The Sun.
London, England, 1858-07-08 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

The Indian Betigioi,s ; or Efsults of the Mysterious
Buddhism. By an Indian Missionary. Newby.
A remarkable work this would be from any one
—but most remarkable is it as the production of
an Indian Missionary. Tun-r' aXX amour is the
motto on the title page—the trite but grand ex-
clamation of Thereistocles, Yet certainly if we
answer to the appeal by reading the book through
before pronouncing as to its merits or its charac-
teristics, oueisfaiu, after reading it, after "hearing"
its author's argument—to " strike" him out of the
catalogue of Christian Missionaries. In many parts
it might almost have been written, one could fancy,
by a genuine Buddhist. It is for the most part an
eloquent rhapsody throughout. The writer has
evidently a lively fincyand au aspiring imagination.
Ha has absorbed into both much of the genius
of the Indian Philosophy. His reflections are sa-
turated with his Asiatic researches. He has drawn
inspiration from the must diverse sources well
imaginable—from Albertus Magnus and Cornelius
Agrippa, from Plato and Aristotle, from Hobbes
and Berkeley, from _Hume and Emerson, from
Bayle and Paracelsus, from Spinoza and Sweden-
borg. As to the style and significance of what is
here written ex. gr. the following :

" Creatures are of that they eat. Aliment becomes
body ; becomes as much soul as that circumstantial
and eliminated soul can admit. We are of our
food, elaborated by the secret magnetic laws of nature ;
which, out of food, precipitates body, and, out of body,
extols mind—or all that we can know as mind. The higher
animals, in instinctive self-maintenance, scorn and abomi-
nate the offal which is the appropriate and natural pro-
ducer and soul-maker, so to speak, of the baser creatures.
Which aro degenerate, even from dead dirt,' in being fur-
ther accursed and convict in life.' Living and walkinc,
corruption, affirmativa.and risen up, defiant, against the
eternal Matterless :—the One Rost ; unformed ; knowing
neither Space, nor Time, nor Being. The Ffindoo follows,
in fact, that which be finds in nature. Deep-buried in it,
ho found eternal divisions in men. He leaves their conver-
sion—the use of the materials--in God's own hand."

Or yet again the subjoined :
" He shall not enforce or do the indignity to nature to
make consort with the fairy-fish, the slimy eel—cursed for
his glutted creeping, like the earliest snake, devil-circling
under the retributive heel of the convicting Angel ! He
shall not esteem the legless creepers, or the tribes of worms
or green glowing insects, or the hirsute, or monstrous, or
glutting children of the quickened desert, starting to ani-
mal alarms, or of the poisoned marsh whose clouds are
gnats—he shall not confound this obscene efflux with the
awe-exciting, the perfect individuality of the princely
panther, or the haughty terrors of the great eagle-impe-
rial among birds. For the creatures aro of their feeding.
Their soul is of the blood and flesh which make it."

Some of the flights are far grander than this, how-
ever—and (what is better still) a trifle more within
the bounds of ordinary comprehension. Instance
the musings upon Space and Eternity : as where it
is said (p. 121), "the universe is just the multipli-
cation of a sand-grain, or fire-particle"—eohoing
the thought of Coleridge that " it is highly proba-
ble that this vast universe seems to God but as one
distinct rounded atom swimming in the viewless
ocean of the true Infinite." Meditations like these
cannot fail to better a man—to give him a livelier
sense of the majesty of the Omnipotent arid of his
own utter nothingness. For inasmuch as it is sug-
gestive of reveries such as these the book before us
is welcome, and as such we give it greeting accord-
ingly.

Philip Paternoster, a Traetarian Love Story. By

an ex-Puseyite. 2 vols. Bentley.
At the present time, when controversial disputes
are unhappily thrusting themselves upon public
attention, and when recent dissensions among
some members of the clergy and their followers,
have made especially conspicuous the opinions of
the Tractarians, as they are termed, a work with
the above title can hardly fail to attract attention
among a large class of readers. Whether the
:Method the author has adopted for displaying the
peculiarities of these opinions is in the best taste,
or is the most inapt essive may he questioned. Setting
aside the author's capabilities for the undertaking,
the work legits an uncomfortable feeling on the
reader's mi There is too much familiarity in
the tone and manner of discussing solemn things
—an error to be at least as much avoided as the
opposite extreme of superstitious reverence.
The character of the hero, too, is so
weak that the author does not fairly represent
the strength of his opponents. Instead of the elm-
slabsration of argument, and all
the aids 01 itnaginatien Irui a U 11,5 1)11;; ;O 01550
ciate with what is designated as the High Church
party, we arc shown a weak and foolish young man
who has neither principles nor practice to support
his opinions. lie carties his ideas of forms to an
extravagant ext?nt, and sets oat finally for Rome,
after behaving in a very discreditable manner in
England. From various causes he remains in Paris,
and finally, abandoning all his vag,ario4, he returns
to his first curacy and imbsides into a sober, mar-
ried country clergyman. The society to which we
are introduced in his company is not much more
pleasing. _Liebe Walford is the most captivating,
tiM her rival Henrietta is quite the reverse. She
and her brother Osborne appear frequently in the
tale, but their movements are complicated and
mysterious. The style is unequal, and there is a
mixture of the • serious and the satitieal
which jars upon the reader. Had the author writ-
ten a work simply expressing his opinions and ex-
perience, he would have pleaded his cause better,
and displayed his abilities to far greater advantage.
His own impressions are evidently sincere, and
when treating of serious themes incidentally, he
writes with force and earnestness, as in the passages
on the sinapl city of prayer and preaching. But
when he makes his characters speak for him, a
tinge of vulgarity mixes itself with the style. It
must be admitted that, however unattractive
the colours in which he has pourtrayed the Trac-
tarians, bis work is free from all personal bitterness,
but he expressly denies that auy important inci-
dent is entirely fictitious. Having been for seve-
ral years a sharer in the opinions he denounces, he
includes himself in his censures. However much
it may be desirable to treat with respect and tole-
rance the creed of those of another faith, no such
feeling need prevent our censuring such startling
innovations on the simplicity of our own. 114aly
will no doubt be attracted by the subject, and those
who are interested in polemical dissensions will be
highly gratified by its perusal.

The Journal of Pigehological Medicine and Menta,
Pathology. Edited by Forbes Winslow, M.D.
Churchill.

This valuable publication continues to collect all
statistics and other information connected with the
treatment of maladies of the mind. It treats, too,
of the higher branches of the subject, and turns
from the painful and melancholy result, to seek the
cause in some reckless disregard of natural and
moral laws, either by the sufferer himself, or those
to whose charge •he was confided in early life.
Viewed in this light, • such topics, however pain-
ful, are.not without their lesson to those in the
full enjoyment of their faculties. They show how
every wilful sin against the laws of nature brings
its own punishinent, slowly, it may be, but not
the less surely. That ovettasking of the mind that
has so often shrouded in gloom the close of an emi-
nent career, has often been denounced by the
psychologist. But there are other evils not less
deadly. The want of mental action, an unbalanced
and undisciplined mind, and a general want of
proper mental contro', are among the causes cited as
Trading to idiosy, insanity, and mental abberra-
tion. The paper on the causes of Idii,cy will in-
terest the physiologist, and an article on the
Psychology of Kant will repay perusal. Those
who are engaged in the treatment er care of these
afflicted beings will find a considerable amount of
information, and the mere, collection and de-
scription of peculiar cases renders the work
valuable to the student of mental patholOay.

The .Tournal of Agriculture. Blaciviood and

Sor!s.

This quarterly, although on a topic not produc-
tive of general interest, has several articles that will
engage the attention of the reader. "A Few
Thoughts and Facts anent Turnips" is the title of
the opening paper, which addresses itself chiefly to
the ,practical agriculturist. This is immediately
followed by ' au inquiry into the merits
of a pamphlet read before the Literary and
Philosophical Society of Manchester, by Mr.
Spence, entitled, " Coal, Smoke, and Sewage."
Tee sewage question having been already amply
discussed in this Serial, the article treats only of
coal and smoke ; and those who are giving the
subject their attention will find a careful considera-
tion of some of the schemes for disposing of noxious
vapours. The article en " The Physical Condition
of the People" treats of the health of the army,
and well deserves the ateiation of those in autho-
rity. We extract the fcillowing passage, whcse
statistics speak fur themselves
"In our youthful days, when Blue-books had not
enlightened our simplicity, we have sung a jolly stave,
the refrain of which was,

His laurels are green when his locks are grey ;
Heigh ho ! for the life of a soldier.
We know better now I A grey-beaded soldier is a
phenomenon twins as rare as a grey-headed civilian !
The strangeness of such a stateauent is augmented v.heo
we further read Deaths per 1,000 per annum, at
ages between 20 and 40—Agriculturat labourers, 6.055 ;
labourers in rural district?, 8.002 ; printers, 9.090 ;
police, 8 922; miners, 10.314; household cavalry, 11.1;
Dragoon Guards and dragoons, 13.5 ; Infantry of the
Line, 17.8 ; Foot Ginnie!, 20.4.'
Which, being inter-
preted, means, that a man may do most things which
his hand findeth to do on this buil earth of ours—he
may he rr pkughman, a night:printer, or a night-pol ce-
man—and yet only incur about from a half to a third
the risk to life incurred by a soldier of the Line. Nay,

•
if, in these days of competition for a morsel of bread, he
be driven off the face of the earth down into its bowels,
the proverbial dangers of the mine are one-half less than
he would incur were he doing duty with the Guards,'
those splendid-looking fellows, whose bearing is so sol-
dierly, and whose physique is apparently so much supe-
rior to that of a slouching miner.
"flow shall we account for such an excessive mor-
tality 'among 60,000 men, in time of profound peace, in
a country which is not only the healthiest, but which
possesses the greatest facility of communication, and the
greatest abundance of supply in Europe 1' Such was the
problem which at first perplexed the Army Commis-
sioners, but whose solution has now, we think, been
found in the course of their thorough sifting of the
various matters submitted to their investigation.
"As might have been anticipated, there is consider-
aVe diversity among the witnesses examined as to the
causes of this enormous mortality ; and we have sundry
amusing instances of extensive conclusions inferred from
slender or doubtful premises. Night duty does it all,'
some were much disposed to argue, till a reference to
the superior health of the night-police shut their mouths.
A better caso was made out by others, who dwelt much
on want of exercise and suitable employment • and, odd
as it may seem, it is really a fact that the foot-soldier
suffers mortally from ennui! The general impression
need to be, that men about :town' and fine ladies'
were the sufferers pas' excellence from this enervating
soul-and-body-killing malady. Well, so they are ' • but,
saving their gentility, it is well that they should know
that thin is a very vul,ar affectnn quite common in V.re
rank and file of her Majesty's Infantry. Infantry, ob-
serve you, courteous readers, for a man who has to lake
care of an animal so noble as a cavalry charger, in caring
for its health, necessarily does a good deal for bis own.
He feeds, grooms, and airs his four-footed friend, with
whom he has often a great deal of social intercourse, alike
beneficial to mind and body. But your Infantry-man
has very often a distressing resemblance to a horse in a
mill. He goes through a routine of military duty, with
which he soon becomes so familiar as to perform it
mechanically. For a certain number of hours a-day
his mental powers are stimulated to the same degree.
of attention ;' the same bodily organs are day by
day called upon to perform movements precisely Iden-
tical, and which, besides being irksome to a soldier
loaded with his accoutrements, are sometimes rendered
still less attractive by extra drill being ordered as a
punishment for carelessness arising from tedium. Peda-
gogues fall into the same blunder when prerscribing a
task' to a poor child whose nerves are warn out by
sitting for hours in school, and whose brain is therefore
no longer able to meditate fixedly on alphabetic mys-
teries."

There is much good and practical sense in this
paper, on a subject which is just now before the
public, and which we trust will 'not be allowed to
sink out of notice again till some vigorous improve-
ments are effected. There is a second paper on
the Town Sewage Question, the Farmer's Note-
Book is continued, and the average prices and
tables of grain are given. In the second part, the
report of the transactions of the Highlr.nd and
Agricultural Society of Scotland, there are some
valuable papers ; among others, one on River
Embankments will attract the reader at the present
time.