This is a beautiful and highly decorated volume, splendidly bound, and well printed. It is illustrated with engravings after original designs by H. Billings, a Boston artist of great and peculiar merit, whose fine and fertile genius we should like to see oftener employed in the illustration of the poets.

Whittier is a positive force in the community, and has popularity as well as reputation. As a poet of sentiment and imagination he is known wherever American literature is read, and has been recognized as an originality by criticism. But even if the critics had denounced, it would have made little difference with his popularity, for his burning lyrics have been sung and declaimed by thousands who know nothing and care nothing for questions relating to style and rhythm. A man with so grand and large a heart—a heart that instinctively runs out in sympathy with his fellow men, must necessarily exercise influence. But this sensibility, though an important and noble element in Whittier’s genius, occasionally does more than its portion of the work of production. Passion, of itself, is not a high peculiarity of a poet, but impassioned imagination is, perhaps, the highest. Now Whittier has passion and has imagination, but they are not always combined. Sensibility is only valuable as it gives force and fire to thought, and the grandest poems in the present collection are those in which conceptions are penetrated with emotions, and the least valuable are those in which emotions get the start of conceptions and roll out on their own account. The reader of the present volume, however, will find a class of poems in it essentially different from those which are intellectually vehement or passionately vehement—a class which are pure utterances of the author’s soul in its most contemplative moods. These are exquisitely tender and beautiful, giving evidence of a mind which to all lovely objects in the material world can

No one can read the present volume without being struck with the vigor and variety of the author’s mind, the breadth and intensity of his sympathies, and the true manliness of his character. The success of such a work is certain.

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This is one of the most original and striking books ever published in the United States, and if it were not marred by some needless obscurities in the preface and notes, would be likely to obtain a popularity commensurate with its merits. It evinces a mind of great power in the region of pure thought, and of great acquisitions in metaphysical science. The leading object of the volume is to present universal history under the form of biography, and its hero is a person who lives the life of the race. It is assumed that he who thoroughly understands the present epoch must have reproduced, and lived through, in his private experience, all the religions, dispensations and civilizations which preceded it; and accordingly the author supposes the case of a man whose mind, in its development, passes through all the leading systems of philosophy which have successively appeared in the world, and lives them in thought as in different ages they have been lived in action. His hero accordingly lives and outlives sensuality, diabolism, atheism, deism, pantheism, Platonism, necessitarianism, transcendentalism, until he arrives at the belief of a living God and a Christian dispensation. The mental moods as well as the opinions of these different systems are represented, and an almost audacious expression given to some of them. Though the work is deficient somewhat in artistical as distinguished from logical completeness, and is too condensed in passages where expansion would have aided the reader, no person who avoids the notes and adheres to the autobiography, can fail to notice the clearness as well as the depth and force of mind it evinces. We are aware of no other book in which so much knowledge of mental philosophy is conveyed in so small a space. The exposition of Plato’s theory of Ideas—the stringent logic applied to the doctrine of necessity—the keenness with which the weak points of atheism are detected, and the remorseless analysis with which they are probed, and the masterly power of impassioned argumentation, fierce, rapid and close, with which the subject of the Will is cleared from its obscurities, all indicate a mind of no common order. The author is evidently a man destined to leave his mark on the philosophical literature of the country. In the present volume there are important and original ideas which will sooner or later become influential.

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Those of our readers who have any taste for the philosophy of history, and who are desirous to see how an American writer can handle the problems which have tasked the acutest and most comprehensive European intellects, had better procure this work. It is written in a style of much energy, beauty and clearness, and is the result of forcible and patient thinking on a wide basis of historical facts and principles. The author is a Kentuckian and a scholar in the true sense. Although the book evidences a familiarity with the productions of others in a similar department of letters, it is still original as well as powerful. There are sentences in it which deserve to pass into maxims; and through the whole volume none can fail to observe the steady and almost triumphant march of an independent and forcible intellect. We do not know how the work has succeeded at the west, but if it has failed to attract notice there, it shows that Kentucky is not so ready to recognize marked ability in letters as in politics. The author, from his position as an American, really holds an advantage over his European rivals; and the felicity and comprehensiveness of his grasp of some great principles, and the power with which he wields them, are in a considerable degree referable to his freedom from many prejudices which beset the largest minds abroad. This volume ought to give Mr. Nourse a name, and we trust it will have that large circulation which its importance and usefulness so richly merit.

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This is a sprightly book, written in a dashing and defiant style, bristling with paradox and sparkling with whimsicalities. The peculiarity of the book consists in its dogmatism, and like all dogmatists the author gives as confident expression to the extravagances of his caprice as to the deductions of his understanding. Many topics are discussed which the title of the book would never suggest. Such are the remarks on the Puritans, Shakspeare, and the Moors in Spain. With regard to the first, the author chimes in with the opponents of the Puritans, and administers twenty lashes to “New England Conceit.” We do not know but that our Eastern friends have dilated a little too much on their ancestors, and been too prone to consider every thing excellent as dating from the Puritans, but certainly the style in which our New York brethren are now bragging about their progenitors, promises to outshine in pretension and impertinence every thing of the kind we have had in Massachusetts or Virginia. Mr. Hart, especially, fairly crows a note higher than any antiquarian chanticleer of ancestry it has ever been our fortune to meet in literature. There is a long passage in the book on Shakspeare, in which the author attempts to prove that in the plays published under Shakspeare’s name, there is little property belonging to him but the rant and obscenity. If Mr. Hart means his dissertation on this topic as badinage, it is rather tedious joking; and if he is in earnest, he shows a strange ignorance of facts and arguments which are as familiar to every student of English letters as his alphabet. Seriously, to combat such a clumsy specimen of irony would only turn the laugh against the critic, and no honor could possibly be gained in proving that the sun shines, or that “eggs is eggs.”

Apart from some extravagances of the kind we have noticed, the book is a grand and exhilarating one, and cannot fail to prove interesting to almost all classes of readers. To seamen, and to all who go out upon the sea in ships or yachts, it is an invaluable companion. The vigor, elasticity and decision of the style are in fine harmony with the frank, cordial, and somewhat chivalric nature of the author.

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We believe that this novel was published before Vanity Fair, and it certainly cannot compare with that brilliant work in incident or characterization; but it is still well worthy a diligent reading. It relates principally to that pinchbeck class of English swells, known as “gents,” and represents English society, as seen through the medium of a cockney’s mind. Mr. Sam Titmarsh, the worthy autobiographer, is a vain but innocent gent, and tells his story with delicious simplicity, and occasionally with much pathos. His little wife is a gem. The scene in which she obtains the office of nurse to Lady Tiptoff’s child, is exquisitely natural and pathetic. Every reader is inclined to echo Mr. Yellowplush’s opinion, even as expressed in his original orthography. “You see, Tit, my boy,” he remarks to the happy husband, “I’m a oonnyshure, and up to enough; and if ever I see a lady in my life, Mrs. Titmarsh is one. I can’t be fimiliar with her as I am with you. There’s a somethink in her, a jennysquaw, that haws me, sir.”

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It is a common charge against critics that they do not read the books they review. We acknowledge the charge in the case of Mr. James’s latest novel, with a feeling akin to exultation. We have read some twenty of his romances, more to verify an opinion than to gratify a taste, and certainly the man is to be praised for doing so large an amount of business on so small a capital. Though his mind is exceedingly limited in its range, he has contrived to fill more space with his books than the most comprehensive and creative of intellects would be justified in occupying. His success must be mortifying to all novelists who really possess original power, and who consider that a new character is something else than an old one with a new name. If Mr. James possessed sufficient force to stamp any character, incident or description, on the imagination, he would miserably fail in the application of his science of repetition and philosophy of dilution. His salvation from popular martyrdom is owing to the very feebleness of the impression he makes on the popular mind.

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This book has passed to a second edition, and promises to take a high rank among American romances. It is so altogether above the general run of novels published in a cheap form, that it is important for the public to understand that though in yellow covers, it has none of the nonsense, stupidity, and ribaldry commonly associated with yellow-covered literature. The author not only understands practical life practically, but he is a scholar and a man of original power. The work is exceedingly interesting, evinces a strong grasp of character, is well written, and while it deserves and will reward the attention of the more tasteful class of readers, it will tend to give a more important, because more numerous and sensitive class, a higher notion of the requirements of romance. We cordially wish the author success.

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This little volume is crammed with shrewd and diverting satire, and illustrated by appropriate cuts. The series originally appeared in Punch. The author evidently understands all the fooleries and deviltries as well as most of the humanities of practical life; and he has commented upon them in a style which is universally appreciable. There is a sort of percussion-cap explosion of wit and satire which keeps attention constantly awake. The book, apart from its brilliancy and readableness, is a good medicine for “snobism” of all sorts.

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The sturdiest champion of literary nationality must concede to Mr. Hoffman the merit of being an American writer. He knows the country, is familiar with its scenery, sympathises with the events of its history, and understands its people, aboriginal and imported. The present novel, which has now reached its fourth edition—an honor enjoyed by few fictions—is a pregnant illustration of the author’s thorough nationality. He is an American without being an Americanism. We have not the least doubt that this edition of Greyslaer will receive a cordial welcome from all who are capable of appreciating the grand and chivalrous spirit which breathes through and animates the fine talents and large acquirements of the author.

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Here is a good book, full of practical instruction, and of information that makes other knowledge practical. A German writer, a good man, has brought a well-stored mind to the task of preparing a volume that shall give the great authors on natural study, without the minuteness of a class-book, or the elaborate development of a thorough treatise. He has opened up the beautiful operations of Nature and her works, and has not neglected to recognize the soul as the antecedent of the body. So that while one is studying about the mighty gatherings of mineral wealth, the wonderful effects of chemical operations, and the instincts of animal life, he is constantly kept above his theme by the declared truth of his superiority to all these, in the possession of an immortal soul. A Christian American has given the work in an English form—good, pure, simple, expressive English—no Germanisms to offend the ear—and yet an occasional adaptation of a German mode of expressing thoughts shows the intimacy of the translator with the original, and his power to select the most expressive forms.

In this volume man is considered, and his power of mental and physical existence developed. The outreaching of the human mind is regarded as worthy of consideration, and lessons of usefulness derived therefrom. The volume before us is admirably suited to the classes of our public schools and to the general reader—and when furnished as it will be with a set of questions suited to the text, it will be a handbook for the classes, of immense usefulness.

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This volume is a collection of songs and short poems from the pen of one of the ablest political editors in Vermont. The book shows that the author’s heart is in what is called the right place, in spite of the stir and fret of politics. The characteristic of the volume is simplicity in the expression of emotion. There is no parade of ornament, and very little fanciful decoration, but the author contrives still to express a variety of moods in a most genuine way. The verse has a spring and elastic vigor in its movement, which continually suggests the notion of impromptu composition. The finest poem in the volume is the first, entitled “The Picture,” and certainly no poet could begin a collection with a piece more calculated to propitiate the reader, and make him look lovingly on what follows.

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A copy of this neat little volume has been laid upon our table, and we have read it with great pleasure. The poems it contains are, generally, good. Some of them are marked with great felicity of thought and power of expression. Mr. Stoddard is familiar to the readers of “Graham’s Magazine,” as one of the contributors to its pages, and we have now on hand some of his poetical articles which we design publishing in due order. His contributions are favorite ones with our readers, who, if they wish to have a collection of the author’s writings, cannot do a better thing than obtain from the publishers, or at any of the principal bookstores, a copy of “Foot-Prints.”

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