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one person is said to have had a return upon himself. We certainly want an expression equivalent to un retour sur soiméme,' but we could not venture to translate it literally like the authoress. Sometimes a favourite expression is repeated too often. This supreme moment,' for example, occurs twice within a few pages, and once more before the end of the same volume. These, however, are but slight errors and inadvertencies, and we mention them principally to warn the writer against too great rapidity of composition. From the quick succession in which these volumes have been given to the public, we believe the caution to be necessary. Boileau boasted of having taught Racine to rhyme with difficulty.' We should like to convince our authoress that she does herself injustice by coming before us in too great haste. She is evidently capable of high things. We owe her much already, but we trust that we shall owe her more. She can charm by vivid delineations of character, and thrill by powerful exhibitions of passion, while she guides by the lessons of practical wisdom and elevates by the lessons of practical piety. Let her not fall short of her high vocation, for it is a high one, whatever the prejudiced and the narrowminded may think. We are getting too far advanced to be influenced by names. We do not ask now with what appellation a book comes to us, but whether it informs the mind or corrects the heart, whether it teaches us to rise above selfishness, to cultivate the kindly affections, to feel the earnestness of life, to pass through time with an eye stedfastly fixed upon eternity. Here then we take our leave of the authoress, thanking her for the pleasure, and we trust profit, which we have derived from her productions, sincerely hoping to meet with her again, and to find that our hints have been taken in good part by the correction of the trifling blemishes with which these pages are more or less disfigured.

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ART. V.-Memoirs of the Life of the Rev. Charles Simeon, M.A. late Senior Fellow of King's College, and Minister of Trinity Church, Cambridge: with a Selection from his Writings and Correspondence. Edited by the Rev. WILLIAM CARUS, M. A., Fellow and Senior Dean of Trinity College, and Minister of Trinity Church, Cambridge. London: Hatchard and Son. Cambridge: Deightons; and Macmillan and Co. 1847.

THE powerful instinct in man's nature which has produced the expression 'hero-worship,' has ever played a most distinguished part in the history of the Christian world. Like all other natural propensities, not in themselves evil, the love of looking up to great men, of having examples before the eye of heroic deeds and remarkable lives, such as may excite the admiration and stir up to some small degree of enthusiasm the lethargic souls of the more unambitious portion of mankind, is sanctified by our religion and made part of its practical system.

Religious biography, to which subject such reflections directly lead, has, moreover, received higher sanction than what is derived from our own interpretation of moral influences; the sacred writings, both of the Old and New Testament, are a divine evidence of the power and suitableness of such modes of instruction. An important difference of name, however, must not be overlooked, between those who form the subjects of secular hero-worship, and those who enchain the feelings of admiration which, in the Christian as well as the worldly heart, are ever seeking for their object. The word hero savours too much of human pride and self-dependence; aims too much at the position of a demigod, to be the proper epithet of a Christian, though many of the qualities which compose the hero will also be found in the catalogue of Christian graces; but religious minds prefer the term saint, as more fitting the character of one who attributes not his powers and opportunities to the efforts of self-will alone, but to a sanctifying influence from above, with which he is mercifully imbued, and by which he is used as the instrument of Providence.

The memory of departed saints, thus forming as it does a powerful element of Christian influences, was sure to find its place in the medieval system which had for its object to adapt the material of the outward world, and the natural mind of man according to one uniform system, that should train and prepare

for, or even, to a certain extent, foreshadow the future state. Biography in that system was not the only, or indeed the chief method, whereby the memory of saints was handed down for the good of posterity. Literature had not then arrived at the position it at present occupies, and moreover, the mere writing a saint's life, when that life might be tinged by the peculiar views of the writer, and when the public would consequently be at liberty to agree or disagree in the praises and excellences ascribed to the subject of it, was too indefinite, too informal, and too precarious a path by which a saint should be established as such in the minds of succeeding ages. Such considerations as these, together with a certain positive realization of the power of sanctifying grace, to which the world is now rather dead, and also with a more definite idea of the connexion between this life and the intermediate state than is now commonly held, would appear to have produced the grand idea of formal canonization. True to her system, the Church of medieval times left not the reputation of a saint in the hands of a few admirers who gathered their knowledge of him from reading_biographical sketches; but by a formal act, she decided that such a man was a saint, and therefore deserving of especial honour. She brought to her aid the arts of the sculptor and the painter to represent him on the walls and windows of her churches, that the attention of all who came within those walls seeking a future home for themselves, might be comforted and stimulated by the thought of those who had run the race before and gained a prize, and to whose communion he should consequently aspire. She named a day on which his bright example might be brought forward to excite the admiration of the zealous, and to stimulate the inactive to leave the base servitude of sloth, and rise with ambitious minds to take an earnest part in the common cause. Now, however, the case is altered; the memory of a good man is left to take its own chance, and therefore, if his admirers think that the recollection of his deeds, and of the sanctity of his life will be useful to posterity; if, in short, they wish his name to be enrolled in the number of reputed saints, they have but one course before them, and that is to collect the history of his life, and give his memoirs a place in the theologian's library. This place must be his niche. Here he stands for posterity to observe the holy expression of his outward man, and contemplate the subdued, or the wise and profound servant of Christ, as the case may be. This must be the bright window, through which the glory of his name must shine to give joy and light to others: his anniversary will be when those volumes descend from the library shelf, and impart their spirit to inquiring students. Such, then, being the importance of biography, there

should be great jealousy lest some should gain a place in the memory of those who come after them of which they are not deserving. If a man makes a noise in the religious world and has many admirers, and after his death that admiration aims at perpetuity in the way we have alluded to, the world has a right to scrutinize what he was, and what he did; and if all does not appear satisfactory, to express their opinion accordingly. A hero, to gain the admiration of the world, must have certain claims of great deeds, or nobility of mind, and so must a man be endowed with the attributes of holiness and goodness beyond the ordinary lot, if he is to be handed to after ages as a saint of the Church. And what are the qualifications which entitle a man's memory to bear a saintly character? Personal holiness is the first, and zeal in the cause of the Church of Christ, whether as manifested by superior learning and deep researches into truth, or by more active ministrations, is the second. Let us, therefore, by these requisite qualifications, examine the book before us, entitled, 'Memoirs of the Life of the Rev. Charles Simeon.'

The circumstances under which this book is published are evidently such as have been adverted to. For many years Simeon was the distinguished head of a religious party in Cambridge, the influence of which spread far and wide throughout the whole country. We are not now discussing the orthodoxy of their doctrines or the propriety of their measures, but simply stating the fact that such a party existed, and that Simeon was its chief head and centre. After his death, at a good old age, there is a wish among his admirers that the spirit of the man may not be forgotten; therefore his memoirs and his correspondence are published. If ever man was set up by his party for a saint-if ever a section of the religious world claimed a man as their own, and committed themselves to him, this was Simeon's lot. Yet when we say that a party in the Church hold up Simeon as their patron and pattern saint, we cannot but remonstrate against the use of the word saint in their theological dictionary. There are two great peculiarities which characterize the saintly character of the so-called Evangelical party, for our readers must really excuse the use of explanatory names. The first arises from their Calvinistic notions; for it is evident that the use of the word saint will alter according to the scheme of salvation which is held. If good works are utterly excluded from the scheme, of course they do not form part of the saintly character; and as far as Calvinistic views prevail, so far will the term saint be applied in accordance with erroneous doctrines about predestination, and not in accordance with the true doctrine of the sanctification of man through good works.

The

second arises from their neglect of the outward ordinance and discipline of the Church. Placing no great faith in the sanctifying influence conveyed through the instrumentality of the visible Church, they forget that saintliness of character is a work of gradual construction through those means, and make it an individual distinction only. Hence that exaltation of the individual, which, amidst all its assertion of man's corrupt nature as the groundwork of its teaching, adheres to the Evangelical' system. No schools of theology trust so much to individuals, no congregations depend so much on the personal qualifications of their ministers, as those whose views are represented by Simeon and his party. It is not by comparison with such a view of saintliness that we shall judge Simeon, but by another. Let it not, however, be supposed that we wish to be harsh in our treatment of Simeon. He was undoubtedly a sincere man according to his views, full of extraordinary zeal and activity both in mind and body for the cause of religion. He had great personal faults, indeed, as his best friends freely acknowledge; he had also deficiencies very remarkable for the position he occupied in the theological world; we do not, however, lay all the blame of this on himself, but rather on the system to which he attached himself. Simeon was not born, indeed, for much theological importance, and perhaps the vanity of his nature was one of the agents by which his greatness was thrust upon him; yet even this failing was wantonly increased by the idolatry of those around him. We look, therefore, on Simeon's position as an extraordinary phenomenon, indicative of the party to which he belonged, and the state of the Church in the last generation. If an unfit man occupies a position which is awarded by the flattery of others, it is hard to judge him personally by the true standard of what his position is. It is through the fault of others that he is there at all; and therefore he himself should be judged but as a specimen of his fellows, as the representative of the spirit of his party. With perfect good-will, therefore, towards Simeon, and with a full appreciation of his good qualities, and a lively perception of the peculiarly dead state of the Church during the time when his views were formed, we must, nevertheless, be allowed to speak freely about him. He might be good in some points, he might be self-devoted and zealous, yet not after all be acting in a justifiable manner. The Church might be dead and slothful, yet his system of arousing her might not be such as her friends can approve; and, moreover, to assert that the line he took was the one best suited to counteract the peculiar evils of the age, is in itself a great act of injustice to those who maintained throughout the same times a steady and zealous conformity to Catholic doctrine and discipline; and such true