NEW PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED. An Analysis of Kant's Critic of Pure Reason. By the Translator of that Work. London: William Pickering. 1844. 8vo. pp. 215. Chronological Introduction to the History of the Church, being a new Inquiry into the true Dates of the Birth and Death of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; and containing an original Harmony of the Four Gospels, now first arranged in the Order of Time. By the Rev. Samuel Farmer Jarvis, D. D., L. L. D., Historiographer to the Church. London: W. J. Cleaver. 1844. 8vo. pp. 618. Notes on Northern Africa, the Sahara and Soudan. By William B. Hodgson. New York: Wiley & Putnam. 1844. 8vo. pp. 107. Proceedings of the Naval Court-Martial in the Case of Alexander Slidell Mackenzie, a Commander in the Navy of the United States; to which is added an elaborate Review, by James Fenimore Cooper. New York: Henry G. Langley. 1844. 8vo. pp. 344. An Address before the Literary Societies of Hamilton College, July 23, 1844. By Horace Greeley. Published by Request. New York: William H. Graham. 1844. 8vo. pp. 40. Fitz Clarence: a Poem. By B. B. French. Washington: Printed by Blair & Rives. 1844. 8vo. pp. 31. Revue Française des Familles et des Pensionnats, paraissant le premier de chaque mois. Vol. I. No. I. New York: F. G. Berteau, Editeur. 1844. 8vo. A Defence of the Protestant Bible, as published by the Bible Societies, against the Charge raised against it by the Rev. Dr. Ryder, that it does not contain the whole of the Sacred Scriptures by 139 Chapters. By Akroatees. New York: Leavitt, Trow, & Co. 1844. 8vo. pp. 68. An Oration delivered at Cambridge, before the Phi Beta Kappa Society in Harvard University, August 29, 1844. By George Putnam. Boston: Little & Brown. 1844. 8vo. pp. 36. The Dangers of the Scholar: an Address delivered before the Gamma Sigma Society of Dartmouth College, July 25, 1844. By the Rev. John K. Lord, of Hartford, Vt. Boston: James Munroe & Co. 1844. 8vo. pp. 32. Droppings from the Heart, or Occasional Poems. By Thomas Mackellar. Philadelphia: Sorin & Ball. 1844. 18mo. pp. 144. An Essay on the Philosophy of Medical Science. By Elisha Bartlett, M. D., Professor of the Theory and Practice of Medicine in the University of Maryland. Philadelphia: Lea and Blanchard. 1844. 8vo. pp. 310. Miscellanies. By Stephen Collins, M. D. Philadelphia: Carey & Hart. 12mo. pp. 308. The Distant Hills, an Allegory. By the Rev. W. Adams, M. A. From the London Edition, with Engravings from original Designs, by Chapman. New York: General Prot. Episcopal S. S. Union. 1844. 18mo. pp. 104. The Shadow of the Cross, an Allegory. By the Rev. W. Adams, M. A. From the London Edition, with Engravings from original Designs, by Chapman. New York: General Prot. Episcopal S. S. Union. 1844. 18mo. pp. 96. An Address to the Essex Agricultural Society, September 25, 1844. By John W. Proctor. Published by Order of the Society. Salem. 1845. 8vo. pp. 46. Dr. Busby and his Neighbours. By the author of "Willie Rogers." Salem: W. & S. B. Ives. 1845. An Appeal to the People of Massachusetts on the Texas Question. Boston: Little & Brown. 1844. 8vo. pp. 20. History of the Law of Nations in Europe and America, from the Earliest Times to the Treaty of Washington, 1842. By Henry Wheaton, LL. D. New York: Gould, Banks, & Co. 1845. 8vo. pp. 797. Address delivered before the Rhode Island Historical Society, Nov. 20, 1844. By William Gammell, Professor of Rhetoric in Brown University. Providence: B. Cranston & Co. 8vo. pp. 30. History of the Revolt of the British Colonies of America. By George Chalmers. Boston: James Munroe & Co. 1845. 2 vols. 8vo. Scenes in my Native Land. By Mrs. L. H. Sigourney. Boston: James Munroe & Co. 1845. 16mo. Lays of the Gospels. By S. G. Bulfinch. Boston: James Munroe & Co. 1845. NOTE TO ARTICLE IX. On page 244, our language seems to imply a doubt, whether the practice of whipping girls actually exists in the Boston public schools. We have since learned from undoubted authority, that the thing is not only allowed, but is practised to a great extent, in these institutions. It is also due to Mr. Mann to state, that in the part of the "Reply" here referred to, and in several other portions of the pamphlet, he wrote with the intention not merely to answer the arguments of the Teachers, but to expose certain defects and abuses in the Boston schools. We looked only at what appeared in print, and our strictures would have been modified considerably, if we had known the facts to which Mr. Mann had reference. The severity of his language, as we have since understood, was often designed rather for the practices of the Boston teachers in school, than for their positions and arguments as they appeared in the "Remarks." NORTH AMERICAN REVIEW. No. CXXVII. APRIL, 1845. ART. I.1. Lettres écrites à un Provincial, par BLAISE 2. Pensées de Pascal, précédées de sa Vie, par MADAME GREAT precocity of genius, however developed or employed, seldom fails to excite at least as much alarm and pity as admiration in the judicious spectator. If not in itself a token of disease already formed, and working as a stimulus on the brain, it is sure to lead quickly to some morbid action of the physical frame, and ere long to dry up the fountains of life. The skilful horticulturist, by a forcing process, can compel the branch of a tree to make a premature and excessive display of fruit; but at the end of the year the limb is sure to perish. The energies of mind are equally exhausted, when compelled to yield their harvest out of season. The great law of compensation, which we find, on close scrutiny, to obtain everywhere in the scheme of Providence respecting mankind, under the glaring inequalities which appear on a superficial view, applies in a much greater degree than we are apt to imagine to the powers of the intellect. It seems as if only a given amount of work can be done. If more is accomplished at an early period, a shorter term of life remains for further achievements. So firmly is this truth established by uniform observation, that a VOL. LX. No. 127. 23 note of lamentation, a mournful presentiment, always mingles with the admiring applause which greets every new and wonderful effort of a youthful prodigy. We mourn that this early excellence should be purchased at so high a price, that premature strength and beauty of mind should be doomed to premature decay. Blaise Pascal, the boy Euclid, the contemporary and peer of Torricelli, Huygens, and Descartes, the scourge of the Jesuits, the boast of the Port Royal school of theologians and philosophers, the earliest writer of correct and elegant French prose, the master in eloquence of Bossuet, and the object of the unwilling homage even of Voltaire, died at the age of thirty-nine. All his important writings, except the Thoughts," which was a posthumous publication, appeared several years before his death; and his most valuable contributions to science were made before he was thirty. As a boy, he seemed miraculously endowed, and the abundant promise of his youth was fully sustained by the rich fruit of his early manhood. Bodily weakness and suffering, to which he was a lifelong martyr, far from impairing, seemed only to heighten the preternatural acuteness and strength of his intellect, as a hectic flush improves the beauty and expressiveness of the features. All that he accomplished in science and philosophy, great as was its intrinsic value, only leaves the impression that he had much in reserve. His discoveries and inventions are rather the indications, than the full fruits, of the vigor and comprehensiveness of his genius. They showed what he might have done, if his ambition had been greater, or if it had not been so early checked and turned into a different channel by religious enthusiasm. One of the most remarkable of his scientific labors, his solution of certain problems relating to the cycloid, a task which had been. proposed to all the geometers of Europe as a trial of strength, and which they had failed to accomplish, was executed by him as a diversion, during the weary and sleepless hours entailed upon him by wasting disease, that confined him to his couch, and made him incapable of holding a pen. As he had renounced science for a long time, the demonstrations remained for many days floating in his memory, before he even thought of committing them to paper. This he finally did at the solicitation of a friend, and performed the whole work of preparing them for the press in eight days. This effort established his reputation as the first geometer of his time; but the fame thus acquired was only another garland to be thrown on the tomb to which he was hastening. He heeded it not; for religious exercises now absorbed his whole attention, and the immortal "Thoughts," the ablest and most eloquent apology for Christianity ever published in France, were the sole occupation of his dying hours. No full and satisfactory account of his life and works has ever appeared. There are eulogies upon him in plenty, but they give only a meagre and fragmentary view of his labors, and supply few materials for a complete portrait of his character and genius. The memoir of him by his sister, Madame Perier, who shared the fervor of his religious feelings, is short, and gives us little more than a record of his bodily sufferings, and illustrations of the remarkable purity, generosity, severity of principle, and self-devotion, which characterized his whole life. We must make allowance for the bias of sisterly affection and pride; but there is no cause to doubt the honest simplicity of the writer's intentions, and the anecdotes which she relates are authentic and interesting. Later authors among his countrymen, though they have added but few facts to his biography, have done full justice to his scientific merits, have celebrated his wit, his acuteness, and his eloquence, and have paid a willing tribute of admiration to the unequalled vigor, terseness, and purity of his style. But they have not fully appreciated his depth of thought and originality in speculation, his reasoning power, his sharp observation of human nature, or the consecration of all the traits of his genius by the most fervid piety. His current reputation as a philosophical thinker and eloquent advocate of religion will be more increased than diminished by the most rigid examination of his works. Blaise Pascal was born in the summer of 1623, at Clermont, the capital of the province of Auvergne, in France. His father, Etienne Pascal, who had himself attained considerable reputation as a man of science and letters, superintended the education of his only son with rare devotion and judgment. That he might obtain greater facilities for instruction, he gave up the office which he had held at Clermont, and came to reside in Paris when Blaise was but eight years old. As the mother had died five years before, the boy was entirely dependent on paternal aid, and the signs |