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Leader (1850-1860), 8th November 1851, Edition Town of 2, Page 1069, Untitled Article

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      Untitled Article

      f llv invested and padded animal as the insect does to the chrysalis that so roundingly envelopes it . This peculiarity is strikingly evinced in the head , as " n some part of this hook will be incidentally shown . Xt is also very curiously displayed in the side fin , the bones of which almost exactly answer to the bones of the human hand , minus only the thumb . This fin has four regular bone fingers , the index , middle , ring , and little finger . But all these are permanently lodged in their fleshy covering , as the human fingers in an artificial covering . ' However recklessly the whale may sometimes serve us , ' said humourous Stubb one day , he can never be truly said to handle us without mittens . '

      «< For all these reasons , then , any way you may look at it , you must needs conclude that the great Leviathan is that one creature in the world which must remain unpainted to the last . True , one portrait may hit the mark much nearer than another , but none can hit it with any very considerable degree of exactness . So there is no earthly way of finding out precisely what the whale really looks like ; and the only mode in which you can derive even a tolerable idea of his living contour is by going awhaling yourself ; but by so doing you run no small risk of being eternally stove and sunk by him .

      Wherefore , it seems to me you had best not be too fastidious in your curiosity touching this Leviathan . "

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      BARRY CORNWALL S SONGS . English Songs , and other Small Poems . By Barry Cornwall . A new Edition , with Additions . Chapman and Hall . Lamartine , in that little glimpse of autobiography which he calls Les Confidences , tells us that " the Abbe Dumont , as well as many superior men whom I have known and loved the best during the course of my life , had no taste for poetry . Of written words he appreciated only the sense , and but little the music . He was not gifted with that species of intellectual materiality which associates in the poet ' s mind a sensation of harmony with an idea or a

      sentiment , and which thus gives it a double hold on man through the ear and through the mind . It seemed to him , and it has often since seemed to me , that there is , in fact , a sort of childishness , humiliating to reason , in this studied cadence of rhythm , in this mechanical chiming of verses which addresses itself only to the ear of man , and which associates a delight merely sensual with the moral grandeur of a thought , or the manly energy of a sentiment . Verse appeared to him the language of the childhood of nations , prose the language of their maturer years . At the present day I think his view was a just one . "

      A cruel sentence to be passed by one who was himself a poet . But the opinion which M . de Lamartine here very happily expresses , and in language more accurate and complete tha / i he usually employs when conveying his opinions—( when he deals with facts and details he is marvellously distinct)—is one which is gradually gaining ground . The form of poetry , its verse , its metre is more and more giving way to prose . Nevertheless , whatever may be the fate of other classes of poetry , we may confidently predict that the song or the brief lyric will always be a general favourite . From its brevity it can never weary or cloy the ear , and from its presumed association with music it will

      maintain its prescriptive right to tune or melody . A few verses , conveying in the tersest and most harmonious language a sentiment we all have felt , is a coin position which will never cease to please . The Kwjlish Songs of the public ' s old acquaintance ; , Harry Cornwall , are here again presented to us with Home additions . We need not say at this late hour how much poetic beauty is scattered throughout these pieces ; and , perhaps , it would be as useless now to express a regret at the inequality : i | » d haste and fragmentary appearance they frequently present . Far from estimating his songs or lyrics too highly , our author has only failed to

      perceive how very precious such brief compositions may becoint ; when every verse , and every line of every verse , stands out clear , succinct , melodious . 1 hero art ) some half-dozen of the lyrics of Wordsworth to which we should more confidently entrust inn imputa tion in future ages than to the ICxcnrsion » tNwlt ; and a living author , W . S . Landor , who has J vnU , e soint ! of the most beautiful prone in the Kng' «»» language , and much admirable poetry beside , j'HH { ilKo given to the world Home of those perfect v"eal ettusions , which , Ninall things as ( hoy seem , »»« world never lets fall , and to which ulone he " » Klit confide bin uuinu and immortality

      . SuJ I > urilHi "K ilu > collection before us of ' English ^' ' J , a mid thought steals over tho mind—they « i aluHl too trim a reflection of the times in which " >« author lias lived . < ) , „¦« Merry England " ban K ven to her poet no more frequent subject than the

      miseries of pauperism , the workhouse , the gaol , the famished or ill requited labourer . Everywhere we are reminded that the author has lived in an age when poor laws and the insufficient remuneration of labour had become the absorbing topics of society . We are very far from blaming the poet—we rather applaud him—for throwing his sympathies in this direction ; but it cannot be denied that the prevalence of such topics as " The Song of the Outcast , " " The Pauper Jubilee , " and "The Complaint of an Outlying Christian , " give an air of distressing melancholy to his volume of poems . It is bare misery not subdued by poetic imagination or tenderness . He tells us himself in one of his happiest strains : — " Song should breathe of scents and flowers , Song should like a river now ; Song should bring back scenes and hours That we loved—ah , long ago ! " Song from baser thoughts should win us ; Song should charm us out of woe ; Song should stir the heart within us , Like a patriot ' s friendly blow . " Pains and pleasures , all man doeth , War and peace , and ill and wrong—All things that the soul subdueth Should be vanquished , too , by song . " Song should spur the mind to duty ; Nerve the weak , and stir the strong : Every deed of truth and beauty Should be crowned by starry song !" But our quotations should rather be made from the additional poems that we have here for the first time presented to us . They quite sustain the well merited reputation of the author . There is no failure of the poetic fervour . " A Journal of the Sun , " the poem whieh first greets us on opening the volume , fully deserves to bear the now familiar name of Barry Cornwall . Day breaks : — " And yonder , high-tossing his antlers In play or in scorn , Stands the stag , and beside him , outstretching His limbs , is the fawn . How lightly he springs o'er the heather ! How lazily slumber the hine t How still are the old giant forests ! And above , how divine Is the sun ! He awakes in a glory : His path is arrayed "With hues like the flush of the rainbow : He scatters the shade—He has scattered the dews and the vapours , Where ' er he has trod ; And now he uncloudcth his beauty , — All over a God ! * * * * * ¦ " He hastes—high away to the zenith ; Clouds , shadows — they fly : High , higher , —he touches—he treads on The arch of the sky ! * * * * * * * " Now already his lustre Is far in the west : liut ho calms the fierce beams as he neareth The isles of the Blest . " These are touches of great beauty . ' The next piece , "Autumn Verses , " opens very prettily -. — " The summer past , what dreams are over ! Tho incense of the air hath tied : The carpets of the golden meadows Are torn by tempests , shred by nlned : The rose hath lost her fragrance ; The lily hangs her head , — - Dead-dead ! " Wo could wish to expunge one expression from these lines , " The carpels of the golden meadows /' Were we making the quotation , we should certainly drop this word , and read the passage thus : — " the golden meadows Are torn by tempests , shred by allied . " Hut wo have no space for verbal criticism , nor indeed for further extract ; wo can only commend the volume to all who know the kindly heart and genuine poetic beauty that shelter UieuiKelvcH under the name of Harry Cornwall .

      Untitled Article

      tt nn ? ~ idd Jewish School and I ' amily liibht . Tho I'iint . l ' nit , < M > iitiiiiiii ' iir tint IVntiil . urh , newl y LriiiiHlnt H .-vci .-. mI tlm Chief lUbbi . lty 1 ) , . A . | j ,,, iit . ch , I ' roi . sHHor of lle » . r « w . & « . l ) tt ,-li ,, . Thk exeellenew of the Anglican version of the Scriptures in universally admitted ; we are , neverthelesH , not ^ surprised at finding a new Knglish translation of the | ti | , l (> undertaken for the uho of tho Jowb ; that body holding views on

      certain points quite at issue with Christian doctrines . This new translation , however , does not entirely depart from the common version , but differs only in those passages where changes were rendered necessary in accordance with the principles ably set forth , developed , and exemplified in an elaborate preface prefixed to the work . These principles are fidelity , uniformity , and independence . The departures from the common version are so numerous that there is scarcely a verse free from them . . We shall just quote a few by which we were struck . Genesis 4 th chapter , 15 lh verse ( authorized version ) , " And the Lord set a mark upon Cain lest any finding him should kill him . " Dr . Benisch , "And the eternal appointed a sign for Cain , that none finding him should smite him . "

      Verses 22 nd , 23 rd , 24 th , in the same chapter , which in the authorized version are unintelligible , and apparently alluding to circumstances not stated in the Bible , make perfect sense in the new translation . They run thus : — " And Zillah she also bare Tubal Cain , the father of every sharpener and of every artificer in copper and iron ; and the sister of Tubal Cain was Naamah ( 23 rd verse ) . And Lamech said unto his wives Adah and Zillah , hear

      my voice , ye wives of Lamech , give ear unto my speech : Now that I can slay a man by a wound of mine and a child by a stripe of mine ( 24 th verse ) . If Cain be avenged seven fold , truly Lamech seventy and seven folds . " The meaning evidently is , that after Tubal Cain had discovered the art of working metals and , consequently , of making deadly weapons , Lamech , his father , said boastingly to his wives , that henceforth he had no occasion to be afraid of any aggressor , and that , if the defenceless Cain could avenge himself sevenfold , he , provided with arms , by a single wound of which a man

      might be slain , would be able to avenge seventy and seven fold any insult that might be offered to him . Genesis 14 th chapter and 18 th verse , is translated , " And he ( Melchizedek ) was a priest of the most high God . " The authorized version translates " the priest . " It is unnecessary to point out in how far this slight difference affects the view which represents that king as the type of Jesus . It is not our province to decide which of the two versions is the more correct ; but this much we

      can say with confidence , that the translation under review fully deserves the attention of the student of the Bible , and is curious enough to justify the present excursion into a department of Literature seldom entered by Journals not professedly theological ; and as we have so very many clergymen among our subscribers —( partly from sympathy with our views , and partly from a natural desire to see what is going on in the opposite camp )—this brief notice may be said to be intended more peculiarly to them .

      Untitled Article

      BOOKS ON OUlt TABLE . History of the Training and 1 'lanting of the Christian Church . By Augustus Neauder ; also his Antignostikus . ( Holm ' s Standard Library . ) II . O . Bohn . With this volume we have the conclusion of Neander's History of the Training and Planting of the Church , and , what most readers will consider far more interesting , his Antignostikus , or review and analysis of Tertullian ' s writings . The latter , indeed , is unusually curious ; giving in lmlf a volume the sum and substance of all the Father ' s works . We especially direct attention ti > the chapters on Uapti . sm , Monogamy , Chastity , Education of Women , and tho Soul . Tim Hhyiuer ' s famil y . A Collection of HainAin ^ H . lty Thomas Watson . Arbioath : Kennedy and Kamsay . This little volume of poems , by a working man , is far more worthy of notice than Hcores of those that come before us . Thomas Watson haa humour and feeling , » nd if not original , at any rate he atrives to express Ilia actual thoughts and feelings . In the preface he speaks modestly of liiH bantlings , and implies that even if they art ; worth " cutting up , " lie Hhall feel complimented . The Mcotch poems neem the heist .

      Ol ympus inul its InhiibUants . A Nimat . ive sk « -lc : Ji of

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      Sor . 8 , 1851 J © Utf He abet . 1069 ¦ ¦ . . ¦ ¦ ¦ . .

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 8, 1851, page 1069, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1908/page/17/