that our nerves are shattered into a morbid facility of emotion, and the hand that writes these lines is not a woman's; yet we should hardly like to tell how often the tear has started as we read this book,-how many hours it kept sleep away,-or even how often and how long we have paused and mused with the finger in the half-closed volume. We do not pretend to much acquaintance with stage-craft; and it is possible enough that the very thoughtfulness which makes Oulita so fascinating to the solitary scholar, might detract from its power of popular effect were it represented on the stage. For ourselves, we do not think it would. There is incident rapid and stirring enough to keep

attention ever on the stretch: and the reflections are such that, while arresting the thoughtful reader who can follow the track along which they point, they will touch the mind and heart of average humanity. Of course, if Hamlet were published at the present day, many critics would call it dull and heavy, and many theatrical managers would not risk its presentation on their boards. And the variety of rhythm and cadence, the occasional abruptness and deviation from common metrical rules, which render the versification of a vigorous drama such as some judges would call unmusical, seem to our mind a beauty and an excellence in verse which is meant to be spoken and heard, rather than to be read; which represents real and passing life; which is put in the mouth of many diverse characters; and which is to be listened to without intermission for two or three successive hours. Smoothness, in Pope's use of the word, would pall and disgust by

so long continuance. And only great variety of metrical character- even the occurrence of occasional discords-can furnish the similitude of life. When one goes to the Opera, one must be content to leave common sense at the door, and to take for granted that all that passes shall go on the basis of an extreme conventionality. But in the case of a tragedy, if the writing and the presentation be worthy, the spectator should forget that he is not looking at reality. The author of Oulita has kept this in view. Yet while remembering that unvaried melody of rhythm would result in satiety and tediousness, no one knows better how to add the charm of music to thoughts with which it accords: Very beautifully, in the lines which follow, have we Mr. Thackeray's ever recurring theory of the prevalence of the affections even in the trimness of modern life :

So dear that in the memory she remains,

Like an old love, who would, indeed, have been
Our only love, but died; and all the past
Is full of her untried perfections, while
Amidst the unknown recesses of our hearts
Enthroned she sits, in tenderest mist of thought,
Like the soft brilliancy of autumn haze,
Seen at the setting of the sun and such
Is Venice-to pronounce her name is sweet,
Just as I love to say the word 'Oulita.’

'REPUBLICANS are born, not made,' says the

lively author of Kaloolah; and so, we have long held, are those persons who may be called trueblue or divine-right Presbyterians. A certain preporderance of the sterner elements, a certain lack of capacity of emotion, and disregard of the influence of associations, in brief, a certain hardness of character to be found chiefly in Scotland, is needed to make your out-and-out follower of the bold, honest, but narrow Covenanters. The great mass of the educated members of the Church of Scotland have no pretensions to the name of divine-right Presbyterians: Balfour of Burley would have scouted them; their fundamental principle is briefly this: that Presbytery suits the Scotch people best; and Prelacy the English : each system having just as much and just as little inspired authority as the other. Dr. Candlish's book

*The Organ Question: Statements by Dr. Ritchie and Dr. Porteous for and against the Use of the Organ in Public Worship, in the Proceedings of the Presbytery of Glasgow, 1807-8. With an Introductory Notice, by Robert S. Candlish, D.D. Edinburgh. 1856.

reminds us that out-and-out holders of views which have quietly dropt into abeyance in most Scotch minds, are still to be found in the northern part of this island. In arguing with such, we feel a peculiar difficulty. We have no ground in common. Things which appear to us as self-evident axioms, they flatly deny. For instance, it appears to us just as plain as that two and two make four, that a church should be something essentially different in appearance from an ordinary dwelling; that there is a peculiar sanctity about the house of God, making tea-parties and jocular addresses in it unutterably revolting; that the worship of God should be made as solemn in itself as possible, and as likely as possible to impress the hearts of the worshippers; that if music be employed in the worship of God, it should be the best music to be had; and that if there be a noble instrument especially adapted to the performance of sacred music, with something in its very tones that awes the heart and wakens devotional feeling, that is beyond all question the instrument to have in our churches. Now all this the true-blue Covenanter at once denies. He holds that all that is required of a church is protection from the weather, with seat-room, and, perhaps, ventilation; he denies that any solemnised feeling is produced by noble architecture, or that the Gothic vault is fitter for a church than for a factory; he drinks tea, eats cookies, applauds with hands and feet, and roars with laughter in church, with no sense of incongruity; he taboos Christmas-day, with all its gentle and gracious remembrances; he maintains that the barest of all

Y

worship is likeliest to be true spiritual service; he holds that there is something essentially evil and sinful in the use of an organ in church; that the organ is 'a portion of the trumpery which ignorance and superstition had foisted into the house of God;' that to introduce one is to convert a church into a concert-room,' and to return back to Judaism;' and that the use of instrumental music in the worship of God is neither lawful, nor expedient, nor edifying.'

We confess that we do not know how to argue with men who honestly hold these views. The things which they deny appear to us so perfectly plain already, that no argument can make them plainer. If any man say to us, 'I don't feel in the least solemnised by the noble cathedral and the pealing anthem,' all we can reply is simply, 'Then you are different from human beings in general;' but it is useless to argue with him. If you argue a thesis at all, you can argue it only from things less liable to dispute than itself; and in the case of all these matters attached to Presbytery, though not forming part of its essence, this is impossible. Whenever we have had an argument with an old impracticable Presbyterian, we have left off with the feeling that some people are born such; in talking to them.

and if so, there is no use

But all these notions to which allusion has been made, are attached to Presbytery by vulgar prejudice; they form no part of its essence, and enlightened Presbyterians now-a-days are perfectly aware of the fact. There is no earthly connexion in the nature of things The Organ Question, pp. 108, 125, 128, &c.