PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.
Air excellent number of the Edinburgh Review opens with an article upon Popular Education, in which the Report lately presented to Par- liament by the Education Commission, Mr. Arnold's book upon Edu- cation in France, and Mr. Nassau Senior's upon our existing English system, are very carefully reviewed. The general result is unfavour- able to the Privy Council administration, which is alleged to be too completely centralized ;.and the_greater expensiveness of the English system, as compared with the French, is clue, according to the re- viewer, not to the architectural elegance and personal comfort considered essential to English schools, but to the multiplication of offices, which is always characteristic of bureaucracy. The reviewer thinks that far too much has been done in the matter of pupil teachers, and that a Protected class has thereby been created, with claims upon state sup- port, which cannot be discharged without extravagance or repudiated without injustice. The worst of it is, it is continued, that even with all these appliances the work is not well done, the elementary branches of learning, which to seventy-five per cent, of the children are all in all being exactly those which are the worst taught. The reviewer would shorten the number of school kours, and break the mo- notony and irresponsibility of bureaucratic rule by an admixture of local management. Thus, it will be seen, that he differs very widely from Mr. Arnold, and only agrees on one point with Mr. Senior. While of the objections to local management adduced equally by Mr. Senior and by Sir George Cornewall Lewis and Mr. Henley, in the late] debate in the House of Commons, he does not con- cglesaand to take notice. Hand over the management of National Lehools, say these authorities, to district or parochial ratepayers, and you create at once a sectarian agitation akin to the church rate quar- rel. The ultimate end of this would be the establishment of the secular system upon the ruins of the denominational, and the conse- quent drying up of those streams of private benevolence which the denominational system encourages. Whatever the force of this argu- ment, it is not to be passed over without a single word. The two other serious articles of the number are upon Mr. Buckle's " History of Civilization," and " Church Reformation in Italy." The first might be expanded with advantage, and in parts, perhaps, is not quite fair to Mr. Buckle, as for instance where the reviewer asserts that the differ- ence between the intellectual development of Scotland and Spain is irreconcilable with Mr. Buckle's account of the superstition Which is common to both. But Mr. Buckle, it must be remembered, success- fully or not, does undertake to show what it was which prevented su- perstition in Scotland from being as mischievous as superstition in Spain. Scotland was infested by only one of the to great corrupting vices, whereas Spain was the home of both. Various other criticisms of him are, however, just and ingenious. The paper on "Church Re- formation m Italy," if we catch the drift of it aright, is intended to show that the supposed alienation of the Italian people from the Romish Church is not true, that a new class of clerical reformers is springing up in Italy., who are likely to strengthen belief in all the dogmas of the Romish Church, while ceasing to make an essential point of its temporal, power. The article, towards the end, is transformed into one on Count Cavour„ and. is a brief but well written and eloquent testimony to the merits of the statesman, as well as to the character of the man. Among the minor articles, we notice especially "The Novels of Penman Caballero," a most interesting account of what is said to be a new product of Spanish literature, in the shape of the regular modern novel. The description which the reviewer gives of the authoresses works is so clear and copious, that we carry away from a single perusal of it a dis- tinct idea of what it is that she has achieved; while in some passages of a more general character he expresses himself with a force and beauty which will probably attract to this article a great share of public attention. The article on Mr. du Chaillu is studiously tempe- rate, but contrives to do as much damage to his veracity, in a quiet way, as anything that has yet been written of him.
three Letters to the Editor of the " Cornhill Magazine" on Public School Education. By Paterfamilias. London : Smith and Elder.— All our readers are probably familiar with these trenchant epistles, and most of them, we presume, will consider the author to have gone away towards proving his case. That case is, that parents who send their sons to our four or five crack public schools don't get their money's worth; that Greek and Latin still enjoy undue pre- dominance over studies which are called more useful, such as modern languages, modern science, and mathematics; and that the staff of masters provided is insufficient to do the work of the school properly. Paterfamilias's complaints are more espe- cially directed against Eton but they apply in a greater or less degree to Winchester, Westminster, and Harrow. None, how- ever, has as yet appeared upon the other side strong enough to cope with the Cornhilt. Neither the article in the Quarterly Review, nor the pamphlet written by Mr. Johnson, an Eton master, has materially shaken the argument against which they were launched. But it has always seemed to us that Paterfamilias and his fraternity are taking a great deal of trouble about an evil that must redress itself. The ge- neral public have the remedy in their own hands. Eton and Win- chester have no monopoly of education. If they had„ then, indeed, these letters would be a public benefit. But as it is if people don't like the education given at these schools, they needn't take it. There are plenty, of others. Paterfamilias himself disposes of the argument which is sometimes brought forward, namely, that there are no good schools for the middle classes, at page 11 of these letters, where he says, "Middle-class schools are rising around them—in London, in Liverpool, at Cheltenham, at Bradley, at Marlborough, at Bradfield, and elsewhere—which are readily adapting themselves to the altered requirements of the age; and unless Harchester means to be left in the lurch, that venerable establishment must conform also." If a man, who wishes his sons to learn one thing, will persist in sending them to schools where he knows they will be taught another, he has nobody to blame but himself, and if the aristocracy are contented that every class in the community should be better educated than itself, they have nobody to blame but themselves. Let them once speak out, and • Eton will very soon listen. Government, Conduct, and Example. Three Lectures addressed to Young Men. By William Dawbarn. Hall, Virtue, and Co.—The first of these three lectures is a popular sketch of the rise and pro- gress of the English Constitution, and of the working of government as it actually exists at the present day. It appears accurate, and we cannot say it is executed in a bad spirit. The second lecture contains a good deal of useful practical advice for the class to which it is ad- dressed. The formation of habits of personal neatness, economy, and good manners, by the young mechanic, will be assisted by consulting these chapters; where he will also pick up some very useful hints to guide him in the transaction of business, and in the discharge of any public duties, such as those of juryman or overseer, which may fall to his lot. The last lecture is upon Sydney Smith" and his writings, and is very well adapted to bring out those points in his character which the working man will do himself the most good by contem- plating.
Time Leigh:; Leig ; or, the Discipline of Daily Life. By Miss Palmer. With illustrations by Walter Raywoods. London : Hogg.-1'his is a sound moral story of a land not so common as it was twenty years ago. As much may be said of the illustrations. From London to Nice. By the Rev. W. B. Dunbar. Edinburgh : Edmonstone and Douglas.—This is a fairly written narrative of travel, a little deformed, perhaps, by. devotional reflections of an over-strained character, but otherwise sensible and amusing.
The Human Foot and Human Hand. By G. M. Humphrey, M.D., F.R.S., Lecturer on Anatomy and Physiology in the University of Cambridge. Macmillan.—This is a very interesting and a very useful little book. We only wish that shoemakers could be compelled by law to study its contents, and make our boots and shoes in conformity
with its instructions. In &fan it of that, we recommend all our readers to purchase it for themselves, and endeavour to insinuate its precepts through the tangled mass of prejudice in which the cobbler mind is enveloped.
Agnes How. Simpkin, Marshall, and Ca—A rather graphic and very disagreeable story, resembling Mr. Shirley Brooks's novels for its mixture of realistic description and melodramatic adventure. The Illustrations are in keeping with the text—Pre-Raphaelite in style, and harsh and tasteless in execution..
17eEpistles of St. Paul to the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians and Colossian.s, after the authorized version. Newly compared with the original Greek, and revised. By Four Clergymen. London: Parker, Son, and Bourne.—The four clergymen are Drs. Alford and Moberly, and Messrs. Humphreyand Mott. For the sake of those among our readers who may now hear of the publication for the first time, we may say that it consists of new translations from the New Testament, printed in parallel columns with the authorized version, and without notes. As no exception can be taken to the scholarship of these gentlemen, and as two out of the four, at all events, are favourably known already for their labours in a hie field, we may presume that the emendations suggested are good Greek and good divinity too. And we furthermore suppose that if any of the proposed alterations affected any question of doctrine the writers would have .told us so.
Popular Lectures on "Essays and Reviews," delivered in various places, end addressed to the common people. By the Rev. John Cumming. London: Bentley.—The value of these lectures is almost exactly the same as that which we assigned last week to the "Anti-Essays and Revws" of Mr. Davis. It will satisfy orthodox persons who have not read the essays; and this is probably a much greater result than one would at first sight immine. But what are we to think of a writer who can gravely put forward such an argument as the following, even to "common people :" "Mr. Jowett's idea is, that we are not included in A.clanes ruin, becalm Scripture says, 'Every soul shall bear its own iniquity.' But we answer at once, it is a matter of fact that we are included in Adam's ruin; it is not a question of philosophical discus- sion, but a question of fact. Take that babe, the new-born infant it cries, it is pained, it sorrows, it is sick, it dies. Why? That infant never committed a sin, it never spoke an untrue word, it never did an unholy act ; why does it weep, and sigh, and groan, and sicken, and ie ? Because in Adam all die : it is not a question of metaphysics, it is a fact."
Routledge's Illustrated Natural- History. Part XXIX. By the Rev. j. a Wood, MA., F.L.S., 8m.—The present number of this serial having finished off the tribe of pigeons, proceeds to the order of Gal- ata, of which it gives us the turkey, pheasant, peacock, and the wild and domesticated "fowl." The text and the illustrations possess the same merit as in all the preceding numbers, which constitute a popu- lar and interesting, and we believe fairly accurate, Natural History. The English Encyclopaedia of Arts and Sciences. Conducted by Charles Knight. Bradbury and Evans. Part XXX.—To review an Encyclopreclia is only less difficult than to write one. We must con- tent ourselves, therefore, with saying that all the articles we have looked at are executed with care, and that a variety of subjects are introduced into it which we should look for vainly in most other works of the same kind. The only defect we have observed is one that arises from a laudable attempt at condensation, which in some of the papers leaves a little too much for the reader's own knowledge to supply. Chambers's Journal. Part XC. June, 1861. London and Edinburgh: W. and R. Chambers.—We fail to perceive that Chambers's Journal lain any way inferior to either All the Tear Round or Once a Week, with the exception, perhaps, of the tales in the two latter, which are written by more able But the miscellaneous articles are writ- ten with as much humour and observation, while we have occasional papers of more weight and thought than anything in either of the other two.
Once a Week. Part XXIV. Stine, 1861. London: Bradbury and Evans.—The only conspicuous novelty in the June number of Once a Week is Volunteer's Drill, an Adjutant's Diary"—a sort of mixture of fact and fiction illustrating the difficulties of working a volunteer corps. We observe the usual number of amusing short tales, of which the "Romance of the Cab Rank," "A Portuguese Tragedy," and the "Revenue Officer's Story," are perhaps the best. "An Experience of Jersey Law" is a very spirited and exciting account of an escape from a debtors' prison in Jersey. The poetry of the present number is not above the average, and Mr. Arnold's translation from "Bion." is vex much below it.
Chamber?: Social Science Tract:: Trades' Unions, Strikes, and Locks Ont. (Tract No. 3.) Price 2c1.—The pamphlet before us is one of a commendable series of tracts, of which the object is to en. lighten the working classes on subjects connected with their own well-being. 1 The present essay supplies a resume of the vexed question of strikes ; laying down a few simple principles of politi. cal economy at the beginning, and then proceeding with a history sd the various strikes which have occurred since the year 1816, whert the conclusion of peace led to a temporary derangement of the labour market, involving not only common strikes but also serious riots. From that time to this the power and influence of Trades Unions have gone on steadily increasing, though strikes have seldom succeeded in attaining the object which they sought. The tract is one-sided, but calculated to do much good.
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