other words, the guide to the objects and phenomena of the "material," and to the typical forms of the "spiritual;" in fact, the key to all human knowledge. The adoption of a theory, put forth under the present form, is not likely to be received, because so much which it involves must be taken for granted, or not taken at all. The world wants proofs, in order to give assent to similar doctrines. It is true we cannot take for proved those imaginative creations which the more vivid fancies of the age may put forth as realities, and here it is that we must pause in yielding our assent to many things which can be at best only conjecture, however ingeniously wrought out and however agreeable in theory. It is not possible here to do that justice to the author's system which it merits, for it would require much space to give even an outline of what rests so much upon the ideal in almost all its relations. We observe, too, that the author is one of those who, we presume, must credit some of the doctrines of Swedenborg, with his two worlds, the natural and the spiritual, on which, or something similar, some might think the basis of the present work is placed. Swedenborg was a very ingenious and clever mechanic and mineralogist, a good man, naturally of a vivacious temperament, until in his advancing age he became possessed with the notion that he had been called by the Lord, under a personal appearance, imparting to him a sight of the spiritual world, and enabling him to converse with supernatural beings and angels, a privilege continued to himself. This was evidently monomania.

From that time to his death he forsook his scientific studies, and published works partaking in general of the predominant idea. His followers, called "New Jerusalemists," have since constituted a small sect, by no means deficient in zeal in support of his ideas, and what he called "the new and perpetual church," of which he was the founder. He furnished a remarkable example of the fact that, to quote a distinguished author, "when the imagination once gets astride of the senses, there is nothing which a man may not bring himself to persuade other people to believe." This we state par parenthesis only, because Mr. Grindon has quoted from Swedenborg, and that there is a similarity in some of his views to those of the distinguished Swede; not that this circumstance creates any prejudice in our remarks upon his pages, but because the similarity is a fact, and there is evidence beyond his own quotation that he exhibits in his scheme that he has considered the labours of that erratic intellect.

Under the head of "Correspondence," the author classes that sympathy which the soul holds with natural objects, and which every thinking man must perceive. These being felt are really within man, for all natural objects exist "because" of man. The author truly says:

"When we admire nature, when we love it, it is virtually admiration of the spiritual and immortal, and this is why the love of nature is so powerful a help towards loving God. Hence, also, the concurrence of science and metaphysics, which are concerned with things essentially the same, only presented under different aspects and conditions. So intimate is the correspondence between the body of man and the faculties of the soul, that Klencke has built upon it an entire system of organic psychology, incited perhaps by the hint of Lord Bacon, when he says that with all this knowledge of the concordances between the mind and the body,

that part of the inquiry is most necessary which considereth of the seats and domiciles which the several faculties do take and occupy.'' The concord, or correspondence between nature and the human soul is no new discovery, says the present author. The mind is in unity with the spiritual essence of the world. How the author works out his "Correspondence" must be seen in his own pages, which are well worthy of perusal, if only, as before observed, for supplying materials for speculative thoughts, besides which, in the course of the advocacy of his principles, he details many facts in natural history which, though cited to strengthen his own views, are, as articles of pleasing information, even under the mode in which they are put or applied, most worthy of attention.

Regarding the author's law of "Use," which he styles the second grand cause of the diversity in the lease of life, so vast in itself, no definition of it will answer that can come into a reasonable compass. It suffices that all uses are said to be answerable to the welfare of the existing organisms, to the instruction and delight of man, and to the glory of God. Each of these three heads is then worked out or explained. The discoveries of geology are touched upon, and all is applied to the support of the author's theories.

The spiritual expression of life, nature, and the seat of the soul, form the head of the next chapter. In that which follows we find "soul, spirit, ghost," disserted upon, the body being their appendage. We have never observed the author's distinction between gwn and pux as the recipient. As to the difference between "ghost" and "spirit," in English, the words are identical in meaning, though the former is often ludicrously applied, and not understood. Holy Spirit should always be substituted when used in a religious sense. We have a chapter on the "True idea of youth and age," well worthy of perusal. The sixteenth chapter treats of the intellectual faculties in relation to life. It concludes with the remark, “We often hear of fine boys. The finest of all boys is the fine old boy, he who has obeyed the poet's great command, 'keep true to the dream of your youth."" The religious element of life is next considered, in which the author truly remarks that "religion is to 'live' a doctrine, not simply to believe' in one." The author sometimes names obscure writers both of the past and present; where the quotation is given all is well, but it is not so with readers who must plead the misfortune of their ignorance in such readings. By-the-by, why does he not print Goethe, or Göthe, not Goëthe, as he quotes German? not that it is of much moment. Regarding religion, he truly observes, "Religion does not consist in for ever busying oneself with religious ideas, in season and out of season; but in letting our knowledge of what is right, colour and 'ensoul' whatever we do. Unhappily, in many minds, religion has been made to consist too much in the performance of certain ceremonies, acknowledging God at stated hours, speaking on given subjects in a certain way; to be, in a word, not what in its purity it really is-a temper, but a pursuit. The consequence is, that, to a great extent, it is shut up in the church at the close of the service, and left there until the Sunday comes round again."

The eighteenth chapter considers that Life is realised by activity, action being the law of happiness. Here we have remarks on the ministration of angels. In another chapter Death is treated in relation to the spiritual

life. Some of the author's ideas are paradoxical. The twentieth chapter is entitled "Rejuveniscence." Nature is Life, subject to particular presentations. Death is but the development of a new life, often the advancement of the old. Thus, the changes the earth has undergone, laid open by geology, and which may again occur, are but successive suites of animals and plants, enduring for ages, to be superseded by others, perhaps for a long succession of time. Thus the world may be considered, as far as certain of its forms go, to be in a continued state of progression. Perhaps this sentiment is carried a little too far in some of its applications. Health and Disease, Miracles, the Resurrection, Mortality and Immortality, Dreams, Analogies of Nature, the Law of Prefiguration, &c., Instinct and Reason, Summary, Inspiration, and Life Epitomised in Genius, are some of the heads treated upon.

We have not space to comment on these, still less to mark out those points to the reader which appear to us not sustainable, as well as to show those which we deem to be sound. We are the less concerned on this head, because it must be clear both to the author and his readers that it would be impossible in a limited space to examine and detail all those points in which we agree or disagree with the author, who is evidently one that has thought very deeply in building up his system-if that term may be used in relation to his labours. It suffices that he has, in expressing his views, brought out collateral lights, in many instances, upon those points in which there can be little difference between thinking men. He has shown the connexion of natural history with his subject, and made use of its phenomena for illustration. It may be said that we have not done justice, but the nature of our notice of the work must be considered more as a mere "notice" than a judgment in relation to it. The work has been much read, for the present is the third edition. We rejoice that such is the fact, because it shows-the merit or the reverse of the author's ideas out of the question-that there are readers enough left, who, turning their vision aside from the huge mass of trivial matter that at present clogs the press, can enter with zest into the consideration of those themes which the boundless field of speculative thought presents to well-regulated minds, whether such thoughts partake most of the vapoury images that "come like shadows" and " so depart, or gradually assuming a substantial shape, are in the end received as new and worthy truths.

To say that the presentation to the world of the fruits of pure imagination, and airy theories which may result from their admission by a portion of the community, is an evil because it may be adverse to current notions or established feelings and habits, is to bar all mental advance. The world moves, and things in it must move in accordance. The consideration of novelties which present themselves to the mind, if they are proved valid and equal in that respect to those which are generally received, have a right to occupy a similar position, and must rank accordingly. Their validity is the main point to be considered by readers. Even under the head of amusement, the examination of a work, novel in theory and the employment of the mind in such a pursuit, is a far more worthy thing than the perusal of those works which, without truth, simplicity, or erudition, and those of France more particularly, without morality, occupy precious time as if they were valuable treasures to our fleeting humanity.

We confess that there is something pleasing, could they but be proved true, in several of the ideas detailed in this work. That death should be but a rejuveniscence is a pleasing notion, flattering human vanity, but with a rejuveniscence, without a consciousness of the past as a guide to improvement, it would be of no moment to us. That geological successions are similar as regards the past, and simple advances towards the state in which the earth became adapted for the reception of man, has been admitted, and that the renewals of all things will continue for an unknown period of time, the death of organic and inorganic substances or matters at one time being no more than a herald to a further advance at hand, these are agreeable speculations as affects matter. Their due consideration is a task to which the author's ingenuity and labour, his zeal in the promulgation of his sentiments, and freedom from all gloom of his views in respect to the future, eminently entitle him. Every writer has a just claim to the public attention, more especially when the nature of his subject is deeply interesting. There has been no stint of thought in Mr. Grindon's work. Its interest is great. As he grounds most of his opinions upon what is consonant with Holy Writ, he may be read and studied by every denomination of Christians, except those who believe their own creed infallible, and that any change in views, religious or political, that has been once settled by habit is a sort of bold treason. The present work has been, and will be, read extensively. We have said we do not agree with some things it puts forth, but it merits that consideration which to all such works is a duty, or more, at least, than a mere gratification of curiosity. It is a source of knowledge to a certain extent, even where there is a dissent from principles, most of which it is but justice to state are not presented here ex cathedrá, but are fairly left to the reader's own consideration, after being put in a mode that leaves no doubt of the writer's earnestness. The misfortune is that too little is proved; but such is the case with all that is speculative and pleasant, calculated to cheer that view of human nature which we are apt to regard, perhaps, as too sombre, with the best colouring we can put upon it. If the work made clear the hopes it does but excite, it would be, indeed, a treasure in the way of discovering a medicine for the unequivocal suffering of our common nature, and that of far more efficacy than those hopes which some are apt to cherish on their own vagueness. Demonstrative deficiency is, we still fear, not to be removed by the illusions of the imagination alone, however brilliant and cheering their aspect; yet we must not abandon the poetry of our existence to substitute cold reality without the latter be of weighty concernment, and no less clear than imperious as regards our more important interests. All that is not plain to the organs of sense must be planted and nurtured in the imagination before it is received as an established truth.

CYRUS REDDING.

STRATHMORE;

OR, WROUGHT BY HIS OWN HAND.

A LIFE ROMANCE.

BY THE AUTHOR of “Granville de Vigne," &c.

PART THE SEVENTH.

I.

THE ASHES IN THE LAMP.

THERE was no moment when Lady Vavasour was so resistless as en negligée in her own dressing-room. With half the pearls and diamonds of her regalia glittering on her in the presence-chamber of St. James's or the Tuileries, though perhaps more dazzling, she was less dangerous than reclining among her cushions like the odalisque of a harem, with the light softly shaded and the air scented with attar of roses, with her shower of hair unloosed, and the folds of some texture, white as snow, or delicate in colouring as the blush on the opal, half enshrouding, half unveiling her, as the sea-foam the goddess. She was so lovely, then, at midnight or morning! and it was a privacy wherein so few saw her, while of even those few, each believed himself the only one!

Strathmore looked at her where she lay, with her feet softly sheathed in pearl-broidered slippers, and a slight smile of amused reverie just parting her lips. He adored her beauty now as madly as at first, and his eyes dwell on it unsated; indeed, with a fiercer and fonder delight, because it had been long his own. It was the morning after Hernani, and he thought of the hint that had been thrown out to him the night before, with disdainful ridicule, and bitter scorn of the man who had employed such methods to implant the lie he had not even dared repeat. Long ago at White Ladies he had suspected where the root of Erroll's bitterness upon her lay; in the last few weeks at Auteuil his suspicion had strengthened into certainty, and this morning, as he felt her hand wander over his brow where he lay at her feet, he repented that he had allowed the memory of any friendship to stay him, and that he had not washed out with fitter punishment the coward envy that had sought to revenge itself on him by the suggestion of a hideous suspicion. Truly all better things are swept away betwixt men, when once the face of a woman has come between them!

"What are you thinking of, caro?" she asked him, softly touching his hair.

In her husband's house they were as secure from intrusion as though they had been alone in Naxos or Cyprus. Celeste was always without en sentinelle on such occasions, and even that precaution was needless. "I was thinking-how many would make you faithless to me if they

could."

"What a wide field for speculation-there are hundreds! Well, if they succeeded, I should not expect you to complain."

'Hush! Do not jest about that."

"Why not?" she laughed. "Love wisely taken is a jest, you know.