Swansea and Glamorgan Herald, and South Wales Free Press. — 1863-09-12 (Swansea, West Glamorgan, Wales)

SWANSEA AND GLAMORGAN HERALD, SATURDAY, SEPTENIBER 12, 1863.  to the chronicles of the eighteenth century—nay, if I look back only in far as the year in which I left college-_ lam startled at the visible improvement. Idu rot say that those rare individuals who stand forth as the landmirks of time were not possibly much greater, and, can sidering the temptations th it begirt them, much better than individuals nowadays. I honour the reverence to noble tombs too implicitly to believe that any living great man can equal a dead great man A dead great man is a sliiined ideal of excellence a living great man is a struggling fellow-mortal. The one is Hercules assoiled from mortal stain when separated from mortal labour, who has ascended from the tire-pile to the Nectar Hall of Olympus; but the other is the Hercules who, if at one time he is valiantly slaying Hydras, and calmly braving the very Powers of Orcus, is seen at another time the effeminate slave of Omphale, or the frenzied murderer of Iphttus. But the progress of society has very fallacious milestones in the monuments we erect to apotheosised individuals. Whatever my admiration for Alexander—and, in spite of Mr Grote, it is intense— Alexander's march through Asia aff,rds me no gleam of intelligence as to the advance of his Macedonian people in the theories of political government or ethical doctrine. .  ---- -Whit I see in England, c imparing this centary with the last—or comparing even the date in which I now write with the (late in which I wrote first—is the ad vancement of numbers, the more general culture of intellect, the milder constructions of law, the greater tenderness to suffering and erring humanity, the more ("scent respect to domestic sanctities, the more intellectual—not unreasoning—acquiescence in religious truths. And, therefore, looking at the world as reflected in the microcosm of my own country,—through all gradations of society, from the palace to the cottage—and through all sections of opinion, from that of the pulpit to that of a club,—it seems to me that a writer of our day and land, aspiring to fame for knowledge of the world, would view that world not with the abhorrence of J uvenal, n a with the despair of venerable Bede, hut with as indulgent a charity as that which makes Shakspeare and Goethe so lovably mild and so genially wise. Still the world i, the world, and it is not Utopia. There are also in Blackwood an Essay on Richter, the continuation of Chronicles of Carlingford, a ghost story, and a poem.  CASSELL'S flnvroay OF ENGLAND takes us to the yew IS4O, and gives a very interesting account of the stirring political events of the commencement of the reign of her present Majesty. CASSELL'S BIBLE DICTIONARY IS a very interesting work. It is carefully written, profusely illustrated, and clearly printed. CASSELL'S ILLUSTRATED BUNYAN is an admirable edition in every respect. The POPULAR EDUCATOR, the Q'TVER, avid the FAMILY PAPER also deserve favourable mention. . .  REYNOLDS MISCELLANY has a series of interesting views of watering places, which we shoul I think worth the attention of tourists doubtful " where to go." Also a variety of original tales of the most awfully sensational description. Bow BELLS is a magazine very much in the style of Reynolds, but larger, bettor illustrated, and in other respects superior. TILE FlottiLv HERALD is as full of interest as ever. "The Story Teller" has some ten stories of varied interest in the present number, and some five well got-up " leading articles," with more than twenty pieces of poetry, fatnily mottoes in proportion, valuable recipes, and no end of scientific and statistical matter.  MUSICAL HERALD, part