It has since been generally adopted, and now forr important item in the New-School theology. It ap however, that there have always been some who coul adopt it. There have always been men who saw t election and reprobation impeach the goodness of the doctrine of free-will, as commonly explained, re still more severely upon his wisdom and his honor. reconcile the absurdities of both creeds with truth indeed been a conflict of ages. I can readily con how believers in the old creeds, which recognize the nity of evil as a foul blot upon the Creator's plan, sh be willing to adopt almost any doctrine which would seem to attribute the origin of such an evil to any than the Great First Cause. But why Universalis who have discarded such old absurdities, who look all evil as a means to an end, who believe that it terminate in good,-should have any sympathy with doctrine of a free self-determining will, is more than understand. If Jehovah can say, "I form the light create darkness; I make peace and create evil; 1 Lord do all these things,"-if without the least hesita we attribute all physical evil to him; if we say God and will overcome all moral evil, that it shall resul good; why should we hesitate to believe that it co tutes a part of his plan, and is now doing its appoi work? Does not Paul's argument favor this, wher says, "Moreover the law entered that the offence m abound; but where sin abounded, grace did much m abound?" And, in accordance with our view of termination of evil, may we not exclaim, "Thanks b God who giveth us the victory through our Lord J Christ." And, in regard to the subject of will, may not adopt the language of the poet, when, reflecting u the overruling hand of God, he exclaims: "In all our ways we humbly own Thy providential power; Entrusting to thy care alone J. W. ART. XIV. Literary Notices. 1. The Elements of Intellectual Philosophy. By Francis Wayland, President of Brown University, and Professor of Moral and Intellectual Philosophy. Boston: Phillips, Sampson and Company. &c. 12mo. pp. 426. 1854. THE distinguishing excellences of this work, in respect to its arrangement and the style of its execution, may be expressed in two words clearness and ease. And these two qualities it appears to us to possess in an eminent degree. Perhaps they were gradually brought to the perfection in which we here find them, partly in consequence of the manner in which the work originated and grew up. It is in substance the course of Lectures which the author has annually delivered to the classes in Intellectual Philosophy in Brown University. The _need of thorough perspicuity, as one of the very first requisites in Lectures which are to be mastered by young men, on an abstruse science, and mastered primarily in the act of hearing, could hardly fail to make itself felt throughout the process of preparing them. And then each repetition of them, year after year, must have suggested such improvements as they were found to need in form, or expression, or thought. We have the results of such a preparation in this volume. Notwithstanding the abstruseness of its subject, it is very easy reading. Short, homely sentences, right to the point, and at the same time a continuous natural flow of thought, characterize its manner. Illustrations, always of the familiar kind, are frequently introduced, either to make the mental processes more distinctly understood, or to bring out the affinities between one such process and another. Practical directions are also given for cultivating the several intellectual powers in the most judicious way. As the work was designed chiefly for a text-book to be used in the regular course of collegiate instruction, it aims only to lay out the general field of the science, and very properly abstains from an exhaustive discussion of particular points. On these, however, the student is referred to places in other standard works where they are more fully treated. Though neither new discoveries nor profound investigations will be looked for in an elementary treatise of this kind, it has throughout the air of originality in one sense: evidently, the author had made the matter his own, and wrote from his own perceptions of mental facts,—which is all that we can demand in such a case as the present. He has also availed himself of "the latest improvements" in the science, especially of Sir William Ham ilton's valuable contributions. In the main he agrees with th Scotch metaphysician, though he partially dissents from him or two points. In a judicious apportioning of the instruction to the severa respectively, in the ease with which the whole may be compreh in the clear good sense everywhere evinced, and in neatness of ment, we think the work excels all other text-books that w seen on Intellectual Philosophy. Were we to enter into a ri criticism of each section, we might query whether there is defect in the argument on p. 100, paragraph 4, for the valid the testimony which Consciousness gives of external object our abnormal states, as much as in our normal state, we have sciousness that we perceive external objects truly. But in conditions, our consciousness is often delusive in this respect, it is still true as respects its testimony to the internal fact. it do, then, to rest the argument wholly on the validity of cons ness, or rather upon the ground that its external cognitions mu as infallible as its internal cognitions? It is true, that its i bility in the former respect is afterwards predicated exclusive its normal condition. But this only shows that we can not r with certainty from the truth simply of its internal cognitions truth of its external cognitions. We do not say that the ge principle is not the true one; we only say that the statement needs to be cleared of an inconsequence. If we do not misreme however, the same defect is also found in Sir William Hami demonstration. Setting this one defect aside, we see little amended in the present work. Its positive excellences are so as to make a solitary oversight, if oversight it be, the more notice 2. Institutes of Metaphysic: the Theory of Knowing and B By James F. Ferrier, A. B. Oxon., Professor of Moral Philosophy Political Economy, St. Andrews. William Blackwood and Sons inburgh and London. 1854. Small 8vo. pp. 530. A copy, received through the politeness of the author, has gr interested us. We find it to be a remarkable work, on several counts. In one of its essential elements, it is original; and, as essential element affects the treatment of the whole matter, we say in general terms that the metaphysical problem of Knowing of Being is here wrought out in a new way. The author expli avows the novelty of his positions, and demands for them, on ground, the most searching criticism. The attitude which he ta is of the very boldest if not daring kind. He pronounces all current systems of metaphysics to be abortions, and claims for own that it is the only one worthy of the name. It surprises uz find that he seems very well to sustain this defiant challenge. The present condition of the science he describes as follows: is a matter of general complaint that, although we have plenty of disputations and dissertations on philosophy, we have no philosophy itself. This is perfectly true. People write about it, and about it; but no one has grasped with an unflinching hand the very thing itself. The whole philosophical literature of the world is more like an unwieldy commentary on some text which has perished, or rather has never existed, than like what a philosophy itself should be. Our philosophical treatises are no more philosophy than Eustathius is Homer, or than Malone is Shakespeare. They are mere partial and desultory annotations on some text, on which unfortunately no man can lay his hands, because it nowhere exists. Hence the embroilment of speculation; hence the dissatisfaction, even despair, of every inquiring mind which turns its attention to metaphysics. There is not now in existence even the shadow of a tribunal to which any point in litigation can be referred. There is not now in existence a single book which lays down with precision and impartiality the Institutes of all metaphysical opinion, and shows the seeds of all speculative controversies. Hence philosophy is not only a war, but it is a war in which none of the combatants understands the grounds either of his own opinion or of that of his adversary; or sees the roots of the side of the question which he is either attacking or defending. The springs by which these disputatious puppets are worked, lie deep out of their own sight. Every doctrine which is either embraced or rejected, is embraced or rejected blindly, and without any insight into its merits," &c. pp. 5, 6. On the other hand, he claims to have given a theory that is established by an unbroken chain of demonstration from its first word to its last. "The general character," says he, "of this system is, that it is a body of necessary truth. It starts from a single proposition which, it is conceived, is an essential axiom of all reason, and one which cannot be denied without running against a contradiction. The axiom may not be self-evident in an instant; but that, as has been remarked, is no criterion. A moderate degree of reflection, coupled with the observations by which the proposition is enforced, may satisfy any one that its nature is such as has been stated. From this single proposition the whole system is deduced in a series of demonstrations, each of which proposes to be as strict as any demonstration in Euclid, while the whole of them taken together constitute one great demonstration. If this rigorous necessity is not their character to the very letter,—if there is a single weak point in the system, if there be any one premise or any one conclusion which is not as certain as that two and two make four, the whole scheme falls to pieces, and must be given up, root and branch. Every thing is perilled on the pretension that the scheme is rigidly demonstrated throughout; for a philosophy is not entitled to exist, unless it can make good this claim." pp. 27, 28. It would be great presumption in us to pronounce, at t period, a definitive judgment on the merits of the system. of propositions, with their scientific definitions and scientific strations, running through some five hundred pages, and so ent on each other that the least flaw in any one link would whole, is not to be disposed of on a single examination, u obvious error shall unquestionably have been found. We covered no such error. So far as a first reading of the enabled us to perceive, the plan to which the author pledges is executed to the very letter. Each proposition seems to be of all possible ambiguity, and then to be demonstrated as st any in Euclid, while all of them taken together seem to c one entire demonstration. At the same time, the points fro erroneous divergences have started seem to be ascertained, grounds of each of these mistakes laid bare. We had begun to make an abstract of the system; but a which we might have anticipated at the outset, has induce abandon the attempt. The book itself contains little more th was deemed necessary to the working out of the problem; a can we compress such a process into the narrow space of a notice? Let it suffice to state that the author claims to ha onstrated the reality of our knowledge even of the Absolute the Infinite. Such as are at all used to metaphysical reading may be that there is no occasion for their being deterred from a per the work by fear of difficulty in understanding it. They w it not only intelligible, but incapable of being misapprehende a little care. Nor will they need to grope their way; they through it at nearly their natural reading gait. To many ject itself can not fail of being dry; but it is enlivened by argumentation, and frequently by sharp polemical contes style is very clear and spirited, though not so suggestive, rich in allusions, as that of Sir William Hamilton. Perh might complain that it sometimes runs a little too near the atory, and that here and there a figure is followed too far. however, is but a matter of taste. 3. The Religions of the World and their Relations to Chris By Frederick Denison Maurice, M. A. From the Third I London Edition. Boston: Gould and Lincoln. 1854. The author of the work above-named has become one of th popular theological writers of the present time. With a n singular clearness and strength, he brings to his work also a est and devoted spirit, and an independence, too, which, if it commend him to the bigot or sectarian, will make him welc the candid inquirer after truth. He has spoken some very |