and 6ol. per annum, and not less than eight millions of money would be sufficient, and a period of time not less than 700 years, to raise all those livings which, in the reign of Queen Anne, were under 50l. per annum, up to 100l.'

To accelerate the effect of Queen Anne's bounty, three grants of 100,000l. each have been voted by Parliament in some recent sessions, the last being in 1811. Mr. Lysons considers this relief as inadequate; and, adverting to the decreased value of money, he thinks that the maximum, to which it is proposed to raise the incomes of poor livings, will not now put a married clergyman in tolerable circumstances.

Supposing it had been thought that 100l., according to the price of the necessaries of life in the reign of Queen Anne, was a sufficient competence for a clergyman's family; upon the same principle of calculation, 200l. would now scarcely suffice, and 250l. is barely equivalent to 100l. per annum in the year 1650.'

Out of the incomes of the inferior clergy, no fortunes can be saved for widows and children. To relieve such distressed families, an anniversary sermon has been preached at the Feast of the Sons of the Clergy, ever since the year 1655, with much success; and various other exertions, aided by the donations of individuals, have been made, which are here specified: but all these charities are reported by Mr. L. to be disproportionate to the extent of the distress. His object is to impress the public mind with a sense of the lamentable state of the parochial clergy, and to induce a conviction that this evil arises from impropriations which have robbed the patrimony of the church' but he has not stated those facts which are necessary to ascertain the actual provision that is made for the established clergy. The question to be put and answered in this case should be, What is the amount of the income paid to the whole ecclesiastical body, and among how many is it divided? Mr. L. only tells us that some of the clergy have too little; he never hints that any have too much. Indeed, a sermon is quoted at p. 124. as excellent, in which the preacher observes, respecting bishopricks, that "most of them, and even the most plentiful, are now scarce answerable to the burdens that attend them." Will the Bishops of Durham and Winchester, and many others, underwrite this sentence?

The history of the meeting of the three choirs, in which harmony and charity were so happily united, will at least be interesting in the counties of Gloucester, Worcester, and Hereford, and may afford an example to similar associations in other parts of the kingdom. In the Annals of the music-meetings, Mr. L. minutely details the pieces which were rehearsed, and the performers who were engaged; introducing appropriate eulogies on those individuals who are intitled to musical fame. A list also is inserted of stewards and preachers, with the produce of each year's collection.

SINGLE SERMONS.

Art. 27. The Power of Divine Grace exemplified in the Insufficiency of the Dispensers of the Gospel: preached at the Gravel-pit

Meeting

Meeting-house, Hackney, June 30. 1813, before the Patrons and Students of the Protestant Dissenting Academy at Homerton. By Robert Stevenson. 8vo. 18. 6d. Conder,

An apposite anecdote is one of the most agreeable modes of illus tration; and Mr. Stevenson no doubt meant to enliven his discourse by a story of this kind: he therefore observes, (p. 7.),, We are told of a Spanish ambassador, who, when he was shewn the treasury of St. Mark, in Venice, tried with his cane to find the bottom of the chests in which the wealth was deposited; and upon being asked the reason of this action, he replied, "My master's treasures differ from yours, in that they have no bottom, as yours have," alluding to the mines of Mexico and Peru. With far more propriety may it be said of the treasures of the Gospel, that they have no bottom.' Unluckily for the preacher, though the remark which he appends to this anecdote be very just, he destroys the idea that the Gospel is a bottomless treasure, when he proceeds to describe it as placed in a vessel with a bottom to it; since wealth inclosed in a vase, or jar, resembles the chests of St. Mark rather than the mines of Mexico. If, however, Mr. S. has introduced metaphors which clash, he offers some pertinent observations: but we do not think that he afforded the students of Homerton Old College' a specimen of the plain style of writing or preaching, when he expressed a period of five years by the periphrasis of five annual revolutions of the great solar orb.' Art. 28. Preached in the Parish Church of Sanderstead, Surrey, Jan. 13. 1814, being the Day appointed for a General Thanksgiving. By the Rev. John Courtney, A.M. 8vo. Is. 6d. Ridgway. After a long comment on the Psalm (Ps. lxxv.) from which the text is taken, the preacher adverts to the circumstances of the times, and congratulates his readers on the happy changes which have recently occurred. He views with satisfaction the confederation lately formed against the Self-constituted arbiter of Europe,' and rejoices in having armies which were once arrayed against us, now united with us, to restore liberty and peace to long suffering nations.'

Mr. C. foresaw the restoration to France of the family which so long ruled over it; and, therefore, while he was thankful for the posture of events at the time at which this sermon was preached, he anticipated the day on which his hearers should be once more assembled, to celebrate the completion of our happiness in the establishment of universal peace and harmony. We rejoice to add that he was a true prophet. The peace which he anticipated in January has, thanks to Divine Providence! now reached us. May it be a lasting peace, cemented by arrangements mutually beneficial to France and Great Britain!

Art. 29. Religion the noblest Employment, and the immediate Concern of the Aged: preached at the Jews' Chapel, December 14. 1813. By Daniel Tyerman. 8vo. 1s. Burton. 1814.

We cannot think that the case of the aged has been so much overlooked by preachers as Mr. Tyerman supposes. Blair, we recollect, has a beautiful sermon "On the Duties and Consolations of the

4

Aged;"

Aged;" and we have often met with printed advice to grey hairs. If, however, Mr. T.'s exertions, in behalf of those who are in the vale of years, be not absolutely necessary, they are well intended, and "the old disciple" may be benefited by them: but what hope can we have in addressing the many who consume their youth in sin and slothfulness, and continue to old age unemployed in the work of God?"Can the Ethiopian change his skin?"" Religion," says Blair, "must be made the guide of life before we can have recourse to it as a refuge from sorrow."

Art. 30. Occasioned by the sudden Death of Mr. Robert Strange, of Thorndon, July 25. 1813. By L. Blakeney, A.M., Curate of Thorndon and Beddingfield, Suffolk. 4to. 28. Wilson.

This is both a funeral and a farewell sermon. On the subject of death, it is almost impossible to say any thing new: but it is easy to be serious, and to exhort to a suitable preparation. Mr. Blakeney is not deficient in eloquence on this occasion: but, as nothing more is reported of the deceased than that he was honest, social, friendly, and humane, with some faults, and perhaps vices,' the preacher might as well have suffered him to have been carried to his grave without the parade of a funeral oration, or at least without the subsequent parade of printing it. Who will be interested or edified by such a memoir ?

CORRESPONDENCE.

The Author of the description of the Retreat begs leave to inform the Editor of the Monthly Review, that no part of the building described in the above-mentioned work has been destroyed by fire. He will be obliged to the Editor to correct the mis-statement on this subject in the last Number of the Review; which has doubtless arisen from the calamity alluded to having recently occurred in a neighbouring institution, the York Lunatic Asylum.

York, 4th month, 20th, 1814.'

In answer to Mr. Grant's polite letter, we have to state that an account of his Grammar is only waiting an opportunity for insertion.

Mr. Berwick's obliging letter is received. We wish him success.

*The APPENDIX to this volume of the Review will be pub"lished on the first of June, with the Review for May.

THE

APPENDIX

TO THE

SEVENTY-THIRD VOLUME

OF THE

MONTHLY REVIEW

ENLARGE D.

FOREIGN LITERATURE.

ART. I. Histoire abrégée de la Littérature Grecque, &c. ; i.e. An abridged History of Greek Literature, from its Origin to the taking of Constantinople by the Turks. By F. SCHOLL. 2 Vols. 8vo. Paris. 1813. Imported by De Boffe. Price 11. 48.

GR

REEK literature is a topic so often introduced, and so repeatedly investigated, that we are almost inclined to turn from those who beckon into this old though interesting path, under a fear of being annoyed with trivial dust. Fabricius, in his fourteen quartos, published between 1705 and 1708, and intitled Bibliotheca Graca, has stored the fruit of forty years of classical study, and carefully brought together notices and fragments of almost every antient writer who has not found a separate editor. His erudition drew alike from the fountains of antiquity and the cisterns of modern criticism; and if a want of method and arrangement renders his work inconvenient for consultation, this defect may in some degree be remedied by using the edition undertaken in 1790 by Harles, to which indexes and references are attached, and in which the incessant supplements of Fabricius are melted into a continuous text. Harles demonstrated his qualification for this task by an excellent Introductio in historiam Lingua Graca, published in 1778, and afterward dilated into four volumes.

It is not, however, so much to these two bibliographers as to M. Schaaf, a professor in the high school of Magdeburg, and APP. REV. VOL. LXXIII.

Gg

author

author of a German Encyclopedia of Classical Antiquities, (2 vols. 8vo., 1806,) that the present writer is indebted for the plan of his work; which has not for its object to assist the learned, but to guide young persons who are in the higher classes of schools or colleges, and who wish for a general view of the treasury to which they are acquiring the keys. Men of the world, also, may like to be reminded of facts which their habitual occupations have rendered less familiar, but to the recollection of which they cling with the affection of early

association.

M. Schaaf's work treats both of Greek and Roman antiquities, and is divided into four heads, which are pursued through six periods. These periods are adopted by M. SCHOLL; who, omitting all that concerns mythology and Roman literature, transplants the rest of M. Schaaf's information into this French epitome. Fuhrman's Manual of Classical Literature has also been consulted; and, as far as the Greek Scriptures and the history of the Alexandrian version are concerned, Eichhorn's Kritische Schriften, four volumes of which were reviewed in our xxiiid Volume, N.S., p. 481. Among the sources, also, employed by the present author, may be reckoned Hanlein's Manual of the New Testament, which supplied some literary history of those books to which the toil of Eichhorn has not yet descended.

A melancholy tribute of gratitude and admiration, which every critical student of the Scriptures will re-echo, is paid at the close of the preface to the memory of the learned Griesbach, who lately died at Jena, in which university he was the most eminent professor. His profound comparative knowlege of manuscripts and editions, and the singular sagacity and impartiality of his verbal criticism, have given to his text of the Christian canon an oracular value. The orthodox and the heretic bow alike to the unprejudiced indifference of his dogmatism; and, where inspiration appears not to guide, Griesbach is now allowed to determine.

The introduction sketches a general plan of the work, and defines the six periods which are to be contemplated in order. The first is called the fabulous period, and terminates at the taking of Troy. Oracles and hymns of uncertain date form the only reliques of the mythologic age, of which Orpheus was the most celebrated poet.-The second period is extended from the taking of Troy to the legislation of Solon; that is, from 1180 to 594 before Christ. The third proceeds to the death

* Vol. v. was published in 1804, and Vol. vi. in 1811, but did not then find their way to us.

of