If so, the work affords very pleasing promise. We have been truly gratified with its perusal, and hope the author may be induced to continue his efforts.

ART. VI.-1. An Oration delivered at Cambridge, before the Society of Phi Beta Kappa, Aug. 26. By the Rev. ORVILLE DEWEY. Boston. Gray & Bowen, 1830. 8vo. pp. 32.

2. The Age of Print. A Poem delivered before the Phi Beta Kappa Society at Cambridge, 26 August, 1830. By GRENVILLE MELLEN. Boston. Carter & Hendee, 1830. Svo. pp. 40.

THE anniversary ofthe society, before which the above performances were delivered, stands at the head of our literary celebrations. The lovers of eloquence and poetry generally anticipate a rich entertainment, and have almost uniformly been gratified. Gentlemen distinguished for their genius and attainments, have been selected to celebrate the occasion, and their efforts have done honor to the society and themselves.

The moral purposes to which this occasion may be made subservient, are of high value. It is attended generally by a large assembly of the most accomplished and intelligent portion of our community, and not unfrequently by distinguished visiters from distant parts of the country. The animation and excitement of a literary festival, during which the cares of professional and active life are laid aside; the rivalries of politics forgotten; the dreams of ambition dissipated; the friendships of former days, already fading dimly from the memory, again restored; classic associations, half obliterated by the throng of busy and anxious and tumultuous projects, brought back, like coins recast at the mint, to their original brightness; the warm and generous enthusiasm of unblighted youth rekindled—the animation and excitement of such an occasion, open the heart to the reception of the loftiest and noblest principles, which, if worthily inculcated, must sink deep, and exert an influence no less beneficial than permanent. High-toned sentiments and eloquent expositions of truth, whether in morals or literature, have uniformly been received with enthusiastic applause. Judging of public taste by such an index, we should consider it very

high, and in a state of constant improvement. The want of some safe public amusement, gives an increased value to every celebration of this kind. The theatre, which is the universal resort for entertainment in Europe, is so far degraded in this country, either from the want of sufficient patronage among the respectable and influential members of society, or from some inherent inaptitude in our countrymen for dramatic amusements, that we should as soon think of recommending the pesthouse for a residence, as the theatre for a public resort. In ancient Greece, the drama was cultivated by the best minds in a nation unrivalled for intellectual glory. The sublimity of the Prometheus, the patriotic associations aroused by the soldier-poet in the Persians, the dreadful visitations of the gods upon a land stained with blood, in Edipus the awful manner in which that crime was expiated, in Edipus Colonos-the majestic virtue of a Grecian heroine, braving a tyrant's wrath and defying a threatened death, that her unhappy brother might enjoy the supposed privileges of sepulture, in Antigone these, with others not surpassed by them, were the usual treat served up for an Attic audience. With few exceptions, the theatre then taught the best morality that was known. In France, faulty, cold, and constrained as theatrical literature has generally been, immorality is the last offence that can be laid to its charge. Corneille, Racine, and even the prince of scoffers, Voltaire, are uniformly respectful to the moral and religious sense of a cultivated nation; and the ingenious comedy of that unrivalled wit, Moliere, subserves effectually the cause of virtue and morality. The labors of Goethe, Schiller, and others, have raised, in some cases, the German theatre to a degree of purity and excellence which other nations, on comparison with their own, might well envy. The theatre of Weimar, while under the care of the patriarch of German literature, and adorned by such productions as Mary Stuart, the Maid of Orleans, Wallenstein, Don Carlos, the Bride of Messina, Egmont, Tasso, Iphigenia, &c., might justly be considered a school of refinement and taste. But among us, it is scarcely possible to attend the theatre a single evening, and not be insulted, either in the principal piece, or in some farcical afterpiece, with expressions or allusions so grossly indecent, that a lady of refined sensibility, it seems to us, would never expose herself to their contamination a second time.

It is on this account that we rejoice to find this anniversary made an occasion for inculcating correct principles. The oration of Mr Dewey, which we have placed at the head of the present article, gave great satisfaction at the time of its delivery, and the public have reason to thank him for submitting it to the press. He maintains with eloquence and ingenuity, a doctrine which the current of popular feeling is carrying, we fear, rapidly into disrepute. We will quote his own words.

'What is the true science, the rationale, if I may say so, of thorough improvement and refinement? What are the true means of spreading at once wealth and beauty over the paths of literary labor?

From the wide range of discussion which this question opens to us, I shall select two views, two principles of intellectual culture (this is my general subject)--the one practical, the other theoretical; both of which derive urgent claims to attention, as I think, from the character of the literature that is prevalent at the present day, and from the state of our own little republic of letters. My practical principle is, that the loftiest attainments of the mind in every sphere of its exertion, are immediately-much as the original tendency or temperament may vary-are immediately the fruit of nothing but the deepest study; that, for instance, the great poet and the great artist, as well as the profound metaphysician or astronomer, is by nothing more distinguished than by this thorough and patient application; that natural genius, as it is called, appears in nothing else, and is nothing else, but the power of application; that there is no great excellence without great labor; that the inspirations of the muse are as truly studies, as the lucubrations of philosophy. In other words, it is the deepest soil that yields not only the richest fruits, but the fairest flowers; it is the most solid body which is not only the most useful, but which admits of the highest polish and brilliancy; it is the strongest pinion, which not only can carry the greatest burden, but which soars to the loftiest flight.

'That the most intense study is necessary to the loftiest attainments in every department, whether of philosophy or poetry, of science or imagination, of reality or fiction, of judgment or taste, would perhaps be best made to appear, by showing the strict and close connexion there is between them; and that there is such a connexion is indeed my theoretical principle.'-pp. 3, 4.

The tendency of present systems in education we agree with Mr Dewey in thinking decidedly hostile to profound attainments. A standard of utility, falsely so called, has become the rallying

point of a host of second-rate philosophers, who industriously circulate their superficial doctrines through the community. With all the boasted superiority of modern times, the ancients were not fools. Eloquent and profound as was Dr Thomas Brown of Scotland, Plato of Athens, was more so. Acute as was Dr Reed, Aristotle of Stagira, was no less so. If the question Cui bono? be applied to the study of the immortal sages of old Athens, the same question may be asked in reference to the sages of Scotia. The plain fact is, in both cases, it would be an indication of a weak and unmanly style of thinking. An intimate acquaintance with the results of a great man's intellectual experience, whether those results were obtained three or three thousand years ago, whether they conduce or not to the physical comfort of this generation, is a worthy object for the labor of any mind, be it ever so great. The modern doctrine of utility, which is, in point of fact, the origin of the superficial dogmas that appear to have gained groundamong us, is as false in theory, as it is pernicious in its consequences. The principles of it are essentially infidel, striking out of the sphere of useful thought, all those ennobling considerations, on which the hopes of immortality finally rest. They cut off the soul from its far reaching associations with the mighty spirits of past generations, and its ardent visions of a future interminable existence. They rob this life of all its glory, by breaking the moral links, which bind us to each other in the belief of a spiritual life. By obliterating, as far as they may, all traces of associations with other objects than those immediately around us, they deprive the soul of half its motives to virtue, and finally chain it down to a merely material, earthly existence. Such is the tendency of that system, which, under the name of utility, has led to the superficial character of the intellectual culture of our day. We do not, indeed, believe this system has gone to its utmost. It is only a tendency, and can never become an established, admitted scheme. We have a most undoubting faith in the energies of human nature. Trampled upon as it has been, by political and priestly misrule, led astray, as it often is, by atheistic utilitarianism, still it has a regenerating principle within, a native and lofty sentiment of immortality, an inherent love of the Beautiful and the Goodwhich, by a delightful speculation of Grecian philosophy, were twin sisters sprung from the same Eternal Parent-an irrepressible looking forward to a diviner life, which rises, from time

to time, and prostrates in the dust the strongest bulwarks erected by Atheism in defence of her dismal, annihilating doctrines.

The view which Mr Dewey takes of intellectual culture, is, we are happy to say, directly opposed to the utilitarian scheme. If this be the true scheme, what use have we of intellect, except to plan machines for the furtherance of bodily comfort? What need of poetry, except to help the memory in retaining trigonometrical tables, the number of days in the months, or perchance, one of Jeremy Bentham's codes set to music, as we read was once done with Justinian's? That view of society, which teaches the necessity of long, severe, deep, intellectual labor, and which is at war with the poor cant of the day, we regard as advocating the best interests of man. The following passage contains some important suggestions in the philosophy of mind.

L

"The questions to be asked here are very simple, but they are very decisive. What is the mind? Is it not one intelligence? And is it not the same intelligence and no other, that is employed in every intellectual effort and in every department of literature? Is not that intelligence, I still ask, whether it builds up a science or an art, deals with theory or practice, constructs a problem or a poem, one and the same thing? Is not the aliment, by which the mind is to grow, truth,-simple, single, harmonious, divinely accordant truth? And is not the right order in which its faculties are to rise to their highest excellence, that of perfect proportion? And must not all disproportion among its powers indicate an imperfect and crude developement? Furthermore, is there any clashing among the natural powers of the mind? Is there to be found, in fact, on an accurate analysis, any of the commonly supposed incongruity between reason and fancy, between the judg ment and the imagination? What is reason? It is usually defined to be the power of comparing our ideas, and of discriminating their resemblances and differences. What is the imagination? It is the power of calling up at will, and assembling congruous ideas, so as to form harmonious pictures. These powers, then, do not exist in a state of war, but of perfect alliance with each other. They are mutually necessary to each other's strength and perfection. Fancy without judgment is extravagance and folly. Judgment without fancy is unproductive drudgery. It may be correct as far as it goes; but without any of that power called fancy, without any new or extensive combinations of thought, without any capability of stirring from the field of observation immediately before it, the judgment does not