216 



NOTES ANB QUERIES. 



[No. 281. 



ment confined to a glass of wine and a biscuit ; 



with " abstinence " parties nothing at all is ofFered. 



The time has been when to attend a country fu- 

 neral was what may be called a favourable op- 

 portunity for getting the worse of liquor ; firstly, 

 to each a large glass of whisky, with bread and 

 cheese ; secondly, an equal supply of rum, with 

 " burial bread ; " and, thirdly, wine ad libitum. I 

 have heard of pipes and tobacco being distributed, 

 but this has never come under my observation. 



G.N. 

 *'■ Platonism Exposed''' (Vol. x., p. 103.). — I have 

 made diligent but ineffectual search for Platonism 

 Exposed. If there is such a book, it is probably a 

 translation of Le Platonisme Deooile, ou Essai sur 

 le Verbe Platonicien, divise en deux parties, au 

 Cologne, chez Pierre Marteau, 1700, pp. 395, but 

 I think it more likely that the author of " A 

 Candid Inquiry " has translated the French title- 

 page. 



The charge of " having no Greek " was often 

 made by controversialists of the last century. 

 The author of Le Platonisme Devoile makes no 

 display, but seems to understand the Greek which 

 he quotes. Whatever may be his obligations to 

 Bayle and Le Clerc, they are much greater to the 

 English Unitarians, whose " Tracts " are generally 

 found collected in three small quarto volumes, 

 with dates from 1690 to 1697. Such publications 

 in English were stopped by the statute 9 & 10 

 Wm. III. c. 32., but I think Le Platonisme Devoile 

 is a continuation of the controversy in French, 

 with a fictitious title-page. A short introductory 

 notice states that the author had been persecuted, 

 and that he did not live to comjilete the third part 

 of the work. In the second part many arguments 

 of the "Tracts" are reproduced ; when the Church 

 is mentioned, that of England seems to be in- 

 tended ; at p. 219. is " un de nos eveques dans son 

 discours au clerge ;" and at p. 231. the differences 

 between Wallis and Sherlocke are correctly epito- 

 mised. Bull is often cited ; as he wrote in Latin, 

 his works might be known to foreign theologians, 

 but it is not likely that the scattered charges, 

 sermons, and pamphlets of Sherlocke, Wallis, 

 AUix, and Stillingfleet, were familiar to any ex- 

 cept Englishmen. "Pierre Marteau" has an 

 unreal sound; and if there was such a person, I 

 doubt whether Cologne, which in the early part of 

 the seventeenth century had shown so much zeal 

 in expelling Protestants and Jews, had become so 

 liberal at its close as to be a safer place than 

 London for Unitarians. 



In examining these authorities, much interesting 

 matter has turned up. I wish to pursue the in- 



5uiry, and shall be glad of any information about 

 «e Platonisme Devoile, and especially of references 

 to books in which it is cited. The only one which 

 I know is Baltus' Defense des S. S. Peres accusez 

 de Platonisme, 4to., Paris, 1711. H. B. C. 



Miitt\[nntox\S, 



KOTES ON BOOKS, ETC. 



Although one of the smallest of the many books which 

 the vast war in which we are at present engaged has 

 summoned from the j^ress, the Narrative of my Missions 

 to Constantinople and St. Petersburg in the Years 1829 and 

 1830, by Baron Milffling, translated by David Jardine, is 

 far from being one of the least important. Read now 

 by the light which has flashed from the cannon of Sebas- 

 topol, it shows most clearly what deep designs were 

 masked by Russia in 1829 and 1830, under her assumed 

 moderation. Baron Muffling's narrative of the events 

 which preceded the Treaty of Adrianople, which is dis- 

 tinguished by its great perspicuity, shows clearly how 

 the policy of Russia was then endangered by the success 

 of her arms, and how she found herself in the singular 

 predicament of being embarrassed by her own strength, 

 and the weakness of her immediate enem3^ Nor does 

 the part which Prussia then, as now, played in that com- 

 plicated political drama, diminish the interest of the nar- 

 rative which Mr. Jardine has so opportunely selected for 

 translation, and has translated so well. 



Among the many excellent numbers of The Traveller's 

 Library which Messrs. Longman have already issued, 

 there will not be found two which possess in a higher 

 degree the merit of furnishing information which every- 

 body desires to possess, in a form which everybody will 

 read with pleasure, than the two biographical sketches 

 which they have just reprinted, with additions, from the 

 Edinburgh Review. The lives of Defoe and Churchill, as 

 here presented to us by the practised pen of the bio- 

 grapher of Goldsmith, exhibit the leading events of their 

 respective biographies, and the salient points of their 

 literary characteristics, in a pleasant, chatty, and in- 

 structive form, which makes us desire to see JMr. Forster 

 yet more frequently engaged upon a class of subjects 

 which he treats so successfully. 



Books Received. — A Guide to the Parish Churcli, by 

 the Rev. Haryey Goodwin : a little volume which realises 

 its title, and furnishes many usefiil hints concerning the 

 public service of the English Church. 



The Moor of Venice ; Cinthio^s Tale, and Shahspeare's 

 Tragedy, by John Edward Taylor. A translation of the 

 tale, and a criticism on the tragedy, which form an ac- 

 ceptable addition to every Shakspeare library. 



A Remembrance of Drachenfels, and other Poems, by 

 W. S. T. and H. G. T. A small volume which shows in 

 every page the right feeling and poetical spirit of the 

 writers. 



BOOKS AND ODD VOLUMES 



WANTED TO PURCHASE. 



ArDBR AXD Hancoc&*s Nudibranchiate Mollusca. Parts I. to V. 



(Kay Society.) 

 SowEHBy's English BoTAny. Third Edition. Vols. I. to IV. 



British Gazetteer. From Wor. to end. 



Orimshaw's Cowpkb. Vols. IV. V. VII. VIII. 



Med. Chir. Transactions. Vol. XXXVII. 



Tales and Sketches op the Scottish Peasantry. By Alexander 



Betlmne. 

 Practical Economy, explained and enforced in a series of lectures. By 



Alexander and John Bethune. Published in Scotland, by Black of 



Edinburgh, and Dewar of Perth. 

 Mother Shipton's Legacies. 



„ „ Life and Prophecies. 1798 preferred. 



Hazlitt*s Spirit of the Age. 

 Sporting Magazine for January, 1853. 

 Solid Philosophy assertkd against the Fancies op the Ideists ; or, 



the Method to Science farther illustrated, with Reflections on Mr. 



Locke's Essay concerning Human Understanding. ByJ. S. Lon- 

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