for him official posts. It was while burdened with these severe public labours, that he wrote thirteen (from Montgomery to Pitt) of the Edinburgh Review Essays. Thus he went on for four years, but the narrow circumstances of his family induced him to accept the lucrative post of legal adviser to the Supreme Council of India. This necessitated his going to India, which was clearly adverse to his prospects at home; yet the certainty of returning with £20,000 saved from his large salary was sufficient inducement to make the sacrifice, and he sailed Feb. 15, 1834.

In India he maintained his reputation as a hard worker. Besides his official duties as a Member of Council, he undertook the additional burden of acting as Chairman in two important Committees, and it is in connection with one of these-the Committee appointed to draw up the new codes, that he has his chief title to fame as an Indian statesman. The New Penal Code was in great part his work, and proves his wide acquaintance with English Criminal Law. He also took great part in the work of the Committee of Public Instruction, and was chiefly instrumental in introducing English studies among the native population. But he was not popular in Calcutta. Certain changes he helped to introduce roused the feeling of the English residents against him, and he was attacked in the most scurrilous way.

In 1838, he was back in England. Meanwhile he had written two more essays for the Edinburgh, one on Mackintosh, and one on Bacon, and he was hardly home when there appeared another, that on Sir W. Temple. After spending the winter in Italy, he reviewed in 1839 Mr. Gladstone's book on Church and State, and might have settled down to purely literary life, but once more he was drawn into politics. Elected as Member for Edinburgh, he was soon admitted into the Cabinet as Secretaryat-War to the Whig Ministry of Lord Melbourne. The position, however, was no gain to Macaulay. He purposed to write

"A History of England, from the accession of King James II., down to a time which is within the memory of men still living," and his official duties forced him to lay this project aside for the present.

Fortunately Lord Melbourne's ministry did not last long; it fell in 1841, and Macaulay was released from office. Still retaining his seat for Edinburgh, and speaking occasionally in the House, he was free to follow his natural bent.

His leisure hours were given as usual to essay-work for the Edinburgh, and he wrote in succession, Clive, Hastings, Frederick the Great, Addison, Chatham, &c. But in 1844, his connection with the Review came to an end, and he wrote no more for the Blue and Yellow, as it was called. In 1841, he had put forth a volume of poems-the Lays of Ancient Rome-not without misgivings as to the result. But the fresh and vigorous language at once carried the volume into popularity, and it had an enormous sale.

On a change of Government in 1846, Macaulay, at the request of Lord John Russel again became a Cabinet Minister, this time as Paymaster-General of the Army, and having to seek re-election from his constituents, went down to Scotland for the purpose. After a severe contest, and notwithstanding a growing unpopularity, he was successful. But at the general election of the following year, the forces in opposition to him redoubled their energy, and he was defeated.

This was the real end of his political life. Although pressed to contest other seats, he resolutely declined, and for the next few years worked 'doggedly' at his History. In 1848, appeared the first two volumes, which had an immense success, 13,000 copies being sold in less than four months. The same year he was elected Lord Rector of Glasgow University. By 1852, the people of Edinburgh had repented the rejection of their famous Member, and took steps to re-elect him free of expense, and so thoroughly was the scheme carried out, that Macaulay, without

having made a single speech, and without having visited the city, was returned triumphantly at the top of the poll. Through the length and breadth of the land the news was hailed with satisfaction, as an act of justice for an undeserved slight in the past. The result was very flattering to Macaulay, but he never really returned to political life as in his younger days. Moreover, forty years of incessant intellectual labours had begun to undermine his health, and he was now unequal to the fatigues that formerly were a pleasure to him. Accordingly in 1856,

after having brought out the third and fourth volumes of his history, of which in a few months 25,000 copies were sold, he resigned his seat, and yielding too late obedience to all interested in his welfare, gave himself up to the enjoyment of that ease which he had faithfully earned. Then in 1857, he was created a Peer-Baron Macaulay of Rothley, his birthplace. Still struggling on with his History in the intermissions of his malady, he died suddenly on Dec. 28, 1859. He was only 59 -the victim of an appetite for work, insatiable and unfortunately too long ungoverned.

Joannis Miltoni, Angli, de Doctrina Christiana libri duo posthumi. A Treatise on Christian Doctrine, compiled from the Holy Scriptures alone. By JOHN MILTON; translated from the original by Charles R. Sumner, M.A., &c., &c. 1825.

OWARDS the close of the year 1823, Mr. Lemon,

TOWARD

Deputy-keeper of the State Papers, in the course of his researches among the presses of his office, met with a large Latin manuscript. With it were found corrected copies of the foreign despatches written by 5 Milton, while he filled the office of Secretary,* and several papers relating to the Popish Trials and the Rye-house Plot. The whole was wrapped up in an envelope, superscribed To Mr. Skinner, Merchant'. On examination, the large manuscript proved to be 10 the long lost Essay on the Doctrines of Christianity, which, according to Wood and Toland, Milton finished

* After the execution of Charles I. in 1649, Milton was appointed Secretary to the Council of State. This office corresponds to our Foreign Secretary. The official language in those days was Latin.

† A Whig plot to assassinate Charles II., on his return from New Market. It was discovered, and several persons, notably Lord William Russell and Algernon Sidney, suffered death.

after the Restoration, and deposited with Cyriac Skinner. Skinner, it is well known, held the same political opinions with his illustrious friend. It is therefore probable, as Mr. Lemon conjectures, that he 5 may have fallen under the suspicions of the government during that persecution of the Whigs which followed the dissolution of the Oxford Parliament, and that, in consequence of a general seizure of his papers, this work may have been brought to the office in which 10 it has been found. But whatever the adventures of the manuscript may have been, no doubt can exist that it is a genuine relic of the great poet.

Mr. Sumner, who was commanded by His Majesty to edit and translate the treatise, has acquitted himself 15 of his task in a manner honourable to his talents and to his character. His version is not indeed very easy or elegant; but it is entitled to the praise of clearness and fidelity. His notes abound with interesting quotations, and have the rare merit of really elucidating 20 the text.

The preface is evidently the work of a sensible and candid man, firm in his own religious opinions, and tolerant towards those of others.

The book itself will not add much to the fame of Milton. It is, like all his Latin works, well written25 though not exactly in the style of the prize essays of

Oxford and Cambridge. There is no elaborate imitation of classical antiquity, no scrupulous purity, none of the ceremonial cleanness which characterises the diction of our academical Pharisees. The author does