writers, who might have mentioned the Christians, but have not. In respect to him however it is remarked, that it would not be easy, after the most careful perusal, to discover a place in his voluminous work, in which the author would, by his subjects, be led to speak of Christianity; for it is altogether a work, not of civil or religious, but of natural history. In one book, for example, he treats of beasts, in another of birds, in another of fishes, in another of minerals. Petronius Arbiter is likewise placed in the second class. We should be disposed to place him among those from whom no mention of Christianity was to be expected. We never have waded far into his filth, but if we may trust our own knowledge and the report of others, he is little else than a writer of obscure stories of loathsome indecency. It is only fragments of him which have come down to us. If we remove this writer and Pliny into the first class, there will then remain only three out of twenty seven authors, from whom any notice of Christianity could have been expected, and by whom it is not mentioned or alluded to.

We will now give one or two extracts to justify, as far as can be done in this manner, the opinion which we have expressed of these discourses. The first is from the third discourse, in which the preacher, after speaking of the consolation, which the belief of immortality affords to the unfortunate, proceeds to address the prosperous.

"I observe, in the fourth place, that immortality is not only a comfort to the afflicted, but that it is also a consoling doctrine to the prosperous. Some of you, my hearers, possess health, and youth, and admiring friends: the world smiles on you; your hearts beat high with ardent expectations; and every object promises you a new pleasure. Others of you have wealth, and honors, and comely and well-disposed children, who both obey and love you, who are daily improving in knowledge and good habits, and on whom you depend for comfort and support in your declining years. These things are all charming: It is fervently to be wished that they may last, and that you may not be disappointed in your fond anticipations. You have now such a taste for happiness, that you must be very unwilling to lose it. But you know it cannot continue long in the present world. Youth and all its pleasures are passing rapidly away: you will

soon be in the middle of life, and ere long on the confines of old age. Those of you who have reached either of these terms, cannot promise yourselves a lasting continuance of your pros perity. Time is giving you repeated warnings, that you will soon be summoned to depart. He is daily robbing you of a part of yourselves; pulling out your teeth, tearing away your hair, stiffening your limbs, covering your face with wrinkles, untuning your voice, quenching the fire of your eyes, and impairing your memory. The wealth and honors, which you possess, those who are younger than you, are eagerly snatching from you; and if not, you cannot carry them away; you will soon lie down in the grave, and leave them all behind you. Is it not then desirable, that there should be a state, in which your youth will be restored and rendered immortal; in which you will receive your bodies cured of every defect; and in which, though you do not recover your wealth and honors, you will obtain what is infinitely more valuable? Is not this what you all wish? and must not the prosperous in particular most ardently desire, that there may be truth in the doctrine, which promises them a restoration of their felicity with unfading lustre and never ceasing improvement?

The seventh sermon is eloquent and impressive. We will give one passage as an example, among other things, of that truth and forcibleness of address which is characteristic of these discourses. It is unnecessary to state its connexion.

"You must first learn the lesson of humility. What do any of you possess, of which you have reason to be proud?

"You are vain of your beauty; you frequently contemplate your image with self complacence; and you hope to become the object of general admiration: But you never receive so much homage, as your heart demands; and when you look at yourself more attentively, you secretly confess and lament, that you exact more than is justly your due; for you can perceive some things in your face and person, which you would be glad to mend. The eye of envy can discern your defects still more plainly; and even candor must allow, that your form is not faultless; that you have not that ideal beauty, which the painter and statuary can express, but which probably was never yet bestowed on any human being. Although then you sometimes delight in yourself, yet you are not always satisfied with your personal charms; and still less with the effect, which they produce on others.

"You boast of your riches: But you know that you are not as affluent, as you wish to appear; that you have not suffi cient wealth to satisfy the demands of avarice or the love of

pleasure; that you are obliged to deny yourself many gratifications, because you are unable to purchase them; that you are still compelled to toil; that there are other men richer than you; that you have not yet attained the summit of gold, on which you expect to find rest and peace; and that though some persons fall down before you, yet that their worship is mercenary and mean, and consequently cannot confer any honor, because no man pays respect to mere wealth, unless he expects to derive some advantage from his homage.

"You are proud of your talents and learning: But how little do you know, in comparison of what there is to be known? You excel in one or two points; but how deficient are you in others? Of this you are conscious; and whilst you carefully conceal your imperfections from the world, you are perpetually afraid that it will discover the secret. The envious, it is true, depreciate you below what you deserve; but at the same time, you are sensible, that you pass among your friends for more than you are worth; that you are not acquainted with as many languages, arts, and sciences, as they suppose; that in many branches of knowledge you are quite superficial; that you have acquired only a few of the terms; and though when you deal them out with fluency, you make the ignorant stare, yet you feel all the while, that you ought not to derive any pleasure from their applause, or be proud of such a vain display. Even when you endeavour to exhibit the talents, which you really possess, talents, which a long and laborious education, and the agony of thought, have in some measure moulded and polished into an harmonious form, though you sometimes succeed, yet you find by experience that you more frequently fail. You can seldom originate what is new, perspicuous, or interesting. After the most industrious efforts, you cannot produce any thing which pleases yourself, or which ought to please others. Your thoughts and expressions for the most part are cold, trite, and obscure. When the rare moment of inspiration at last arrives, it so frequently comes without any act of your own, that you have no more reason to be proud of it, than of any natural advantage, which is independent of yourself: for it descends -unbidden, like the lightning of heaven; it flashes suddenly on your mind, and soon leaves it in darkness and gloom. Your partial friends, who behold the reflection of the light in the next public exhibition of yourself, fondly hope that you can always be as brilliant, if you please: but you know that their expectations are vain, and that the flame of genius is not subject. to your command. During a long life, spent in painful study, and anxious watchings for the sacred fire, you may be able once or twice to compose a work, which will affect, delight, or astonish the world; but the rest of your productions, you will confess, ought to be consigned to everlasting oblivion, as there

Besides,

is nothing in them to charm or enlighten mankind. what ought to humble you is, that your genius is frequently accompanied with the most pitiable weakness, with such a palpable departure from the rules of common sense and common prudence, with such caprices and prejudices, that even vulgar men deride you. You are commonly so little acquainted with the ordinary course of human affairs, that a fool may deceive you, and a knave, by flattering your vanity, render you the prey of the grossest impositions. Of this in time you will become sensible; and on the whole you will learn from experience, that talents and learning without humility can never fill your heart with peace." p. 235-240

Our limits will not allow us to gratify ourselves and our readers in making any further extracts. This volume is one of those works, on which we are willing to rest the literary character of our country. We expect soon to see another collection of discourses, to which likewise we shall be proud to refer a stranger-the posthumous sermons of one, whose name will be to us semper acerbum, semper honoratum. We pre

sume that we are at liberty to state, that the author of the present volume is the Rev. James Freeman, D. D. senior Rector at King's chapel, Boston.

ARTICLE 7.

A sketch of the history of Maryland, during the three first years after its settlement: To which is prefixed a copious introduction. By John Leeds Bozman.

Coale, 1811, 8vo.

Baltimore: Edward J.

WE begin to feel the miseries of reviewers.

Mr. Bozman We have been

has awakened us to a sense of our situation. reading his copious introduction to the history of Maryland, filling two hundred and fifty nine octavo pages, and his history of that state for the three years after its settlement occupying about eighty two; to all which is appended about forty closely printed pages of notes and illustrations. He announces his intention of continuing this history. Our minds are oppressed by the recollection of what we have gone through, and the phantasms

of Mr. Bozman's future volumes are haunting our imagina. tion. He has filled eighty two pages with the history of the three first years of the state of Maryland, which brings its history down to the year 1638. Between this and the year 1812 there is an interval of one hundred and seventy four years, the history of which, at the rate of eighty two pages for three years, will fill no less than four thousand seven hundred and fifty pages, allowing nothing for notes and illustrations; and without these will occupy somewhat more than twelve other volumes of the present size. "Lo, what it is," as good old Bishop Hall exclaimed:

"Lo, what it is, that makes white rags so deare."

There is nothing of particular interest in the history of these three first years. Dr. Holmes, in his Annals, has related every thing concerning them, that one at the present day desires to know, in fewer lines than Mr. Bozman has pages. Most of the records of the colony likewise for this period are lost, by which its historian thinks that the present age has <been deprived of the knowledge of many valuable facts. In consequence of this loss, he has been obliged to make out his work in a manner, of which the following may afford some notion. 1, The laws sent over by the proprietor of the colony were rejected by an assembly of the colonists, and he gives the whole record of their proceedings on this occasion. 2, There was a contest between lord Baltimore and one Claiborne, who had possession of the island of Kent. Some men of the latter fired upon and killed some of the colonists. They were afterwards seized, and brought to trial, and we have a copy of the indictment, and of the consequent legal process on the occasion. 3, There is found among the old records of the state a mutilated, and in some parts unintelligible, copy of what purports to be a petition of Claiborne, respecting this dispute, to the king in council, and of the doings of the council respecting it. They are both of no sort of importance, and there is some doubt whether they are authentic. But Mr. Bozman has given the whole, and discussed the question of their au