regarding Spirit and . Matter in a candid and philosophic Spirit that he . knew not how to define them , yet believing in and firmly maintaining the doctrines of the transmigration and metempsychosis of souls ; and not only so , but actually making them cardinal doctrines of the Christian religion—nay , even exceeding that extravagance by a statement that C . iriat has had forty - nine incarnations , the first of which was Adam , and the last the author of " Minimi * , " who supplies as evidence of the faot-r-the initials J . T ., and address 2 ( 5 , University Street , twenty-six being a syuillino number . But our author says there were three Adams . " Tno two first chapters of the book of Moses relate to Adam the first , the immediate founder of the blade variety of

    mankind ; the remainder of Genesis contains the history of Adam the third , or white Adam , as well as that of his descendants , Adam the second , or rod Adum , lmmoly , the founder of the human variety comprehending the Americans and the Yellow Mongolians , is intimatud in the Bible by tho very name of Adum , the etymology ol which is red earth .- ' ' Here , upon the' authority of Dr .. Webster , we may state Unit Adam nieans " form" or ' imago , " not red earth ; this latter definition being an error of Joaephue , und arcouted by theologians , till corrected by the learned doctor we lmvo mentioned . But Adam , thu iirst was a " man of genius . . " He elaborated in hi » mind u wholo system of liuigUajfi ) . A magnificent language with words for all the principal objects « t nrtiire , nnd for ull the nrimitive wants of Hoeitil iiitorcourno , _ and iu < fl nil ineiuai

    men of ifeniuH he was endowed with superior powers . Until «> t an . ilvHis and of mental synthesis . Genesis nays that whatsoever Adam called every living creature , that was the name thereof .

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    May 26 , 1860 . J The Leader and Saturday Analyst . 4 # 9

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    * Miranda ; a Book divided into Three Parts , entitled Sbula , Number * , Btara , on the Neo-Ohriatian Jleligion . London : printed and published by James Morgun .

    Eccentbic Literature.*

    ECCENTBIC LITERATURE . *

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    S the facility for printing and publishing increases , the world must -t \ not be surprised if it is from time to time deliberately treated to some marvellously intellectual follies perpetrated in the name of Beason and Faith . There are books , it is true , which can only be ¦ puoducea-at-special periods , and by meii of peculiar idiosyncrasies . It is also very certain that history cannot be written before tlieTE » ctr ~ nor prophecy after it . The greater portion of writing , at the present time , and perhaps the best , is that of commentary . Ail that has occurred , or is occurring in the World , is either subjected to critical comment or lucid exposition . The right conception of the whole , or any part of history , religion ,. or science , depends , we imagine , very much upon the integral unity of the intellectual faculties and moral instincts of tlie individual . Should reason be strong and predominant in Jin individual , experience testifies that he will be exempt from the total influence and control of appearances , and from visions whose fabrics are baseless . We need not state the converse of this proposition . We know that an individual of great imagination and small reasoning powers ia subject to all sorts of illusions and conceits . He lives in a cloudy atmosphere of intelligence , and is incapable of perceiving any thing clearly , or of thinking any tiling rightly . 13 ut what shall wo say when we perceive a mind possessing the imaginative and the rn- tioual laculty apparently to an equal de ^ reu , and culinly exercising both in forming a theory absolutely bu « e < l upon pure ccMijucture , fancy , or whim r Such appears to be tho author of the strange worlt before us entitled " Miranda . " He professes to find confirmations of the old aud new dooirinos of Cniiat from wonders hitherto unheeded in the words and divisions of the Bible , in the facts and dates of history , and in the position anil motions of the heavenly bodies . With this phantasy ho nets oil' ou an expedition through the whole I ? . ii ? aii , Jewish , » ud Ciristiau history of the world , und having siiiisfiod himself as to the direct bearing and relation of every historic . il and every unhistoricul occurrence , fact , fable , myth , talc , romunce , and legend in the earth to the Christian religion , h « j deliberately proeoeda to . classify .. und form them all into n tiXHlein , which po-sesses-tranHcendout beauty , in ita uiilhui ' s estimation . But wo have deop misgivings that he will got inoro disciples to woudor und luujrh' at his collodion of wondora thmi to admire aud believe them . Indued , w * i are strongly of opinion that to believe in hi « theory domnnds an utter iilinegnution of ull common BeiiHO and common judgment . Our uutlior , however , at the outset of his system , him committed u fatal error . Of all works with

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), May 26, 1860, page 499, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2349/page/15/