The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1872-01-19
BOOK NOTICES.
BY hon. W. G. M'ADoo.

Us success VIII be as signal, ana It's
achievement Of good as splendid, as
It's heroism deserves.
Z 1t is the thrilling story of reclana-
ton from vice OfOne woman by anOth-
er. To achieve her purpose, the hero
Inc Ia the disguise OF male attire,
pIunges into palatial abode OF vice
In New Orleans, and encounters per-
lis which would have overwhelmed a
weaker spirit. But she succeeds. The
brilliant young being who was endan-
gered is happily rescued ere the blight
OF sin had shed its bale upon her soul.
Mrs. French has well executed 3
difficult task. Hitherto this gifted
woman, resident of McMinnville, |
Tenn, has been known to the literary
world only as 8 poet. For the last
few years her poems have frequently /
attracted the attention Of the public, /
and she may safely be said to have
achieved, in that line, q national Tepu-
tatiOn. In the recent elegant volume
edited by ida Raymond" entitled
s. Living Fe11lCtLe Writers Of the South, ("
Mrs. French occupies the most con-
spieuous place among the LitteTdteUrs
OF Tennessee. The biographical /
sketch Of her which appears there re-
Yeals well the pure and philanthropic /
character of the author, and sheds it's /
light on her lofty aim in the prOduc-
ton Of ''My Roses.D
We would not be surprised if that |
class of persons styled by Robert
Burns 1.-THE unco guild, or the rigidly |
righteous should indulge in mucn |
aeetic fault-finding over the volume |
before US. There are many in this |
imperfect world of ours who shy so |
Yirtuously st what st. Paul does in |
deed advise US generally to ''avoid, ~
h ~ nwFHh
that they stumble blindly over the |
precipice OF real sin on the opposite |
side of the highway: Sin, in this, that |
they fail to snatch from destrU ctiOn |
the innocent who are entering the |
threshold Of ruin, and when a good |
word, or helping hand would rescue
the failing-yea, even sometimes the |
fallen-from the pit Over-much |
care in avoiding sins of commission |
may readily lead us into sins OF OD1ts- |
sion.
"AIy Roses" is capacitated to do !
great good for class Of human beings |
who should long since have attracted |
an appropriate share of the reformato-
~ exertions of woman: exertions |
well ..guarded, tn be sure still ereT-
ttOT9s-not Indifference, and blighting |
indiscriminate condemnation. The
noblest and purest of Mrs. French's |
sex must applaud her motives-those
who are competent to think for them
selves, and dare to adopt the recon-
mendatiOn of Lord Bolingbroke that
"When we come to determine, let
nothing appear so venerable as our
understanding"
1t is true that Mrs. French's book
may be used for an evil purpose by
the silly-rOmantic, or the already vi
tiated, of her sex in "high-lifeD who
seize greedily on q pretext for dis
guising themselves in the habiliments
ofthe stronger sex, and seek in such
disguise haunts generally forbidden to
virtue. But every candid reader of
my Roses" must cOncede that such
would be a perUerSiOn Of the inten-
ton Of the writer of the true logic Of
the book. Mrs. French is no more re-
sponsible for the result in such case
than the druggist who vends an ounce
ofOpium to q suicide unknoWing of
the suicidal intent -ey
To guard her work against becoming
too ready preteXt for the viciously |
inclined, Mrs. French has chosen to |
present combinatiOn-picture not of
every dag life, but of highly ideaIized |
possibilities Of human existence and |
action. To those who would perveTt |
the volume to evil conclusions, she |
yourself placed in the same circum-
stances precisely as Henrietta de Hau-
terive-with French blood coursing
through your veins (who has said there
are tao kinds of nature, Human ma
ture and French nature?) and in ro-
mantle old New Orleans-the1 YOU
may do what she did" "My ROses''
presents very uncommon combina-
ton of character and circumstances
--,EA IL. A..
BILE, and even the improbable are care
fully summed. In so doing the au-
thor has shown herself an "Artist in
words"-so Sir Henry Bulwer Lytton
styles himself in cOntTadistinctiOn of
John Gibson, the Sculptor, whom he
characterizes as "Artist whose ideas
speak in marble" Lord Bacon re-
marked in the taste for fiction evidence
of the greatness and dignity of the
. human mind, adding ingeniously that
s'the objects of this world, and the
hold going on in it, do not fill the
mind nor give it entire satisfaction.
An accomplished writer of Georgia,
Miss Fannie Andrews ("Elzie Hay,i |
In a recent able article on "The Novel
as a work Of ant, which appeared in
the best of the Southern periodicals.,
1.-THE Southern Magazine" says at |
Is q humiliating fact that human ma
ture in its unVarnished state, never
fulfils our ideal" And Bulwer-Lyt-
ton in that most wonderful of all the
productions of his fertile genius, Ian
O7si, says that "Every critic in art
from Aristotle and Pliny-from Win
kelman and Vasari, to Reynolds and
Fuseli, has sought to instruct the
painter that nature is not to be copied
but e5GIted-that the Hottest order of
art, selecting only the Hottest cOmbi-
nation, is the perpetual struggle of hu-
manity to approach the Gods" This
eXaltRtion and idealization OF the COM
monplace is stFikingly visible in 'sMy
Roses and while it records an ex-
treme case, it presents an extreme
remedy: leaving the irresistible con-
clusion behind 1t that minor modifica-
lions Of the mischief demand milder
or different remedies; and that q rem
edy, or an attempt at a remedy, of a
suitable kind to the particular case in
hand is solemn duty which should
take the place Of that scornfuI and un~
Womanly inhumanity which the sell
dshnesS OF man has designedly inn
planted in the breasts of the softer sex
towards their erring sisters.
'NTy Roses" in its picture of the
gorgeous snd empoisOned t'Masion
des BijouX" presents a wonderfully
accurate glimpse at one lamentabie
phase of female life which has always
existed and perhaps always will exist.
Hitherto man has not only not effect
cd, but he has not really attempted to
effect reformation. Man never will
man is prominently selfish beng.
His selhshness, and naught else, has
debarred woman from such attempt.
il, as the gifted authoress of "My
Roses'' remarks, reform ever reaches
those giittering, yet fearful haunts,
Woman's pure and brave heart must