the moft improbable means. In a word, John Bull has the faults of all the modern English comedies, with little, very little indeed, to raise it above the worst of them. Something might alfo be faid against the moral, and political tendencies of it, but these alfo are common to multitudes.

NOVELS.

ART. 21. Confeffions of the Nun of St. Omer; a Tale in Three Volumes. By Rofa Matilda, 12mo. Hughes. 1805.

A very fine, fentimental, and improbable ftory, written in turgid and affected language. For example, "at length I married; it was a step of defperation, and failed of yielding me the folace. I expected; it Smoothed not in its placid even chain, the efferveffence of my foul," &c. &c.

If this be not nonfenfe, it is certainly very like it. The moral, however, is good, for it teaches the mifchiefs which arife from the neglect and violation of the focial duties.

ART. 22. The Pilgrim of the Cross, or the Chronicles of Chriftiana De Moubray. An Ancient Legend. In four Volumes. By Elizabeth Helme, Author of St. Margaret's Cave, Sc. Sc. 12mo. 4 vols. 16s. Longman. 1805.

This is a performance of a fuperior fabric to the above; more 'fubftantial and better intellectual food. The incidents, though very various and very striking, are well put together. It excites confiderable intereft; and the final happy conclufion delights the reader, without offering any grofs offence to his judgment. The Pilgrim of the Crofs will obtain a refpectable place in the circu lating library.

ART. 23. The Impenetrable Secret. A Novel, in two Volumes, By Francis Lathom, Author of Men and Manners, Mystery, &c. Lane.

"This tale," fays the author in his preface," is not a romance, for I have been faithfully affured, that the incidents contained in it, have actually taken place. In action, they can. not but have excited a confiderable intereft to the parties who were concerned in them. Should half their intereft accompany them to the closet, the author will judge himfelf fufficiently repaid for the promulgation of his fecret." If this was his object, we doubt not that he will be amply repaid; for we feldom remember to have met with a tale poffeffing fo much to catch the feelings and improve the heart. The adventitious aids of declama.ory dia. logue and fecond-hand fentiment, he carefully avoids; and has travelled through the claffic retreats of Mrs. Radcliffe, withou Яopping

Y y 4

stopping us to bait with an Alpine defcription on the road. The ftory is built on an incident which has long been a favourite on the ftage in a comedy of Shakspeare's, and was lately intro, duced into the drefling-room by the Canterbury Tales of Mrs, Lee. But the circumftances that precede the disclosure of the fecret, and the events that unravel the web of the mystery, are notwithstanding moft unufually interefting; and, unless we give credit to the truly author-like avowal juft quoted from the preface, perfectly original.

No writer is fo dull as an egotist, who breaks his narration in every chapter, to lay down the moral of the foregoing matters, and preach for the inftruction of his readers. Such examples are rare in the novel before us; but many profane folks will probably fimile at this grave axiom: no man of honour would have attempted to kis the cheek of a woman, whofe hand it was not his intention to have asked in marriage." This is perhaps a little romantic; but we wish not to cavil at a work whofe doctrines if they be fometimes overftrained, are ftrained on the fide of virtue.

ART. 24.

The Count de Valmont; or, the Errors of Reafon. Tranflated from the French. 3 vols. 12mo. 125. Hat, chard.

This publication under the title and form of a novel, is a vaJuable defence of Chriftianity againft infidelity and vice. It, reprefents the ftory of a young man of fathion, feduced by the fallacious reafonings and example of an infidel friend, from the path of duty; and restored to a fenfe of his errors and his dan. gers by the affectionate expoftulations of a parent, and the ad, mirable conduct of his wife. It is an excellent work, which we anxiously recommend to univerfal attention. The following fhort extract will furnish the reader with a fpecimen of the style and its argument,

"Were it not for the dreadful punishment which you foretold would await me, the mournful image of my unhappy friend, which perpetually haunts me, and often comes to embitter my fweeteft joys, I fhould be the happieft of men. Already do I tafte all the advantages and all the charms of religion. My paffions are calmer; my mind is more tranquil; my confcience is as much at reft as, circumftanced as I am, it can be ; and my heart is fatisfied. O my God! why was it fo long ere I knew thee? Alas! how blind are thofe, who, in an eftrangement from thee, expect to find truth and happinefs! In the calm of retirement, I have meditated deeply on thofe objects which you have traced ous to me; thofe powerful motives for an entire return to God; thofe great truths which fo forcibly ftruck me the first moment that I received your letter what a ray of light did

they

they pour on my foul! What fentiments did they awaken there! How great and merciful did God appear! how abject and criminal myself! In bitterness and humiliation of heart did I reflect on paft years, and trace out the vile and impure fource of my errors! Bending under the heavy remembrance, I confeffed with fhame my faults: Heaven deigned to hear me; it aided my weakness, melted my foul, and caufed me to fhed repentant tears, that were to me fweet and refreshing as a copious dew to the parched and burning earth. My worthy paftor has been my friend and affiftant in the great work of reformation; he has ftrengthened and comforted me, and given me the best advice for my prefent, and the wifeft precautions for my future conduct, The wretched captive who fees his bonds broken and his chains loofed, feels not fo lively a fatisfaction as I do at my freedom from the flavery of fin. With reafon do you aver, that if re. pentance has its rigours, if it requires privations and facrifices, it amply recompenfes us for them by the felf-approbation and in ward peace which it imparts.

"But what right have I to talk of facrifices? My dear Emilia makes them to affection and to our union, when the re jects a rank and wealth which the might confiftently with good fenfe and propriety have accepted; but I, whofe conduct they difcredited, and whofe inclinations they corrupted; who per verted the ufe of them, and who, far from renouncing, faw them torn from me with reluctance; of what facrifices can I boaft, or what lofs do I fuffer in fuch poffeffions? No; I gain every thing, for I now begin to be acquainted with happiness. It is not in the accomplishment of our ever-growing withes; in the fuccefs of our ill-concerted projects, that it confifts; religion and the moderation of our defires can alone impart it.

"What fubjects of recollection are the exceffes, the blindness, and the miferies from which I have efcaped! By what paffions was I agitated! what vices did I not give into! what abfurd fyftems did I by turns adopt! what a habit of falfhood had I contracted! You alone forced me, in fome degree, to re. fpet Truth; but I am now fully fenfible of the importance of that love for her with which you wished to infpire me, and how greatly it influences our fentiments an our conduct it is now in my eftimation the most facred and valuable of all human characteristics: had I preferved it in the degree that it was once carefully implanted in me, never, no, never should 【 have erred as I have done!" P. 230.

MEDICINE,

ART. 25. The Evidence at large as laid before the Committee of the Houfe of Commons refpeding Dr. Jenner's Dijesvery of Vaccine Inoculation, together with the Debate which followed;

and

and fome Obfervations on the contravening Evidence, &e. By the Rev. G. C. Jenner. 8vo. 213 pp. 6s. Murray. 1805. At this time when fuch pains are taken to degrade the practice of vaccination, when its power of fecuring the conftitutions against the infection of the Small Pox is denied, and it is even faid to contaminate the blood, and induce new and unheard-of difeafes, the publication of the volume before us is very seasonable, as it shows with what extreme caution the legiflature acted in inveftigating the merit of the difcovery, before they gave their fanction to the practice, and the number and weight of the evi dences, on which their decifion was founded. We here learn, that the introduction of inoculation with Cow Pock, instead of vario. -lous matter, was warmly recommended by many of the most experienced phyficians and furgeons in this metropolis. They declare it as their opinion, that it will prove a complete fecurity against the infection of the Small Pox. That the Cow Pox is not infectious, confequently incapable of injuring or annoying fuch of the inhabitants, in any place where it is practifed, as may not choose to undergo the operation; that it is extremely mild and fafe, and not fo likely as the Small Pox to leave behind it the feeds of future difeafe. To this opinion we believe almoft every practitioner of character is now a convert. Dr. Mofely, indeed, in his examination before the Committee of the House of Com. mons declared his difapprobation of the practice. He had heard it had failed in fecuring the conftitution from the Small Pox, and that it had induced other difeafes; but on being defired by the Committee, p. 41, to name the parties who had fuffered, or the perfons from whom he had obtained the information, or to give fome clue by which the bufinefs might be inveftigated, he could do neither one nor the other. A ftrong inftance of the power of prejudice. Dr. Rowley, who alfo has lately figured by his coarfe invectives againft Cow Pox Inoculation, on his examination before the Committee, related the cafes of two children faid to have taken the Small Pox after having had the Cow Pox. He had the account, he faid, from Dr. Wall, of Oxford. But Dr. Wall, on being applied to by the Committee, fhowed that Dr. Rowley had entirely mistaken the matter, no fuch circumftance having happened. Dr. Rowley had not at that time learned, that the Cow Pox difpofes the body to tumours, impofthumes, and foul ulcers, of which he is now giving fuch alarming accounts, they were then, it feems, rather to be apprehended from the Small Pox.

"Q. Do you know, he was afked by the Committee, any inftances where diforders or humours, fuppofed to have been excited, or founded by Vaccine Inoculation, have been attended with the various difaftrous circumftances you have mentioned ?"

"A. I have feen ulcers fucceed in the beginning of the inoculation, but that has been entirely obviated by the fubfequent practice."

"Q. Did

Q. Did you never fec thofe fymptoms arife after the Small Pox Inoculation ???

A. Not the fame, but fome of a worse nature, which have appeared in different parts, and at laft proved fatal."

Yet this is the heaviest charge that the Drs. Mofely and Rowley have made against the Cow Pox in their late publications, that it leaves the patients difpofed to the eruption of foul blotches, &c. The whole of the evidence is interefting, and will be read with pleasure by every friend to humanity, as well as the ingenious remarks of the editor with which they are accompanied.

ART. 26. Obfervations on fome late Attempts to depreciate the Value and Efficacy of Vaccine Inoculation. By Samuel Merri man. 8vo. 35 PP. 15. 6d. Murray. 1805.

To the last question the Committee of the Houfe of Commons put to Dr. Mofely, "has the extenfive practice of Vaccine Ino. culation confirmed or weakened your doubts with regard to its efficacy?" He gave for anfwer, "his opinion had undergone but very little alteration, but he was inclined to think more favour. ably of it." In this difpofition of mind, however, he appears not to have remained long, as from that time he became diligent in collecting all the ftories that were or had been circulated to difcredit the practice, in order to drefs up a pamphlet, which he has fince published under the opprobrious title of Lues Bovilla, or the Cow Pox. Although there is very little of argument, and fewer facts contained in that publication, which can, by thinking or reasonable perfons, be turned to the difcredit of vaccination, yet fome attempts at ridicule, with much confident affertion of bad confequences, which the Doctor fays he has feen follow the practice, has given his book fuch a degree of credit, among the common people in particular, as might, if not anfwered, deter them from fubmitting their children to the operation. The public are therefore indebted to the ingenious author of the obfer. vations before us, for examining and refuting the illiberal and injurious affertions contained in the Lues Bovilla. The obfer. vations will be read with the more pleasure, as while the author fhows himself to be fuperior to the Doctor in reafoning, no illiberal or harsh expreflions are ufed in cenfuring his book. The two points which Dr. Mofely, in common with all the opponents to Cow Pox Inoculation, endeavour to establish are, that it does not give a complete fecurity against the infection of the Small Pox, and that it introduces or occafions the production of foul humours in the body, which appear on the fkin in the shape of tumours, ulcers, blotches, &c. To the first of these charges this author obferves, we have inconteftable evidence that many thou. fands of perfons have been preferved by the Cow Pox from the variolous infection for feveral years, and a few perfons for fifty and more years, though frequently expofed to infection. That on examining the cafes, in which it is faid to have failed, the greater part of them have been found to be miftated.

But