1822.] 
to contribute; and no one can rise from its 
perusal without a full conviction of the 
utter inefficacy, and perfect imbecility of 
the measures which the forebodings of the 
Holy Allies have induced them to oppose 
to the torrent of public opinion, by which 
they must so soon he overwhelmed. Our 
opinion of the Abbé is raised by the can- 
dour with which he has done justice to the 
memory of his late master, Napoleon,— 
who, according to his own prediction, is 
emerging, day by day, out of the cloud of 
calumuies with which his mean detractors 
had covered him, 
The Memoirs of the Life of Artemi, of 
Wagarschapat, near Mount Ararat, in 
Armenia, trom the original A¥menian, 
written by himself, are well deserving of 
perusal, not only as conveying an exact 
account of the familiar life of his country- 
men, but as displaying, in striking colours, 
the sufferings of the Eastern Christians 
under the Mahometan yoke. From his 
earliest years to the time of his arrival in 
Russia, with which he closes his narration, 
Artemi has little of a personal uature to 
record, but a series of insults and inflic- 
tions, from some of which he narrowly 
escaped with his life. The domination of 
the priesthood in Armenia, and the abuses 
of the monastic institutions which abound 
jn that country, form a great part of the 
intolerable grievances to which the wretch- 
ed inhabitants are exposed. But, what 
we consider to be the most important in- 
formation to be derived from this work, is 
the eagerness with which the Armenians 
seck to escape from the petty and vexa- 
tious tyranny which oppresses them, into 
the arms of the more tranquil and civilized 
despotism of Russia; a disposition of 
which this power will no doubt avail itself 
to tle utmost, in the prosecution of the 
gigantic career of ambition, which now on 
all sides lies open before it. 
Jn our remarks on the reprint of “ War- 
wick’s Spare Minutes,” we praised the 
neat, elegant, and novel style in which it 
was re-printed. Since that period, two 
other works have appeared executed in 
the same manner, and in every respect 
uniformly with the. preceding. These are 
QuaARLEs’s Enchiridion, and SoaMe JE- 
NYNs’s Disquisitions. The former. of these 
consists of about 400 “institutions, divine, 
contemplative, political, economical, and 
moral.” They are distinguished by aknow- 
ledge of mankind, adeep and sincere piety, 
and a familiar acquaintance with ancient 
history, poetry, and general learning. His 
political opinions, indeed, smell somewhat 
too strongly of the cavalier, but they are 
comparatively moderate, and *seldom in- 
traded. Asa “manual” (ryy2p8icv) of mo- 
rality and sound piety, we cannot too 
warmly recommend it to the notice of our 
* We remember but two instances. 
Literary and Critical Proémium. 
69 
readers,—JENyNs’s Disquisitions, the other 
work ailuded to, is of a very different cha- , 
racter. It is of comparatively modern 
date, and is evidently the leisure produc- 
tion of a scholar and a gentleman. The 
subjects of some of his essays appear prima 
facie abstruse; but they are treated in 
such a manner as to be “ made easy to the 
meanest capacity.” They are distinguish- 
ed by a gentle, benignant, and) humane 
feeling, united with a penetration and eru- 
dition, which do equal honour to his head 
and to his heart. 
There is nothing so much dreaded by 
the interested and bigotted supporters of 
old abuses, as the attempts which are daily 
making to show the practicability of re- 
form and improvement, The state of the 
Criminal Law in this country has long 
called for a redress of the grievances 
which are inflicted by it; and the legisla- 
ture, roused at length by the strong public 
sentiment which has been so widely ma- 
nifested, have taken some steps to do 
away with these manifold abuses. ‘That 
so ancient a system as this should be en- 
dangered by any improvements, has of 
course excited the fears and jealousies of 
the friends of power, and accordingly we 
find that a champion has stepped forward 
to oppose, toto celo, all those wise and 
benevolent attempts which have of late 
years been made to procure a mitigation 
of the Criminal Code. The title of the 
volume is as follows :—An Enquiry into the 
present State of the Statuteand Criminal Law 
of England, by J. MILEr, esq. of Lincoln’s- 
inn. The weakness of the arguments, the 
variety of contradictions, and the numerous 
mis-statements which are to be found in 
this volume, are so obvious and gross as to 
make a detailed answer to them perfectly 
unnecessary ; we can only say, that if any 
of our readers entertain a doubt as to the 
justice and expediency of the proposed 
alterations in the system of our Criminal 
. Law, we beg they will take the trouble to 
-peruse Mr. Miller's treatise with attention, 
which, we do not hesitate to say, will fully 
-convince them of the propriety of such 
proposals. Were it not, indeed, for tlie 
quarter in which this weak but violent 
effort to support a falling system first ap- 
- peared, we should have supposed we were 
reading a work intended, by its fine vein 
of irony, to serve the cause which it pro- 
fesses to oppose. 
A new romance, by Miss ANNA Marta 
PoRTER, has just made its appearance un- 
der the title of Roche-Blunche, or the Hun- 
ters of the Pyrenners, in three volumes. 
This lady’s novels are always well written 
and interesting ; and we cannot therefore 
regret that they follow one another so 
quickly. The present volumes are, we 
think, fully equal, in point of style and 
delineation of character, to their prede- 
cessors; but, upon_the whole, the fable is 
not 
