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THE very best manual of public speaking which we have seen whether we consider the sagacity of thought, the point of the style, the moral sincerity and candor, or the brevity and directness of the counsel, is Mr. Holyoake's little volume, whose title we give below.* Popular debate is a very earnest and a very formidable business among the humbler classes of intelligent Englishmen, for whom he especially writes. Fas est et ab hoste doceri; and in seeking to give to preachers and teachers of the Divine Word the benefit of such skill as their antagonists have developed, the American editor has done well to adopt this manual. The notes, and the Essay on the British Pulpit, add little to its value.

We have received a thin, handsome volume, on the great old problem, to reconcile Science and Faith. The author, who writes with considerable ability, and strong conviction, attempts no new metaphysical solution. His argument is, that the two should respect each the other's boundaries; and that a practical solution is found in so adjusting the course of college instruction as to do full justice to both, - the results of induction being our authority for the one, and the truths of revelation for the other. The formula is not precisely novel, but it is put with earnestness, and with the strong belief that America is the true field for reconciling the old-world controversies. The best part of the book is the clear and excellent analysis of the tendencies, or parties, that make the existing discords of human belief. The sketch of a proposed course of instruction for the young depends for its realizing, of course, on the degree to which the instructors are already imbued with the method. Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? As a book of hints and suggestions, both teachers and thinkers will find it of service. To them we cordially commend it.

WHEN one hears the trash that is sung in our country churches nowa-days, it is hard to feel grateful to the pioneers who gave so great an impulse to church music twenty years ago. They brought many really good tunes into use, and some good ones have become familiar since; but there was better psalmody on the whole when honest old "Handel and Haydn" held sway, than now. And the degeneracy in the music has spoiled our choirs. Time was when every country town had its choir, which enjoyed the solid anthems of the Academy, and the rich, sweet music of the Ancient Lyre, and which was not even staggered by a chorus from the Messiah or the Creation. Now, nothing but what is easy and sentimentally pretty will suit. Voices are not trained to the higher notes, ears are not trained to grand chords, and at a change of key, or an unusual interval of notes, the singers are bewildered and discouraged. And there are plenty of so-called musicians to pander to this feebleness, and year after year the market is flooded

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with strange names of books, and stranger names of tunes, until it would seem that ingenuity in nomenclature must be exhausted, and the washy stream stop flowing from its own weakness. One would really despair, were it not for a comforting fact now and then; - as, for instance, that it has been thought worth while lately to republish so rich a treasure-house of music as Zeuner's American Harp; that the Ancient Lyre, the best single collection within our knowledge, has a steady and constantly increasing sale; and that, occasionally, a new book is published, as excellent as that which the accomplished Treasurer of the Commonwealth has devoted his leisure hours to preparing.* is largely made up of new music, and much of the old that is inserted has been forgotten in our generation. Among the old tunes are General Oliver's own productions, some of the best of Zeuner's, and a fine selection of those grand English tunes which ought to form a large part of the repertory of every choir. We should add also the German and English anthems, which may be old, but which are new to us. Arrangements from the great masters we are glad to see comparatively few of. We have no fancy for "Batti, batti," under the name of Smyrna, the Austrian National Hymn under that of Westborough, or the Prayer in Der Freyschütz under that of Betah. Of the new tunes there are many excellent ones by the compiler himself, e. g. Melrose and Algernon. Some, however, seem rather labored and artificial, and none are to our thinking so good as the old favorites, Federal Street and Walnut Grove. Perhaps the best things in the book are tunes by some of our well-known musicians, of which we would especially mention Faith and Aspiration, by S. P. Tuckerman, Newstead and Chelsea, by J. F. Tuckerman, and Gloucester, by Edward Hodges, - admirable specimens of very different styles. We are glad to observe that the stanzas of hymns given here are free from dogmatic and sectarian phrases, - which in some collections have been unpleasantly prominent. The book, by the way, is all music, with no "Accidence" or "Elements" for vocal drill.

THE plan of an annual survey, which should arrange, digest, and fuse into a symmetric form the best literary productions of the year, giving the substance of theology, philosophy, history, and literature, as they have been brought out in the year's publications, commends itself to the reason of all thinking men. The difficulty is only in its impartial and judicious execution. In so large a survey, much must be omitted. What shall be the standard of insertion or omission? If dogmatic prejudice rules, the most valuable works may be excluded. If literary friendships are allowed to have influence, works may be admitted which severe justice would reject. Clearly, no single editor is competent to the task: and in the number of editors which so various a task would seem to require, there is great risk of inequality in the parts, and of want of harmony. If all the editors are of the same school, the work will be one-sided and not trustworthy. If they are of different schools, it is likely to be vague, weak, and hesitating in its criticism, bearing throughout the tone of caution and compromise. It would seem almost impossible to make such an annual "Tableau" a frank, full, and impartial condensation of all the new and permanently valuable thought of the year.

We cannot say that the company of Catholic priests and professors who have aided the Dr. Duillé de Saint Projet in describing and reviewing the literary and theological productions of the year 1860,* have succeeded in giving a complete, an impartial, or a satisfactory survey. We could not expect this, where the design is so avowedly to criticise everything from the Romanist stand-point, and to point out its relation to Catholic doctrine and to Catholic ideas. These gentlemen not only confess their dogmatic purpose, but they defend it and they rejoice in it. The main object of their joint labor is to refute heresy and to oppose dangerous error. They write as watchmen of the faith, whose duty it is to give the alarm and to show the danger. Their selection of books to be noticed is made wholly with a view to exalt that which is Catholic, and to degrade that which has any other interest. Although less than half the volume is appropriated specially to "Theology," the whole volume is sacred to Catholic orthodoxy, which rules the notice of science, of history, of novels, of journalism, and of the fine arts, as much as of religious criticism and controversy. No one of the painters in this large "Tableau" forgets that he is a pledged servant of the Holy Mother Church.

Allowance made for this open and dominant dogmatic prejudice, the plan which these priests propose is well carried out. They have given us an interesting book, always good and clear, and often eloquent, in style, ingenious in reasoning, well proportioned in its parts, and just in many of its criticisms. After an Introduction of fourteen pages, in which the design and plan of the work are explained, it proceeds to treat in order, under the head of "Religion," - 1. The Catholic Movements of 1860, principally those which relate to the Papal sovereignty, noticing here all the most important books and pamphlets, and the great Cyclopædia of Catholic Theology, translated by Goschler from the German of Drs. Wetzer and Welte; 2. Apologetic labors, with notice of the works of Deschamps and Freppel; 3. Polemics, with notice of the works of the Prince Albert de Broglie, of the various answers to M. Renan, and of the famous "Conferences de Notre Dame"; 4. The Worship of Mary, with especial praise of the work, "The Virgin Mary alive in the Church," by Auguste Nicolas (a very different writer from Michel Nicolas, who is to these Catholics only a blasphemer); 5. "Piety," or Practical Religion, with obituary notices of eminent deceased preachers, and of recent ascetic works; 6. The Græco-Russian theology, as interpreted by Gagarin and Galitzin, with the hope con

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Revue de l'Année Religieuse, Philosophique et Littéraire, Tableau Annuel des principales Productions de la Théologie, de la Philosophie, de l'Histoire et de la Littérature. Paris: Jacques Lecoffre et Cie. 1861. 12mo. pp. 520.

fidently expressed that Russia is about to become Catholic; 7. Protestantism, in which the present destructive tendencies of that schism are pointed out, and the evangelical and rationalistic parties are made to share equally the disgrace of their position, M. de Pressensé faring no better than Scherer and Réville. This survey covers 190 pages, and our statement of it will give an idea of the method pursued throughout.

After this are treated in order Philosophy, traditionalist, rationalist, theist, idealist, materialist, and mystico-sceptical; History, of the Monks, of Mary Magdalen, of France, of Joan of Arc, of the Consulate and Empire and the Restoration, and the "Archæology" of the year; "Literature" and the Drama, with notices of eight schools of "romance"; "Law," in its various departments; "Science," especially medical and chemical science; the Fine Arts; and finally the "Periodicals," Reviews, Magazines, and Newspapers, secular and religious, general and special.

If the Liberal thinkers of France, from their stand-point, would give us an annual volume of this kind, it would be exceedingly valuable. It would be, on a larger scale, what the quarterly summaries of the Westminster Review are in England.

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In a time of revolution, events so fast outrun men's criticism on them, that this comes more for curiosity than guidance. At this moment, our government seems to have triumphantly proved its thesis, that secession was the work of a faction, and that the majority in the seceding States have remained loyal to the old federation. But what one month proved, the previous ten had steadily belied. And it is no wonder that the social revolution, the open war on slavery, which the more conservative reserved for the last military emergency, should have seemed to the more zealous the necessary and only policy to inaugurate the campaign. We have before called attention to the singular eloquence and force with which this is urged by the author of "The Rejected Stone." It is presented again, with power far inferior, yet carefully and earnestly, in another little volume issued by the same publishers. The argument is already a little distanced by the triumphant march of events. Yet it is an argument that will keep, and may have its future uses. At any rate, the retrospect is always valuable. It is put clearly and strongly by this new writer. "Barons of the South" is the felicitous phrase in which John Adams, nearly eighty years ago, indicated the hostility his keen sense discerned between the governing class at the South and the sincere republicanism of the North. As Thierry throws a glare of light on the early history of England by teaching us to look at the Norman conquerors as an encamped army, with its general for king, and its officers for lords, - for centuries hostile and strangers in a land not theirs, - so we see our political history shown dramatically as the working out of a plot against liberty, followed from the beginning by these new "Barons" on democratic soil; and there is about as much truth in one view as in the other. The story is very instructive; and the frequent telling of it will save us, we trust, from any repetition of the great calamity and dishonor that had all but issued in the overthrow of the Republic.

The later steps of this conspiracy we have seen nowhere so well and clearly traced as in the Address of Mr. Channing, delivered and published in England, and for sale by the same publishers. A timely and patriotic service when first rendered, it remains of permanent value as a brief, eloquent, and sufficient summary of the facts which justify our nation in accepting the terrible arbitrament of war, - war, let us hope, now advancing rapidly toward its victorious close.

A new edition of "The Uprising of a Great People" includes the seasonable and friendly discussion of that point of controversy with England two months ago so threatening, but so happily settled since on a basis that seems to promise a better understanding of the rights of neutrals, and new guaranties of peace.

It gives us pleasure to mention, in this connection, the recent Election Sermon of Mr. Alger, careful in thought, vigorous in statement, and elevated in tone, - an excellent exposition of the order of religious thought suited to the time, and the more meritorious as it avoids the temptation of entering into the details of those questions of public policy which just now may well perplex our wisest men.

It is a little trying at this day to find an old accusation of bad faith against our government brought up afresh, and that not only in such prints as Blackwood and the London Times, but in a paper which looks strangely out of place in our liberal contemporary, the Westminster Review. The charge is, that, in the settlement of the northeastern boundary, in 1842, Mr. Webster suppressed a map assumed to be that on which Franklin had traced the treaty boundary, and so deceived Lord Ashburton into assenting to unjust terms. We had supposed the controversy was long ago laid to rest by the following facts, which it seems require re-statement now :- 1. That the commissioners had previously agreed to waive all discussion of the terms of the old treaty, and to decide on a new line, and therefore, even supposing the map genuine, Mr. Webster was noway bound to bring it forward; 2. That there is no proof that the map in question was Franklin's, and in fact the line on it is too rudely traced, and on too small a scale, to be of any service as authority; 3. That a map on a much larger scale, of more recent date, and of far higher claims to authenticity, having the boundary laid down according to the American claim, and certified (apparently) in the handwriting of George III. himself, lay, in fact, at that time, in the British archives, and was suppressed, by some person in the interest of the British government, until the settlement of 1842 had been agreed to. Curiously enough, the two maps were used after