may not be expected on behalf of the brave fellows commanded hy Lord Nelfon (himself a man of Norfolk) who never were, and, as many of them as furvive, never will be, fugitives? ART. 22. Favole Scelte degli autori piu celebri. Raccolte da Leonardo Nardini, ad ufo degli studiofi della Lingua Italiana. 12mo. 251 PP: 3s. 6d. Dulau, &c. 1800. The ftudents in Italian literature have already received from the hands of Signior Nardini, feveral ufeful, and fome elegant publications, calculated to aflift and encourage their proges. To these works, the prefent judicious collection of Italian Fables makes a very fuitable and pleafing addition. They who have collected the productions of fabulifts, who have written in Latin and French, will be pleafed alfo to poffefs a felection from the beft Italian writers of that class. The authors whofe fables are here printed, are arranged in the following order: Dante, Zucco, Ariosto, Pignotti, De Roffi, Bertola, Grillo, Pafferoni, Roberti, Rilli-Orfini, Ricci, Crudeli, Tulli, Clafio. Several of thefe writers this editor thus characterizes in his Preface. Chi potrà riculare al Pignotti l'amenità, al De Roffi la gentileffa, al Bertola la grazia, fpeffo al Grillo la naturalezza, la ingenuità al Pafferoni, la lindura al Roberti, e al Rilli-Orfini la femplicità, come diftintivo loro, benchi tutte fovente in quefte qualità fi riconofcano?” An original Fable, compofed by himfelf, is inferted by S. Nardini by way of Dedication, to the Ladies Alicia Gordon, Elizabeth Drunimond, and Ifabella Strange. DRAMATIC. ART. 23. Life: a Comedy, in Five Acts; as performed at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden. By Frederick Reynolds. Syo. 80 pp. 28. Longman and Rees. 1800. We have fo often given our fentiments on dramatic productions (for we cannot call them comedies) of the clafs to which this belongs, that further obfervations on the fubject may appear invidious, and are manifeftly ufelefs. When experience has fhown, that confiftency in the plot, probability in the feveral incidents, truth and nature in the cha racters, and even wit and humour in the dialogue, may be fet at naught by a dramatic writer, provided he can keep the ftage in a buftle throughout the earlier fcenes of his piece, and produce (whether naturally or not) a ftriking fituation at the clofe, why fhould we blame an author (who, if he lives to pleafe, must please to live") for adopting the cafieft means of fecuring applause and profit ?-Of the play now before us, though we have read it with attention, we feel unable to give a clear and intelligible account. There are indeed incidents in abundance; but fcarcely one of them fuch as could, in our opinion, have cccurred in real life. In the dialogue, we look in vain for wit and humour, or even (in any great degree) that flippancy which used to fupply their place. We muft, however, do jutiice to the concluding fcene; which contains an interefting and well-managed discovery. NOVELS. NOVELS. ART. 24. Erneftina. A Novel. Dedicated, by Permiffion, to her Royal Highnefs the Duchefs of York. By Esther Holften. In Two Volumes. 490 pp. 79. Crosby and Letterman. 1801. Very infipid, yet highly abfurd. There does not feem to be any ill intention in the writer; but to propofe her heroine as an example, after having related fuch extravagances in her conduct as amount nearly to macnefs, is, to fay the leaft of it injudicious. It is, however, useless to criticize what probably few but reviewers will read. Prefixed to this Novel is a refpectable lift of subscribers; who, we prefume, muft have been influenced by esteem for the author rather than the work. ART. 25. The Myfterious Penitent; or, the Norman Chateau. A RoTwo Volumes. 12mo. 392 pp. 6. Crosby and Letter mance. man. 1800. The ftory of this Romance is interefting, and not ill-told; but fome of the most important difcoveries are made too foon; and, in the catastrophe, the worst character, and, fo far as intention goes, the most criminal, is rather rewarded than punished. Upon the whole, however, few modern Romances, thofe of Mrs. Radcliffe excepted, display more talents, or may be read with more fatisfaction. MEDICINE. ART. 26. Three Lectures upon Animal Life, delivered in the University of Pennsylvania. By Benjamin Rush, M. D. Professor of the Inftitutes of Medicine, &c. 8vo. 84 PP. 2s. 6d. Philadelphia printed; fold by Mawman, London. 1799. Thefe Lectures contain an exemplication of the doctrine of life, as explained by Brown and Darwin, whom the author calls," two of the most diftinguished mafter-builders in medicine of the 18th century; for whom, he has done little more," he fays, "than carry the hod, to affift in completing part of the fabric; the great and original conception, and foundation, being entirely theirs." Pref. p. 1. But as this foundation is laid in air, the labour of carrying materials, to complete the fabric, cannot have been great; neither will its duration, we truft, be of very long continuance. We will, however, quit this metaphor, which the author unluckily introduced, and lay before our readers fome of the principles of the doctrine he is endeavouring to inculcate. 66 Every part of the human body, the nails and hair excepted," he fays, Lecture I." is endowed with fenfibility, or excitability, or with both of them. By fenfibility is meant the power of having fenfation excited by the action of impreffions. Excitability denotes," he fays, that property in the human body by which motion is excited by means of impreffions." But as fenfation implies motion, or can be only ma nifefted nifested by motion, we see no distinction here made between those two powers. Senfation, before the introduction of the new philofophy, was fuppofed to be a power inherent in mind, and was thence eafily dif tinguishable from irritability, a property in the living fibre; but our new philofophers, arguing upon a fuppofition that we have no minds, or at leaft attempting to explain every thing without the admiffion of one, have fallen into the error of confounding sensibility and irritability. "It is of no confequence," the author goes on to fay, " to our prefent inquiry, whether this excitability, be a quality of animal matter, or a fubftance," that is, a being. "The latter opinion," that it is a being," has been maintained by Dr. Girtanner, and has fome probability in its favour." Into fuch abfurdities do men fall, when attempting to explain what is beyond their capacity to comprehend! The author defines life, fee p. 27, "to be the effect of certain ftimuli, acting upon the fenfibility and excitability, which are extended, in different degrees, over every external and internal part of the body, Thefe ftimuli," he fays, "are as necessary to its exiftence, as air is to flame;" and in another place, p. 73, "life is as much an effect of impreffions upon a peculiar fpecies of matter, as found is of the ftroke of a hammer upon a bell, or mufic, of the motion of a bow upon the ftrings of a violin." The ftimuli that are found efficacious in kindling life, are, it feems, fee p. 8, "light, found, odors, air, heat, exercife, the pleafures of the fenfes, food, drinks, chyle, the blood, a certain tenfion of the glands, which contain fecreted liquors, and the exercife of the faculties of the mind," that is, we fuppofe, thought. But it is evident, the greater part of these ftimuli, as founds, odours, the pleafures of the fenfes, &c. can only be perceived by a living being, confequently life cannot be the effect of thofe ftimuli; and that life may be fupported without the aid of many of them, we know; as the foetus in utero neither fees, hears, taftes, fmells, or breathes, and yet continues to live. On the whole, we fee nothing in this new doctrine tending to render our -nowledge of the nature of life more precife and accurate, or that will teach us to fupport with more vigour, or for a longer period, than in that with which we were for quainted. before ac ART. 27. A Compendious Medical Dictionary, containing an Explana The first edition of this work was published in the year 1798, and was mentioned by us, in our Review for January in the following year, with commendation. Though the author takes no notice, either in the title or Preface to this edition, of any improvement or alteration that might be expected by the readers, yet the additions are fo confi. derable as to amount to one fifth or fixth part of the volume. Thefe confift not only in the infertion of numerous terms that had been before omitted, but in amplifications of the defcriptions of the various parts of the body, of the fubftances used in the materia medica, and of the chemical and other proceffes by which they are rendered fit for ufe. afe. Thus the defcription of the lacteals, which in the first edition was comprised within the space of two or three lines, in the prefent occupies more than half a page, The liver, which had by a strange overfight been before omitted, is here described with the ininutenels which fo important a vifcus deserves. The author has also been more careful in giving the definitions and derivations of the terms, in marking the quantities of the words, and in fhort appears to have laboured, and fuccefsfully we think, to make the work worthy of the continued notice and patronage of the public. DIVINITY. ART. 28. The Charge of Samuel, Lord Bishop of Rochefter, to the Clergy of his Diocefe, delivered at his Second General Vifitation, in the Year 1800. Published at the Request of the Clergy. 4to. 36 pp. Is. 6d. Robfon. 1800. ས When a compofition of such distinguished excellence as the prefent Charge demands our report, we feel it almost a duty to place it among the leading articles of our work, that the confpicuoufnefs of the fituation may attract an attention, without which our fuffrage would be given in vain. It has happened, however, in the present inftance, that fome months (to reviewers always very fhort) have ftolen by, without the allotment of fuch a place to this production; and in clofing the prefent Review, we feel more inclined to exprefs our fentiments immediately, though briefly, than to hazard another procraftination. The chief ufe of a more detailed account, would be to excite the defire of feeing the original, and this, even a short sketch may poffibly effect. The Biop opens his Charge by speaking of the prefent crifis, as demanding, in a very peculiar degree, the attention of the clergy. He ftates the centre of mifchief to have been placed in France, and defcribes with a ftrong, though rapid touch, confpiracy against religion, which is detailed by Barruel and Robifon. He fight of deep and found learning throws a luftre over this narrative, and the Bishop Ipeaks of perverted knowledge as a man to whom the most correct is intimately familiar. What he then fays on the rife of Antichrift, depends upon ideas refpecting thofe famous prophecies, which we shall not now difcufs, though highly worthy of confideration. The learned prelate then denies and refutes the infidious affertion, circulated for the worft purposes, that the atheistical fect in France were enemies only to the corruptions of Chriftianity, True it is, that the glaring corruptions of Popery gave them a vaft advantage in carrying on their. infidious defigns; but to Chrift and his Apoffles, and to goodnefs in every fhape, they certainly were enemies. The proofs of this important truth are given at fome length. འ. The Bishop then defcribes the mode of attack which feems to he going on in this country, changed and modified fo as to fuit a people far from being ripe for undifguifed Atheism. He traces the confpirators against religion in a new fpecies of pretended Methodists, but dif guifed Jacobins, whofe bufinefs is to alienate the people from the lergy, by the aid of an enthufiafm, which ferves only as a cloke for the the most dangerous defigns. Thefe people he reprefents as forming fchools for teaching, with extreme affiduity, their perverted doctrines; and recommends to his clergy, that they fhould form and carefully fuperintend fchools of a right tendency, as the best method of counteracting fuch fchemes. This is the true purport of what had been publicly mifreprefented concerning a fpeech of the fame prelate in the Houfe of Lords. He concludes with many very momentous fuggeftions, on the mode of teaching and preaching the whole, and not the mutilated doctrine of the Apoltles; fubjoining at the end a few words, but of great fignificance, on the fubject of refidence. We have thus analyzed a difcourfe, as pregnant with valuable matter as any that has been produced for a confiderable time. As we cannot here add fpecimens of fuch a length as to edify the reader, we fhall only add, that the style of the Bishop gives full effect to his thoughts, and that ideas of the utmoft confequence are always conveyed in terms of fuitable energy. ART. 29. A Sermon, preached before the Honourable the House of 1801. There is fomething in the ftyle of Dr. Proffer folemn and energetic, not without a degree of ftiffness, but redeemed by precifion and force. His text is, "As many as I love I rebuke and chaften: be zealous therefore and repent. Behold I ftand at the door and knock." (Rev. iii, 19.) The preacher, in conformity with this text, confiders our public difficulties of all kinds as warnings from the Lord, which ought to be improved by practical repentance, and a forfaking of thofe offences which have brought us into perplexity and danger. The following picture of our late dimculties, and the mode in which they have been met, is of eminent merit. It was a fituation of danger and difficulty, from which our refcue feemed almost impoffible, without many fignal fucceffes. It prefented abroad and at home much to be planned by talent; much to be gained or prevented by vigilance; much to be fupported by patience; much to be furmounted by perfevering and deliberate fortitude, or executed by prompt and timely valour : in a word, it demanded, through the wide range of public fervice, qualifications the moft accomplished. Yet thefe requifites have been difplayed by fo many perfons, in the various departments of public fervice, and in fo many critical inftances, that, on taking thefe occurrences together, crowned as they all are by the perfonal character of the Sovereign, it may juftly feem that a particular provifion was made, for that trying fituation, through which the country was to pafs; and that a gracious Providence raifed up an agency to conduct and fuftain us under this unprecedented ftruggle; and, as it fhould feem, fpecially adjusted great in#ruments to the dangers and difficulty of the occafion." ART. |