The Sun.
London, England, 1833-09-02 00:00:00

FRASER S MAGAZINE.

There are substance, eloquence, and humour
in this number, all mixed up together after Fra-
ser's usual hodge-podge fashion. The inttroduc-
tory essay on " Dr. Chalmers and Sir C. Bell"
is of a metaphysical character, and contains some
just, if not very profound, thinking. " The
Joke" is a very serious affair, and may be read
with imperturbable gravity. " Gallery of Literary
Characters" contains a portrait of Mr. Moir, the
Delta of " Blackwood's Magazine." We are
unable to speak of it as a likeness, having never
seen the original. " On Intellectual Endow-
ments" is from the pen of Sir Egerton Brydges.
It is eloquent, but too rambling and desultory
Speaking of Collins (whom Campbell seems to
have taken as his model), the author says—
" truth is the essence of all Collins's ideal per-
,onifications—of all his ideal embodiments?'
Nothing was ever more justly said than this. An
ina4nce of its accuracy has just occurred to us

in the far-famed " Ode on the Passions," where,
in personifying " Exercise," the poet says—

" Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear,"
one of the justest and most poetic epithets,
(wherein the image is at once visibly bodied
forth before the mind's eye) to be met with in
the whole range of our English imaginative li-
terature. Within a limited range, Collins was
one of the most perfect of our poets, and inspired
even Johnson himself, who, in speaking of him
as a writer (in an exquisite burst of prose music,
as sonorous as the roll of a cathedral organ),
says—we quote from memory, and therefore
under correction--" his genius loved to wander
among the magnificence of enchanted castles,
and be lulled to sleep by the water-falls of
Elysium." There is more truth than novelty in
the following remarks by Sir Egerton Brydges :
" 'We ought to endure the insults of the arrogant and
mean with a calm indifference or scorn. They who as-
sume to themselves an offensive consequence are always
hollow and worthless pretenders ; men of true rank and
high genius are always simple and conciliatory. New
wealth and power are always insolent ; and the respect
acquired through fraud is retained by artifice. The
cunning man is always a rascal, and generally a fool--
idiots and mad persona are always cunning—the cold pru-
dence of the worldling is beard-hearted vice."

"On Military Promotion" is an agreeable
essay, of which, however, we like the introduc-
tory portion by O'Doherty the best. At the
close of his introduction, the shrewd adjutant
adds a P.S. to his bookseller, to the following
effect, " Please send check per bearer, M. 0. D,"
a delicate hint, which, in some cases however,
especially in these depressed times, authors are
more ready to give than publishers to take heed
to. " The Poets of the Day" is a sprightly,
satirical notice of some of our minor verse-
mongers. From the " Fraser Papers" we take
an account of the authorship of the " Rejected
Addresses,"—a jeu d'esprit not yet forgotten,
though it will be of age next year. H. stands
for Horace Smith : J. for his brother James.
The most popular of the imitations (if we except
that of Scott) were written, it will be seen, by
James Smith.
REJECTED ADDRESSES (AS ORIGINALLY V, RITTEN.)
1. Loyal Effusion
2. Baby's Debut Wordsworth J.
3. Address
4. Cui Bono 9 Lord Byron
5. Hampshire Farmer... Cobbett J.
6. Living Lustres
7. Rebuilding Southey
8. Drury's Dirge
9. A Tale of Drury Scott H.
10. Johnson's Ghost
11. Incendiary Spenser H
12. Fire and Ale Lewis
13. Playhouse Musings Coleridge
14. Drury's Hustings...
15. Architectural Atoms Busby H.
16. Morning Post
17. The Theatre Crabbe
18, 19, 20. The Travesties
21. Punch

THE QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF

A GRICULTURE.

There are one or two fair papers in this
number ; but it is certainly upon the whole
inferior to many of its predecessors. One article,
promised to be one of great interest, on
tumours in cattle, broke off at the end of the
first page, the next twenty pages not having
been bound up in the copy sent to us. There
is a good account of the state of agriculture in
the county of Wexford, which we recommend to
the perusal of all absentee proprietors. The
following extract will shew how much may be
done for the peasantry in a short time by a little
attention:—

Within the last ten years, a great majority of the
cabins, even of the poorest occupants, have been dashed,
whitewashed, and supplied with windows. Previously to
that period they were of a dingy brown, the original mud
colour. Little gardens are also frequently seen in front
of the houses, and the dunghills have been more generally
removed to the rear, or to a respectful distance from the
door. All this has been effected through the instrumen-
tality of the county Agricultural Societies, acting with
all the energy and freshness of youth, and the zeal of a
few individuals, among whom Mr. Boyse held the foremost
place. The lower orders of the peasantry, however poor,
are seldom or never seen without shoes and stockings ;
the labourers are well clad; employment for men is usually
abundant, though in the remote rural districts, where
there are none but the poorest class of farmers to afford
employment, the situation of colliers is very miserable,
—tvaees 4d. or sd. a day for men, with two meals; and as
a set off against this, there is often a charge of 41. yearly
rent, for a cabin and patch of miserable potato ground un-
manured ; and there is little or no employment for women
or children in either town or country :—hence an especial
cause of misery. Where the fecundity of the lower classes
is notorious, where (perhaps happily) no manufactures
exist, and where, of course, the women have little em-
ployment except in the domestic occupations of breeding
and nursing children, assisting in taking out and plant
ing potatoes in the spring and winter, boiling the potato
put (we assume that fuel is at their service), washing the
duds of the household, and occasionally sweeping the
cabin floor,—scenes of real comfort are not to be
expected."

But the most ambitious paper in the number
is on the education of the labouring class by
Mr. William Hawkins, of Hitchin, in Hertford-
shire. The intentions of the writer are good,
and many of his views are sound ; but we must
enter our protest against the sectarian views he
entertains. He makes the continual reading of
the Bible a sine qua non in any system of na-
tional education ; which, as we know that largc
classes of our fellow subjects object to placing
the Bible in the hands of children before they
are of an age to understand it, amounts to saying
that they shall be taxed for the establishment of a
system, in the benefits of which they cannot
share. We are bound to say, however, that
Mr. Hawkins does not push his opinions on
this subject to the bigotted excess of the op-
ponents of the liberal system of education which
has been adopted by Government in Ireland.
When the Bible is thoroughly mastered, he is
willing that the attendants of Sunday schools
should have their minds enlarged by the study of
the Almighty's still greater book, the universe.
He says :
" A course of instruction extending over the Sundays
,sf three or four years after fourteen years old, affords us
the means of instilling such principles, and imparting such
knowledge, as shall enter, as it were, into the substance of
the soul, and change its nature. It may be made to see
God in all his works, and thus to he surrounded conti-
nually by his presence. The pupil is to be made
acquainted with the several kingdoms of the material
world, the laws impressed upon them, and the purposes
f rr which they were created. He should be made to per-
ceive the benevolence of those purposes, and the unerring
wisdom with which they are brought about by the means
employed. The laws which govern the motions of the
planets are very fer tile in examples of benevolent inten-
tions, effected by Infinite Power and Wisdom. Laplace
.
.ays isinfinity to unity against their being regulated b)
chance. Upon the earth, perhaps, nothing hears more
striking testimony to the attributes of its Maker, thin th
human frame. Mr. Abernethy used to say in bis lectures,
Dr- Young was right, an undevout astronomer is mad.
But what shall we say to an undevout anatomist?' The
truths of geology, chemistry, and several other sciences,
raise equal admiration, and lead to similar conclusions. I

need not enumerate the several departments into which
our acquired knowledge has been divided. It is sufficient
in an elementary treatise like thi4 to say. that in subordi-
nation to the interests of religion, I should propose to de-
vote the Sunday school hours to the acquisition of a corn.
prehensive knowledge of the state of the material universe,
—to an acquaintance with the philosophy of the mind,
and of the history of mankind in times past."

This is the language of a man of sense as
well as of piety, and it induces us to pass over
and forgive several doctrines not quite so unex-
ceptionable.