be reconciled to our views of Divine perfection without that expedient, they cannot be reconciled with it. But the passage is quoted to shew, that this theory of law does involve, in our author's own mind, that limitation of Almighty power which has just been attributed to it.

II. The charge of narrowness of view lies not against that conception of the Deity which resolves acts of creation into his immediate working, but against the theory which is here developed as the more enlightened and elevated one. If, indeed, it were necessary to suppose that "creative intelligence was constantly moving from one sphere to another, to form and plant the various species which may be required in each situation at particular times," (p. 161,) the idea of direct creation on the part of God must be abandoned. But such a notion as this is derived from a material view of the Deity which we altogether reject. To the limited capacity of man it is something gained, that he can employ instrumentalities for the purpose of effecting the objects he contemplates, instead of endeavouring to accomplish them by his personal agency alone. He thus shortens his labour, and enlarges the sphere of his influence. But omnipotence, by its very nature, places its subject above all such instrumentalities. It is the sublime attribute of an Almighty intelligence, that whatever he desires to do is done by his simple fiat. To regard him as working all things by the immediate counsel of his will, is to form a conception of his majesty, which differs from the rule we apply to ourselves only because it is more elevated and extended than any human analogies can reach. If we could form no other idea of power than that conveyed by material agency, such anthropomorphic views of the Author of Nature as this book deals in, might satisfy our thought; but while we acknowledge the existence of an infinite spiritual force as the great property of the Creator, we naturally estimate the comparative excellence of conceptions of the Deity as they embrace the most pure and perfect exhibition of such force. It will be observed that in the extract given above, there is an acknowledgment of the doctrine of Divine Providence. Such an acknowledgment is fatal to the whole theory in connexion with which it is made. If there were any strength in the argument against the immediate operation of God in creation, it would equally tell against his exercise of providential supervision; and if such a supervision is believed to be exercised by him, all that is required on his part, for the purpose of an immediate creation, is conceded.

III. If we seriously ask ourselves what is meant by creation, the answer we shall obtain will of itself be quite sufficient to explode the theory of Divine operation now under review. Throughout this book, creation is constantly confounded with mere change of form. It is, or ought to be, one of its objects to prove, that the origination of new beings proceeds from the same principles which govern the ordinary alterations occurring in organized and inorganized matter. But this, instead of being proved, is quietly assumed; and wherever a change of form can be produced, it is treated as though it were of the same nature as creation; and wherever a positive creation is the subject of remark, it is treated as though it involved no more than such change. The preservation of the plain distinction between these two things will destroy the force of most of the reasoning employed. If the bringing into existence of a being which did not previously exist, does not of

itself, by its very nature, indicate the operation of divine power,power which is peculiar to the Deity,-nothing can afford such an indication. The reasoning which denies to it this application, if consistently carried out, will amount to a denial of the personal existence of the Deity altogether. The same grounds on which his interference in acts of creation is controverted, will equally support the theory that nature has arisen without the agency of God at all. The theist, if deprived of the argument from creation, will be unable successfully to defend his position; and the argument from creation is of no value, unless it can be brought to bear upon the immediate exertion of infinite power by the Creator. If creation does not prove divine agency by the necessity for Almighty interference which it involves, that agency may be absolutely rejected. The condition of matter which could produce such a phenomenon, implies the possession by the matter of a power which, if it does not belong exclusively to the Deity, nothing can. God is effectually superseded; and the theory which thus takes away one of the main supports of our faith in his being, cannot, by the smooth professions which it makes, be allowed to shake off the imputation of the Atheism to which it most certainly leads.

r.

FRUITS OF A RELIGION OF FORMS.

WHEN We see the hand, red with the blood of the wretched native, raised to invoke the blessing of Heaven on the cause which it maintains, we experience something like a sensation of disgust at the act, and a doubt of its sincerity. But this is unjust. We should throw ourselves back (it cannot be too often repeated) into the age-the age of the Crusades. For every Spanish cavalier, however sordid and selfish might be his private motives, felt himself to be the soldier of the Cross. Many of them would have died in defence of it. Whoever has read the correspondence of Cortes, or, still more, has attended to the circumstances of his career, will hardly doubt that he would have been among the first to lay down his life for the Faith. He more than once perilled life and fortune, and the success of his whole enterprize, by the premature and most impolitic manner in which he would have forced conversion on the natives. To the more rational spirit of the present day, enlightened by a purer Christianity, it may seem difficult to reconcile gross deviations from morals with such devotion to the cause of religion. But the religion taught in that day was one of form and elaborate ceremony. In the punctilious attention to discipline, the spirit of Christianity was permitted to evaporate. The mind, occupied with forms, thinks little of substance. In a worship that is addressed too exclusively to the senses, it is often the case that morality becomes divorced from religion, and the measure of righteousness is determined by the creed rather than by the conduct.-Prescott's History of the Conquest of Mexico, Vol. III. p. 362.

LETTERS FROM THE LATE ROBERT SOUTHEY, ESQ., TO MRS.
MARY HAYS.*

DEAR MADAM,-My letter would be a valuable one, if the ability of suggesting any fit subject for your talents were equal to the good-will with which it is attempted.

Novels are generally interesting in proportion as they excite our attention by what is new. I think the manners and customs of other countries and other times afford mines of such novelty, as yet unransacked. The materials are easily acquired from our numerous books of travels. It will be far more difficult to keep up the metaphysical costume. If I did not believe you were capable of overcoming this difficulty, I should not offer the suggestion. Some materials for thinking may be afforded by thus contrasting the opinions and institutions of different countries, and enforcing what is true every where.

The French Atala owed all its celebrity to its scenery and manners; it had the effect of the serious pantomimes at our theatres. Oscar and Malvina, or the Death of Captain Cook, and all its scenery, and ten-fold as much painted with ten-thousand-fold more genius, is to be found in Bartram's Travels. St. Pierre's Tales have this advantage in a high degree. I do not know a single English novel that possesses it. Many plans have at various times occurred to me, but the seed never remained long enough to germinate. I remember one which would almost be the antithesis to Atala. A Portuguese, on her way from India to the mother country to become a nun, wrecked on the coast of Africa, and falling into the power of the Caffres-the best savages of whom we have yet heard to convert her and her father confessor till he marries her to a negro, might form the groundwork of a story. If you like to dwell upon the darker side of the picture, the scene of a gloomier action may be laid among the fiercer American tribes, or in Hindostan. Manco Capac, the civilizer of Peru, has always appeared to me an excellent hero for a philosophical romance, but I have felt the full difficulty of forming any solution, short of miracle, for his appearing where he did and improving savages by so wonderful a conquest of intellect over ignorance. Should you think of building any story upon foreign ground, I can perhaps save you some trouble by referring you to the readiest source of information.

Whenever I have thought of writing a novel among my own ways and means, to develop some single character has been the main object of the plan; such, for instance, as a man who accustoms himself to look at every thing in a ridiculous point of view, till by laughing at every thing, he laughs away every good principle. A great mind ruined by a little failing would well deserve to be delineated-by indecision, or procrastination, or by that excess of good-humour which submits to weaker intellect rather than inflict pain. I have dwelt with more pleasure upon the ideal character of a man renouncing fair prospects for principle, throwing himself upon the world with the belief that while he can obtain food, raiment and shelter, it is beneath him to be unhappy, and being happy in consequence of that belief.

The narrative of Madame Godin has been translated, and is so very short, that I once transcribed it. I should be sorry to see you employed in translation; nor is it easy to point out any work of merit which has not already been made English. I remember a wild Ariosto-like romance by Cazotte, called Ollivier. Gibbon's recommendation induced me to read it. One volume would comprise it, and perhaps the author's name might give it a saleable notoriety. There is a romance of far higher merit by the Abbé Terrasson, of which there is a translation by a Mr. Lediard, some fifty years old, not enough known nor common enough to prevent the success of another. Sethos is the book I mean. It has as much learning as the Anacharsis, though unfortunately the author

* See C. R. (8vo) Vol. XI. pp. 813, 941.

has given no references, and therefore gains no credit. The character of the hero is very finely conceived-a philosopher who voluntarily resigns a kingdom and a mistress. If you could find a bookseller who would set out this book with good maps and prints, for which Denon's book would supply noble scenery, I am certain it could not fail to answer. It would fill two octavo volumes.

There is a good History of Charlemagne, in four duodecimos, by Gaillard; a History of the Arabs, of the same length, by the Abbé Marigny; but this last, I think, has been Englished. Booksellers are the people to judge of the saleableness of such works. Their merit is another thing. Travels are more saleable. Sir John Chardin is the best traveller that ever went eastward, and only one volume was ever translated. This would be expensive on account of re-engraving many prints; but books sell the better for prints. Something might be added to his accounts from later travellers. There exists no translation of Niebuhr's Travels, except a miserable mutilation by that wretched Scotchman, Heron. These writers are both of great and established merit. The former I should prefer, were I a bookseller, and should be sanguine in my expectations of success. I think it extends to six small volumes: about half was published in our language, in one folio. Three quartos might comprise it. But your powers of language ought not to be wasted upon translation.

In whatever plan you may adopt, if there be any way in which I can be of the smallest service, I shall be very glad to prove that the proffer is not a mere form of courtesy. Should you like my first suggestion, I have a trick of dreaming stories, and could send you some rude outlines, which you might work upon at your own pleasure, and fill up or use as painters use their daubs. In the course of next month I expect to visit London, and will then look for Ollivier, (which is somewhere among my poor scattered books,) that you may cast your eye over it. Meantime, if you can make me in any way useful, command me freely. The points on which we differ are fewer than those on which we agree, and our hopes of mankind are the same.

Yours truly and respectfully,
ROBERT SOUTHEY.

Kingsdown, Bristol, May 23, 1803.

My dear Madam,-You attribute more weight among the booksellers to my recommendation than it possesses. It might be of some avail if they referred a manuscript to me, but it is of none in introducing a work to them, for this reason, that they regard subject as the main thing, and consider themselves as the best judges of that, which probably they are. If the subject be likely to succeed among other winter fashions, then they think about the execution, and refer it to some professor of criticism, which, in contradistinction to cobbling, may be called the ungentle craft.

The history of our manners from the accession of the Stuarts, is, I fear, only to be collected from scattered authorities. Just at that point you will find a very interesting document at the end of Stowe's Chronicle, containing all his recollections of the changes which had taken place. A continuation of Warton's History of Poetry is announced, which will probably give you all the light you want respecting the literature. But for morals, fashions and domestic habits, till the days of Addison, there are, I believe, no better documents to be found than what can be picked out of the dunghill of our comic writers. For this reason, the latter part of your work will be the most laborious.

Messrs. Longman are about to send off a parcel to me, in which your papers may be enclosed.

Yours very truly and respectfully,
ROBERT SOUTHEY.

UNITARIANISM IN GERMANY.*

THE course which the cause of religious reformation has taken in Germany, varies considerably from that which it has pursued in this country and in the United States. Here, the differences of opinion which a regard to scripture and to the dictates of the human mind have within the last century developed, have led to secessions not only from the Episcopal Church, but also from various bodies of Dissenters, and so to the formation of separate societies and institutions which pursue their work apart from the Trinitarian communions. In Germany, however, there has been little or no withdrawing from the several State Churches, but the progress of religious change has gone quietly but effectually on in connexion with, and even under the support of, the ancient ecclesiastical institutions. One consequence of this process is, that the great doctrinal changes which have been going forward have been either unknown or misunderstood by foreigners. Outwardly, the German Church has appeared to be Trinitarian; inwardly, the most distinguished of its theologians, and the more cultivated of its laity, have renounced the Trinity. Judging it by outward appearances, some Englishmen have considered that it was firm in its adherence to the old formularies of faith. Others, a little less acquainted with facts than these, looking at the Church internally, have declared that it had broken away from the Christian moorings altogether, and was floating wildly on the troubled sea of scepticism.

It is always dangerous to speak of large bodies of men and great religious movements in general and indiscriminate terms. In the case before us, serious mistakes have been made by this rash and hasty manner of judging. There is, indeed, truth in the opinions of which we have spoken. The German Church outwardly professes the doctrine of the Trinity, yet in many parts more in form than in substance, having full liberty of inquiry and full liberty of speech. Many Germans, both divines and laymen, hold as well as profess the doctrine of the Trinity, yet those who believe it in the established, the traditional, the ecclesiastical-that is, the only proper sense, are neither very numerous nor very eminent. It is equally certain that many, both in and out of the Church, have in Germany so far rejected the miraculous character of the gospel as to place themselves outside of the pale of the Christian communion, as that communion is understood by the writer; yet even in this case it must be added that, speaking generally, these persons have not given up the Christian name, and would consider themselves aggrieved were that name to be denied them.

But, setting aside these extreme cases, we feel ourselves justified in saying, that among the more sober-minded members of the German Church, whether theologians or not, there is a general disbelief of Trinitarian doctrines, in conjunction with such a reception of Christianity as prevails in the Unitarian Church of this country and of the United States. The detailed evidence on which this opinion rests, may at no distant time be laid before the public in a work designed to present the actual state of Antitrinitarian Christianity as it exists in

There is One only God (Es ist Nur ein einiger Gott, &c.); or, the Doctrine of the Augsburg Confession brought to the Bar of the Bible and of History. By Dr. H. A. Bergmann. Leipsic. 1843.