Lightfoot, and Castel, brought forwards their vast stores of oriental learning, to explain the difficulties, clear the obscurities, and illustrate the beauties, of the sacred writings; that Cudworth unfolded his "True Intellectual System;" and, that the pious and benevolent Sherlock (uncle to the truly evangelical Bishop Wilson) pourtrayed in his "Practical Christian," and exemplified in his useful life, the proper fruits of faith, the beauty of holiness, and the happiness of virtue. To the lasting credit of our Church be it spoken, that the labours of these pious, sincere, and able divines, and their immediate followers in the same glorious path, were blessed with complete success; atheism was overwhelmed, infidelity silenced; and profligacy shamed; and the impress of religion, morality, decency, and sobriety, so deeply stamped upon the English character, as, we trust, will render these graces its peculiar distinguishing marks, to the latest future ages. NOTE OMITTED." So prone to be imaginative," page 181, vol. ii. The visionary appearances, which, like Banquo's ghost present themselves, not unfrequently, to the roused and wounded conscience, have furnished rich materials for the poet's purposes, both in ancient and modern times. But, we do not recol. lect, that any bard of the present day has made a more happy use of these "accusing spirits," than the Rev. W. L. Bowles, in his beautiful "Ellen Gray, or Dead Maiden's Curse," oct. Archibald Constable, Edinburgh, 1823. The following extract, we conceive, will be thought to justify this remark : In foreign lands, in darkness and in light, A coffin now is laid in holy ground, CONCLUSION. OUR "Illustrations" of Novels by the Author of Waverly are now closed. All that remains for us, is, to make some slight observations on those stories which have not been the subjects of our particular notice; and to venture a few general remarks on the works at large, and on the nature of that influence which they are calculated to exercise on public taste, feeling, and sentiment. It is no very easy task to determine, on principles of criticism, to which of our author's various novels the highest praise should, in justice, be awarded. They evince so much splendour of genius, fertility of invention, copiousness of diction, and richness of comparison and simile, that, as those of higher cast are successively read, each appears to deserve a preference over its fellows. If |