thought and to its form. Every word which she ever wrote of Goethe was admirable, and yet what we possess was only her preparation for better work. Nothing was ever more tender and true than her sketch of "The Two Herberts" in this volume. Let the reader dwell also on what she has to say of "American Literature," and the "Lives of the Great Composers." The closing volume of this series, entitled, "Life without and Life within," strikes us as the most interesting portion of her miscellaneous writings, and its contents are almost entirely new to the public. Here we have the best of what remained about Goethe, pleasant criticisms, and ideal sketches of various kinds, appeals for the unhappy also, and words which, if the fault-finders will but read them, will show, not merely her spiritual capacity, but, in some respects, the measure of her attainment. It is impossible, in closing, to criticise these works as they deserve. We repeat what is well known, and has been often said, that their suggestiveness is their chief and perpetual charm. No one can read attentively what she wrote, without learning to think for himself. The difference between her written works and her marvellous conversation was well indicated by a compliment paid by the Comte de Ségur to Madame de Staël. "Tell me, Count," she asked in a vivacious moment, "which do you like best, my conversation or my printed works?" "Your conversation, Madame," was the immediate reply, "for it does not give you leisure to become obscure.” - Some poems are added to the last volume, and these have been severely criticised. It is quite probable that Margaret never would have published them, that she would have said of them at last, what she wrote at the first, that her verses were merely "vents for her personal experience." Nevertheless, let them be as faulty in artistic form as the critics would represent them, we are glad to have them, as revelations of her inward life. She wrote never a word to be spared. We feel an unbounded confidence in her, and we thank her brother for sharing in it. One of these poems, at least, seems to us to have exquisite truth and beauty, both in thought and form. We refer to the "Lines" addressed to the lady who illustrated her "Summer on the Lakes." These volumes are stereotyped clearly, on good paper, in tasteful array. Yet one criticism upon their form we cannot withhold. We deeply regret that all the biographical matter was not thrown together, according to its period, even if Appendix after Appendix had been thus made needful. It is further a matter of regret, that the essays themselves are not dated. We are quite aware that this is not usual; but in this particular case their psychological value would have been much increased by such a means of tracing development. We should have been glad to extract largely from these volumes; but to do it, we must have resigned all hope of speaking at length in regard to Madame Ossoli's personal character, which we were unwilling to pass without our tribute of sincere, yet we trust not undiscriminating, respect and gratitude. We could hardly believe, till we had turned the six volumes. over repeatedly, that the only portrait offered in this complete edition is one from the picture painted by Hicks, during the last few months of her life in Rome. It was well to have this preserved, for there is great ideality and sweetness in the expression,-a certain look we always hoped would dawn and nestle there. Those who saw her after a mother's hope had risen in her heart say that this was a good likeness; but we cannot but miss the old portrait, published, we think, in a former edition of "Woman in the Nineteenth Century." If the later portrait gives an idea of more personal beauty than Margaret possessed, it wholly fails of that majestic, Junolike curve of the throat, which was more than beauty. If it was, as in the engraved countenance now given us, that her eyes dilated and her lips grew tender when she gazed upon the wounded men in those Italian hospitals, let us know it; but we cannot be satisfied to possess only a likeness which not one of her early friends would recognize. ART. VIII. 1. Life of Jesus. pp. 267. 2. The Life of Jesus, critically examined. By DR. DAVID FRIEDRICH STRAUSS. Translated from the Fourth German Edition, by MARIAN EVANS, Translator of Feuerbach's Essence of Christianity. New York: Calvin Blanchard. 1856. 8vo. pp. 901. 3. Christ in History. By ROBERT TURNBULL, D. D., Author of "Genius of Scotland," "Pulpit Orators of France and Switzerland," "Life Pictures from a Pastor's Note-Book," etc. New and Revised Edition. Boston: Gould and Lincoln. 1860. 12mo. pp. 540. 4. Disquisitions and Notes on the Gospels. - Matthew. By JOHN H. MORISON. Boston: Walker, Wise, & Co. 1860. 12mo. pp. 538. . 5. Illustrations of Scripture; suggested by a Tour through the Holy Land. By HORATIO B. HACKETT, D. D., Professor of Biblical Literature in Newton Theological Institution. New and Revised Edition. Boston: Gould and Lincoln. 1860. 12mo. pp. 354. THE assaults upon Christianity and its records never leave tokens of even partial success; their only enduring memorials are to be found in added buttresses at the points of attack. Many of the richest departments of religious literature owe their existence, in which unborn generations will rejoice, to transient and obsolete phases of infidelity, so that the opposers of the truth have unwittingly raised up for it defenders and interpreters, and have brought into clearer view the elements of its beauty, strength, and grandeur. Such has been the consequence of the bold onslaught made upon historical Christianity by Strauss's Life of Jesus; and we avail ourselves of the appearance of Hase's work in Mr. Clarke's Translation to review the theory, which, in common with so many other re cent works, it is designed to refute.* It is, indeed, a late period for us to take our first distinct cognizance of Strauss's Life of Jesus; but we have reason to believe that this book is constantly passing into the hands of fresh readers, and, while it probably makes few disciples, is creating no small amount of scepticism and unbelief as regards the facts recorded in our canonical Gospels. The theory which bears the name of Strauss could hardly have originated anywhere but in Germany; nor is it easy for a well-ordered Anglo-Saxon mind to conceive of its being seriously propounded and actually believed. It is far from being clearly defined and self-consistent in the author's own statement; and his Life of Jesus, while a work of great learning in detail, is singularly deficient in comprehensiveness and unity. To one aim only is it true, and that is the undermining of every statement in the Gospels which would make them the authentic history of a God-born teacher and a supernatural revelation. The theory, in brief, is this. Jesus was the son of Joseph and Mary. In his childhood he manifested unusual intelligence and promise, as compared with his external advantages, and was the object of admiration in the humble family circle in which his lot was cast. He early became a disciple of John the Baptist, and, sympathizing at first with John's fervent expectation of the speedy advent of the Messiah, he soon conceived the idea of assuming that character, and personated it so successfully as to become his own dupe, thus passing unconsciously from venial imposture to sincere enthusiasm as a reformer and innovator. He made proselytes, chose disciples, and uttered discourses which impressed themselves profoundly upon the popular mind, and drew upon him the hostility of the chief men of the nation, especially of the Pharisees. They procured his execution as a traitor. He perhaps only swooned from loss of blood, and the story of his resurrection may have had a basis of fact. If he died, the story of his resurrection The first edition of Hase's work was published before the appearance of Strauss's Life of Jesus; but after the publication of the last-named work, Hase so entirely reconstructed his Life of Jesus as to give it throughout an aspect of having been written with special reference to Strauss's theory. was of later date; and in either case, it would have naturally connected with itself that of his ascension to heaven. After his death, many marvellous incidents concerning his life gradually gained currency. Some of these were the spontaneous outgrowth of popular credulity; others were symbolical forms in which his disciples sought to embody the doctrines and precepts which had formed the staple of his discourses. His miraculous birth was invented and believed, because it seemed impossible that the Messiah should have been born like other men. Supernatural works were ascribed to him, because they had been attributed in the Hebrew legends to the ancient prophets; and it was indispensable that he who was greater than they, and of whom they were thought to have written glowing predictions, should have performed more numerous and more marvellous miracles than any of them. His appearances after his resurrection—if it be admitted that he died—were fabricated to meet the improbability that he should have returned to life without having been seen. These wonderful stories were circulated orally among his disciples for half a century or more, and were during the lapse of those years both magnified and multiplied. After a while different persons-none of them his immediate disciples-compiled such narratives as had reached their ears; and of these compilations there have come down to us our four Gospels (which were written not far from the close of the first century), together with other fragmentary works of equal authority, commonly called the Apocryphal Gospels. This theory admits, as our readers perceive, a slender thread of actual history, on which are strung an unwieldy and incongruous cluster of myths. But how are we to distinguish between facts and myths? First, Strauss knows, and so does every philosophic interpreter, that the observed order of Nature has never been suspended or superseded; consequently every supernatural incident is a myth. In the next place, Jesus having been conceived of as the Messiah, it was inevitable that representations should be made of him in accordance with the Hebrew notions of the Messiah. Therefore all representations of this class, though not supernatural, such as his birth in Bethlehem, his descent from David, his flight |