liberty. The book should be put in the hands of every teacher; and it would not be amiss if its wisdom should be applied in the family circle.

12. The Good News of God. Sermons. By Charles Kingsley New York: Burt, Hutchinson & Abbey. 1859.

Sydney Smith wrote the most sparkling of reviews and the dullest of sermons. It does not therefore follow that the author of "Alton Locke" and "Hypatia" has, in the composition of the sermons named above, been deserted by his genius. The clerical character of Smith was professional; Charles Kingsley is an earnest man to the core, and will engage in nothing that does not enlist his full sympathy. His theology is a sort of mixture compounded of the Thirty-Nine Articles, and the transcendental philosophy. He at once loves the church of which he is a member, and loves to express his own thought freely. The Bible, the Prayer-Book, his own philosophy are all freely mingled in his sermons. His style is direct. Not a circumlocution can be found. He talks; his sentences are conversational in their structure. His deep sympathies, linking him with every movement of his day, makes him practical and fervent in every sentence. We heartily commend his book of sermons to the reader's attention.

13. Sermons Preached and Revised, by the Rev. C. H. Spurgeon. Fifth Series. New York: Sheldon & Company. 1859.

The suddenness of the unprecedented reputation of Mr. Spurgeon with "the common people," has led the cultivated few to question the justness of his claims to the favorable regards of the community. The suspicion has been that he was to prove but a 66 nine-days wonder," to be succeeded by some other equally eccentric novelty. But Mr. Spurgeon holds his own with the masses, and is fast compelling the respect of those whose refined sensibilities are not unfrequently shocked by a coarse allusion or an inelegant metaphor. His sermons have so much of directness, simplicity, and point, that their wide circulation is rationally accounted for.

14. The life of Frederick William Von Steuben, Major General in the Revolutionary Army. By Friedrich Kapp. With an Introduction by George Bancroft. New York: Mason Brothers. 1859.

This work adds a new and, in some respects, a peculiar fund to our knowledge of the details of the American Revolution. The success of the American cause is owing, in no small degree, to the services of foreigners, who, in matters of discipline par

ticularly, had an experience to which the American officers were, for most part, strangers. Conspicuous among this class, was Baron Steuben. His name frequently occurs in the American annals of the period; and the value of his services were duly appreciated. But till the appearance of this book, we have had but scanty knowledge of his general history. His biographer has evidently given the public an authentic book-the papers of Steuben himself furnishing him many of the most important particulars. Opinions respecting the war and the American cause generally, are freely given, and have especial value as coming from a foreigner. In an Introduction, Mr. Bancroft, the historian, gives expression to his entire confidence in the fidelity and truthfulness of the book.

15. The Harvest of Love. A Story for the Home Circle. By Minnie S. Davis. Boston: A. Tompkins. 1859.

This, in the form of fiction, is the history of a youth who, as the victim of unkind treatment, becomes unamiable in disposition, mischievous in conduct, and gives promise of a wretched manhood; but who, under the counteracting influence of love-both in its general and its "tender" forms-undergoes a revolution in character; becomes exemplary and truthful in conduct, and reaches a happy and prosperous manhood. With perhaps some exaggerations of vice and of virtue, the privilege of all novelists, the story is exceedingly well told, and holds the reader's attention from the beginning to the close. The writer has established a desirable reputation with the lovers of light literature.

16. To Cuba and Back. A Vacation Voyage. By Richard Henry Dana, Jr. Boston: Ticknor & Fields.

Were not the merited fame of successful authorship eclipsed by that of a splendid legal reputation, Mr. Dana would always be thought of as one of the few classic writers of America. Genius, a costly culture, a high sense of rectitude, and a disinterested devotion to principle, all combine to form in him a noble manhood. An innate conservatism is neutralized by its unquestioned sincerity. He belongs to an illustrious line, and he amply sustains an hereditary reputation. His independent spirit has in it no particle of stubbornness. We respect the man quite as much as we admire him. Of the book before us, we need say but a word. We read it with unabated interest at a "sitting." Its pictures of Cuba and its people are graphic, and give internal evidence of being just.

ART. XIX.

The Doctrine of Necessity.

ON resuming the disquisition which we introduced a year ago, it is no more than good manners to acknowledge the attentions that have been paid to our former Article. With all who have bestowed labor upon it, we reciprocate friendly regards and assurances of respect. But we beg leave to observe, that disputations between essayists, in the way of review, defence, rejoinder, and answer, are very apt, if prolonged, to run into narrow criticisms on each others' performances, on each others' personal consistency, and on other individual peculiarities, which have little to do with the merits of the question at large. The essential elements that determine a subject, are in danger of being left, in order to hunt down some crude argument, or hasty position, of an individual opponent, or to turn some unlucky expression of his against him. Old hunters, we are told, have a saying, that "the good dog is the dog that follows the coon, instead of worrying the pack, or daffing with them." In the present case, the question of Necessitarianism is the coon. Let us, then, take after it, as soon as we get ready to start again.1

First, however, we would bespeak attention to a preliminary remark. Now, the question before us is not, Whether God is Sovereign. For of this truth we have no doubt. It does, indeed, appear to us that Necessitarianism sets it aside, and subjects God to the same Necessity in which it fixes But that is its concern, not ours. With ourselves, the only question which could arise with respect to that truth, is the following: Whether the Sovereignty of God is of such a nature as that He must will and produce all the sin in the world,-we mean, in any natural sense of the word; or whether, on the contrary, his Sovereignty is of

man.

1 We apologize for using the term "Necessitarianism." There seemed to be need of some term, that might cover the whole of the ground occupied by Fatalism and the Doctrine of Necessity; since we sometimes have occasion to speak of the general principle, without distinguishing the two schemes into which it is fashioned.

such a nature as to be opposed to all sin,-we still mean, in the natural sense of the expression. And to this question, we suppose, there will be no difference in the answers given by thinkers, on all sides; none, at least, so long as they keep to the common sense of language. If they ever appear to differ, it will be by their resorting to some unintelligible use of words. For that He who is perfect holiness, and perfect truthfulness, wills sin, that he wills it into his creatures, and at the same time forbids them to do the very thing which he wills them to do,-forbids them, under pain of his displeasure, to do what he makes them do,-this, taken in any natural sense of the words, would be a proposition absolutely unthinkable, to say nothing of its moral aspects. We can not even so much as think of perfect holiness but as opposed to sin, nor of perfect truthfulness but as opposed to false pretence. And now, to say that in order to hold to the holy and truthful Sovereignty of God, we must also hold him to will and produce sin while he denounces it, or to say that a denial of the latter is a denial of the former, certainly seems like using language after the noted prescription, to conceal one's meaning, if meaning there be.

Entering, now, on the main purpose of the present article, and passing by that scheme of Necessitarianism which is usually called Fatalism, we will attend chiefly to the other, or modified, scheme, commonly known as the Doctrine of Necessity. Fatalism, as a scheme, we may suppose to have been sufficiently laid open in the former article, especially as but few can be brought to stand by it in its integrity and self-consistent forms. But the more current Doctrine of Necessity, though already discussed at some length, may be considered a little further, with profit perhaps to a clear understanding of the matter.

There appears to be a self-inconsistency in its course. And this inconsistency is not accidental, but inherent in its very plan; as will appear, if we look into the case.

Take the so-called Doctrine of Necessity, in its philosophical form; for, like Fatalism, it has its philosophical form, and its theological form. The latter we reserve for subsequent consideration. At present, we ask concerning the former only, On what basis does it stand? Wholly

on that of strictest Necessity. Let it be observed, that the least admission of any different element into the case, explodes the entire structure. This is a circumstance which, it appears to us, is not commonly seen with perfect distinctness; may we, therefore, refer to our former article, for a fuller exposition of it. Thus, founded on pure Necessity, argued on pure Necessity, and defended on pure Necessity, the doctrine claims to be impregnable on that ground alone. But having once become apparently established on those premises, it finds that, in order to adjust itself to certain exigences, it must mitigate this its vital principle by compounding it with some agency of a different kind; forgetful, it would seem, of the only condition on which it can hold its being. We will describe, more in detail, the process through which it passes.

In its philosophical form, then, the doctrine is constructed out of the general maxim, that every thing is necessitated by a fixed succession of previous and attendant causes; we say, out of this general maxim applied to the human mind and conduct, thus: Every movement of our minds, every state of our minds, good or bad, whether it be character, disposition, purpose, motive, or volition, must be produced, precisely such as it is, by some immediate cause or causes; and these immediate causes, together with their action, must be produced, in their turn, by another set of causes behind, of which we have no control; and these, again, by something else still further back, and further out of our reach; and so backwards, set behind set, ad infinitum. The whole, however, is but one tightly linked series, that is interwoven, like a netting of wires, through our wills and through all our faculties, holding them, and so working them after its own way. Our wills, our faculties, can not so much as move, but by the Galvanic shocks that are sent along these wires,-if we may use such a metaphor. Whatever activities we may have within ourselves, they are put in action, and kept in action, and wholly directed in their action, by the force transmitted down to them, from past eternity, through that infinite chain of causes. No movement, no ability to move, ever springs up within us, in any other way; so that we can not think, nor feel, nor will, nor intend, nor act, but as we are made to do by the working of this concatenation that operates behind, around, and through us.