genius and skill may be exhibited in the conception and composition. There is another objection also, founded on our religious feelings as Protestants, against such subjects as the Madonna and Child, Infant Christ with Flowers, &c., and others which are more nearly related to Romish legends than to Scripture history. We should really consider subjects less ostensibly sacred as more in harmony with the character of a religious work, than portraits of Madonnas or Magdalens, which please merely when viewed as works of art, and neither illustrate Scripture, nor minister to devout feeling.

And now we are upon this subject, we must advert to another Annual, which, but for its objectionable title, we should have been tempted to pass over altogether, as contemptible alike in the literary character of its contents and the style of its embellishments. The Editor of the volume designated by the word Emmanuel, is, we make no doubt, a pious and well-meaning man; but the apology he offers for giving the name of Christ to his insipid olio of tales, acrostics, and indifferent poetry, shews that he is a man not very easy to reason with. We do not charge him with intentional profaneness or frivolity', but with a very singular want of judgement.

He considers that he is no more open to attack for making it the title of his work, devoted as it is entirely to religion and virtue, than was Pope, or Handel, or Klopstock, for affixing to their several works of human composition the name of the Messiah. If, indeed, it is impious to use the word Emmanuel to designate a religious publication, how can we absolve from the charge of profaneness, divines and legislators, and the whole body of Christian believers, who, for the last eighteen centuries, have used, in conversation and acts of Parliament, to record the date of even the most common transactions, the general but no less sacred expression, "In the year of Our Lord".'

Is it possible that the reverend Editor can gravely produce these as parallel cases? By the same mode of reasoning, any misuse of the Divine name might be vindicated. Because the name of Our Lord is necessarily introduced into acts of Parliament, in referring to the Christian era, therefore it may wantonly be used to name a book! Because Klopstock composed a poem called the Messiah, therefore we are at liberty to call any thing else Messiah, whether Messiah be the subject or not! As there is an Emmanuel College at Cambridge, so Mr. Shepherd does not see why there may not be an Emmanuel shop in Newgate Street, and an Emmanuel Christmas-box, with the façade of Emmanuel College as a frontispiece! Perhaps next year, we shall have another Annual, designated by the holy name of the Trinity, and defended by the similar plea, that we have a Trinity College, a Trinity House, and a Trinity Lane! But we must take leave to tell Mr. Shepherd, that whoever be the devout

' and influential individuals' who have passed high encomiums' upon his title, and hailed it as one of peculiar fitness for a 'publication so truly Christian in design and principles',-he has committed a palpable offence against religious propriety, by his unmeaning use of a Divine name of peculiarly sacred character, as the catch-title of a bookseller's speculation. He would have scrupled, we presume, to call his book Christ, or Jehovah, notwithstanding that it might have opened with a hymn to the Saviour, or a poem upon the Omnipresence of the Deity. Yet, the word Emmanuel is not less sacred; unless Mr. Shepherd will contend that it has been divested of its sacred character by being assumed as a Christian name. If so, he cannot object to being himself henceforth denominated, the Rev. Emmanuel Shepherd. But seriously, if the title were merely of equivocal propriety, since the Editor admits that animadversions had been made upon it by some pious individuals, why persist in going counter to a feeling which every devout man must respect, and create a subject for awkward and unsatisfactory apology?

Our objections to the title of the work would remain the same, were its contents of superlative excellency. But, if our readers wish for a few specimens of the poetry, they shall have them. The Spread of the Gospel', by John Hicklin, opens with the following stanza :

"Go forth", said the Saviour, "go forth in my name,
And to earth's distant regions the Gospel proclaim":-
The Apostles of Truth on their embassy ran,

To declare the bright hope of salvation to man.'

From the Patriarchs, a sacred drama', we take a Chorus of Angels.

FIRST ANgel.

Come from your mansions of glory so bright,

Ye spirits of happiness, haste!

Leave, leave your blest thrones and with me unite
To view with the joy of purest delight,
A deed full of grace, a heavenly sight

Illumine the earth's dreary waste.

We do not say that there is nothing better than this doggrel. About the prettiest poem in the volume is the following, by L. E. L.

THE PILGRIM.

Vain folly of another age,

This wandering over earth,
To find the peace, by some dark sin
Banished our household hearth.
On Lebanon the dark green pines
Wave over sacred ground,
And Carmel's consecrated rose
Springs from a hallow'd mound.
Glorious the truth they testify,
And blessed is their name;
But even in such sacred spot
Are sin and woe the same.
Oh, pilgrim, vain each toilsome step,
Vain every weary day;

There is no charm in soil or shrine,
To wash thy guilt away,

Return, with prayer and tear return,

To those who weep at home;
To dry their eyes will more avail,

Than o'er a world to roam.

There's hope for one who leaves with shame
The guilt that lured before.
Remember, He who said "Repent,"

Said also, "Sin no more."

'Return, and in thy daily round
Of duty and of love,

Thou best will find that patient faith
Which lifts the soul above.

In every innocent prayer each child
Lisps at his father's knee,

If thine has been to teach that prayer,

There will be hope for thee.

There is a small white church that stands

Beside thy father's grave;

There kneel and pour those earnest prayers

That sanctify and save.

'Around thee draw thine own home ties,
And, with a chastened mind,
In meek well doing seek that peace
No wanderer will find.

In charity and penitence

Thy sin will be forgiven.

Pilgrim the heart is the true shrine
Whence prayers ascend to heaven.'

We have looked through the Keepsake, to find some poetical trifle worth extracting; but without success. The noble lords and honourables may be poets among peers, but they are clearly not peers among poets.

NOTICES.

Art. VIII. The Lady's Almanack and Annual Miscellany, for the Year 1830. Embellished with beautiful Views of British and Foreign Scenery. In silk, with morocco case.

WE must find a corner in our pages for a notice of this extremely tasteful little annual,-which, though of humbler size and more modest pretensions, has the advantage in more than one respect over its more aspiring competitors. In the first place, the poetry, if not original, is all worth reading, and remembering, for the selection gives us the cream of the literature of the day. Secondly, the interest of the volume is sure to increase, the more use is made of it; and as it will certainly last a year, will long outlive that of the picture-books. Thirdly, it has undoubtedly superior claims to the title of a remembrancer. Fourthly, each engraving stands a good chance of being looked at for a month together; and though nothing may be written upon these illustrations, lines of mystic interest, of prophetic import, are written under each, the true character of which every one must unravel for himself. The work, as the title indicates, is, or rather includes, an almanack,— a moral time-piece, sure to go true, and the case is almost worth the money. Besides the usual contents of such works, we have a Life of Madame de Stael, with portrait; a scene from Sir Walter Scott's 'Anne of Geierstein'; the Destruction of Jerusalem, from "Salathiel"; a tale of the Maldive Islands from Ibn Batuta; and a selection of poetry by Mrs. Hemans, Miss Baillie, Bishop Heber, Mrs. Godwin, &c. There are fourteen head-pieces, very neatly engraved, consisting of landscapes in miniature, some of them from Prout's designs.

Art. IX. 1. The Spirit of Pascal: comprising the Substance of his Moral and Religious Works. Second Edition. 32mo. Price 1s.

London. 1829.

2. Fenelon's Devout Meditations complete. Price 1s. London. 1829. Two admirable specimens of translation, got up with a rare display of typographical taste. Fenelon's Pious Reflections for every Day in the Month', are probably well known to most of our readers: to these are added, in the present edition, his brief Meditations on Scriptural Subjects, and Thoughts on Sickness. The Spirit of Pascal has been carefully distilled from the somewhat desultory and occasionally obscure materials of the original; the language of which is, however, faithfully rendered. The object of the Editor has been, to give to it the character of a consecutive treatise, arranged in nineteen sections. A spirited notice of the Life of Pascal is prefixed. They are two very nice and cheap little pocket companions.

ART. X. LITERARY INTELLIGENCE.

Messrs. Holdsworth and Ball have in the Press, new editions of Dr. J. Pye Smith's Scripture Testimony to the Messiah, much improved, and enlarged by more than one-fourth of New Matter, in 3 Vols. 8vo.; -of Foster's Essays on Decision of Character, &c. ;-and of the Natural History of Enthusiasm.

In the Press, Sermons, preached in St. James's Chapel, Newport, Isle of Wight, by the Rev. J. Binney, now of London. 1 Vol. 8vo. In the Press, The Early Reformation in Spain, and Some Account of the Inquisition. Translated from the French, by the late A. F. Ramsay, M.D. With a Memoir of the Translator. Post 8vo.

In the Press, Questions and Answers on the History of France. By a Lady.

Nearly ready, the Ecclesiastical Polity, and other Works, of Richard Hooker. With an Introduction and numerous Notes. By Benjamin Hanbury.

The Society for the Promotion of Ecclesiastical Knowledge announce for publication on the 1st of January next, No. I. (price 6d.) of the Library of Ecclesiastical Knowledge,-" On Free Enquiry in Religion."

The Rev. John Clayton, Jun., has in the Press, an Address to a Wedding Party; printed at request.

The Rev. Jos. Fletcher is preparing for publication, a fourth edition of his "Lectures on the Principles and Institutions of the Roman Catholic Religion," with important Additions, and an Appeal on the Duty of Protestants at the present Crisis.

Messrs. Westley and Davis announce for publication early in the ensuing Year, an edition of the Old Testament, according to the Established Version, with the exception of the Substitution of the original Hebrew Names in place of the English Words LORD and GOD, and of a few Corrections thereby rendered necessary. With Notes by the Editor.

Notices of the Brazils, in 1828-9, by the Rev. R. Walsh, LL.D., will shortly appear.

A new edition of the Rev. H. F. Burder's Mental Discipline, with many Additions, is in the Press.

The principal Memoirs in the Fourteenth Volume of the Annual Biography and Obituary (for 1830), will be of Sir William Hoste, the Countess of Derby, Lieut.-Col. Denham, Sir Humphry Davy, William Shield, Esq., Sir Edward West, Earl of Harrington, Thomas Harrison (Architect), Sir Brent Spencer, Lord Colchester, Dr. George Pearson, Mr. Terry, Sir David Baird, William Stevenson, Esq., Earl of Buchan, Mr. Thomas Bewick, Sir James Atholl Wood, Archibald Fletcher, Esq., Dr. Wollaston, John Reeves, Esq., Lord Harris, Mr. Baron Hullock, William Thomas Fitzgerald, Esq., Earl of Huntingdon, &c. &c.