The Sun.
London, England, 1839-11-02 00:00:00

MAGAZINES CONTINUED.

MONTHLY ZWRUNICLE.

The great fault of the present Number is, not
that its articles are bad, but that there is too few of
them. They should have been shorter and more
varied. " Emigration in Ireland," for instance,
might have been advantageously compressed into
half the space, for the theme possesses not an atom
of novelty, having long since been worn as thread-
bare as one of Joe Miller's best jokes. But the
essay on "Martin Luther and the Reformation" is
not a sentence too long, being penned, con more,
by one to whom the character of the great Reformer
has evidently long been a theme for speculation. The
account of Luther's first visit to Rome, whither he
came from the seclusion of his humble study ; and
of his disappointment and disgust at the pomp and
luxury which he there witnessed among the Princes
of the Church—these details are well told ; and not
less so, the brief description of Erasmus'
rapures when he, too, for the first time visited
the Imperial city. But this great scholar's
enthusiasm is easily accounted for. Of course
he would be delighted with Rome from the stirring
classical associations linked with her name ; but
the great secret of his admiration was, we sus-
pect, the prodigious mob of titled, illustrious, and
influential individuals with whom he there came
into contact. Notwithstanding his vast learning,
Erasmus, like Goethe, was weak enough to reve-
rence titles, without reference to the characters of
those who bore them. He was an absolute wor-
shipper of crowned heads, and had not strength of
mind enough to rate at their fitting worth the honied
courtesies which flowed from patrician lips. At
Rome, he found a splendid mob of peers and
princes, with and without brains ; and was as much
delighted with them, as he was with the compli-
mentary speeches and letters of our Seventh and
Eighth Henrys. We quote from this article on
Luther, the introductory: stanzas of a poem tran-
slated from the German of Jean Paul Richter. It
is entitled " A Dream," and, to our thinking,
there is something very impressive—not to say,
sublime—in its imagery :
Methought I slept within a churchyard old,
Beneath a baleful yew one eventide,
Where to the silence of his region cold
Death had long gathered man's ephemeral race ;
And on my sleep a frightful dream was rolled.
As I lay dreaming in that charnel place
The steeple clock, with downward rolling wheel,
And iron tongue, Time's slow and heavy pace
Tolled forth, and I awoke at that dread peal,
Then vainly looked aloft in the night heaven
For sunlight :—but eclipse did quite conceal
Its glory with the moon : all graves were riven
And chat nel doors were swung by hands unseen,
And o'er the walls were flitting shadows driven.
Though no corporeal forms did intervene.
And others upwards stretch'd in the pale air,
And none lay sleeping now but babes serene.
The cope of heaven in folds immense did wear
A grey and sultry mist—a giant shade
Was drawing down like vapour closer there.
Above I heard a distant fall, as made
By some great avalanche; whilst in earth's womb
A boundless earthquake's steps did retrograde
Afar, and then anon would near entomb
The wavering pile, which up and down would rock.

The line we have marked in Italics conveys a
truly spectral and ghastly idea to the mind, like
some of the images in Coleridge's " Ancient Ma-
riner." An ordinary poet, not content with thus
throwing out a hint for the imagination to work
upon, would have given, after the fashion of Ho-
race Walpole and Monk Lewis, a minute descrip-
tion of the phantom forms that " swung" open the
"charnel doors." From occasional peculiarities in the
style, we suspect that this article is from the pen of
Mr. Carlyle. " The Walpurgis Night "is a very
indifferent translation from the Witch scene in
Faust. After Shelley, who has done it so admir-
ably, no one should have attempted the task.
" Foreign Statesmen of our Time" is too condem-
natory of M. Thiers, who is represented as little
better than a shuttlecock, bandied about from party
to party just as they please. We have read his
" History of the French Revolution," but do not
remember that he speaks disparagingly of the
" people," as the Reviewer asserts. How could
he, indeed, when the hero of his history is Dan-
ton ? " Commercial Policy of Engleind," is a
useful, statistic article.