their superior intelligence; for at the period of their greatest civilization, Christendom was enveloped in the deepest mental, and, we may say, moral darkness. We have already seen that their universities were attended by students from various parts of Europe. These diffused the knowledge they had acquired, among their benighted countrymen. This was especially so in Italy, the south of France, and Christian Spain; and in these countries appeared the first indications of the dawn of that great revival of letters, which has since ushered in so glorious a day. It is now generally admitted, that the Arabic has imparted much of its character to the Provençal and Castilian literature. It gave to the early poetry of the latter, many of its peculiar measures, and indeed, as an author remarks," so far from being confined to the vocabulary, or to external forms of composition, it seems to have penetrated deep into its spirit, and is plainly discernable in that affectation of stateliness and oriental hyperbole, which characterizes Spanish writers even at the present day." Whatever may be the comparative merits of the literature of the Spanish Moors, and whatever its influence upon that of Europe, we can but admire the genius of a people, who in so short a time arose to a state of high civilization; and who, in spite of institutions, both political and religious, highly unfavorable to intellectual development, created for themselves an imperishable renown in the world of letters. Their refined pursuits in that age of gloom, appear doubly attractive when compared with the barbarism of the North, as beauty is invested with new charms by contrast with deformity. While the lazy monk effaced with vandal hand, the chef d'oeuvres of antiquity, to be succeeded by his lying record of the miracles of saints, the Arab scholar derived rich treasures from the productions of the Grecian and Roman masters. While the feudal baron, in his fortified castle and surrounded by his retainers, was only intent upon deeds of rapine and bloodshed, the Moorish knight was engrossed by the gentle exercises and courteous usages of chivalry," or offered up incense at the shrine of the muse. It is melancholy to turn from this pleasing picture, to that of their present degradation. They have been driven from the beautiful land they so fondly loved, and their very existence, as a nation, destroyed. With their power, their learning, elegance, and refinement have departed, and "darkness has again settled over those regions of Africa, which were once illumined by the light of learning." Their exiled descendants on the shores of Barbary, still cherish the remembrance of the glory of their ancestors, and pray to Allah that they may yet be restored to that blissful region, which they imagine to be overhung by the paradise of the Prophet. 66 EDITORS' TABLE. LITERARY NOTICES. CLASSICAL STUDIES; Essays on Ancient Literature and Art. By Barnas Sears, President of Newton Theological Institution-B. B. Edwards, Professor in Andover Theological Seminary-C. C. Felton, Professor in Harvard University. Boston, Gould, Kendall & Lincoln, 1843. We have received this work from the publishers, but have not had leisure to peruse it in the manner we wish to do, and shall therefore defer a more extended notice of it till our next number. Its typography and general execution are honorable to the publishers, and creditable to the American press. THE MARRIAGE RING; or how to make home happy. From the writings of John Angell James. Boston, Gould, Kendall & Lincoln, 1843. We have been much pleased, and mayhap, profited in a hasty survey of the contents of this neat little volume. The writings of Mr. JAMES have been so long and favorably known to the public, that any recommendation of them from us might be deemed superfluous, and it will be a sufficient inducement to the perusal of this work, simply to state that it is compiled principally from his acknowledged productions. Its object, as stated in the Preface, is to furnish "a Manual for those just entering the marriage state, a period in whose history important interests are involved, and touching which, it may never with more truth be said, 'a word spoken in due season how good is it; it is like apples of gold in pictures of silver."" We would invite all, and more especially our Senior friends, to examine the work. In elegance and neatness of appearance, it is fully equal to the volume before noticed. SCENES IN INDIAN LIFE; a series of original designs, portraying an Indian Chief. By Felix O. C. Darley. Nos. 1 and 2. Colon, 1843. events in the life of Philadelphia, J. R. This is a work published monthly, beginning with April, 1843, and to be completed in five numbers. We have received the April and May issues, and have been much pleased with the interesting information which they contain. The tale of the War Eagle answers well the purpose of illustration, and gives a life-like air to the whole performance. The lines of "?" will appear in our next number. Q's "Lines to an old spoon," are really quite graphic; but we shall hardly be able to find room for them in our pages. The Hypochondriac" contains some good passages, but we think we have seen the following anecdote before: "I remember an old gentleman, who was afflicted in this manner, (hypochondria,) who imagined himself to be an owl; and every night as soon as the moon arose, he would clamber to the roof of his house and there would sit for hours, with his form bent up, his head sunk between his shoulders, his hair standing out straight, and his eyes rolling and protuberant, screaming in dolorous notes-whoo-oo-whoo-oo!' He was cured eventually by falling headlong into a cistern, from which he was drawn by his friends, half drowned, but completely recovered from his mania." The "Old Ruins" are dust and ashes. "Black Hawk," and the "Sailor to his love," are rejected. We had prepared an Epilegomena for the present number, but owing to the length of some of the pieces, it was crowded out. LITERATURE has been justly defined, the aggregate mass of symbols by which the spirit of an age, or the character of a nation, is shadowed forth. Following, necessarily, the course of empire, and adapting itself to the various circumstances which mould the manners and opinions of different nations, the only law it obeys in its progress, is the great law of succession, by which its benefits are diffused among mankind. It accumulates, so far as such a process may be predicated of it, by accessions which, unlike the immutable truths of natural science, bear distinctive marks of their origin. A transcript of mind and of the objects of sensation, it interweaves, throughout its whole structure, delineations of character and sketches of natural scenery which transport us at once to the time and place of its production. Nor do those fundamental principles which are recognized in the mental world, and on which are based perennial models in letters, serve so far to identify the works of genius as ever to obliterate the peculiarities which constitute its nationality. Much less can they prevent the changes which are wrought in literature by the progress of society in civilization; the language, manners, and mental habits of mankind are changed from age to age, and correspondent modifications are discoverable in all the departments of literature dependent on taste. Pre-eminently is this true of poetry; its elements are essentially different in different stages of refinement. Its spirit is, indeed, identical, inasmuch as human passions remain forever the same in their nature, and its object, also, is constant, being invariably to call out those passions, to quicken imagination, and kindle emotions of beauty, sublimity, or terror; but its means of accomplishing these ends are as various as the diversified conditions of society; its garb exhibits all the vicissitudes of fashion. Too little regard, it should seem, has been paid to this fact by those eminent critics, Hazlitt and Macaulay, in instituting comparisons between the poetry of a barbarous and that of an enlightened age, derogatory to the latter. We can by no means sympathize with them in their jealousy of the progress of civilization, as if, forsooth, it were some juggernaut car, crushing beneath its lumbering wheels all that is noble, romantic, and heroic in society. Grant that the credulity of childhood gives place to the judgment of age, as the province of the unreal, the visionary becomes illumined by the light of science, and the boundaries of the unknown recede; grant that in proportion as the mind ceases to be inspired with awe or enthusiasm by the phantasms of a preternatural world, more definite and rational views are entertained of the realities of this; yet, from such premises, no other than a most unworthy estimate of the poet's art will lead, even in theory, to the conclusion that the sphere of his influence becomes, in consequence, circumscribed, and the wings of his genius clipped. By every invasion of the dark domains of superstition, by every conquest of knowledge over ignorance, his power finds an ampler scope, his imagination is furnished with richer materials, and may plume its pinions for a higher flight. The mind not only beholds its horizon expand with each step in its upward progress, opening wider prospects and more enchanting scenes, but, in turn shedding light on the objects it contemplates, it renders distinctness of observation commensurate with its extent. And we have yet to be convinced that a deeper insight into the mysteries of nature, gives an air of meanness or of insipidity to her works, or that a comprehension of the grandeur, beauty, and order of the external world, and some familiarity with the causes of things, throw a drowsy spell over the minds of men, from which the rod reversed,' relapse into barbarism, alone can set them free. "Absurd," to borrow one of our theorist's own weapons, "absurd to suppose that the notions which a painter may have conceived respecting the lachrymal glands, or the circulation of the blood, will affect the tears of his Niobe, or the blushes of his Aurora." And is there nothing preposterous in the assertion, that the poet, who has drunk deep at the fountains of experimental knowledge, and reveled in the hoarded treasures of classic lore, till his thoughts wander through time and space, travel earth around and return, like richly freighted argossies, from every clime, is, by reason of his acquirements, forever doomed to me diocrity; or, scarcely less humiliating, is forced to the conviction that they are at best, a lesson to be unlearned,' because,' forsooth, enervated by long continued training and encumbered by things of earth, his genius assays in vain to scale 'the highest heaven of invention,' and reason, grown arrogant by discipline, lords it over imagination, rejecting with disdain her proffered flowers? Neither experience nor observation teaches us that one is unfitted to admire the tints of autumn leaves, and draw therefrom a theme for pensive thought, in consequence of having learned the exact process of decomposition, by which each tint is produced; or that he looks with less rapture on the clouds which retinue to rest the king of day, because he knows their golden fringes are all the result of refraction and deception. Nor does it consist with the common sense of men, that he who has attained the highest degree of critical discernment, is the last to perceive and acknowledge the truth to nature, in that noted line, "How sweet the moonlight sleeps on yonder bank !” or again, when 66 'Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day is so shocked at the unscientific appellation of the stars, that he feels no response in his soul to the beautiful description of dawn. The achievements of science and philosophy, subversive of the higher, the inventive faculties--the Lotos fruit which debases genius! Unworthy sentiment of this theorizing age. They furnish, continually, the very aliment of poetic genius. They have made the wilderness, moral, mental, and natural, to blossom as the rose; they have opened paths into regions hitherto unexplored, affording new glimpses into scenes of wild magnificence and beauty, fitted, when acting upon minds open to their influence, to awaken the deepest emotions; they have made this goodly frame the earth, and the brave o'erhanging firmament,' to teem with forms of real, as well as ideal perfection, and clothed with attractive grandeur, worlds which before were either insignificant points in creation, or objects of unmingled terror. They have, in fine, brought home to the feelings of men, through their intellects, vast accessions of the most. exalted poetic imagery, which, by their means alone, have been made the poet's legitimate materials; for in his sublimest moods he can, after all, only describe what men think and feel; only as they are elevated on the same table-land with himself, may he portray in full splendor the vision,' and exhaust the 'faculty |