LITERARY NOTICES. 



627 



seriousness of its issues, the excuse must be 

 that they were writteu with perfect freedom, 

 most of them as anonymous contributions to 

 popular journals, and that an a liniment may not 

 be the less sound or an exposition less effective 

 for being playful." 



No apology, however, is needed, and it 

 would be well if scientific writers having 

 the capacity of humor would imitate the 

 example of Dr. Gray in giving it freer ex- 

 pression in works designed for popular 

 reading. 



Transcendentalism in New England : A 

 History. By Octavius Brooks Froth- 

 ingham. G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 

 395. Price, $2.50. 



The general purpose of the author in 

 the preparation of this volume is thus hap- 

 pily stated by himself: " While we are 

 gathering up for exhibition before other 

 nations the results of a century of Ameri- 

 can life, with a purpose to show the issues 

 thus far of our experiment in free institu- 

 tions, it is fitting that some report should 

 be made of the influences that have shaped 

 the national mind, and determined in any 

 important degree or respect its intellectual 

 and moral character. A well-considered 

 account of these influences would be of 

 very great value to the student of history, 

 the statesman, and philosopher, not merely 

 as throwing light on our own social prob- 

 lem, but as illustrating the general law of 

 human progress. This book is offered as a 

 modest contribution to that knowledge." 



The modern philosophic movement 

 known as " transcendentalism," and the 

 beginnings of which Mr. Frothingham traces 

 to Germany, Fiance, and England, has had 

 a marked development in this country, and 

 he has done a much-needed service to the 

 students of the drifts and currents of mod- 

 ern thought by working out this historical 

 delineation of it. No man was better pre- 

 pared to do this useful work than Mr. 

 Frothingham. By his wide, scholarly prep- 

 aration, by his personal acquaintance with 

 the leading characters who have had a 

 share in it, by his sympathy with its influ- 

 ence, his observation of its results, and his 

 attitude of an independant critic, he was 

 qualified to deal with it on its various sides, 

 and he has accordingly given us a book in 

 a high degree readable and entertaining, 

 instructive and valuable. Its merits as a 



study in philosophy are only equaled by 

 the skill and attractiveness of its personal 

 sketches of the men and women who have 

 been prominent as representatives of tran- 

 scendental thought. And, although Mr. 

 Frothingham's reputation in the theological 

 world will be regarded by many as dubi- 

 ous, yet his treatment of the historic bear- 

 ings of transcendentalism upon religion is 

 most suggestive, and may be read with 

 profit by all interested in this class of 

 questions. 



The Life and Letters of Lord Macau- 

 lay. By G Otto Trevelyan. Harper 

 & Brothers. Vol. I., pp. 416 ; Vol. II., 

 pp. 406. Price, $5. 



This biography has made a decided and 

 unexpected impression upon the public 

 mind ; it is, in fact, a sort of revelation. 

 Of Macaulay's outer life as essayist, histo- 

 rian, orator, and politician, everything was 

 known, his career having been a conspicu- 

 ous one. But as to his private life little 

 was known except that he was supposed to 

 be haughty and cold, and an everlasting 

 talker, who harangued the company at din- 

 ner until everybody was tired of him. Very 

 little was understood of his kindly and lov- 

 ing nature, and his tender and heroic devo- 

 tion to his father's family from youth to 

 age, as so admirably narrated in these vol- 

 umes. We have not in a long time been so 

 enchained by a biographical work as by this 

 of Mr. Trevelyan. We have not space to 

 give any analysis of it, or to make extracts 

 trom its pages, but it is proper that we 

 should refer to one feature in Macaulay's 

 education which the reviews thus far seen 

 quite fail to notice. Macaulay went to the 

 University of Cambridge and took early and 

 powerfully to the purely literary aspects of 

 culture. The sciences and mathematics he 

 despised, and hated, and ridiculed. But 

 mathematics is the great thing at Cam- 

 bridge. Macaulay might have neglected 

 and abused the physical sciences to almost 

 any extent, but if he had paid a decent re- 

 spect to mathematics all would have been 

 well. As it was, he incurred the disappro- 

 bation of the authorities, and failed to reach 

 the position he sought, and to which he waB 

 unquestionably entitled by the brilliancy 

 of his scholarship. It was exactly in the 



field where he was 



strongest that the ex- 



