Swansea and Glamorgan Herald, and South Wales Free Press. — 1863-09-16 (Swansea, West Glamorgan, Wales)

SWANSEA AND GLAMORGAN HERALD, 'WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER, 16, 1863.  lam startled at the visible improvement. Ido cot say that those rare individuals who stand forth as the landmarks of time were not po.sibly much greater, and, consideriog the temptations that 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 inan is a shrined ideal of excellence a living great MAD is a struggling fellow-mortal. The one is Hercules assoiled from mortal stain when separated from mortal labour, who has ascended from the fire-pile to the Nectar Hall of Olympus; but the other is the Hercules who, it 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 Omphate, or the frenzied murderer of Iphitus. 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 affords 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, comparing this century with the last—or comparing even the date in which I now write with the date in which I wrote first—is the advancement of numbers, the more general culture of intellect, the milder constructions of law, the greater tenderness to suffering and erring humanity, the more dscent respect to domestic sanctities, tile more intellectual—not unreasoning—acquiescence in religious truths And, therefore, looking at the world :xi refd.cted in the microcosm of my own country,—through all gradations of society, from the palace to thy 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 Juvenal, not 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 is 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:B Births: Dram Natty is is very interesting work. It iS carefully written, profusoly illustrated, an clearly printed. CASEILLI:B ILLUSTRATED BUNYAN is an admirable edition in every respect. The POPULAR EDUCATOR, the (IL ITER, and the FAMILY PAPER also deserve favourable mention. REYNOLD'S MISCELLANY has a series of interesting views of watering places, which we should 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, better illustrated, and in other regpeets superior. TILE FAMILY Henahn 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, family mottoes in proportion, valuable recipes, and no end of scientific and statistical matter.  Music.tr. IlmtAir., part