taken by his mother to Geneva, where he received a classical education. In 1805 he went to Paris with a view to the study of law, but soon became engrossed in literary pursuits. He began to contribute largely to journals and periodicals, wrote pamphlets and edited translations, and exhibited a strength and maturity of intellect that soon brought him into notice. In 1812 he became assistant professor of modern history in the Sorbonne, and the same year married Mlle. Pauline de Meulan, whose royalist influence opened for him a political career, on which he entered on the fall of Napoleon. He was made successively Secretary-General of the Department of the Interior (1814) and of Justice (1815), Master of Requests (1816), and Councillor of State (1817); and from 1816 to 1820 he was DirectorGeneral of the Communal and Departmental Administration. In 1822 he was dismissed from the Council of State and the Sorbonne for criticising the government in his pamphlets, but was reinstated by the Martignac ministry in 1828.

In a pamphlet advocating constitutional government, published in 1816, Guizot had expressed the sentiments of the party afterward known as doctrinaires; and this, with his high literary reputation, austere presence, and scholarly eloquence, gave him a remarkable political influence from his first appearance in the Chamber of Deputies, in January, 1830. He promoted the downfall of Charles X., became Minister of the Interior in the first cabinet of Louis Philippe, and of Public Instruction in the coalition ministry of Soult (1832-6); and after a few months he received the same post in the Molé cabinet, but soon disagreed with his colleagues and resigned. He was ambassador in London from February to October, 1840, when he succeeded Thiers as Minister of Foreign Affairs; and in 1847 he replaced Soult as premier. The revolution of 1848 chiefly resulted from his upholding, in concert with Louis Philippe, the policy of peace at any price abroad,

and of opposition to democratic reform at home. at home. Guizot regarded the growing agitation for electoral reform as a trifling matter, and reluctantly consented to resign his office on February 23d, when the Revolution had actually begun. He fled to England, but returned in 1849, and was defeated as a candidate for the legislative assembly. In 1861, although a Protestant, he came forward as an advocate of the temporal power of the Pope. After supporting the Ollivier ministry and the plébiscite in 1870, he objected in 1874 to the former's academical eulogy of Napoleon 111. ; and on hearing that Napoleon had formerly paid his son's debts, to refund the amount he sold for 120,000 francs a picture by Murillo, given him by the Queen of Spain, and to the last supported himself by his pen in compiling a history of France for the use of children, and other works. He died on the 12th of September, 1874.

For many years Guizot was a leading member of the Protestant Synod, but finally withdrew on account of his aversion to any deviation from the strictest Calvinism. Nearly all his works have been translated into English. The most celebrated are his histories of Civilization in Europe and France, based upon his lectures in the Sorbonne, and his histories of the English Revolution, of the English Republic under Oliver Cromwell, and of the Protectorate of Richard Cromwell and the restoration of the Stuarts. At the time of his death he was engaged upon an elaborate history of Spain in ten volumes, for the preparation of which he had learned Spanish at the age of seventy-two. Noteworthy among his other writings are his essays on Corneille and Shakespeare," his admirable sketches of Sir Robert Peel and of Washington, and his "Histoire de Quatre Grand Chrétiens Français" (2 vols. 1873-4). His speeches have been collected under the title of "Histoire parlementaire de France," etc. (5 vols. 1863). He also published Memoirs pour servir à l'Histoire de Mon Temps (8 vols. 1858–68).

66

THE DATA OF ETHICS. By Herbert Spencer. New York: D. Appleton & Co.

Hitherto the successive volumes of Mr. Spencer's "System of Synthetic Philosophy" have followed each other in an orderly progression according to a preconceived plan; but "The Data of Ethics," which forms the first part of the "Principles of Morality" appears out of its regular place in the series, leaving the second and third volumes of the 'Principles of Sociology" yet unpublished and probably unwritten. The reason for this break in the original plan is explained by Mr. Spencer in his preface. "I have been led," he says, "thus to deviate from the order originally set down, by the fear that persistence in conforming to it might result in leaving the final work of the series unexecuted. Hints, repeated of late years with increasing frequency and distinctness, have shown me that health may permanently fail, even if life does not end, before I reach the last part of the task I have marked out for myself. This last part of the task it is to which I regard all the preceding parts as subsidiary. Written as far back as 1842, my first essay, consisting of letters on "The Proper Sphere of Government," vaguely indicated what I conceived to be certain general principles of right and wrong in political conduct; and from that time onwards my ultimate purpose, lying behind all proximate purposes, has been that of finding for the principles of right and wrong in conduct at large a scientific basis. To leave this purpose unfulfilled after making so extensive a preparation for fulfilling it, would be a failure the probability of which I do not like to contemplate; and I am anxious to preclude it, if not wholly, still partially. Hence the step I now take. Though this first division of the work terminating the Synthetic Philosophy cannot, of course, contain the specific conclusions to be set forth in the entire work, yet it implies them in such wise, that definitely to formulate them requires nothing beyond logical deduction." He explains, further, that he is the more anxious to indicate at least the outlines of his final work because now that moral injunctions are losing the authority given by their supposed sacred origin," "the establishment of rules of right conduct on a scientific basis is a pressing need."

It would be useless to attempt to summarize a work which is itself a summary, or to epitomize an argument which is itself an epitome; and we probably cannot convey a better idea of the scope and subject of the treatise than by reproducing the titles of its several chapters: "Conduct in General," 99 66 The Evolution

As regards literary quality, the 'Data of Ethics" is the most compressed, the most easily understood, and the most readable of all Mr. Spencer's philosophical writings. The author's style has always been remarkable for its precision and lucidity, but in this work he seems to have determined to omit all those details which might perplex the average reader and to make it a popular classic in its department. If this was his intention he has succeeded most admirably, and his work can hardly fail to influence profoundly the course of ethical speculation.

THE YOUNG FOLKS' CYCLOPEDIA OF COMMON THINGS. By John D. Champlin, Jr. With Numerous Illustrations. New York: Henry Holt & Co.

The difficulty of answering the numerous questions asked by children as new subjects are suggested to them, is one of the most familiar of household experiences. It cannot be met by sending them to the ordinary cyclopædias, because the articles in these presuppose on the part of the person consulting them a more matured intelligence and a wider range of information than children can be expected to possess. The result is that the questions, which are often of the highest importance to the child's mental growth, are either not answered at all, or are put off with such lame and inadequate explanations as the parent can muster on the spur of the moment. It is this want that Mr. Champlin's work is specially designed to meet; and it meets it so admirably that, after examining it and perceiving how generally useful it is likely to prove, one is inclined to wonder that the scheme was not carried out earlier. Now that the work is done, however, it ought to be considered, in every household where there are children, as more indispensable than any other book of reference.

In regard to the scope of the work the author explains that he has "attempted to furnish in simple language, aided by pictorial illustrations where thought necessary, a knowledge of things in Nature, Science, and the Arts which are apt to awaken a child's curiosity. Such features of Astronomy, Chemistry, Physics,

Natural History, and Physiology as can easily be made intelligible are explained, special attention being given to the natural objects which most immediately affect human happinesssuch as the phenomena of air, light, heat, and electricity, and those parts of the human system whose health is influenced by our habits. Much attention has been given, too, to the description and explanation of the manufacture of articles in common use, and of the various processes connected with the Arts; while all the animals interesting from their domestic relation or as objects of curiosity have been treated as fully as the limits of the work will permit. The scheme does not embrace any account of Persons or Places, as they would have added too much to the bulk of a single volume."

Of course the practical serviceableness of such a work must depend in a great degree upon the compiler's skill in exposition; and it is gratifying to be able to say on this point that Mr. Champlin's style is a model of simplicity, clearness, and precision. Any child who can read at all will be able to understand without difficulty most of his explanations; and to such children as possess even in a moderate degree the child's insatiable curiosity, the book will prove far more interesting than many story-books.

The volume is gotten up in handsome style, and contains a large number of useful illustrations.

THE GREAT SPEECHES AND ORATIONS OF DANIEL WEBSTER. With an Essay on Daniel Webster as a Master of English Style, by Edwin P. Whipple. Boston: Little, Brown & Co.

The publishers have brought together in this large and handsome volume a selection of the best known speeches and orations of Daniel Webster, comprising his great public addresses or discourses, the most famous of the speeches which he delivered in the United State Senate, and a number of those weighty legal arguments which gained him the recognized leadership of the American bar. These include forty-five titles, and to them is added an Appendix containing specimens of Webster's state-papers : his despatches on "Impressment " and the "Right of Search," his Letters to General Cass on the Treaty of Washington," and "The Hulsemann Letter." Each speech or address is prefaced with an account of the occasion and circumstances of its delivery, there are copious explanatory notes, and an excellent index renders the treasures of the volume easily accessible. Prefixed to the whole is an elaborate essay on "Daniel Webster as a Master of English Style," which, though it hardly represents Mr. Whipple at his best-being rather overstrain

ed and artificial-will really help the reader to understand the secret of Webster's power and to appreciate the quality of his work.

The volume is admirably adapted to awaken renewed interest in Webster, and ought to find a place in every household, as containing a large proportion of those productions which, while recognized as the masterpieces of American oratory, seem likely also to secure a permanent place in American literature. HAWORTH'S. By Frances Hodgson Burnett. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

"Haworth's" confirms Mrs. Burnett's title to a place in the foremost rank of contemporary novelists. It is not so pleasing a story as 'That Lass o' Lowrie's," chiefly because the heroine is a much less attractive and original personage; but it shows a decided advance on the artistic side, and is a better planned, better proportioned, better written, and more evenly finished work. The distinguishing feature of the story is a certain rude, self-confident strength. The author pays little attention to minor details, laying on her colors with swift, bold strokes, and demanding the co-operation of the reader's imagination, which she manages perpetually to keep busy. The incidents are ingeniously varied, the movement is rapid, and though the narrative is long, the interest never flags for a moment. Finally, though it deals with some rather dubious people and circumstances, the book is thoroughly wholesome and tonic.

POEMS OF WORDSWORTH. Chosen and Edited by Matthew Arnold. Golden Treasury Series. London and New York: Macmillan & Co.

The sagacious and penetrating article on Wordsworth by Matthew Arnold, which was published in the September number of the EcLECTIC, was originally written (and now appears) as an introduction to this volume, which is all that the truest and wisest admirers of Wordsworth could wish. "To disengage the poems which show his [Wordsworth's] power, and to present them to the English-speaking public and to the world, is the object of this volume. I by no means say that it contains all which in Wordsworth's poems is interesting. But it contains, I think, every thing, or nearly every thing, which may best serve him with the majority of lovers of poetry, nothing which may disserve him." The pieces thus selected number (including sonnets) just one hundred and sixty-five. In their arrangement the somewhat fantastic and artificial classification of Wordsworth is discarded, and the poems are grouped together more naturally, as narrative poems, ballads, lyrical poems, sonnets, reflective and elegiac poems, etc. In appearance the

volume is all that could be desired, being published in the chaste and convenient style of the well-known Golden Treasury Series.

FOREIGN LITERARY NOTES.

A PUBLISHING firm has been established at Cettinje, in Montenegro.

THE new edition of the "Encyclopædia Britannica," states the London Bookseller, has been entirely set up by two girls, using Fraser's type-composing and distributing machines.

HARRASSOWITZ, of Leipzig, promises an exact photolithographic reproduction of the original MS. of Thomas à Kempis' "Imitatio Christi" recently discovered in the Royal Library of Brussels.

CARDINAL HERGENRÖTHER has been commissioned by the Pope to submit to him a new plan for arranging the Vatican archives in order to make them more accessible to scholars. At the same time the cardinal has been authorized to publish interesting codices.

THE Revue Politique et Littéraire states that a considerable number of unpublished MSS. by M. Thiers, containing much curious information with regard to the political affairs in which their author was concerned, have been deposited at the "Banque de Londres."

MESSRS. CHATTO & WINDUS will shortly publish a little book on Witchcraft in Shakspere's days, and his progressive treatment of it in his plays, by Mr. T. Alfred Spalding, LL.B., Treasurer of the New Shakspere Society. The book is a rewritten enlargement of Mr. Spalding's paper "On the Devils in Shakspere," read before the New Shakspere Society.

ANOTHER attempt to rival the Revue des "La transDeux Mondes is to be made. formation qu'a subie la France depuis 1870," 46 a créé des besoins nouveaux we are told, dans la nation, par suite, de nouveaux devoirs à la presse ;" and hence the Nouvelle Revue, which counts in its list of contributors MM. About, Bardoux, Gustave Flaubert, Leconte de Lisle, John Lemoinne, F. Sarcey, Spuller, Sully Prudhomme, etc.

THOUGH the second edition of Dr. Ingleby's Shakespeare's Centurie of Prayse," which he has given to the New Shakspere Society, raised the number of allusions to Shakspeare and his works in 1591-1693 from 228 in the first edition to 356, yet the compiler has already found or had sent to him six fresh allusions in that period, besides the two that

66

SCIENCE AND ART.

The

reck

PROTECTION OF FORESTS IN AUSTRALIA.— It is satisfactory to learn from the anniversary address of Mr. Ellery, President of the Royal Society of Victoria, Australia, that legislative measures have been taken to check the less destruction" of timber in the forests of that colony, where rival owners of saw-mills have chopped down trees out of spite, and then left them to rot. The Department of Agriculture, supported by the new laws, has begun to reafforest the stripped mountain-sides with exotic as well as indigenous trees, whereby the state nurseries at Mount Macedon are making wonderful progress," and a valuable growth now covers a large part of the summit. these nurseries thousands of plants are distributed to other parts of the colony; and it is remarkable that many of the European and American timber trees thrive better than the native, and grow more rapidly than in their

From

original habitat. "It is intended also," says Mr. Ellery, to sow many of our wrecked forest areas broadcast with the seeds of indigenous trees, notably the ironbark, and the same process will be tried on some of the treeless plains to the north." With a view to proper protection of the young plantations, a beginning has been made in the establishment of a college where young men will be trained in woodcraft and forestry and in agricultural chemistry. By these praiseworthy means it is hoped that the climate of the colony will bc ameliorated, and the ever-increasing tendency towards drought-which is the invariable accompaniment of a treeless district-arrested.

PROTO PLASM AND LIFE.-Dr. Allman set a very good example, as President of the British Association, this year at Sheffield. By confining himself to one subject, and that one which he profoundly knew, he made a remarkably interesting and instructive address, instead of gathering up the scraps of many sciences, and telling us nothing adequate of any. His subject was the principle of life, as manifested in vegetables and animals alike. described what is called protoplasm, the raw material of all living organizations-a very complex combination of oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, and nitrogen, which is not yet fully determined. He described its habit in its un

He

organized forms, when not even any special nucleus of organization can be detected, and how even then it throws out projecting fingers, sometimes in the direction opposite to that of gravity, and withdraws them again into itself. He described it, too, in its higher forms. He showed how close is the analogy between vegetable and animal forms of protoplasm; how the cell of the yeast fungus contains about 2 per cent of peptine, a substance only hitherto known as the product of the digestion of azotized matter by living animals. He stated that plants, like animals, may be placed under the influence of anæsthetics; that a sensitiveplant can be temporarily deprived of its excitability by the influence of ether; that the growth of cress is suspended by the influence of ether; that under the same influence aquatic plants no longer absorb carbonic-acid gas, or give off oxygen, though that process is resumed the instant the influence of the anaesthetic is removed; and that yeast under the influence of ether ceases to act as a ferment. But while arguing from this to the ultimate identity of all forms of physical life, Professor Allman refused to infer that thought was a property of protoplasm, and held that the analogy which is supposed to warrant that inference is a false and illusory one.-The Spectator.

RECENT WEATHER IN ENGLAND.-The present year has been so exceptional in respect of

weather that it will be interesting to place a few facts on record. The usual average of rainfall, as reckoned by meteorologists for the first six months of the year, is nearly twelve inches this year the fall from January to June was eighteen and a half inches! The prodigiousness of the excess may be judged of by comparing it with the years 1858, 1864, and 1874, in each of which the total rainfall was less than nineteen inches. The superabundance of water during the present year may be regarded as calamitous. The effect is aggravated by deficiency of sunshine. Observations made at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, show that in the first six months of 1878 there were six hundred and forty-three hours of sunshine; this year there were four hundred and seventyone hours only. June, 1878, was spoken of as a gloomy month; but it had one hundred and eighty-one hours of sunshine, whereas June, 1879, had not quite one hundred and nineteen hours. So wet a June indeed as the last has not occurred for twenty-seven years, with the exception of June, 1860, when the rainfall was more than seven inches; and it is clear that a long spell of dry weather will be required to restore the balance.

The

July was expected to make amends for the previous deficiency; but that usually sultry month proved less propitious than June. landscapes were green everywhere; but luxuriant leafage and rank grass are not equivalent to sunshine, and the weather-prophets who predicted an 'intensely hot dry summer found themselves at fault in the presence of persistent rain. The cold for the seven months prior to July was greater than it has been for one hundred and sixteen years.-Chambers's Journal.

A STARTLING DISCOVERY.-The Athenaum has been favored by a correspondent sending a startling letter, received from Miss M. Betham-Edwards, in which occurs the following passage:

I send you the following particulars of a recent scientific invention, just patented, and destined without doubt to play a very important part in our economic history. I think it must be regarded as a solution for once and for all of the great coal question, or rather fuel question, not only among ourselves, but abroad. M. Bourbonnel, of Dijon, the celebrated lion and panther slayer, lighted upon the following discovery by hazard, and after six years' persistent investigation brought it to entire workable' perfection. He discovered, by means of two natural substances, inexhaustible in nature, the means of lighting and maintaining a fire without wood or coal; a fire instantaneously lighted and extinguished; a fire causing no dust, smoke, or trouble; a fire costing one tenth at least of ordinary fuel; and, what is more won