Year: 1868

WHERE is THE CrYs-A 16mo. volume published by


Roberts Bros Boston.


This is the title OF one Of those peculiar books that
periodically emanate from the half-crazed brain and
prolific imagination Of some religious fanatic, and
which seldom survive the brief hour Of wonder and
amazement that such works invariably afford to a
limited number OF readers. The book appears
anonymously, the author probably having some good
or eccentric excuse for Withholding his name from
the public; yet 1t requires no extraordinary skill or
shrewdncss the part of the reader to discover that
the writer, whoever he may be, under the soubfQue
of sIsrael Knight,n makes himself the hero OF his
own work, and then abOriOusly endeavors to invest
said hero with countless metaphysical graces and
virtues and almost succeeds In persuad ding the
reader to regard him as one OF the funniest, most
logica, and positively of the cutest chaps in oil
Chrstendom. The inquiry, ''Where is the city ~ re-
lates to neither own lovely Gotham, the busy
"Hub," nor to any Of the other modern Babyl0ns or
GOmorrahs nor, strictly speaking, does 1t refer to
that celestial city supposed by the truly pious to be
situated somewhere beyond the clouds, but
it refers rather to the UtOpian city OF all
such fantastic zealots as the author of the
work now before us, and the name Of which
place on some particular day, told. shall be,
"The Lord Is there" Quite pleasant and captvat-
ing name that for any city. However, to find this
city the youthful Israe-it must be borne in mind
that the hero is only beardless bOy-starts upon o
journey, and meets with many strange, thrilling,
ludicrous and romantic adventures some OF which
are told in clear, forcble manner with undercur-
rent of humor pervading the whole, which, II 1t does
not exactly hold up to ridicule derisiOn certainly
smacks of unquestonable irreverence. Forgetful Of
the fact that man cannot serve God and Mammon at
the same time, our author, Yankce-ke, attempts to
kill two birds with one stone by mixing up business
with his search for the city, but whether or not he
made travelling expenses depOnent sAyeth not. 1t


ranspires in the fore part of the book that the city
hero s In quest OF Is the true Church. and he
escapades that befel him before he succeeded in
reaching his goal He tried every road that held out
the slightest hope or inducement OF leading thither
these he evidently did not consider as pointing
in the right direction, or else thought them too
hard to travel His experiences among the
Baptists CongregatiOnasts, Meth0dsts Eps-
copaans Quakers, Swedenborgians, Spirit
uasts, Unlversalists and Unitarians Is some
it attering any Of these particular sects. He
found something to admire and much to condemn in
ALL but not one OF them, according to his way of think
II the hero Of the book had devoted himself more to
religious subjects and less to worldly affairs he might
have succeeded better in his undertaking. But after
tarryng awhile among the Baptists Methodists
Spiritualists and host OF other religious denOmina
tons-every one of which he now abuses more or
lcss-the precociOus Israel did find the city; but 1t
was not within the fold OF any particular church. but
upon the broad ground Of "Church UnOn," which
latter apparently the real object of the book From
its pages, however, we CLEAN this consolation: We
are all travelling directly toward the city, ana shall
surely reach 1t, II but lead good, Christian lives
and work for the good OF our fellow man, no matter
what NAV he our religious beliefs or principes so
that we Judge not one another. Regarded as pure


y religious work. this book has too much levity rdi-
cule and contempt mixed up with Its poorly selected
quotations from the Scripture to suit even the most
ultra Church UniOnst Of the present day; and Its
general reading matter VIII be pretty certain to
cnend ninety-nine out of every one hundred of its
readers.