The Press.
London, England, 1854-08-19 00:00:00

SATURDAY,

devoted to domestic life, and the materials out
of which Mrs. Austin weaves her production
are almost exclusively the memoirs of the two
German authoresses, Mme. Pichler and Mine.
Schopenhauer, most agreeable and intelligent
old-fashioned chroniclers. But, when Mrs.
Austin proceeds to give us an account of the
more public characters of the era, she takes
the atrabilarious and all-hating, all-deriding
sketches of Charles Henry Ritter von Sang for
her guide. We are bound to add, however,
that she uses his statements with the caution
and suspicious qualifications which they jus-
tify and require. This section brings the
survey of Germany down to the colossal irrup-
tions of the French under Napoleon, and the
destruction of " the Holy Roman Empire."
Mrs. Austin then takes a host of miscellaneous
authorities, and describes, through their
means, the condition of the various States
belonging to " Viterland " during the career of
the wonderful conqueror whom we have just
mentioned, and for whom Mrs. Austin has
not one lenient word to say. She makes no
disguise of her antipathy, and seems quite
unconscious or forgetful that, as a historical
critic, assuming to exercise the functions of
a judge respecting past events and characters,
this is too sweeping a confession. We will
take leave to remark here that Mrs. Austin
seems not to have any very profound or philo-
sophical opinions to communicate on the sub-
ject of Napoleon I. What he did in Germany
and in Europe at large requires to be
balanced with what he did in France.
We recommend those who have not seen in
the Edinburgh Review the contributions from
which this book is, with some little recomposi-
don, produced, to read it ; they will find in it
much amusement and much information also.

A Treatise on Relics. By John Calvin. With
Introductory Dissertation. Edinburgh :
Johnstone and Hunter.
Tats volume contains a new translation of
Calvin's discourse on relics, besides a compi-
lation from several modern writers who have
illustrated the subject of Romish superstition.
The author is far too profuse in his quotations
from those Romanists, who have ingeniously
varnished over the corruptions of the systems of
which they are the literary defenders. To
such a length has he gone that we were re-
minded of the old Jesuit practice of intro-
ducing Romish arguments and views in essays
insidiously entitled as defences of Protestant-
ism. We have fourteen pages translated and
copied from Beugnot's " Histoire de la des
traction du Paganisme dans l'Oceident"
(pp. 16.28). In another place (pp. 53-6:9 we
have ten more pages extracted from the same
writer. Copious passages from the work
" Hierurgia," besides interesting remarks from
Chateaubriand and Fleury, are also cited ; and
a painful sense is left upon the mind in seeing
the subtlety with which intellectual men
labour to defend what is false. We u ere much
struck by the author's remarks in the following
passage :
There is no abuse in the world which cannot be justified,
if the example of persons occupying a high station or that
of great numbers is sufficient for it. The advocates of
the
the
adoration of relics in our own days may defend it by
fact that about half a million of people went in 1845 to
worship the holy coat of Troves, and that still more re-
cently great honours were paid the relics of St. Theodosia
at Amiens, by a number of distinguished persons,—
bishops, archbishops, and even cardinals. The cantos da fi
of the Spanish and Portuguese inquisitions could not be
wrong. since kings, queens, and the most eminent persons
of state approved them by their presence. Idolatry cannot
be an error, since so many monarchs, statesmen, and
learned men, had conformed to its rites ; whilst, on the
other side, the same reason may be pleaded for the penal
laws of Ireland, and other enactments against the Roman
Catholics, because they were established and maintained
by so many Parliaments.
It happens, however, that, as society is consti-
tuted, the appeal to example and to long pre-
scription has always great force. Only a
comparatively small number of persons adopt
their opinions after abstract reasoning. A
volume like this before us might prove a use.
ful auxiliary to a Jesuitical controversialist
anxious to make out a case for the worship of
relics. For what the moral poet said of vice
is applicable to superstitition :
" But seen too oft, f unitise with its face,
We first endure, next pity, thou ambrosia."