Sunday Morning Thoughts; or, Great Truths in Plain Words. 1859. 8vo. pp. 216. Sheldon & Co., New York. Sunday Evening Thoughts; or, Great Truths in Plain Words. 1859. 8vo. pp. 206. Sheldon & Co., New York. PAMPHLETS RECEIVed. The Critic Criticised, and Worcester Vindicated; consisting of a Review of an Article in the "Congregationalist" upon the comparative merits of Worcester's and Webster's Quarto Dictionary, together with a reply to the attacks of Messrs. G. & C. Merriam, upon the character of Dr. Worcester and his Dictionaries. 8vo. pp. 67. The Divine Law in the Physical Being concerning Alcoholic Beverages. By WILLIAM DELOSS LOVE, Pastor of the Spring street Congregational Church, Milwaukee. Delivered at the Church, Sunday, January 23d, 1859. Published by request. 8vo. pp. 20. An Introductory Lecture delivered before the Law Class of Columbia College, New York. By THEODORE W. DWIGHT, Professor of law, &c., &c., on Monday, November 1st, 1858. Published by request of the College Corporation. 8vo. pp. 55. Established in Righteousness. A Discourse to the First Church and Society in New Haven, on a day of Public Thanksgiving, Nov. 24, 1859. By LEONARD BACON, Pastor. New Haven: Peck, White & Peck. 8vo. pp. 20. Slavery Viewed in the Light of the Golden Rule. A Discourse delivered in the Fourth Congregational Church of Norwich, at Greenville, Conn., December 19, 1859. By R. P. STANTON. Norwich. 8vo. pp. 19. LIST OF BOOKS NOTICED IN THE NEW ENGLANDER OF MAY, 1860. THE NEW ENGLANDER. No. LXXI. AUGUST, 1860. ARTICLE I-A HYMN AND ITS AUTHOR-AUGUSTUS L. HILLHOUSE. SEVERAL of the more recent hymn-books contain a hymn which they refer to "Hillhouse" as its author. The reference is in one sense correct; and yet, as understood by readers generally, and by most of the compilers copying one from another in succession, it is erroneous. The entire hymn was first published in the Christian Spectator, at New Haven, April, 1822. It is as follows: VOL. XVIII. "1. Trembling before thine awful throne, Contend!-0! smile and heal the strife.. "2. The Saviour smiles! upon my soul "3. Earth has a joy unknown in heaven- 37 "4. Ye saw of old, on chaos rise The beauteous pillars of the skies: "5. Bright heralds of th' Eternal Will, Or, thron'd in floods of beamy day, "6. Loud is the song-the heavenly plain "7. But I amid your quires shall shine, And all your knowledge shall be mine: A portion of this exquisite hymn (including only the first three stanzas) was copied by Dr. Nettleton into his Village Hymns, in 1824. The hymn, as a whole, remained unknown (save to those who happened to remember the original publication) till it was inserted entire in the Supplement to Dwight's Psalms and Hymns, which was published at New Haven, in 1833, and which was used for a few years in some of the Connecticut Churches. In 1845 it was inserted, with the omission of the sixth stanza, in the book of Psalms and Hymns prepared and set forth by the General Association of Connecticut. Since that time it has found a place in the Plymouth Collection, in the Congregational Hymn Book, and in the Sabbath Hymn Book. In the first of these it is given entire. In the second, two stanzas, the fourth and fifth, are omitted. In the last, we find the fourth, fifth, and sixth stanzas of the original cut down and patched into one, after this fashion: "4. Ye know where morn exulting springs, And evening folds her drooping wings, The complete hymn, in its original form, is unsurpassed in the English or any other language. Perhaps it is as near per fection as an uninspired composition can be. The thought, the feeling, the imagery, the diction, and the versification are all exquisite. It is not easy to say why or how such a hymn was omitted both by the Old School Presbyterian compilers, and by Dr. Beman, whose work has become the book of the New School Assembly. Who was the author of that hymn? "Hillhouse," said Nettleton, when he inserted three stanzas of it in his Village Hymns. At that time, the poet Hillhouse, whose name is now classical in American literature, had published Percy's Masque, and the Judgment; but neither of the poems bore his name, and probably it did not occur to Nettleton that the author of the hymn needed to be distinguished from the author of Percy's Masque, more than from the well known patriot and statesman, the Commissioner of the Connecticut School Fund. Nine years later, when "Hillhouse, the poet," was almost as well known in literature as his venerable father had been in politics, the compiler of the Supplement to Dwight's Selection referred this hymn distinctly to "A. L. Hillhouse." The compilers of the Connecticut Psalms and Hymns knew well enough who was the author of that hymn; but accidentally, in their index of first lines, they referred to him only by his family name, "Hillhouse." Mr. Beecher, in making his Plymouth Collection, copied the hymn from the Supplement to Dwight, and probably knew that "A. L. Hillhouse" was not "the poet Hillhouse;" but, like the Connecticut compilers, he did not mark the distinction. The compiler of the Congregational Hymn Book knew that he found the hymn in the Connecticut book and in the Plymouth Collection, and that in both it was referred to Hillhouse; and, very naturally, he inferred that he knew who the author was. Consequently, in his "index of authors," he informed his readers that this hymn was written not merely by some person bearing that family name, but by James A. Hillhonse, who was born in 1790, and died in 1841. In like manner the compilers of the Sabbath Hymn Book have been betrayed into the same inference. Their first edition gives the names of authors in the index of first lines, and ascribes the hymn, "Trembling |