tains no code of morals at all. The information here collected, on the subject of morals, is altogether of a negative, kind; and may be comprised under the following heads:

1. The idea of accountability to a Supreme Being is to be systematically excluded.

2. All reference to a future state of existence is to be excluded, when man shall have arrived at a state of perfection. In his progress to that state, it seems to be implied, in several places, that an accommodating sort of priests are to be tolerated. But these priests must take special care to regard all sorts of religion as equally good; and, though they may have different creeds, each one must regard his neighbor's creed with as much complacency as his own.

If there is any thing which can be called positive morality, in the work before us, the substance of it consists in hatred to kings and priests, and love of the republican system. Even this is destitute of all adequate sanctions. We have looked in vain for any great motives to action; and find the whole system deplorably destitute of every thing which can interest the human mind for any length of time. The pleasant song of liberty and equality may amuse for a moment; but to rely upon it as the grand instrument of renovating the world is childish in the extreme. In addition to what we have already quoted, the following are the chief gleanings which we have been able to make respecting morality and religion. Atlas threatened the world with a convulsion, as we have already stated, un

less the grievances of the people of Africa were speedily redressed. His speech is followed by a speech of the poet, who, in his proper person, as the argument teaches us, addresses the American Congress on the same subject. Lest his distinguished countrymen should take Atlas to be in earnest; in other words, lest they should suppose the po, et to be so superstitious as to urge the possibility of a divine judgment, he takes care to guard against any conclusion of that sort:

"Fathers and friends, I know the boding fears

Of angry genii and of rending spheres Assail not souls like yours; whom science. bright

Through shadowy nature leads with sur

er light;

For whom she strips the heavens of love and hate

Strikes from Jove's hand the brandisht

bolt of fate

Gives each effect its own indubious cause, Divides her moral from her physic laws, Shows where the virtues find their nurturing food, And men their motives to be just and good." B. viii. 1. 309-318.

In like manner, when Columbus supposes the glorious reign of Christ, as he had read of it in the Apocalypse, to be approaching, Hesper repels such an opinion.

"Such views, the Saint replies, for

sense too bright, Would seal thy vision in eternal night; Man cannot face nor seraph power display The mystic beams of such an awful day. Enough for thee, that thy delighted mind Should trace the temporal actions of thy

kind," &e B. 1.1 511-516,

In those happy times, when universal peace and philanthrophy shall have assumed the dominion of the world, every poet will be a Pantheist; for the bard

instruction in any thing but politics. The republican principle will have been discovered to be the foundation of all morality, and will supersede all religion. As a preparation for that event the author seems peculiarly fond of the project of an universal empire; and even holds, that modern wars will help forward the work of civilization till, in the French phraseology, a general peace shall be conquered.

It is curious to observe on what slender foundations philosophers are compelled to erect the vast superstructure of human happiness. We have seen, that political liberty is to supply a foundation for this superstructure; but, in some places, the poet seems to build on other foundations. At one time, the spirit of commerce is to answer the mighty purpose of civilizing the world; at another, a pacific Iliad is to produce a pacific disposition in all readers. As to the spirit of commerce, we are told, that

"This leading principle, in its remoter Corsequences, will produce advantages in favor of free government, give patriotism the character of philanthrophy, induee all men to regard each other as brethren and friends, and teach them the benefits of peace and harmony among the uations.

"I conceive it no objection to this theery that the progress has hitherto been slow; when we consider the magnitude of the object, the obstructions that were to be removed, and the length of time taken to accomplish it. The future progress will probably be more rapid than the past. Since the invention of printing, the application of the properties of the magnet, and the knowledge of the structure of the solar system, it is difficult to conceive of a cause that can produce a new state of barbarism; unless it be some great convulsion in the physical world, so extensive as to change the face of the earth or a considerable part of it. This indeed may have been the case already more than once, since the earth was first

On this passage we may perhaps remark hereafter.

Mr. Barlow laments greatly, that 'Homer, instead of the Iliad, had not given us a work of equal splendor founded on an opposite principle;' and thinks, that 'mankind, enriched with such a work at that early period, would have given a useful turn to their ambition through all succeeding ages.' Note. B. x. 1. 261.

He must be a novice in morals, who does not know, that the influence, which the Iliad has exerted in favor of war, has been solely in consequence of the adaptation of that poem to the natural state of the human heart. To argue that a poem of an opposite character would produce correspondent opposite effects, or even immensely greater effects, is not less absurd than to say, that because fire thrown upon gunpowder produces a tremendous explosion, therefore water, at the temperature of the human body, if thrown upon the same combustible, will produce a mild and genial heat.

But let us examine this supposed transforming energy of a pacific Iliad. Can a single fact be selected from the whole history of our race, which warrants the expectation, that mankind will become peaceful, virtuous, and happy, merely by contemplating the excellence of peace, virtue, and happiness? Is it not high time, that such a fact should have existed, if it can ever be expected to exist? The worst that Mr. Barlow and his breth

ren would probably say of the New Testament, in their sober moments, would be, that it is a fiction. It stands on as high ground, therefore, in their own estimation, as any pacific Iliad could do, so far as its authority is concerned. Why does not the New Testament produce, in the hearts of those who believe it to be a fiction, all those pacific dispositions, and in their lives all that pacific conduct, of which the world certainly stands in need? If we are compelied, for the sake of argument, to regard this book as a fiction, we have a right to say, that no man, who has a particle of taste or sense remaining, can deny,that it is the mort interesting and the most sublime book in the world; that it is uniformly, and in the highest degree, favorable to peace, justice, temperance, kindness, charity, benevolence, and the happiness of mankind; and that it condemns all those ambitious, revengeful, and implacable dispositions whence wars proceed.

But we will not, for any length of time, consider this holy book as a fiction. It has God for its Author, a God of holiness and purity, who will not regard it as a light offence to exalt the beeficial tendency of a mere effort of human genius above the benign influence of the Gospel which He has given to perish ing man.

The contemptuous manner, in which Mr. Barlow is accus

tomed to speak of the scriptural

*Mr. B. did say, on a certain occasion, that the Christian religion was a "damna ble mummery," but he was probably writing under the influence of violent malice, which took away all appearance of sobriety.

history of the Old Testament, is observable in the following

sentence:

"The manner in which the Jews were set at work to constitute their first king proves that they were convinced that, if they must have a king, he must be given them from God, and receive that solemn consecration which should establish his authority on the same divine right which was common to other nations from whom they borrowed the principle." Note. B. vi. 1. 39.

We have said that kings and priests were exhibited, in this poem, as the great authors of human misery. After a description of anarchy or chaos, in the natural world, and of subsequent order, we read;

"So king's convulse the moral frame,

the base

from the Bible, and would require a most marvellous stretch of credulity. Let us illustrate this subject by adverting to the account of the formation of the universe, which has been already given in the words of the poet, and we shall see that there must be in his scheme the materials of a voluminous creed. For the sake of perspicuity we will divide this account into distinct periods.

1. In the beginning of the poet's creation, so far as he thought proper to reveal it, Nature and Chaos existed together. Which was the oldest we are not told; and it would probably take many a learned disquisition to settle the point.

2. Nature broke the crust of Chaos, and "thirled" forth the materials of the universe. These materials were then in the most singular state imaginable. There

3. These materials lay in that state for millions of years. Na ture, in the mean time, had the hard task of brooding the mass during all that vast period. It is a great wonder that she had not given up the experiment in despair.

4. Nature then seeks and sorts the principles of things, puts the whole mass in motion, and whirls forth her globes by myri ads and by millions.

5. After these globes had been well sorted and placed by Nature, and had proceeded in their cosmogyral courses, light begun to appear. At this she VOL. X.

seems to have been surprised; but she hailed the light with joy.

6. At some later period, which appears to have been a very remote one, the earth was born. It seems to be implied, that the sun is the father of our earth, and that the earth is the mother of the moon; which seems to have been extracted by the Cæsarian operation; for Hesper

-"healed the wounded earth when from her side

The moon burst forth and left the South Sea tide."

1

7. Millions of generations, toiled and died, while coral was forming in the ocean, and its waters were becoming salt: i. e, as ed as would be occupied by we suppose, as much time elapsmillions of successive generations of men. A generation is

never reckoned to be less than

thirty years; sixty millions of years at least must have elapsed, therefore, while the earth was undergoing this process.

8. At least sixty millions of years more elapsed while a soil was forming on the earth, before the said earth could form or nurse her man. Nature appears to have retired before this time, and left the earth to produce such beings as she could sustain.

9. At some unknown period after the soil was formed, man rose from the earth. We are not to understand, however, that man was at first erect; for we read that his footsteps were unformed, and his tongue untoned, and that he continued in that pitiable state for countless ages.