The History of a Flirt. 2 vols. Lea & Blanchard, Philadelphia: 1841.
This novel displays considerable ability, wasted on very common-place incidents. If the author will undertake a subject worthy of her talents—are we wrong in fancying the writer a lady?—we may yet hail her as a novelist of no slight pretensions.
Outlines of Geography and History, presenting a Concise View of the World. By Frederick Emerson, author of the North American Arithmetic. Hogan & Thompson: Philadelphia.
The Preface of this little work greatly interested us in its favor, and a careful examination of its contents did not lessen the interest. In its arrangement, Geography and History are combined—the former being the leading topic, and the latter the concomitant. The author’s observations, in respect to this junction, are just. The two subjects are so intimately connected in their own nature, that, however they may be separated in books, they can never be disconnected in the mind. The simultaneous study of both, properly connected, secures the learner from imbibing false notions of either.
The book is concise, but accurate, and well adapted either for a prefatory text-book, or for those whose limited school-time will not allow them to go through with a more diffuse system. It is very neatly and substantially gotten up.
The Works of Lord Bolingbroke, with a Life, prepared expressly for this Edition, containing additional information relative to his Personal and Private Character: 4 vols. Carey and Hart: Philadelphia. 1841.
An American edition of the works of Lord Bolingbroke has long been a desideratum to the scholar, and it is with no little pride we record that to Philadelphia we are indebted for so elegant an edition of them, as now lies before us. The typography of these volumes would do credit to the famous London press. With the exception of a few costly works published from time to time in our country, this edition of Lord Bolingbroke is unrivalled as a work of art.
The volumes before us contain the various political and philosophical writings of Henry St. John, Viscount Bolingbroke. Of these, the political tracts are the most valuable: in a measure, for their matter, but chiefly for their style. Among these, the “Dissertation on Parties,” the “Letter to Sir Wm. Wyndham,” the “Idea of a Patriot King,” and the letters “on the study of History,” are the most celebrated. The philosophical essays, occupying two of the volumes on our table, are comparatively valueless, and inferior, both in style and matter, to the political tracts. They are deeply imbued with the sceptical opinions of the author, and we should have willingly seen them omitted in this edition, if it were possible to get up a complete one, with nearly one half of the author’s works left out. Little, therefore, as we value the philosophical works of Bolingbroke, we commend the publishers for not expunging them as too many others would have done.