never seen his work; or that a theologian may possihly be a little thievish 3 The reader may draw his own conclusion. We shall only state facts.

It is a fact, that The Xew-Englander, a quarterly published under the auspices of Yale College, attacked the predecessor of Dr. Whedon. But, in spite of the hostility of The New-Englander to the work in general, it admitted that its discussion of the great question of foreknowledge and free-agency had been attended with ' success'. Now this was a great deal for an enemy to admit; that is to say, for a necessitarian to admit that the argument from foreknowledge had, for the first time, been taken out of his hands, if not turned over to his adversary. Is it possible, then, that a solution, which had attracted the attention, and secured the hearty approval, of both friends and foes, should have entirely escaped the notice of so great a friend of free-agency as Dr. Whedon ( The reader can decide for himself.

It is also a fact, that Dr. Whedon has, in another portion of his book, condescended to notice, in a foot-note, the work in which he might have found his ' new thoughts', if he had been so disposed. But, as he has noticed it in this obscure way only to bestow upon it a blundering criticism, so we shall conclude, perhaps, that his contempt for the work was too great to allow him to borrow anything from its pages. Be this as it may; it is certain, that his ' new thoughts' are in its pages, and were there for years before his immortal production, on the same subject, ever saw the light of day. Dr. Whedon, if we may judge from the book before us, seems to have read everything on the 'subject of the Will, except the little volume in which his ' new thoughts' occur.

After all, however, we are not willing to believe, that a theologian can be at all thievish. There must be an evil intention, or there can be no theft; and even if Dr. Whedon did borrow a few ' new thoughts' from a preceding obscure writer, who knows but his intentions were very good? In borrowing them, he may have intended, perhaps, merely to pay them back, with interest, to mankind; and thereby manifest his magnanimity. Or, in borrowing them from so obscure a writer, and inserting them in ln's own immortal production, he may have merely intended to give them a place more worthy of their existence, as well as the sanction of a great name; and thereby, cause them, the more conspicuously and the more certainly, to bring the great difficulties of his subject' nearer to a solution'. Such may have been," we say, his very benevolent intentions; and the humble author from whom he has condescended to borrow his 'new thoughts' ought to be grateful for the honor which the great Dr. Whedon has done him.

We should, however, do injustice to Dr. Whedon, if we failed to suggest, that he may not have been at all aware that his 'new thoughts' were borrowed. 'When the true metaphysics shall appear', says a celebrated philosopher, 'it will be like a reminiscence of what was before known.' It will be so clear and simple, that the reader will be apt to imagine, that he knew it all before. Though the work in which Dr. Whedon's 'new thoughts' exist, had cost its author many long years of patient study, and protracted meditation; yet the highest compliment ever paid it was that of a reader who, having completed its perusal, exclaimed, ' Why, that is just exactly what I have always thought!' Now the same thing, for aught we know, may have also happened with Dr. Whedon; and hence, he may have believed that he only had to put together ' what he always thought', in order to solve the great problem of foreknowledge and free-agency. If so, we nmst, in a judgment of charity, forgive the offence, on the ground that he knew not what he did.

One or two words more respecting the philosopher, Dr. Whedon, and we are done with him. One of the most striking features of his book, is its amazing verbosity. The only point in controversy hetween himself and the necessitarian is, whether the mind is self-active in willing, or whether its act, or volition, is implicated in the mechanism of cause and effect. Yet the first part of his work, entitled ' the issue stated ', occupies no less than seventy-four pages! The fog of words in which he is nearly always involved may serve to increase his own apparent dimensions; it is inconsistent certainly,—utterly inconsistent,-— with anything like perspicuity of expression, or clearness and simplicity in the exhibition of truth.

His book opens, very properly, with the three-fold classifies tion of the phenomena of mind into ' intellectivts, sensibilities, and volitions'. The intelligence is that by which the mind thinks; the sensibility is that by which it feels, and the will is that by which it acts, or puts forth volitions. This three-fold distinction, or classification, is indeed the great stronghold of the cause of free-agency. According to the psychology of Edwards, Hobbes, and the elder necessitarians, there are only two departments of the mind,—' the understanding and will', or ' the understanding and the affections',—the will and the affections being identified with each other. This two-fold classification, or distinction, was the great stronghold of the cause of necessity; for as it is universally admitted, that the states of the sensibility, or the affections, are necessitated, or produced, by causes over which they have no control; so it was only necessary to merge the will,—the only self-active power of the mind,—in the sensibility, or the affections, in order to make its real characteristic disappear, and bring it under the law of cause and effect. On the other hand, it is only necessary to adopt the three-fold distinction in question,—now universally received,—in order to extricate the will from the false psychology of the past, and, by showing its true characteristic in the pure light of consciousness, restore it to its rightful position as the self-active power of the mind.

We had supposed that Dr. Whedon intended to do this. We had supposed that he intended to show, that while all the states of the intelligence and the sensibility, are necessitated, the states or acts of the will are free; that is, that they are not produced by causes over which it has no control. But we soon discovered that we were greatly mistaken. For, instead of seeing the unspeakable value of the three-fold classification in question, Dr. Whedon soon loses sight of it altogether, and plunges into the darkness of a necessitated will. He makes, or rather reproduces, the said three-fold distinction, only to lose 6ight of its value, and fail to apply it in the great cause of free-agency espoused by him.

He begins well. He 6tates, at the outset, that' all the operations of the first two of these faculties, namely, Intellect and Sensibility, are universally felt, and acknowledged to be necessary and absolutely caused'. Hence the freedom of the mind cannot be found in them. He also states, that the Will is not necessitated, that its acts or volitions are not produced by causes over which it has no control, or from whose influence it is not free. But, instead of adhering to this position, he abandons this great stronghold of his own cause into the hands of the enemy. That is to say, he admits, (p. 379), that' the determination of the clock pointer may be no more fixed and necessitated than the determination of a volition'. Thus, after all, he does not see, that a necessitated Will is no will at all, that a volition absolutely caused is a contradiction in terms! Hence, we would advise him to go back, and learn this very first lesson from Coleridge's Aids to Reflection, or from some other manual for beginners. For to say, as he has repeatedly done, that an act of the will may be necessitated, or absolutely caused, is to say that it is & passive impression merely, and not an act of the will at all. It is, in other words, to betray the cause of ‘The Freedom of the Will' into the hands of the enemy. If Dr. Whedon had only perceived, and borne in mind, the value, or use, or application, of the three-fold distinction ,which, after Cousin, and others, he has so learnedly laid down at the very opening of his book, he might have been spared this unconscious treason to the great cause he has so zealously espoused.

Every state of the mind, which is necessitated, or absolutely caused, is a passive impression, and not an act of the self-active will. But the mind, in willing or in putting forth volitions, is self-active, is free, and not necessitated to act. Deny this, as Dr. Whedon does, and the cause of free-agency is betrayed. Assert, as Dr. Whedon does, that the Will may be necessitated, or absolutely caused, to act, and the great fundamental error of the necessitarian is blindly conceded.

Hence it is, that Dr. Whedon has automatons, or machines, grinding out moral good and evil, holiness and sin! Hence it is, that he has ' a god automatically good', or holy, as well as 'a fiend automatically bad', or sinful! We have heard of the 'mills of the gods'; but never before had we heard that they could turn out moral good or evil, holiness or sin, as other ma. chinwy turns out paper collars, or pewter buttons! This is a part and parcel of the great discovery of the nineteenth century.

We are glad, however, that Dr. Whedon has, in one of his lucid intervals, pronounced his 'god automatically good', or holy,' a blasphemous contradiction '. We are also glad to believe, that the great God never created a man, or other moral agent, in the image of any such 'blasphemous contradiction '. We rejoice, on the contrary, in the belief, that he created man in his own image; and, as such, endowed him with the capacity to act without being necessitated, or absolutely compelled, to act. In other words, we rejoice m the belief, that man was endowed, by his Creator, with the god-like power of a self-active will, and not with the attribute of Dr. AVhedon's 'blasphemous contradiction'.

Art. V.—1. Familiar Lectures on Scientific Subjects. By Sir * John F. W. Herschel, Bart, K. H., M. A., D. C. L., F. R. S., &c., &c. Xew York: George Rutledge & Sons. 1869.

2. Cos?nos: A Sketch of the Physical Description of the Universe. (Vol. II.) By Alexander Von Humboldt. Isew York: Harper & Brothers. 1857.

3. History of the Inductive Sciences. (Vol. III.) By William Whewell, D. D., Master of Trinity College, Cambridge. London: John W. Parker. 1847.

We have had, of late, many disquisitions on the physical constitution of the Sun. Why not have, then, discussions also on the physical constitution of the Earth? The sun, it is true, is many hundred thousand times greater and more glorious than*^., the earth; but then a knowledge of the earth, as the planet in which we dwell, comes more directly home to our business and bosoms, than that of any other body in the universe. This