New Publications.
Dissertations, Chiefly On Irish Church History.
By the late Rev. Matthew Kelly, D.D.
Dublin: James Duffy. 1869.
Rev. Matthew Kelly, a canon of his native diocese of Ossory, Ireland, and a Professor in Maynooth College, was one of the most accomplished of the contemporaries of Dr. John O'Donovan, Professor Eugene O' Curry, George Petrie, Rev. Dr. Todd, Very Rev. Dr. Renehan, and the few other truly great Irish scholars of the past and passing generations. He was a native of Kilkenny City, and was barely in the forty-fourth year of his age when called to his reward, Saturday, October 30th, 1858. He was a very able writer on and investigator of Irish history, in all its branches, particularly in the ecclesiastical and ethnological lines, of which his editorial labors for the Celtic and Archaeological Societies of Dublin, his editions of White's and O'Sullivan's writings relative to Ireland, as well as of the Martyrology of Tallacht, and his contributions to the Dublin Review, Duffy's Catholic Magazine, the London Rambler, etc., etc., have given abundant proof. He is more widely known by general readers through his remarkable translation of Gosselin's great work, On the Power of the Pope during the Middle Ages. His friend and fellow-laborer, Rev. Dr. McCarthy, has collected from the periodicals named, chiefly from the Dublin Review, into this volume—for a copy of which we are indebted to the Catholic Publication Society— several dissertations by the lamented Dr. Kelly, chiefly on Irish church history—an examination of which makes us deeply regret that he was not spared to complete the labors in which he was engaged, and which he had in contemplation at the time of his death—which included nothing less desirable than a new and thorough edition of the Acta Sanctorum of Colgan; a new edition and a continuation of Rev. Dr. John Lanigan's Ecclesiastical History of Ireland; and the completion of the publication, under such care as he was capable of bestowing, of the Very Rev. Dr. Renehan's Collections on Irish Church History. The volume before us should find a place in every private as well as public collection that aims to have represented in it the genuine scholarship of Ireland.
A Few Friends, And How They Amused Themselves.
A Tale in nine chapters; containing descriptions of twenty Pastimes and Games and a fancy-dress party.
By M. E. Dodge, author of Hans Brinker and the Irvington Stories.
Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co.
The author in this little book makes a happy effort to revive amongst us again those pleasant, home-like games that give such a charm to the fireside. Many of these pastimes are new, and all of them interesting and amusing, requiring enough thought and wit to keep one's faculties in pleasant activity. Society, it is true, will scarcely condescend to be amused in so simple and cheerful a way; but as it is a question whether it is ever heartily amused, we can very well afford to set aside its ruling, and enjoy ourselves with the pleasant pastimes of our "Few Friends." A picture-gallery, such as is described in its pages, although it might not provoke such artistic and wonderful criticisms as the Academy of Design, would not yet fail to be very amusing. The great charm of these games, as the author remarks in her preface, is the bringing together the old and young, in the common pursuit of pleasure.
A Short Grammar Of Plain Chant, for the use of schools, seminaries, and religious communities.
Troy, New York: P. J. Dooley. 1868.
It is with the sincerest pleasure we meet with any evidences of a desire to return to the use of the Gregorian chant in the offices of the church. Perfectly rendered, we know of no modern compositions in figured music which can equal it in fitness or grandeur. The best that can be said of timed music is, that it is pleasing; that its varied harmonies delight the ear; and that in the most worthy of such compositions there are pathetic, joyous, and at times sublime expressions. But of the Gregorian chant only can it be said that it edifies, compels to prayer and praise, and never hints at the world, the flesh, or the devil. Like the sacred vestments of the priest and the solemn ceremonies of Catholic worship, it is a part of the outward expression of the church's homage to God. It is the befitting song of the sanctuary, and we are thankful the church has never sanctioned any other.