ART. I.-THE PRINCIPLE OF O. A. BROWNSON'S SUCCESSIVE
THE CONVERT; OR, LEAVES FROM MY EXPERIENCE.
A. Brownson. New York: Edward Dunigan and
Brother. 1857.
THIS Volume professes to be a biography of Mr. Brownson's
religious and non-religious life; or an account of the beliefs
he has successively entertained, and the reasons of his
adopting and abandoning them, till he reached that which
he last embraced. It is designed to justify his renunciation
of the Protestant faith, and vent the scorn with which he
now regards it; to apologize for the universalism, the in-
fidelity, the Fanny-Wrightism, Robert-Dale-Owenism, St.
Simonism, idealism, and Unitarianism to which he next suc-
cessively gave his advocacy; and finally to vindicate his
transition from those faiths-most of which are total re-
jections of Christianity-to an unreserved and passionate
subjection to the authority of the Catholic church.
The task appears to have been quite congenial to Mr. B.'s
tastes. He seems to have felt no paroxysm of diffidence,
no hesitation from delicacy to lift the veil from his life.
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