offer of a prize by the American Peace Society for the best Dissertation on a Congress of Nations. It was found impossible to select one among the Essays offered as exclusively worthy of the prize; and, after several attempts to procure an award, the Executive Committee agreed to divide the prize between the five of the Essays, that were deemed the most suitable for publication, and to give them to the public without farther delay. The indefatigable President of the Society, Mr. Ladd, has added a sixth Essay, in which he has "gathered up the fragments," and compiled such additional statements and reasonings as were necessary to embody within the volume a complete view of the subject.

The first Essay is by John A. Bolles, Esq.; the fourth by Professor Upham of Bowdoin; the second, third, and fifth are anonymous. They are all of them worthy of the cause; and, taken together, they not only present the project of a Congress of Nations in a great variety of aspects, but also furnish numerous and ample illustrations of the causes, evils, and remedies of war, of the responsibilities of governments, citizens, and Christians with reference to the great subjects of peace and war, and the modes in which the cause of universal peace may be best promoted.

The appendix contains numerous petitions, memorials, and reports on the subject of a Congress of Nations, all of them full of weighty and interesting facts and reasonings. Among these we would particularly solicit attention to the "Second Petition of the New York Peace Society," as a specimen of close and powerful reasoning on the feasibility of the settlement of international law, and the establishment of a uniform system of arbitration; and to the report made to the Senate of Massachusetts by Hon. Stephen Fairbanks, April 4, 1837, as happily exhibiting the progress and the then existing state of public opinion on this important subject.

We close with assuring our readers that the volume, though large, will amply repay the time devoted to its perusal; and those, who may not be convinced, will retire from its pages instructed. It must do a most essential service in reviving faith in the practicability of the great moral enterprise to which it is consecrated, and in relieving the speculations and schemes of the friends of peace at the present day from the charge of novelty, inconsistency, and absurdity.

A. P. P.

CRITICAL NOTICES.

A Sermon on the death of John Lowell, LL. D., delivered in King's Chapel, Boston, March 22, 1840. By F. W. P. GREENWOOD, D. D. Boston: Little & Brown. 8vo. pp. 36.

WE are but fulfilling a duty of gratitude in mentioning with respect the name of Mr. Lowell in the pages of this Journal. It is entitled to an honorable mention here, not only for the gifts and services, which have given him a place with the benefactors of society, but for the valuable contributions of his pen to the Examiner, and to its predecessor, The Christian Disciple. The heartiness and good will, which Dr. Greenwood has happily illustrated as a distinguishing trait in the character of Mr. Lowell, was in nothing more fully exhibited than in the ready zeal with which he met the religious as well as political exigencies of his times, and contributed his powerful aid to supply them. Nor was this all; nor even the greater part of his merit. He united the still rarer and more attractive quality, rare, indeed, when combined with an ardor of spirit like his, of perfect gentleness and good will under criticism. The docility, truly child-like, with which after pouring out his thoughts with a fulness and fervor exceedingly apt 'in others to beget an undue parental partiality for them, he would submit his manuscripts to the revision of hands and heads younger than his own, and suffer them to be changed, condensed, or abridged, was almost, we may say, without a parallel. We can gratefully, and with something like admiration, recall instances of this sort, in which great freedoms of criticism were not only endured (which is the usual limit of human virtue in regard to such matters) - but were even thankfully received, and with the utmost cheerfulness adopted. What a contrast this to the feverish impatience and testiness of some, whose love of what they have once written is only less than the sin of idolatry.

But we hasten to the Discourse, which has called up this pleasant recollection of our late friend and honored fellow citizen. The sermon itself will be read, as we believe it was heard, with great satisfaction. Particularly is it to be commended for its just and discriminating eulogium. And amidst the examples that abound of exaggeration and fulsome praise, as impolitic as they are unjust, it is refreshing to find, as here, discretion and good taste in conferring honors upon the dead. This is a difficult service, and requires for its performance both wisdom

and integrity. We fear, that the Pulpit is not always faithful to its trust in this regard. It should give flattering titles to no man, which work the double mischief of compromising its own dignity, and of doing a deep injustice to the subject of such flattery. If, as must happen in a world where everything is imperfect, great virtues and preeminent gifts are united with undeniable faults, let the faults be gracefully admitted, or at least let us have no fanciful exhibitions of immaculate excellence. Let the preacher remember, that he is called to speak not of saints and of seraphs, but of men; and that nothing is so likely to provoke unmerited censure on one part as exaggerated praises on the other.

We cannot avoid remarking the singular felicity (it really does one's heart good to consider it) of the preacher in the choice of his text on this occasion. It is precisely the one, which, of all others that might have been selected, marks the character of Mr. Lowell. How could "his complete and undisguised heartiness in purpose and action" have been better exhibited than in the account of King Hezekiah, as written in the Book of the Chronicles, Ch. xxxi. 21. "In every work, that he began in the service of the House of God, and in the law, and in the commandments, he did it with all his heart, and was prospered."

The active life of Mr. Lowell was spent amidst great public excitements. It was a period both in our political and ecclesiastical condition well suited to call forth the characteristic energy of his spirit. It was fruitful, also, as are all such periods, in eminent men. Dr. Greenwood having mentioned Parsons, Sullivan, Dexter, and Otis, as his associates at the bar, thus speaks of those who were "associated with him in friendship, in public concerns, and political sentiments." Of these, he says,

"I will mention only three; Fisher Ames, Christopher Gore, and George Cabot. To have belonged to such a company - his elders men of virtue as well as of intellect. to have been received into the hearts as well counsels of such men, is of itself a diploma and a character. They too have gone to the land to which our friend has just been taken. As I repeat their names, with those already repeated, and join them with his, the spirit of the past comes over me, and bows me to do justice to it, and reverence. Is there an equal gathering of the illustrious now? Good and nobly gifted men we have among us in the maturity of their faculties, and others are coming on. All times have their men, and will have. This is the order of Providence. I do not believe in the dying out or the deterioration of mind. But I ask whether there is now such a large and bright constellation as was clustered together at that time? It has been my privilege to watch some of its component stars, as in their serene lustre they hung VOL. XXIX. 3D S. VOL. XI. NO. I.

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for a while in the West, and then sunk below the horizon, — and whether I turn to the East, or raise my regards to the Meridian, I confess, that though the heavens are full of lights, I see no such congregated and fraternal brightness as was that which is now almost gone down. But all stars must set, and the observers also must lie down in the dust; and this inevitable and constant event should serve to bring back our thoughts to the great and subduing facts of our mortality."— pp. 10, 11.

It may have been supposed, that in the ardor of political controversy, in which Mr. Lowell for a series of years was so earnestly engaged, he might have been betrayed by his temperament into the usual errors of party politicians, bitterness and ill humor, or have incurred the common reproach of selfish aims and purposes. To the cause he espoused he certainly gave his whole heart, and many and able were the productions of his fervid genius and rapid pen." His opponents, also, stood in fear of him, and would have been too happy to have found occasion against him. But, as Dr. Greenwood testifies, and the testimony is of no small weight,

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"Thus much I may say;—that amid all the violence of contending parties, Mr. Lowell's sincerity and integrity were never seriously questioned; that his motives were manifestly pure; that he never sought a political office, and never would accept one; that amid all the buffets of the conflict, he never cherished one spark of malice or one root of bitterness in his heart, which was no place for the one or the other; and that as I lately glanced over some of the pamphlets of which he was the author, not with all the attention they deserved, but with all I could spare, entertaining the common impression that the zeal of the times and the zeal of his own nature had often betrayed him into offensive and uncharitable statements, and remembering also, as I well remembered, the language of mutual exasperation, which was everywhere to be heard during that tempestuous period, I was surprised to find how little there was of an objectionable description in those writings, and was rather struck with their power of argument and store of rich illustration, than with their heat."

pp. 15-17.

Mr. Lowell, though holding an eminent rank in his profession, withdrew from the practice of it soon after 1804; affording a rare instance in our community at once of early professional success, and of philosophic contentment with what he had obtained.

"It was one of his characteristics, that he was not at all desirous of amassing wealth. He valued independence of circumstances for himself and his family: that independence he had achieved by his youthful toils; and he had no wish for more."

Again,and it is a lesson which we earnestly commend in passing to the consideration of the sanguine schemers and speculators of our day,—

"He never, through all the fluctuations and depressions, which this country for the last forty years has witnessed, impaired his property, or sought hastily to increase it by speculation."

For, as the preacher had just before remarked,

"Mr. Lowell's warmth of character existed in a rare combination with exemplary prudence in the administration of his affairs, in counsel, and in the essentials of deportment."— p. 29.

The happy consequences of this uncommon union of qualities were found in the enjoyment of an elegant competence, in freedom from the anxieties inseparable from schemes, so common with us and so often fatal, of great and sudden accumulation; in the serenity of domestic enjoyment, in unbroken friendships, in philosophic pleasures, and in religious trust.

To each of these sources of satisfaction we might distinctly advert. Of the two latter, his intellectual and religious character, we cannot do so well as to quote again the preacher's words.

"I have said enough already of Mr. Lowell's intellect. It was of a very high order. It entered into all subjects of thought. It was distinguished for its celerity of operation, its independence, and its strong grasp of whatever was presented to it. And yet he was as humble as a child. I have been surprised, and sometimes almost oppressed, by the unaffectedly respectful attention with which he has received some of my own imperfect remarks. He seemed grateful for any knowledge from any source.

"Shall I speak of his religious character? I should do him no justice if I did not. With his characteristic susceptibility and delicacy, he avoided the obtrusion of his religious doctrines or devotional sentiments. But it was impossible not to perceive, from constant indications, that the sanctions of religion were ever present with him. He believed in God, he believed also in his Son Jesus Christ, with a heartfelt and practical belief. His thoughts of God were of the most reverential and prevailing kind. He referred his life and all things to his holy will. He attended the services of the Sanctuary as frequently as his health would permit. He did not think that because he was able to worship alone in God's beautiful fields, he was absolved from the duty of social worship in God's holy house." — pp. 29, 30.

We conclude our notice of this eloquent tribute to the memory of a gifted and excellent man, with the following extract, for which we are sure that those of our readers, who may not have perused the sermon, will thank us.

"Within late years Mr. Lowell gradually withdrew from the situations of public trust which he had been filling, situations of trust and honor, though not of emolument, and gave himself wholly to his family, his friends, his books, and his garden. In this latter place he