find a curious table, in which the coalitions against Greece in the Persian war, and against France in the Republican war, are set I forth in opposite columns, where Persia on one side nods at Germany on the other the "Satrapies de la Perse, la Lydie, l'Arménie, la Pamphylie," &c. are flanked by "Cercles de l'Empire, la Bavière, la Saxe, les Electorats de Trèves, d'Hanovre," &c. -" divers peuples Arabes" stand opposite to "la Russie”—and the Scythians are called in to balance the Swiss. Then, we have an exquisite parallel between the land-fight at Maubeuge and the sea-fight at Salamis:-" C'est ainsi que la flotte Persanne, composée de diverses nations,-l'armée Autrichienne formée de même de différents peuples; ces coalisés, les uns traîtres, les autres pusillanimes, ceux-ci craignant des succès qui refléteroient trop de gloire sur tel ou tel général, telle ou telle nation; toute cette masse indigeste d'alliés, fut brisée à Salamine et a Maubeuge." We are involuntarily reminded of the ingenuity of Shakspeare's Fluellen. "If you look in the map of the 'orld," says the gallant Welchman, "I warrant you shall find, on the comparisons between Macedon and Monmouth, that the situations-look you-is both alike. There is a river in Macedon, and there is also a river at Monmouth: it is called Wye at Monmouth; but it is out of my prains what is the name of the other river; but 'tis all one; 'tis so like as my fingers is to my fingers, and there is salmons in both." Listen once more to M. de Chateaubriand supporting the parallel between Persia and Germany. "Cependant l'empire d'Orient, et celui d'Allemagne avoient changé de maîtres.-Darius et Leopold n'étoient plus.-A ces monarques, savants dans la connoissance des hommes et dans l'art de gouverner, succédèrent leurs fils, Xerxès et François. Le roi de Perses, élevé dans la mollesse, étoit aussi pusillanime que l'empereur Germanique, nourri dans les camps de Joseph, est courageux. Ils semblent seulement avoir partagé en commun l'obstination de caractère." Why, this system of comparison by opposites is the very same that is pre-imagined by Shakspeare: it is rank plagiary. Hear again the good Captain Fluellen. "As Alexander is kill his friend Clytus, being in his ales and his cups; so also Harry Monmouth, being in his right wits and his goot judgment, is turn away the fat knight."

One of M. de Chateaubriand's greatest works is his Génie du Christianisme, a work of eminent eloquence and much research, yet one of the most unequal and unsatisfactory productions of genius that has been witnessed in modern times; full of brilliant beauties and glaring defects-passages which all must admire, and errors that might be detected by a child-excellent in intention, yet so executed as to draw down the reprobation even of those who

are most zealous in the cause the writer has undertaken to defend. The illogical character of the author's mind is conspicuous in almost every portion of this splendid failure. It is conspicuous in the very outline of the work, and it is still more evident in the details. He takes up arms against objections which are not worthy of his attacks, and he combats them with arguments which he ought to have seen were inadequate to his purpose.

The object of his work he thus describes. It had been maintained, he says, that Christianity was " a religion sprung from barbarism, absurd in its doctrines, ridiculous in its ceremonies, and hostile to the progress of arts and literature;" and he therefore undertakes to prove that" of all religions that have ever existed the Christian religion is the most poetical, the most favourable to liberty, to the arts, and to literature; that the modern world owes every thing to it, from agriculture to abstract science, from the humblest asylum for the unfortunate to the temples built by Michael Angelo and embellished by Raphael; that it favours talent, purifies taste, and invigorates thought-that it offers noble images to the writer, and perfect models to the artist; and that it is desirable to call all the enchantments of imagination and all the interests of the heart to the aid of that religion against which they have been employed." Such, he says, is the object of his work. The intention was certainly excellent. He saw that Deism in France was captivating its proselytes with the classical beauties of heathen fable-that both in literature and in the fine arts no models were acknowledged except those of Greece and Rome. He saw that among a people on whom the outward forms and surfaces of things have more influence than on us, this invariable use of classical symbols, this invariable appeal to classical models as the true criterion of all excellence, tended much to confirm them in the anti-christian feeling which then generally prevailed in France. He wished to counteract the poison by teaching them to discover beauties in the Christian creed, and if he did not convince their reason, at least to captivate their tastes. In adopting this course, M. de Chateaubriand seems never to have considered what very humble ground he was condescending to occupy. He seems never to have asked himself whether such a line of defence was not derogatory to the great cause he was undertaking to advocate, and whether it was really advantageous to religion to treat it as if it was one of the fine arts. Nay more, he seems to have forgotten that the utmost success in establishing his position would profit him nothing with those whom he addressed. The deistical admirers of Greece and Rome, who thought the Heathen mythology the most beautiful, the most poetical of all mythologies, did not on that account believe in it. Their imagination did not controul their judgment; their

tastes were not connected with their creed. If, therefore, the eloquence of the Génie du Christianisme could have succeeded in inducing them to discard their classical models of excellence, could have wrought an entire revolution in their tastes, and led them to draw thenceforth only from Holy Writ their subjects for poetry or for painting: this would no more necessarily have made them Christians, than their veneration for classical models had proved them to be worshippers of Jupiter and Minerva. The utmost success of his line of argument could have scarcely tended to do more than just to raise Christianity above the absurd and vicious mythology of Greece and Rome. He would have shown only that Christianity was a little more favourable to art and literature than the Heathen creed; that they had flourished greatly under a false religion, and rather more under the only true one. This was the utmost success that could be attained by the most complete establishment of that line of argument which he had chosen to adopt. It ought to have occurred to him that if, both under a true and under a false religion, arts and literature had been found to flourish, the mere difference of degree could not be available in argument as proof or disproof of either creed, and that we must seek some other cause of their advancement. If they had advanced under the false worship of Jupiter, it was surely absurd to state, as an argument in favour of Christianity, that they had also advanced under the true religion of Christ. This absurdity is increased, when we remember that the argument was addressed to those who practically denied its validity, by denying that the mythology of the ancients was entitled to belief in consequence of that supposed poetical superiority which M. de Chateaubriand is

anxious to contest.

The case would have been different, if M. de Chateaubriand had addressed his arguments to believers in any known creed; if he had compared the effects of Christianity, not with the scarcely deducible results of a worship which is utterly exploded, but with the visible and unquestionable workings of an established religion which does actually exercise an influence over a large portion of mankind. He might usefully have compared it with Mahometanism; he might have shown the benumbing and degrading influence of the false religion, the civilizing power of the true. He might have shown, that, while Mahometanism is clogged with observances which fetter the progress of the human intellect and render man stationary and unimproved, Christianity encourages the full developement of all his powers-that, while Mahometanism scarcely accommodates itself to any but the nations among whom it was promulgated, while it holds forth future rewards which, like the Valhalla of the Saxons and the huntingground of the North American Indians, are adapted to the gross

animal pleasures of a peculiar people; while it prescribes ceremonies, few of which are suitable, and one (the fast from sun-rise to sun-set) impossible to an inhabitant of the Arctic circle; Christianity is equally addressed, and can with equal ease be embraced, by every human being on the face of the globe. If M. de Chateaubriand had instituted a parallel like this-had compared contemporary religions, and results of real importance to the condition of man, which are plainly deducible from each, he would have done more wisely-though even then it could not have been said that he had established his argument on lofty ground. But M. de Chateaubriand does nothing of all this he does not compare contemporary religions: he compares the works of modern Christianity with the productions of ancient Paganism: he brings forward on either side, not results which are directly and unquestionably to be attributed to the influence of religion, but which cannot be proved to have sprung from that source, and which can only be said to have co-existed with it. He has moreover adduced circumstances, which, whether derivable from a religious creed or not, are, instead of being vitally important to the temporal welfare of man, denounced by some as absolutely worthless, and classed even by their admirers rather among the ornaments and luxuries of civilized existence, than among those great principles on which depend either our welfare in this world or our hopes of happiness in another.

It is very true that Christianity is favourable to the progress of arts and literature; that it is very capable of poetical treatment; that the epics of Milton, Dante, and Tasso, claim our admiration as well as the Iliad and the Æneid. Raphael may have surpassed Polygnotus; and St. Peter's at Rome may be a more splendid work of architectural skill than any of the temples of ancient Greece. But is Christianity to be defended on grounds like these? Is it to be recommended on such a plea? Can any one who regards it rightly, feel that to the immensity of its importance one tittle has been added by the most satisfactory proof that poetry, painting, architecture, and music, are not incompatible with its tenets? M.de Chateaubriand, for a devout man, seems strangely insensible to the immense inequality between the substantial importance of religion, and the value of the trappings which he summons to support it. Even to the undevout, religion will appear the most powerful engine that ever influenced the condition of man; and to commend it because ornamental arts have flourished under its mighty shadow, would appear to him trifling and absurd. As wisely might we say, in commendation of the steam-engine, that it was not incapable in some parts of being elegantly carved, and even decorated with gold leaf; as well might we say, in praise of the

elephant, that he sometimes carried an embroidered houdah. To see the real insignificance of this mode of defence, let us suppose that the reverse of that which M. de Chateaubriand maintains were true. Suppose that, instead of having flourished, poetry and the fine arts had withered under the influence of Christianity; suppose that from the commencement of the Christian æra no great poem had been written, no fine picture painted, no splendid temple built, and that for all of this kind that deserved admiration we must look solely to Pagan Greece; suppose this true, who would not smile if it were gravely adduced as an argument against the truth of Christianity? The question of its truth must evidently rest on other grounds, and that being once established, objections like these would not be even as a feather in the scale against it. We must conclude, not that the Christian scheme was untrue, but that whatever had not thriven under its influence and had appeared incompatible with it, was injurious and immoral, or at least not essential to the welfare of mankind. And yet it is upon circumstances which, if reversed, could not militate against Christianity, that M. de Chateaubriand grounds the greater part of a lengthened argument in opposition to the dexterous sophistries of the French Encyclopedists. It is by such means he hopes to silence the ablest opponents who ever directed the arms of perverted reason against the evidences of religion.

M. de Chateaubriand probably felt that he was justified in adducing every thing which could be said in favour of the cause he was supporting, and that if Christianity had been favourable to poetry and the fine arts, it was an additional merit, which it was proper to state; but it does not appear to have occurred to him that a weak argument is worse than none, and that the advocate who insists upon trivial points, as if they were important, creates an impression that nothing more important remains to be brought forward. M. de Chateaubriand lays as much stress upon the promotion of poetry and the fine arts, as if he was saying nearly all that could be said in favour of Christianity, and he thus prepares a triumph for the sceptic, who might reasonably ask him how it happened that the decline of literature and the fine arts might be dated almost from the commencement of the Christian æra, and that we had been subjected under that religion to more than a thousand years of barbarism. Thus his futile defence would have no other effect than to give an undue weight to a futile objection. Our object in the foregoing remarks has been not to enter into a theological discussion, but to illustrate the illogical character of our author's mind, and to show how, with great powers of eloquence at command, he becomes a weak and even a dangerous advocate, through the want of a just apprecia