Alarmifts,-miferable politicians, who have been dupes of the found; terrified by the downfall of aristocracy in France. Bewildered by apprehenfions and fears for themselves, they have loft all fenfe of their duty towards the people, and have joined the confpiracy of courts against the interefts of humanity: for example-Duke of Portland, Earls Fitzwilliam and Spencer, Meffrs. Windham,. Powis, and a list of et cæteras, ad infinitum.'

Art. 33. A Letter to the Prince of Wales, on a Second Application to Parliament to discharge Debts, &c. The Eleventh Edition. With Notes. Corrected by the Author. 8vo. pp. 111. 29. Owen. 1795.

In the preface to the prefent edition, the author again introduces the name of Mr. Fox; whom, through every edition, he has attacked as a partizan of the heir apparent. He is likewife fevere on the various defcriptions of people who (according to him) have attached themselves to the fortunes of Mr. F. with a view to the improvement of their own.' He here alfo takes occafion to clear himself from the imputation of being a minifterial fcribbler, because he has cenfured the conduct of oppofition.' Be this charge as it may, one thing feems perfectly clear, that the extraordinary attention of the public to a pamphlet already advanced to the eleventh edition must certainly be a circumftance extremely flattering, as well as beneficial, to this animated and adventurous writer.

6

MEDICAL, &c.

Art. 34. A Treatise on the Diseases in Children, in Two Parts: the First comprehending all fuch Infantile Complaints as may fall under the Province of the Surgeon: Part II. containing general Direc tions for the Management of Infants from the Birth; particularly in regard to Drefs, Air, Exercife, and Diet, &c. &c. By Michael Underwood, M. D. Licentiate in Midwifery, and Phyfician to the British Lying-in Hofpital. A new Edition revifed and enlarged. 2 Vols. 8vo. 10s. 6d. Boards. Matthews. 1795.

Of two previous editions of this ufeful work we gave an account in our Reviews for December 1784, and March 1790. It is fufficient for us to announce the prefent as a much improved and augmented impreffion.

Art. 35. An Effay on the Caufes and Phenomena of Animal Life. By John Herdman, Member of the Medical Society, Edinburgh, and Surgeon in Leith. 8vo. pp. 336. 35. 6d. Johnfon. 1795. This is a rational and well-written compendium of those doctrines concerning animal life, which have obtained general admiffion in confequence of the modern discoveries, chemical and phyfiological. The writer firft takes a brief view of the structure of the animal body, chiefly for the purpose of fhewing that a fimilar organization, differently modified, fubfifts in every part. Secondly, he fhews that, by the union of the various parts of the animal body, a complete and indivifible whole is formed. Thirdly, he gives fome general obfervations on the nature of the principle of excitability; and, Fourthly, Takes a view of thofe agents, by the operation of which the phenomena of life are produced and continued. Of all thefe topics he gives

as clear views as their intricate nature, and the narrow limits to which
he has confined himself, will admit; and, though he has freely copied
from other writers, it is evident that he is capable of thinking and
examining for himself. The work may be ufefully perufed by ftu-
dents who are defirous of obtaining, in a small compafs, general in-
formation concerning doctrines which are certainly interefting matters
of difcuffion, how much foever they may yet fall short of the scientific
precifion and certainty which can alone enable them to be fafe and
ufeful guides in the practice of medicine.

Art. 36. A Treatise on Difeafes in the Urinary Passage, &c. &c. To
which are added fome new Observations on the Venereal Disease.
By Mr. Dufour, Villiers-Street, York Buildings, Strand. 8vo.
IS. Allen and West. 1795.

A tolerable Quack Bill!

NOVELS.

Art. 37. Robert and Adela: or, the Rights of Women best maintained by the Sentiments of Nature. 12mo. 3 Vols. 9s. 6d. Boards. Robinsons. 1795.

The defign of this novel is to counteract the influence of the doctrine, which has lately been maintained with fo much ingenuity, concerning the rights of women. In one of the principal female characters, natural fenfibility is fuppreffed by the affectation of equality and independence. The heroine, after having tormented her lover and herself by an obftinate perfeverance in the haughty referve which her fyftem prompts, in fpite of her feelings, at laft lofes his affection, and from vexation throws herself away on a vulgar Welsh efquire, who poffeffes no qualities congenial with her difpofition. The cha racter is throughout well fupported, and the leffon fuggefted in the title is ftrongly enforced. This is, however, by no means, the whole bufinefs of the novel. Other very natural and interesting tales of love are related, and many lively descriptions and pertinent reflections are interfperfed. Some of the principal characters being French, allufions to the recent ftate of France are fo frequently introduced, as to give the novel a political air. We also meet with other digreffions of a more general kind, among which the moft pleafing are, a retrospect of the antient state of England, made during an excurfion through Wiltshire and Hampshire; and a defcription of a part of South Wales.

The ftory is ingeniously conftructed, but the ftyle is not, on the whole, correct. In one or two places, we remark inftances of the Hibernian or Scottish idiom; for example, " I think we would not be the worse of an emetic;" this phrafe is very improperly put into the mouth of Lord Mount-garth, a Devonshire nobleman, a moft fingular and original character. Mifs Wollstonecraft's name is written Woolftone Croft; the Earl of Landsford is fon to the Countess of Aldborough; French noblemen are made to fign their letters with their Christian name, inftead of with their title, according to fact; and the frequent repetition of the frigid and vulgar termination of Your's,' particularly from a female, is tirefome and disgusting.

Art. 38. Myfteries elucidated. By the Author of Danish Massacre,
Monmouth, &c. 12mo. 3 Vols. 9s., fewed. Lane. 1795:

1

This publication belongs to the clafs of biftorical novels; a fpecies of writing against which we have repeatedly ftated objections that appear to us unfurmountable, arifing from its tendency to lodge in the memory of the young reader a confufed mafs of facts and fictions: The author, whofe name, Anne Maria Mackenzie, is announced at the clofe of the preface, is of a different opinion, and maintains that this kind of tale holds the proper mean between the extravagance of the antient romance, and the infipidity, or the improbability, of the modern novel. She urges in its favour its tendency to reftrain the writer's imagination from that unbounded licence, which creates a fucceffion of horrible images, and real or fuppofed preternatural appearances. Thefe fhe has purpofely avoided in this story: but, at the fame time, fhe has very fuccefsfully combined a series of perplexing and myfterious events, which are in the iffue happily difentangled and elucidated. The story is laid in the reign of Edward II. The hero of the tale is Raymond, an adopted fon of De Spencer, one of the king's favourites, but afterwards difcovered to be the real fon of the king, by a clandeftine marriage with Lady Lancafter: the heroine is Ella, the daughter of Earl Fitzroy, who has fallen a facrifice to Mortimer's revenge. The ftory of their loves is interwoven with many circumstances borrowed from real hiftory, or easily connected with it. The cruel fate of the wretched Edward at Berkley Castle is pathetically defcribed: the characters of Mortimer and Ifabella are introduced in a manner very confiftent with hiftorical truth; and the story is diverfified by pleafing defcription, and told in correct language.

Art. 39. Elifa Porvell; or, Trials of Senfibility: a Series of original Letters collected by a Welsh Curate. 2 Vols. 12mo. 7s. Boards. Robinfons. 1795.

As a pathetic tale, this is a performance of confiderable merit. The fituation and incidents are uncommonly interefting, and are well contrived to leave on the mind of the reader a ftrong impreffion of the folly of concealment, and the fatal confequence of yielding the reins to paffion. In the former part of the story, feveral characters are introduced, which fhew the writer to be very capable of a lively and humorous defcription of manners: but, as foon the reader is introduced to Elifa Powell, he ceafe's to fmile, and exchanges gay amusement for tender fympathy. In the principal hero is exhibited a highly wrought pattern of generofity and benevolence. The writer diverfifies his ftyle according to his characters with confiderable command of language; and, from a pleafing Addrefs to Summer, introduced in the courfe of the narrative, he appears to be tolerably fkilled in the art of verfification.

Art. 40. Count St. Blancard; or, the Prejudiced Judge. By Mrs. Meck. 3 Vols. 12mo. gs. fewed. Lane.

This work is avowedly a tranflation from the French. It is probably the labour of fome industrious emigrée; as the French idiom predominates, and fome errors of the prefs are difcoverable. The story is well chofen, and is divested of the immorality, party, and levity, which are too frequently found in the lighter productions of French writers.

-To

-To thofe who feek amusement in tracing the former manners of France, we may recommend this little work. It may divert a folitary hour, without endangering youth or difgufling age.

Art. 41. The Traditions, a Legendary Tale. Written by a Young Lady. 12mo. 2 Vols. 7s. fewed. Lane. 1795.

From an advertisement prefixed to this novel, and from an uncommonly numerous lift of fubfcribers, under whofe patronage it makes. its appearance, we are led to confider it as an offering of benevolence to diftrefs. It appears to have been written by a young lady, probably of fome diftinction, certainly of fome talents, to ferve one of those unhappy foreigners whom the convaltion of the times has thrown into this country. The piece is of the romantic caft, and is more adapted to raise aftonishment and terror than to excite pity. The language is correct, and the story is of good moral tendency. The principal fault of the work is that it gives too much encouragement to fuperftition, by connecting events with preceding predictions, and by vifionary appearances, for which the reader is not enabled to account from natural caufes.

Art. 42. The Abbey of Saint Afaph. By the Author of Madeline, or the Caftle of Montgomery. 3 Vols. 12mo. gs. fewed. Lane. 1795. Although in a novel it is certainly not unreasonable to expect novelty, nothing is more rare than to find it. The hackneyed tale of a young man of rank falling in love with a fair damfel of unknown birth and no fortune, who, after a feries of adventures, is difcovered to be of high defcent and heiress to a large eftate, and rewards the patient fidelity of her difinterefted admirer, is the ground-work of this novel. With this flory is interwoven another, not lefs hackneyed, of a concealed marriage, an abandoned wife, a ruined and repentant husband, and a happy re-union. Thefe mingled tales are interwoven with a fufficient variety of fubordinate incidents to render the whole tolerably amufing; and fome good moral reflections are interfperfed. Had the author been contented with relating the rife, progrefs, obftruction, and completion of thefe tender attachments, we thould have pronounced the novel on the whole a pleafing performance: but he has thought it neceffary, in compliance with the prefent rage for the terrible, to conduct the reader into a horrid cavern, (where the father of the heroine has been fhut up for the unmerciful term of nineteen years,) and there to terrify him with a fiery spectre emitting from its gaping jaw fulphureous flames, and fending forth horrid fcreams, and with a moving and fhrieking skeleton,-only that he may afterwards have the pleasure of finding that he had no occafion to be frightened, the fpectre being only a man, its infernal flames nothing more than a preparation of phofphorus, and the inhabitant of the fkeleton not a ghost but a rat. The grofs improbability and ludicrous abfurdity of this part of the work are fufficient to annihilate the fmall portion of merit, which might otherwife have been afcribed to this performance.

Art. 43. The Castle of Ollada. A Romance. izmo. 2 Vols. 6s. fewed. Lane. 1795.

This performance is very properly entitled a Romance. The writer appears to have a fancy plentifully ftored, from former romances,

with images of love and terror, and a memory not ill furnished with the terms and phrafes which belong to the school of fiction. The story, which is laid in Spain, tells of a beauteous damfel, the daughter of a haughty and cruel baron, whose charms enamour Henrico, a peafant of myfterious defcent. Their moonlight interviews within a friendly grove; the hero's encounter, in a well-described tournament, with a wealthy duke to whom his mistress had been devoted; with fundry mifcellaneous efcapes and refcues; are in the true ftyle of romance. Some of the inferior characters are well sketched, particularly that of the fimple, credulous, prating Villetta, Matilda's waiting-woman. Had the writer confined himfelf to his love-tale, and opened it more at large by a fuller display of scenery, sentiment, and character, the performance would have been more complete: but, in order to gratify the fashionable tafte, he has introduced a story of a caftle fuppofed to be haunted by ghofts, but at length discovered to be inhabited by a fet of coiners; which will, we apprehend, afford the reader little amufement. We must add that the occupation of these coiners is reprefented in too favourable a light. The introduction of thefe incidents has increased the intricacy of the general ftory, and has obliged the writer to spend a great part of the fecond volume in explaining myfteries, which after all are not very clearly unfolded, when he ought to have been interefting the feelings of his. readers in the fortune of his principal characters. The language is in general correct but fometimes, in attempting to elevate his ftyle, the writer falls into affected statelinefs; for example, when he speaks of a horfeman conceding half his beaft' to another perfon. The pointing is frequently inaccurate; in the very first sentence of the book, the fenfe is concealed by a wrong ufe of the parenthesis. We mention thefe trifles becaufe, notwithstanding the defects of this performance, we difcern in it promifing marks of ingenuity.

THEOLOGY, &c.

Art. 44. A Differtation on the Infpiration of the New Teftament, as proved from the Facts recorded in the Hiftorical Books of it. To which is added, a Sketch of the Arguments, by which the Infpiration of the Old Testament may be proved in the eafieft Method. By P. Doddridge, D. D. 12mo. pp. 79. Is. 6d. Longman.

1793. The differtation here re-published originally made its appearance as an appendix to the third volume of that popular, and in many respects valuable, work, Dr. Doddridge's Family Expofitor; and we understand that it was never before feparately published. Whatever opinion may at prefent be prevalent concerning the inspiration of the books of fcripture, a work intended to establish this point, from the pen of Dr. Doddridge, may well merit a republication. The editor's declared intention, in (at prefent) bringing forwards this work to the public, is to obviate the objections which have lately been made against the infpiration of the New Teftament; which, he is of opinion, it does in fo effectual a manner, as to fuperfede a particular reply to fome late publications in favour of focinianifm.

Art. 45. Sermons fur les Circonftances préfentes, &c. i. e. Sermons on prefent Circumftances, delivered in the French Church in

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