a

fellow labourer, and Mr. (now Dr.) Marshman, where they arrived in October following.

From this brief outline it will be seen, that Mr. Ward was far from being an illiterate man when he entered upon his preparatory studies; and that it was at a considerable sacrifice of his worldly prospects that he resolved to devote himself to the sacred office. For the station which he was appointed to occupy as a missionary, he was singularly qualified; and he expresses himself in one of his letters in the following remarkable terms.

• I think I should have liked preaching in England, if I had not had other work to do; but I sometimes think I should have killed myself. If I preach half an hour in a tolerably quiet way, I almost lose my voice. I can talk in a plain way in Bengalee, but very confined : what is preaching without figures, illustrations, and a liberty to enlarge and press home truth? Yet, I do rejoice in my destina. tion. I know not any place on earth where I might be more useful, if I had the piety of a Pearce.'

In the year 1819, Mr. Ward visited this country for the benefit of his health. He embarked for India a second time in May 1821. But he had scarcely been fifteen months in the bosom of his family, when he was called to finish his earthly course. For further details, we refer our readers to Mr. Stennett's interesting memoir.

The poetical effusions given in the Appendix,! will have answered the purpose of gratifying the feelings of Mr. Ward's friends, and may, therefore, be onnitted without impropriety, in the event of a second edition, which will enable the Author to reduce the price of his volume.

We must make room for the following letter as an exemplification of Mr. Ward's excellent spirit. We give it without comment.

• March 3, 1810. • I think you cannot abstain from communion with any real christian whose moral conduct substantiates the truth of his faith in Christ, without a positive crime. The first law of Christ is love, and the first law of the infernal regions is disunion. Hold the 'opinions which you conscientiously find in the Bible, and give none of them up to please man : but, after all, the greatest of these is love ; and how you can love christians in a proper manner, and be shy with them, and avoid their communion, merely because their opinions are not all like yours, and because they demand the right of thinking for themselves, as you do, is a mystery to me. I think the shutting out from communion such a man as Doddridge, or Baxter, because he was a pædobaptist, arises from the same spirit as that which burnt men alive : this is exclusion ; that was exclusion from life. In one

:

respect the injury is small, because the person can communicate with others; but the strict communionist, if he and another baptist, and Doddridge lived together in a country where there were no churches of Christ, ought, on his own principles, to shut out Doddridge from communion, though he could commemorate the Lord's death no where else, and though Doddridge lived in a state of the highest communion with God, while these two baptists, perhaps, were almost too loose to be retained in a christian church. We admit pædobaptists to communion with us; but should the Serampore church change its practice, which, in my opinion is its glory, I would take all proper occasions to protest against its spirit; but should I abandon all means of doing good, because they acted wrong? Would not my opinions, mildly and properly urged, be more likely to do good, than if I left the church, and placed myself at a greater distance from my fellow-christians?" ' 243-245.

Art. XIV. A Present for a Sunday School; or a plain Address on the Fear of the Lord; adapted to the Capacities of little Children; being the first of a Series on different Subjects. By a Minister of the Established Church. 18mo. pp. 36. Price 4d. London. 1824.

Τ

IT is so very rare to meet with any publications designed for children, the style of which is really on a level with their capacity, that we are induced to go rather out of our way to notice this excellent little Sunday School address, which may be recommended as a model for simplicity. A short extract will sufficiently justify this commendation.

ART. XV.

SELECT LITERARY INFORMATION.

The Rev. J. Morison, author of " Lectures on the Reciprocal Obligations of Life," is preparing for publication a History of the Cameronians, and he will feel particularly obliged for any assistance which may be rendered to him, by the friends and admirers of Scottish literature, in this most difficult undertaking.

The Lovers of the Arts will soon be gratified by the appearance of a translation of the History of the Life and Works of Raphael, from the French of M. Quatremere de Quincy, accompanied by copious additions in the form of notes, and preceded by a history of the progress of painting in Italy from the time of Cimabue to the era of Raphael.

Shortly will appear, a volume concerning the Astronomy of the Egyptians, particularly referring to the celebrated circular zodiac discovered at Denderah, and which was subsequently conveyed to Paris. It will be compiled from the publications of the Abbe Testa; Messrs. Dupuis; Visconti; Tardieu; Ferlus; Saint Martin; Le Lorraine; Lalande; Grosbert; Savigny; Nouet; and Cuvier; all of whom have written concerning the sphere of Denderah, but more particularly from the last work

that has appeared from the pen of M.

J. B. Bot.

In the press, in 1 vol 8vo. Sermons, Expositions, and Addresses at the Holy Communion. By the late Rev. Alex. Waugh, A.M. minister of the Scots': church in Miles's lane, Loudon. A short memoir of the Author will be pre fixed.

Dr. P. M. Latham has in the press, an account of the disease lately prevalent at the General Penitentiary, 8vo.

In the press, The Progress of Dissent.'-Observations on the most remarkable and amusing passages in an article in the last number of the Quarterly Review. Addressed to the Editor. By a Non Con.

In the press, the Controversy with the Unitarians of Manchester respecting their possession of chapels and trusts: with an Introduction.

In the press, Letters to a Sceptic of distinction in the nineteenth century.

In the press, a Series of Discourses on the Lord's Prayer. By the Rev. Sam. Saunders, of Frome.

A new edition of the Rev. Andrew Reed's Supplement to Dr. Watts's Psalms and Hymns is announced, enlarged, and with some originals.

ART. XVI. LIST OF WORKS RECENTLY PUBLISHED.

BIOGRAPHY.

The Life of the Rev. Philip Henry, A.M. By the Rev. Matthew Henry. Enlarged with important Additions, Notes, &c. by J. B. Williams, F.R.S. 8vo. 15s.

The Annual Biography and Obituary, for 1825. 8vo. 15s.

Memoirs of the Life of the Rev. William Ward, late Baptist Missionary in India: containing a few of his early poetical productions, and a monody to his memory. By Samuel Stennett. 12mo. 68.

THEOLOGY.

Personal Election and Divine Sove. reignty; a discourse, with an Appendix containing Notes and Observations on collateral Subjects. By Joseph Fletcher, A.M. Third edition. 8vo. 3.

A Letter to the Editor of the Quar

terly Review, occasioned by its animadversions on a work entitled "Divine Influence." By the Rev. T. Biddulph, Minister of St. James's, Bristol. 8vo. 1s.

Thoughts on Antinomianism. By Agnostos, Author of "Thoughts on Baptism. 12mo. 1s. 6d.

Discourses delivered at the Settlement of the Rev. W. Orme, at Camberwell, Oct. 7, 1824, by the Rev. Jos. Fletcher, Greville Ewing, and Robert Winter, D.D. 2s. 6d.

A new Selection of more than 800 Evangelical Hymus for Public and Family Worship, being a complete Supplement to Dr. Watts's Psalms and Hymns. By John Dobell. Roy. 24mo. 5s. 6d. bound.

The Ordination Services at the Settlement of Rev. J. Price at DevonshireSquare. 8vo. 2s.

Erratum in the January Number.

At page 12, line 2, for from sin read within.

*5s

THE

ECLECTIC REVIEW,

FOR MARCH, 1825.

Art. I. Historical View of the Literature of the South of Europe.

By J. C. L. Simonde de Sismondi, of the Academy of Arts of
Geneva, &c. &c. &c. Translated from the Original, by Thomas

Roscoe, Esq., with Notes. 2 vols. 8vo. Price 11. 8s. Lond. 1823. WE did not notice in our Journal, M. Sismondi's work upon

the literature of the South of Europe, when it first appeared. But we do not regret the omission, since it has enabled us to examine it in a very competent and correct translation. In many respects, the original is considerably a gainer, as it comes from the hands of its translator ; especially as Mr. Roscoe has embellished the extracts of M. Sismondi (which, from the refractory spirit of French poetry, he was obliged to present through the lifeless medium of French prose) with elegant metrical versions into English. These, to an English reader, must considerably augment the value of this important portion of literary history.

These volumes comprise a rapid sketch of the Arabian literature, the language and poetry of the Provençals of Langue d'Oc, the Trouvéres of Langue d'Oil, and the Italians. A very interesting branch of the Author's extended undertaking,--the literature of the Western Peninsula of Europe, will occupy the sequel.

To those who are desirous of making accurate researches into the literary history of Italy, the origin of its language is a necessary inquiry. But the solution of the problem has long divided the learned. M. Sismondi and M. Ginguené concur in attributing the rise of the languages now spread over the south of Europe, to the tenth century. But neither of these writers has, in our opinion, traeed the gradual melting down of the ancient into the modern tongue with satisfactory clearness, It is not our aim to supply the defect, for it is a task too minute for the rapid pen of a reviewer. Yet, we cannot abstain Vol. XXIII. N.S.

S

not escape

from a few remarks on a subject of so interesting and curious speculation. That all the southern dialects of Europe were derived from the Latin, is too obvious to require proof. That language had been gradually substituted, in consequence of the Roman conquests in those countries, for the original dialects, which were, it is supposed, for the most part, Celtic. But the Latin thus introduced into these provinces, and nearly effacing their mother tongues, could not, if it obeyed the law of all languages when they come into vernacular and provincial use, preserve either the primitive purity of its pronunciation, or its usual conformity to its written sounds. Even in Italy, it did

the common fate of languages, and was, of course, exposed to the corruptions of popular speech ;-corruptions which, in the declining days of the empire, became the more licentious from the decay of learning, the only standard by which common discourse can be rectified. The restraint, therefore, on ungrammatical anomalies and arbitrary licences, being thus removed, every province capriciously innovated upon the Latin, which followed the natural proneness of all living languages to that abbreviation of words, and that melting down of its consonants, which are found so convenient for colloquial ease and rapidity. When the barbarous nations obtained a footing in those provinces, least of all was it to be expected, that the elegant precision of the Latin inflexions would have stood uninjured. From the analogies

From the analogies of the northern dictions, the use of the auxiliary verbs became more frequent. Then followed the passive auxiliary, and the words habeo and teneo, also, as auxiliaries in the conjugation of verbs. Then, from the same Teutonic examples, came the usage of the definite and indefinite articles, the want of which was too sensibly felt by those rude conquerors, not to be speedily supplied.

Still, however, the Latin language existed, and the barbarous settlers agreed to take it in exchange for their own. Yet, no language, whatever may be its intrinsic vigour, can long withstand those successive invasions and conquests which are alike the scourge of idioms and of nations. "It remained, however, in substance, from the age of Constantine to the twelfth century, and was the language of all public records even to a later period; but the Latin was no longer in common use, and the corrupt jargon, or · lingua volgare,' began, at that time, to assume the shape of a distinct language, and to acquire, by degrees, the form in which it was found by the creative genius of Dante, who first smoothed its chaotic and elemental rudeness into symmetry and beauty.

In the weanwhile, the Latin language had declined in France at a much earlier period. Beyond the seventh century, it had