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    stfL (ft I Vl>ut JUXlS*

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    Untitled Article

    THE LONDON PULPIT . The London PvipiU By James Ewing Ritchie . Simpkin and Marshall . A . oood book might be written on this subject , but we are sorry to say the present author has not achieved that desirable entity . It is rather astonishing that he lias not done so ; for he has a fair knowledge of London congregations and London preachers , and he has a genuine reverence for pulpit elociaence—ihe spoken word of piety—in any or in no sect . From Dr . Dale and Mj . Maurice , through various forms of dissent , down ( or up ) to

    Johannes H . onge , ~ the most distinguished London preachers are described and criticised . The writer's mind throughout seems to oscillate between a serae of the funny' and a sense of the Infinite , and to be without the faculty of expressing either . It is not possible to joke more heavil y or more inopportunely than our author ; or to give an air of insincerity to real religious feeling more completely than he has done to his own , Stlch a man cannot be a good critic ; but he gives congregational opinions impartially . Mr . Montgomery and Dr . dimming are , of course , facetiously

    dealt with eWery small critic in these days throws stones at those recognjsed humbugs . But being recognised as L-umbugs by thinking people out of their own congregations , there is no necessity for wasting 'words upon them . Of the latter Boanerges , our author ( who is ever ready to say the good he knows of a preacher ) might hare told what he has told of Dr . Dale , viz .: that he is active and ' charitable among the poor—giving and causing others to give lime and money to help those who want help , " irregpective of -the religious sect of the recipient . "

    The different chapters of this book appeared originally as articles in the Weekly News . The nature of the subject will give it a certain amount of popularity , but it is -without literary merit , and therefore cannot live long .

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    BOOKS ON OUR TABLE . The Statistical Companionfor 1534 . By T . C . Banfield , Esq . Longm an , Brown , Green * ""' ¦ '; ' ^ * -. ^ ;¦*" ¦ ; ' ' ¦ ' '¦ "• " . " " \ _ " " ' .. '""' ¦ ' ¦ ' and Longman . The Presents Stale of Moroccos a Chapter of Mussulman Civilisation . By Xa \^ er ^ P * u ^ Xk ^ , Longman , Brown , Oreen , and Longmans . ^^ . 0 oijot » i ;? rithe Advantages of Ots Savings' Bank . . Long&an , Brown , Green , and _^ £ ' ' ¦ ' ¦ ¦ ¦¦ ' " « ¦¦ - -. • - ' . / .. . Longmans . TktCast&an , on Historical Tragedy . By T . N . TWourd . Edward Moxdn . Tfo one Primeval LMngwue ^ traced experimentally through AncientInscriptions . By fife ^ J ^^ IMrtes > Fowter , B . J > , . . \ Richard Bentley « T » Kba or ' - Loj ^ . -Ditty , By JBmilie Flygare Carina . \ Eichard Bentley , Eifcuimj . a& rat ^ ^ , Sdmplrin , Marshall , and Co . T ^ Na ^ i ^ of Russia and Turkey , and ( heir Destiny . By Ivan Golovin . TrSBner and Co . The Life of Mrs . Sheneood . Edited by her daughter , Sophia Kelly . Darton and Co . Zemo , d WOe of ft * Italian War . By James D . Horrocks . John Chapman . Bmsiaas it . it : Us Court , its Government , and Us People . By John BeyneU Moreli .

    titii u > ¦« ¦ ¦ . ' George BouUedgeand Co . ^ f ^^ ' George Boatledge and Co . The Lancash ire Witches . George Boutledge and Co Critical and Bulorical Essays . By the Bight Hon . Thomas Babington Macanlay , M . P . ¦ -. ¦ :- ¦¦ ; ., Longman , Brown , Green , and Longmans . T ^ Cheery of Coinmon L ife . W . Blacksrood and S ons . Household Medicine . W . S . Orr and Co-Counterparts ; or The Cross of Love , By the Author of " Charles Aachester . " 3 vols . ' ¦ " ¦' ¦ ' ¦ .. . Smith , Elder , and Co . A Volunteer ' s Scramble through Scinde , the Punjab , Bisdostan , and the Himdayah Moun-. tom # . Bjr Hugo James . 2 vote . W . Thacker and Co .

    Wight and the Soul A Dramatic Poem . By J . Stanyan Bigg . Groomtridge and Co . TheB aUad of Babe Christabel Third Edition . By Gerald Massey . David Bogue . Angelo . . A Romance of Modern Rome . 2 vols . Richard Bentley . The English Cyclopaedia . A New Dictionary of Universal Knowledge . Oondncted by Charles Knight . Part XII . * Bradbury and Evans . Poetical WorJcsof John Dryden . ( The Annotated Edition of the English Poets . ) Edited by Bohert BelL Vol . TU . - John W . Parker and Son . Collected Eiiiwn of the Writings of Douglas JerrolcL ( Plays . ) Part XLL Punch Office . The Newcome * . Memoirs of a most Respectable Family . Edited by Arthur Pendennis , m E « q- No . VIII . Bradbury and Evans ! Tke National ' Miscellany . Office , 1 , Exeter-street . Chambers \ Journal of Popular Literature , Sd « qcey and Art . Part IV . _ , Xj W . and R Chambers . Househol d Narrative of Current Event * . Office , 16 , Wellington-street North . Oper * Legisla £ ion . By Herbert Spencer . ( Chapman ' s Library for the People . )

    a rx j * n . John Chapman . A Defence of Religion . By H . W . Crosskey . { Chapman ' s Library for the People . ) rt i t- i-r John Chapman . Catholic Uman . Essays towards a Church of the Future , as the Organisation ofPhilanthropy . By F . W . Newman . John Chapman . The Glasgow University Album for 1854 . Edited ly the Students . Richard Griffin and Co . Jack and the Tanner of Wj / mondham . By the Author of " Mary Powell . " Arthur Hail , Virtue , and Co . The Cardinal */) Daughter . By R . M . Daniels . { The Parlour Library . ) T . Hodgson . Beauchamp . By G . P . R . James . ( The Parlour Library . ) T . Hodgson ] Nicholas I ., Emperor and Autocrat of All Vie Mtissias . B y the Rev . Henry Christmas ' ™ It \ ¦ J . F . Shaw . The Worthies of the Working Classes , and their Friends . By S . Bannister , M . A . T . C . Newby . The Land We Live In . Part II . W . S . Orr and Co .

    The Art Journal . George y irtue and Co Hoggs Instructor . Jamea Hogg THus Illustrated London Magazine . Piper , Stephensoa , and Spenco Bentley ' s Monthl y Review . Piper stephensoo , and Spence The Northern , Tribune . * " ' Holyoako and Co Thm Prospect ™ Review . John Ch Q

    Untitled Article

    THE ROYAIi ACADEMY . ITibst Notice . The influence of tbe war does not yet show itself on the walla of the Royal Academy . Nature , as it is there reflected , is tranquil to a degree of stillness , yrhich is as little mere self-possession—strength in repose , as the constrained and mincing manners of English society are the manners of quiet after-action . Art must reflect nature , but only as it is felt by the artist ; and the artist can only feel according to his condition and training . He cannot paint that -which he cannot enter into ; and if ie- cannot undergo something of the emotions -which present the great types of human action

    and feeling , he cannot reproduce them on the canvas . The weariness of English society re- appears on this painted mirror . Those things which are still most alive amongst us have also their most vigorous life . here . The notion of battle is still the official idea of Mr . Jones , R . A ., the librarian , who has taken the "battle-field for his department , and supplies this year the " Battle of Hyderabad . " We should have action enough here , and it comes early in the series . The catalogue tells us that there is the Poonah Irregular Horse in green uniform ; that there are parties of the Twenty-second led by Major George , making their way over nullahs and ramparts ; there is Lieutenant Smith mortally wounded ; and Trumpeter M'Phelan taking a

    standard from a Belooch : -with more stirring incidents of the : same kind . And accordingly , on reference to the picture , it is easy to identify the Poonah Irregular Horse , Trumpeter M'Phelan of the Twenty-second galloping over the nullahs . The figures are in the attitudes appropriate to their purpose . But it is a diagram , less living even than the tableau of a theatre . Infinitely more grip of the task in hand , more stir of soul , " more action in short , and even passion , is displayed in Johnstone ' s " Tyndale translating the Bible into English . " The left hand keeps ' watch upon the place , the countenance" intent upon the original , the right hand ready to fasten down the idea , the whole figure knit to its purpose , although well settled in the scribe ' s attitude . Bat in this country we do understand

    something of the struggle over the desk ; we see and feel the action and the passion that go on over the dry wood ; and nature—as we distort it—reappears -well enough upon tie canvas . There are , indeed , other passions that survive amongst us , and Stone has he old , old tale—that tale as it is often told . A youth | comely , * and after the artist's own type , is whispering his tale into the ear of a blushing girl , who looks singularly pleased . It is a pretty pair , but yet we have a convicion that the story is often told in a much more impressive manner . Perhaps his couple are too young to typify the passion in its strongest form . It looks more like a fancy , which does not move them deeply ; neither of them looks even serious in-face :

    " Nor grow they pale , as mortal lovers do . " There is infinitely more true passion in Hunt ' s ' Conscience Awakened , ' and here again the vice of English society tells . An inane animal or a wellconditioned gentleman , who might be a blonde guardsman by his cut , has had a young girl sitting on bis knee , and has been singing to her , " Oft in the stilly night . " Near them , in the well-furnished drawing-room , is a bird out of its cage nearly caught by a cat . The young guardsman as lolling

    back m his chair with some laughing cajolery to the girl , whose back is towards him , as she has risen from her seat ; her hands ' are clenched together , and her countenance is convulsed with the agonised sense of her danger , which can be well understood , looking at the low character of the beast of prey to whom she has nearly fallen . So , the best piece of true passion that we get out of the Academy exhibition , is taken from the depraved side of society , as if it were only there that nature is suffered to exist in its full force . What an entanglement of ideas does the picture suggest !

    Life , in the sense of vegetative existence , abounds in Frith's view of " Life at the Sea-side . " A crowded beach , with the heterogeneous gathering that can alone be collected there , as it might be viewed from a passing boat . The old gentleman sweeping the sea with his telescope , the genteel child dabbling with its ankles in the water , the moustached young buck lounging in sultry ease , looking with vacant eye upon the waves , and half listening to the women near him , the fat old lady surveying the prospect , the child , shrinking from the bathing-woman , the belles , the beaux , the savants , the tradesmen , the sailors , all the oddities and commonplaces of society "brought into one view—without the deep moral of Hogarth or the

    caricature of Buss ; in short , with nothing more than the plain transcript of life as it is , which Dickens gives in pen-and-ink . The spectators crowded round this picture as they would round a looking-glass , and ard charmed to recognise life as they know it . Such is life in England—and at the Royal Academy . There is , indeed , an attempt to rise to history , and the artist strives to effect his purpose by an established process . Numbers of figures are collected together and composed into something of symmetry —one side balancing the other . Portions of the figures are shown naked , or nude , as it is called , and the muscles are strongly defined . Much antiquarian furniture is collected from the curiosity -shop ; the whole is finished with great force , and a subject is chosen .

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    4 * 8 THE LEADER . [ Saturday ,

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• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), May 6, 1854, page 428, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2037/page/20/