in the language of the announcement of the work, "The editor's connections with Great Britain and Germany will enable him to avail himself of every thing new and important in the theological literature of those countries." From the same announcement we learn, that "the editor will have the aid of several of the leading theological writers of this country, as well as of some in foreign lands." But we are not informed how many, or who, among the learned, are his pledged collaborators, or will be active and efficient contributors to the work. For aught that appears, the work is to rest chiefly upon the shoulders of Dr. Robinson.

The first number or volume of the work, we have read with approbation and interest. It is, perhaps, all that ought to have been expected; but we confess, it hardly met the high expectations we had indulged before its publication,—not how ever from the want of a greater variety in the subjects, as the editor appears to have feared. For we think, the more homogeneous the matter of each volume, the more value it will possess as a book of reference. This number contains three tracts, viz.

1. RESEARCHES IN PALESTINE, by the editor; compiled from various communications received at different times from the Rev. Eli Smith and Rev. S. Wolcott: (with a map of the country around the sources of the of the Jordan.) pp. 9-88.

2. SKETCHES OF ANGELOLOGY IN THE OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS, by Moses Stuart, Prof. in the Theol. Sem., Andover. pp. 88-154.

3. THE REPUTED SITE OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE, by the editor; in reply to allegations contained in the Oxford "Essay on the Ecclesiastical Miracles." pp. 154-202.

The first article is, both as to matter and form, a supplement to Dr. R.'s great work, entitled "Biblical Researches in Palestine;" and it

should be appended to that work, or rather, be incorporated into its next edition. As it is a mere supplement to another work, and as several of the most important portions of it had previously been spread on the pages of other periodicals, we have some doubts of its claim to a place in a collection of tracts intended to be "of permanent value as a work of reference."

The second article is a general treatise on Angels, and is written in the usual flowing and popular style of the learned author. It bears of course much resemblance to the ar ticle "Angels" in our biblical dictionaries, and to the chapters on good and evil angels in our best systems of theology. The author does not aim to propagate any new views or any favorite opinions he may entertain. Nor does he attempt to settle and decide upon all the important questions which relate to his subject. Indeed, we should have been gratified, if the learned author had given us more distinctly his opinions on several points which he has but slightly touched. For instance, has each individual man and child a guardian angel to attend him from the cradle to the grave, as the Romanists believe? Did the Lord Jesus Christ, or the Word and Son of God, appear in the form of an angel, on several occasions, to the early pa triarchs and others under the Old Testament; and if so, which are the texts that speak of these manifestations? On the whole, this ar ticle gives a good popular view of the biblical doctrine concerning an gels, and it will doubtless be read with interest by most persons into whose hands it may fall. At the same time, we have doubts whether such popular summaries of theological knowledge are exactly suited to the specific character of this work. They seem to us to belong rather to those journals which aim at immediate usefulness, than to

disposed to make his work the vehicle of useful instruction, not only in all other departments of general knowledge, but in the higher departments of morals and religion. We see no reason why it should fail to merit the patronage of the public.

Self-Cultivation. By TRYON ED

WARDS.

Counsels of the Aged to the Young.

By A. ALEXANDER, D. D. A Pattern for Sunday School Teachers and Tract Distributors, and a Word for All. By J. A. JAMES.

THESE little volumes, by three popular authors, have just issued from the press of John S. Taylor & Co., 145 Nassau Street, New York. They have, all of them, that chief excellence of a book, a fitness to do good. They have also the charm of elegance. There are no better works of the kind.

CONGRESS.

THE twenty seventh Congress, just expired, has been in many respects remarkable. It was elected by a party suddenly and surprising ly triumphant in every part of the Union, and its expected destiny was,

to relieve and to reform. Convened by a presidential proclamation at the earliest practicable period, earlier indeed than the election of some of its members, it has been in session, with only two short vacations, from the last day of May, 1841, to the fourth of March, 1843. Its first assembling was under the cloud of a great national bereavement. The brave and honest old man whose personal popularity had been a chief element in the success of the party which had inscribed his name upon

its banners, had been struck down from the presidency by death. The Vice President had succeeded to the vacant chair, according to the provisions of the constitution; and the heads of departments, as nominated by the lamented Harrison, were still in their places; but Mr. Tyler had not succeeded to the chieftainship in the party that had elected him only to an office which, though sometimes honored by the occupancy of able and accomplished men, had never been found to require any superior qualifications. Confidence and a good understanding between the individual administering the gov ernment and the leading minds in the national legislature, instead of existing beforehand and preparing both to move harmoniously in one direction, were to be created by act

ing for common objects. How it happened that a mutual understand ing and reciprocal confidence between the President and the majority in Congress did not result from their acquaintance and intercourse-how it happened that what seemed to be earnest attempts on the part of the President to make himself understood by Congress, and earnest attempts on the part of Congress to accommodate their proceedings to what they understood to be his views, were entirely unsuccessful, we will not undertake to explain. At the end of the first or special session, the great body of those members of Congress who belonged to the party which had elected General Harrison to the presidency, united in an address to the public virtually denouncing Mr. Tyler. Thenceforward that party, out of Congress, was not indeed dissolved into its original elements, but was disheartened and weakened. Public opinion as expressed in elections was against Mr. Tyler, and against those from whom he had separated; and the next Congress will commence with a decided majority of the identical party which suffered so signal a defeat in the great election of 1840.

Had General Harrison been spared, it is possible that the result might have been different. Yet there were difficulties in the nature of the case, which neither the popularity of the good President,' nor the statesmanship of his advisers, nor the ability of the leaders in Congress, would have been altogether likely to overcome. The triumphant party had indeed abstained from committing themselves as a party on some particulars of policy in respect to which they were far from being entirely agreed among themselves; yet they were regarded by the public as pledged to accomplish certain general results, all exceedingly difficult of attainment, and some of them quite impossible without the aid of time. First and chiefly, they were

expected to relieve the wide com. mercial distress of the country. How this was to be done-by what specific enactments all those evils which had been imputed, not unreasonably, to the policy of the two preceding administrations, were to be suddenly remedied-was not very distinctly understood. The leaders in Congress appear to have projected a series of measures which were to be acceptable, some in one quarter, and some in another, and which taken together, in all their relations, would constitute a system of policy under which the country was to emerge, speedily, from its embarrassments. The north was supposed to demand a tariff of duties so adjusted as to afford protection to the manufacturing interests; and the north was therefore to be gratified and relieved by a protective tariff. The south and west were supposed to require some national institution which should rectify their misera bly disordered currency; there was therefore to be a national bank, with notes every where current, equali zing exchanges, and facilitating the restoration of the old commercial intercourse between those great producing regions and the commercial emporiums on the Atlantic. new states, brought to the verge of bankruptcy by their ill devised and ill managed schemes of internal improvement, were to have their credit restored, and were to be enabled to pursue their undertakings, by a distribution of the proceeds of the public lands. To relieve in all parts of the country those active and adventurous business men whom the late reverses had overwhelmed, and to remove that vast amount of private indebtedness which had been contracted when all men were delirious from the inflation of the currency in 1835 and 1836, old scores were to be wiped out, and new books were to be opened, by a general bankrupt law. These measures were to be adopted singly, and each by a differ

The

ent majority, but when adopted, and carried into operation, they would constitute a system in which every part would help to support and invigorate the whole. Had Harrison lived, the complete system might have been adopted. But the bank and the distribution were defeated by the veto of Mr. Tyler. The bankrupt law having stood just long enough to do whatever evil it was capable of doing, and thus to make itself unpopular, has been repealed by the same votes that created it. The protective tariff alone remains to be repealed by the party now coming into power. The great measures projected for the relief of the country may be considered as having failed.

The reformation of abuses and corruptions in the government, is a thing readily, and let us believe honestly, promised by all parties, but very difficult of performance. In this respect, the late Congress has not accomplished all that was expected from it, nor even all that it attempted. The expenses of the government have indeed been very considerably reduced, not only by the abolition of that old nest of jobbing and peculation, the Florida war, but in some other particulars. One measure of reform, the bill for the reduction of the compensation of public servants, not excepting members of Congress, was carried in the House of Representatives by the votes of those who were about retiring to private life, against the votes of those who are, or who expect to be, re-elected. It was afterwards materially changed in the Senate, and was thus lost. The loss of this bill leaves the patronage of the President without any effectual diminution. The greater the compensation of the various officials who hold their places at his pleasure, the more reason will he have to expect that they will bestir themselves in his favor. Of course all that was promised, in 1840 and before, about

abolishing the connection between the patronage of the government and the elections, is now disregarded.

A standing topic of complaint with the people, is the length of the sessions of Congress, the time which is consumed not in the proper business of Congress, but in windy dis courses about matters and things in general, which are delivered and afterwards printed for effect on the people, as electioneering documents, and tons of which are sent by mail to all parts of the country, under the franks of the members. The late House of Representatives sig. nalized itself by the adoption of several regulations for the despatch of business. In consequence of these regulations, that Congress has been able to complete a greater amount of business-has passed a greater number of public and pri vate acts, than any of its predeces

sors.

Yet it has not accomplished this without sitting more months, more days, and more hours,' than any former Congress. Some of those regulations, though perfectly justifiable on the ground of necessi ty, were better suited to a debating club than to a dignified representative body, legislating for millions. It does not tell well for our national character, that our House of Repre sentatives is compelled to have a rule that no speech shall exceed one hour in length. True, there is noth. ing unreasonable in the rule itself; neither Franklin, nor Sherman, nor Ellsworth, nor Madison, nor Ames, in such Congresses as we once had, would have needed more than an hour to say all that such men deem. ed it necessary for them to say on any one topic of discussion. Of all the great speeches that ever swayed the decisions of a Roman senate, or of a British parliament, how few have ever exceeded the compass of an hour. But suitable as such a rule may be to a school of rhetoric, it seems out of place, and therefore out of taste, in a legislative assembly.

We apprehend that one source of the endless loquacity of Congress, and of the various mischiefs with which it is connected, may be found in the compensation of the members, and the mode in which its amount is determined. He who hires a man by the day to perform a given job, will ordinarily find that he has hired a slow workman. And especially if that workman is earning higher wages at that job than he has ever earned before, or is likely ever to earn again in any honest employment, he will be quite sure to make as many days' work of the job as possible. Now the members of Congress are paid by the day, counting Sundays and holidays, from one end of the session to the other; and of the men who actually go to Congress, not one in five ever earned eight dollars a day for six months together, in his own business or profession, whatever that may be. It is therefore for the pecuniary interest of the great majority of the members, to make long sessions. Very few-perhaps none may deliberately act upon this consideration. But assembled bodies of men, however high-minded the individuals may be, will almost always be swayed by the insensible action of their personal interests. No plainer illustration of this can be desired, than the fact that those representatives in the last Congress, who are to have no seats in the next, voted as a body, for the reduction of compensation; while the other class, as a body, voted against it. Whenever a man rises in Congress to deliver himself of a tedious and impertinent harangue, the only effect of which is to distract attention from the matter in hand, and to obstruct the progress of business, he knows that he is not speaking at his own expense, and that the weary quorum who are compelled to hear him, are not hear ing at their own expense; he knows, and they all know, that the time which he consumes is neither his

nor theirs, but belongs to the public; and therefore it is that he is auda cious to speak, and they are patient to hear. If, on the contrary, that man had an interest in not speaking otherwise than to the purpose, and if every member had an interest in not hearing any thing impertinent or tending merely to delay, how greatly would the whole aspect of things be changed. Speaking otherwise than to the matter in hand-speaking to constituents a thousand miles off-speaking to the nation-would be well nigh as intolerable there as in a court of justice. All the feelings of courtesy between gentlemen, and of equity between man and man, would operate to keep the ora tor to the point; and the sense of the right of every man not to be defrauded or "bored" out of his own time, would make the House indig. nant against every impertinence. No need would there be of a "one hour rule" in such a state of things. No need of the speaker's hammer, like the sharp crack of a Kentucky rifle, bringing down the orator in the very midst of his loftiest gyra tion, beyond "the flaming bounds of space and time."

Let

We say then that it is time for the people to prescribe a new mode of compensating members of Congress. A mere reduction of compensation would not answer the purpose. our members of Congress be well paid, so that we may, if we will, elect those whose services will be worth paying for. But instead of eight dollars a day, let the average annual amount of the per diem allowance for the last ten years be ascertained; and let three quarters of that amount be the yearly wages or salary of every member. This is our plan; and if, within three years from the adoption of such a system, more business is not done, and better done, in sessions of half or two thirds of the length to which sessions have recently grown, then give the New Englander no credit