and that its hypotheses are supported by remarkable coincidences. To the discovery of these coincidences Mr. Croly is justly entitled. The subject of his work is one which like inhalation of certain gases, is suited to excite extraordinary dreams, but Mr. Croly has certainly brought historical evidence to bear upon it, which may, in arguing à priori, be presumed comprehensible in the meaning of the Prophecy. For Prophecy is by no means limited to single interpretation; certain psalms, for instance, being known to refer both to David and to Christ. Indeed it is the peculiar distinction of the Bible from other books (as we have before had occasion to notice), that matters apparently indifferent are in reality prophetic. This is implied, as we think, in the Scripture being the dictate of inspiration; for why should it interfere to dictate what was naturally matter of course. Indeed Providence, in even profane views of things, acts in a most extraordinary prophetic manner. Who, for example, can look upon the reverse of a Roman coin of Britannia, and behold her sitting upon a globe with the ocean at her feet, and not see that human invention could not give a more extraordinary prophecy of the extent of her future naval supremacy? It certainly is singular, that dates should be found to tally so minutely with the prophecies; and, as it is not to be disputed that Popery is most distinctly recognized in the Apocalypse, it is perfectly within the justifiable limits of ratiocination, to make particular applications to that point. The book is, however, one evidently of study, of profound meditation. Of ingenuity it bears evident characteristics, and very probably has many more favourable points of view, than we are able to suggest, because we cannot afford the time and room requisite for minute and particular investigations.

72. The History and Antiquities of Lewes and its Vicinity. By the Rev. T. W. Horsfield, F.S.A. Vol. II. containing a Description of the Environs, &c. 4to. pp. 268. Plates.

WE had occasion justly to commend Mr. Horsfield's former volume, and we willingly allow the same praise to the present. It is written upon correct topographical principles; for it is to be remembered that local history belongs to the literature of record; has

for its object the ancient and modern state of places, as connected with persons and events, and assimilates a picture gallery of ancient portraits, landscapes, and historical subjects. One improvement we should like to see adopted, viz. the descriptive part. It is now in general vague and inde finite; but Mr. Fosbroke's Tourist's Grammar, a cheap work, and containing all the marrow of the great writers of the picturesque, would with only common attention enable every topographer to be tasteful, and discriminative in his accounts of places. We could mention the warm approbation which it has received from professional landscape gardeners, but we deem it unnecessary, and only regret that any gentleman should engage in local description without first getting-up the principles of the picturesque, and Mr. Fosbroke has made it easy of acquisition at no expence. The study is not only easy, but delightful; and as no man would attempt to paint a landscape who had never learned to draw, so neither ought he to describe a place without being able to give its distinct character; for the words hilly, flat, and woody, have as little precise meaning, as would be two eyes, a nose, and a mouth, for the specification of a portrait.

The places under notice do not present many subjects of curiosity; but there is one certainly of a very extraordinary kind, which we apprehend is an unique, viz. a bibliomaniac farmer, a collector of splendid editions. So odd a circumstance may be explained by craniologists; as to ourselves, we should be rash to offer an opinion; indeed we should be afraid, for it might sanction the Pythagorean metempsychosis, viz. that print-collectors had and might again re-inhabit the earth in the incongruous form of sturdy husbandmen.

Mr. Horsfield's account of this nondescript is as follows:

"Mr. John Kimber of Chailey near Lewes was a farmer of the old school, plain in his dress, and unassuming in his manners; and though his unostentatious appearance, united with his many peculiarities, gained him the character of a miser, yet his taste him to spend considerable sums of money for scarce and expensive books prompted in its gratification. Whilst some of his neighbours regarded him as the slave of avarice; others, not more justly, considered him as one of those whom much learning

had rendered mad. His learning, however, was very superficial; and though, like many other collectors, he was more gratified by possessing than by using his literary wealth, the books that he most sought after were such as were highly embellished; scarce editions he valued less than splendid copies, and what was showy pleased him more than what was useful.

"A gentleman, to whom Kimber was previously unknown, informed me that on one occasion, entering his bookseller's shop, he was surprised to hear a plain and meanly dressed farmer, whose conversation indicated a mind scarcely superior to that of the humblest peasant, bargaining with the bookseller for a copy of Macklin's Bible, published at about 80 guineas. With astonishment he soon beheld him pay down the stipulated sum, and place the six ponderous volumes in a sack, with which he had come furnished, and staggering under his load, carry them to the door, where an old carthorse stood ready to receive the burden. With some assistance, the well-tied sack was hoisted on the back of the animal, the stirrup leather fastened around it with cords, and the happy purchaser, balancing the load with his hand, trudged along by the side of his old servant, apparently anticipating the joy that awaited him, when the treasure he had amassed should be safely deposited amongst his bulky tomes at Chadley.

"On entering the house of Mr. Kimber, the visitor would perceive no trace of the owner's taste. Not a volume displayed its gay covering, not a shelf bent under the weight of literary labours; all his books were neatly packed in boxes, which, piled one upon the other, formed no inconsiderable part of the furniture of his bed-room; on these he gazed with pleasure, when the morning beamed, and to them he had recourse, when the evening twilight came, to while away the hours till bed time. Seated in his chimney corner he again and again turned over the leaves of his costly volumes, exulting in the embellishments, for which they were valued, and on account of which they were bought, and though he could be said to be intimate with the letter press of the volumes which he possessed, he was certainly not unacquainted with the engravings by which they were illustrated.

But it was not on books alone that Mr. Kimber expended large sums: he was equally the patron of science. Costly maps decorated the boxes, in which they were enclosed; magnificent globes were safely packed in cases, which warned the carrier to be wary of his charge; theodolites and telescopes, protractors and quadrants, planetariums, lunariums, and portable orreries, were sheltered in boxes from the dust of the chamber-maid, and ever ready for use as soon as unpacked.

GENT. MAG. May, 1827.

"On the death of this literary and scientific farmer, his property, which was left to his brothers and nephews (and which did not amount to more than 40007.), was disposed of. His books and philosophical apparatus were disposed of by auction in Lewes; and the competition was such as to turn to good account the taste of the worthy Bibliomaniac." P. 57.

The Downs are full of the earthworks of British villages; and the following account of the fortifications about the Harbour of Newhaven, shows that they were very similar to those on the Avon, near Clifton and Bristol:

"The parish of Iford is in the hundred of Swanborough in the rape of Lewes. This hundred is called in Domesday, Soneberge, Soaneberg, and Suaneberge. It probably derived its name from an ancient fort or berg, situated on the side of the road, leading from the harbour of Newhaven to the town of Lewes. The fosse and vallum, of a square or Roman form, were till lately visible on the manor farm, which takes the name of the hundred. The fort was probably designed as a protection for the country people (called Suanes by the Saxons) in the event of any sudden invasion or surprise, till the strength of the country could be collected together at Lewes Castle. A similar berg or fort was constructed on au elevated piece of ground, called the Castle field, between Deans and Piddinghoe. At the mouth of the ancient harbour of Newhaven, which then extended from headland to headland, were two other castles or camps, intended doubtless for the protection of the harbour, of a circular form, and supposed to be of British construction; the one, on the point of Castle-hill, overlooks the new harbour, the other at the end is between Cuckmere haven and Seaford. Both are at present of a semicircular form, having lost their original shape by the reiterated action of the sea and air on the crumbling cliff." P. 186.

We must notice some few unimportant mistakes. Mr. Fosbroke having said that from the Wassail being mentioned by Plautus, and known also in France, it could not originate in a meeting of Vortigern and Rowena (Encycl. of Antiq.), Mr. Horsfield says he does not see this, because it may have been known to the Romans and Gauls, and yet the Britons be ignorant of it (p. 89). Does not Mr. Horsfield recollect the Romanized Britons, and that they were not ignorant of the manners and customs prevalent in Italy and France? Besides, how could a thing known before be said to

deau qui l'accable, et dont celle sent peutêtre en ce moment les funestes consequences!!! Si vous avez préféré l'intérêt de votre pays à quelques rubans suspendis, à votre habit; à quelques serremens de main de la part de souverains; Vous eussiez saisi la seule occasion qui se soit offerte, et qui ne se presentera jamais plus

-les souverains, en vous flattant vous ont dupé; ils savaient que plus ils enfleraient votre amour propre, plus ils diminueraient -les prétentions de la puissance libéraratrice, confier à votre administration. Ils y ont réussi !! se peut-il que l'Angleterre ait tout joué, tout gagné, et qu'elle n'ait rien? P. 357.

In candour, we are bound to confess that Lord Castlereagh could not have carried all these points, but he might have done much good. Inter alia, he might have saved the Vaudois and French Protestants from oppression and persecution; but his great and grand error was permission to the Continental powers of possessing Sụgar Islands. The loss has been estimated in the Shipping Interest alone at an enormous annual sum.

"During the war, says Mr. Torrens (on the Production of Wealth, p. 239), the United Kingdom was the entrepôt for the colonial trade of Europe. The consignments from all the colonies of produce for the purchase of foreign goods, and from all the countries of Europe of foreign goods for the purchase of colonial produce, constituted an immense mercantile capital, circulating throughout the ports of the United Kingdom, paying a regular commission to the British merchant, with dues, profits, and rents for the use of docks, wharfs, and warehouses. When peace returned, and England resigned her colonial conquests, this immense floating capital was no longer attracted to her ports. The British merchant ceased to receive his accustomed commission, and the proprietor of docks and warehouses the dues and rents paid by the colonial and continental consumer; and the cessation of hostilities, instead of giving, as some persons seemed to expect, a new im

pulse to commercial prosperity, was followed by a diminution of trade and a loss of

wealth."

The fact is, that Lord Castlereagh was not a statesman, only a House of

Commons minister.

Buonaparté, however, had his errors also. Our author enumerates among these his omission to extinguish Popery.

"La conservation du Papisme a entretenu chez les peuples d'Espagne, de France, et d'Italic, un tel germe d'ignorance et de servilisme, que les successeurs du grand

74. Histoire du Mariage des Prêtres en France, particulièrement depuis 1789. Par M. Grégoire, ancien Evêque de Blois. Paris, 1826. 8vo. pp. xi, 156.

FEW Ecclesiastics of the present day will bequeath to posterity so enviable a pattern as the Constitutional Bishop of Blois. His letter to the Inquisitor De Arce, exhorting him to the purest strain of philanthropy; and abolish the holy office, is written in its only blemish is the dream of political fraternity, in which his countrymen then indulged. At the same time, he was the first person to propose openly the emancipation of the Jews, which, under the Imperial government, was carried into effect. His share in the Revolution is more equivocal; but it is one thing to embark in schemes with the ardour of conviction that they are beneficial, and anoprudence of their supporters. If in ther to decide in the closet upon the the heat of that feeling he pronounced England the tyrant of the sea (for England he may be presumed to have meant), the society of the patron of Cowper taught him otherwise, and he made our land ample amends, by styling her the country in which, of all Europe, the most religion is to be found.

At the Restoration, M. Grégoire was removed from the see which he had held under the Constitutional and Im

perial Governments. He wished to

* A curious Frenchification this of "Old England."-Rev.

resume the path of politics, and, we believe, was actually returned as a deputy, but his session was not allowed. Perhaps, on a review of his literary labours, he may congratulate himself on the prohibition.

The present work is less of an elaborate discussion of the question of Ecclesiastical Marriages, than one growing out of the consequences of the Revolution. But it will inform those who do not wish to study deeper, and we should be ungrateful, were we not to say that we consider this tract as being all (controversy excepted) that it is necessary to read.

The question is one of uncertainty, because the Scriptures give no rules concerning it, unless a permission be implied from the absence of prohibition, and the lineal succession of the Aaronical priesthood. St. Paul forbids polygamy to the Clergy*, and asserts his right of marriage, and of travelling with a wifet. M. Grégoire observes, that St. Peter is perhaps the only one of the Apostles, whose marriage is proved. But the words of the Apostle refer also to the brothers (or cousins) of the Lord; and the posterity of St. Jude are mentioned in subsequent history. He then asks, would the Apostles have praised the virtue of chastity, without setting an example of it? To this we answer, that the precept must be considered as being opposed, not to matrimony, but to li

centiousness.

In fact, the question is one of expediency. Does celibacy conduce to the better performance of ecclesiastical duties and the decrees of Councils, and the writings of the Fathers, do but evince the current opinion of the times. All experience is against celibacy as injunctive, though when voluntarily practised, it is in many respects beneficial. But every mind is not so tempered as to endure it; and, instead of forbidding marriage to the clergy, it would be desirable to make the priesthood an asylum to those who, from whatever reason, are unlikely to marry.

The Revolutionists of France de

nounced celibacy as a crimes, and their proceedings, as detailed in this tract, were as strange as they were cruel. But what is unjust towards society, when originating in caprice, must bear another character when its intention is beneficial. The posterity of an individual cannot be balanced with the good which a virtuous and ardent mind may produce, when released from domestic society; not that we forget Howard to have been a husband and a father, but his case is an exception; and those whose benevolence must make home its first object, will have proportionably little to bestow on those around. There is danger, that celibacy may produce the most exclusive selfishness, and to counteract this tendency it requires a constant succession of active duties. The monks of La Trappe, observes M. Chenien, are useless to the world, while those of St. Bernard merit its gratitude.

As a specimen of our author's manner, we give the following extract, which may serve as an answer to two questions naturally growing out of this argument:

"On demandera sans doute si ces ma

riages ont été heureux, si la concorde y a régné, si une conduite édifiante a fait oublier le vice de leur union. Quelques uns ont offert ce resultat; mais beaucoup de ces mariages, mal assortis, ont en des suites facheuses. La disparité d'éducation, d'opinions et de mœurs, suffisait pour troubler l'harmonie, et souvent le joug du mariage a vengé le célibat. Au milieu des vicissitudes et des réactions politiques, des prêtres devenus époux, ont été dévorés de chagrin, poison corrosif qui aura sans doute abrégé la vie de plusieurs... Quoiqu'en France l'opinion soit versatile et souvent erronée, jamais elle n'eut l'injustice de faire peser aucune défaveur sur la postérité peu nombreuse des prêtres mariés. D'ailleurs, parmi les jeunes gens issus de ces unions on peut en citer qui, par l'intégrité de leurs mours et l'éclat des talens, parcourent avec succès la double carrière du barreau et de la littérature." C. x.. pp. 122, 123.

We have said nothing of the local interest. We doubt whether the noargument, because it has only a local

§ In Scripture, we may observe, that voluntary celibacy is recognised in Matt xix, 12, and compulsory celibacy is coosoled in Isaiah lvi. 4, 5.

See the affecting story of St. Dunstan, in Turner's Anglo-Saxons, reign of Edwis.