300 MONTHLY REVIEW OF LITERATURE. 



Mr. Johnston, Cowper's relative, and which never appeared in any previous 

 edition of the poet's works, render the whole as complete as could be wished. 

 We observe that Messrs. Baldwin and Cradock have also announced a new 

 edition of Cowper's works, similar to the present. Surely the public will not 

 be gulled by it ; for it is only an experiment on their gullibility. This edition 

 completely supersedes any other of Cowper for a long period of years to come ; 

 and we are sure the public will not be imposed on by the'flourish of trumpets, 

 in the shape of high-sounding advertisements, with which the forthcoming 

 edition is announced. 



A Treatise on Pulmonary Consumption, comprehending an enquiry 

 into the Causes, Nature, Prevention, and Treatment of Tuber- 

 culous and Scrofulous Diseases in general. By JAMES CLARK, 

 M.D. ; F.R.S. Sherwood and Co. 



AMONG all the diseases " which flesh is heir to," there is none that pre- 

 vails to a greater extent, or that is more fatal in its consequences, than that 

 of consumption. The ravages which it commits on the human frame, espe- 

 cially in the more temperate parts of Europe and America, are absolutely 

 frightful. Sometimes it singles out one or two from a family as its victims ; 

 at other times sweeps off whole families one after another in rapid succession. 

 It is pre-eminently one of that class of diseases, unless taken in its earliest 

 stages, which baffles all medical skill. In its advanced stages it smiles at 

 every prescription and every mode of treatment in the wide range of the 

 materiel medica. Every judicious and intelligent physician, therefore, instead 

 of amusing himself and others with the hopeless task of eradicating a disease 

 which invariable experience we mean when it has become confirmed has 

 found to be incurable, will apply himself to the consideration of the best 

 means of discovering consumption in its earliest manifestations, and endea- 

 vouring to prevent its becoming a confirmed malady. In no case does the 

 maxim, " prevention is better than cure," hold so good as in the instance of 

 consumption : and hence Dr. Clark, in the volume before us, principally ap- 

 plies himself to the detection of the earliest symptoms of the disease, and to 

 the means which ought to be adopted with a view to the prevention of the 

 malady. These topics he has treated at great length, and with singular 

 ability. And what greatly enhances the value of his observations on these 

 heads is the pleasing and popular manner in which he writes. Dr. Clark 

 does not, as is too commonly the case with writers on medical subjects, 

 address himself to the faculty. His design evidently is that mankind ge- 

 nerally should both understand and benefit by what he says ; and certainly 

 no intention was ever more fully realised. Dr. Clark writes in a strain which 

 must please the most fastidious and most scientific, and yet with so much 

 plainness and perspicuity that every intelligent reader must understand him. 

 This feature in Dr. Clark's work adds infinitely to its intrinsic merits. Of 

 the strictly medical excellences of the work, Dr. Clark's distinguished repu- 

 tation renders it unnecessary that we should speak. It is undoubtedly the 

 ablest and best written work on the subject of consumption which has ever 

 appeared : and it is one which ought not only to be in the hands of every 

 medical man, but which ought to find a place in every family in Great 

 Britain. We anticipate the happiest results from its publication. 



The Prime Minister; a Poem, Political and Historical. By a Peer, 

 pp. 1 51 , bds. Churton, 1 835. 



THIS peerless volume will, no doubt, be puffed and advertised from Fal- 

 mouth to Inverness, but to no purpose. It pretends to a vast deal of lordly 



