herd of borrowers, effected a revolution, of which the solitary remains are now a most onerous tariff, a public debt of $17,000,000, on which 6 per cent. interest is paid, of which the Treasury contains, or owns, $10,000,000, loaned to speculators, banks, and brokers, without interest. In March, 1841, when the late administration came into power, the debt of the federal government was then $6.910,669, consisting chiefly of Treasury notes, floating in the operations of exchange; and all redeemable within the year, at the pleasure of the government. This description of debt was, of all others, best adapted to the exigencies of the Treasury. Because, when, from a revulsion of trade, caused by the breaking down of the bank currency, or other events, the government revenues fell off, they could be paid out into circulation, and absorbed in the exchanges; and when trade recovered so far as to restore the revenues, they would be returned, and the debt extinguished. Such a revulsion in trade produced the necessity for the Treasury notes. cumulation has averaged $10,000,000 for more than two years. This money has been loaned to banks without interest; and in their hands has been the basis of loans to speculators, and of a considerable derangement of the currency. That is to say, the federal government has actually been paying $600,000 per annum interest for money that the banks have been using to their own advantage. This state of affairs has been highly injurious to the mercantile interest, because the receiving banks have rigidly demanded, in specie, the balances which the payment of the duties created in their favor against all other banks. The effect has been, whenever the customs have been large in any one month, to draw specie into the vaults of the government bank, and thus to force a curtailment of their mercantile loans on the institutions in general, and, also, to enhance the ability of the pet bank to loan to speculators, and to avail itself of the high rate of interest resulting from the contraction its own movements had compelled the other banks to adopt. Alternate The revenues in the year revulsions and speculations have at1840, from duties on merchandize, tended this state of affairs. The indewere $13,496,834, only, at that time, pendent treasury is now to be restored, as seen by the above table of imposts. and the connection between banks and Nearly one half of the goods imported the government finances, to be disconwere free of duty. Mr. Woodbury, tinued. This measure naturally calls then Secretary of the Treasury, pro- forth the most strenuous opposition of posed to lay a duty of not over 20 per those who profit by the present state of cent. on those articles, except tea and affairs, and this evinces itself in a rigid coffee, an operation which would, with curtailment of loans in those quarters the general recovery of trade, restore where the greatest distress will be crethe revenues. The first act of theated by it, and by so doing promote the extra session of Congress, in the summer of 1841, was to borrow money on a stock debt, redeemable only at the end of a term of years, at the same time the duties were imposed on all articles before free, and raised to 20 per cent. on articles that before paid less than that. The effect of this, was to contract a permanent debt, and to make a temporary debt a permanent one; at the moment that means were taken, which, aided by the recovery of trade, would restore the revenues, and permit the extinguishment of the debt. The consequence has been, that the government has been paying upwards of $1,000,000 interest, on a public debt redeemable only in 20 years, while the revenues accumulated to the extent of $13,000,000 in the Treasury; and the ac unpopularity of the independent treasury as far as in their power lies. Happily, however, the power of the banks is far less now than in former years, when the late national bank for the same cause made war upon the government in the same manner. The amount of capital seeking investment, in the hands of private individuals, is far greater now than formerly. During the past year there has been paid off, by the federal and state governments, more than $10,000,000 of stock debt, by far the largest portion of which remains for investment here, in the hands of those who received it. Pennsylvania has paid during the year $2,000,000 of interest, and her stock has become permanently active. Michigan has renewed the payment of interest on her acknowledged debt. Illinois has paid, in specie, a 11⁄2 mill tax towards the interest on the state debt; and Indiana is about following the example of Illinois in that particular.. These are circumstances which not only add to the means of capitalists, but are calculated so far to restore confidence among foreign capitalists as to lead to an extended employment of capital on this side of the Atlantic when present warfears shall have been allayed. These fears have operated alike upon domestic and foreign private lenders to cause them to hold up, and thus give effect to the struggles of the banks against the sub-treasury law. Money has, in consequence, advanced in some cases to over one per cent. per month. This state of affairs is of its nature temporary. The constant maturity of paper, at a time when the disposition to embark in new enterprises is not great, is daily lessening the demand for money, and must, therefore, of itself soon produce a superabundance. The operation of the Independent Treasury, in connection, as is proposed, with a branch mint in New-York city, will, in the highest degree, favor a regular and abundant supply of money for commercial purposes, if not for speculation. Without a mint in New-York, the operation of the specie feature of the law is practically impossible. The largest importation of specie into the country is at the port of New-York; and there being here no means of coining it, it remains in the bank vaults, and they issue their promises based upon it. If the government demand specie for its dues, it must be drawn from the banks in the shape of foreign coins of all descriptions. This money, at the legal rates, may satisfy the demands of the government; but when the government attempts to pay it into circulation the people will take it reluctantly. Spanish pistoles, Portuguese doubloons, Indian mohurs, and English sovereigns are coins with the nature and value of which they for the most part are unacquainted. If, however, the treasury vault is connected with a branch mint, American new and sound coins may be paid out, and all classes of people will eagerly receive them. The first influence of such an operation will be to give effect to the gold bill of 1834, the object of which was to keep coin in the coun try; as, however, the law regulating the coinage is of but little use, unless the coinage takes place, a mint in New-York city, where most of the specie arrives in the country, is a necessary adjunct to that law. So provided, a difference of at least 1 per ct. will be produced in the exchanges in favor of keeping the coin in the country; and by affording a plentiful supply of coin, ready for circulation, the treasury will be to the banks of the city what the Bank of England is to the non-issuing banks of London, viz., the furnisher of the currency with which their business is conducted. The active demand for specie thus created by the government will affect the local currency healthily, because it checks the exorbitant issues of those small country banks, the profits of which are derived from the discount on their notes in New-York and other centres of business. It will also act as a powerful antidote to the excessive import of goods on credit, under the modifications of the tariff, which, it is hoped, are about to take place. One of the worst effects of a fluctuating paper currency, is that, by artificially raising prices, it prevents exports. This has, to some extent, occurred during the last few months in relation to flour. A considerable foreign demand sprung up on the strength of the news from England; but the exaggerated accounts arising from political causes, excited hopes here that any price could be obtained for flour. Instead, therefore, of selling, as orders came from England, dealers held, by the aid of bank facilities, until the price rose from $4 50 to $7 25. The effect was, that out of very large receipts only 274,274 bbls. of flour were exported from Sept. 1st to Dec. 26th. This involved a fall to $550, at which rate English buyers again entered the market. This illustrates in some degree the general effect of bank facilities, which, at the same time, promote large imports on credit, and the consequence is revulsion. A low tariff, with the operation of the Independent Treasury, is eminently calculated to promote the import of all that is actually wanted in the country, and cause the export of United States produce in payment, by which means the general welfare of the whole country is improved ad infinitum. NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS. Sketches of Modern Literature and Literary Men, (being a Gallery of Literary RePortraits,) by GEORGE GILFILLAN. printed, entire, from the London edition. 2 vols. (bound in one.) New-York, D. Appleton & Co. In paper, 75 cts.cloth, $1 00. This book contains sketches of Jeffrey, Godwin, Hazlitt, Robert Hall, Shelley, Chalmers, Carlyle, De Quincey, John Foster, Wilson, Edward Irving, Walter Savage Landor, Campbell, Brougham, Coleridge, Emerson, Wordsworth, Pollock, Charles Lamb, Allan Cunningham, Ebenezer Elliott, Keats, Macaulay, Thos. Aird, Southey, and Lockhart. The author writes with spirit and vigor, and presents the reader with animated pictures of the literary character of the persons whom he has selected for the subjects of his critical analysis. His sketches will be read with interest and gratification by those, who have a taste for literary criticism, and who desire to make themselves acquainted with the qualities of mind of the particular individuals in question. And who is not curious to understand and appreciate the intellectual merits of such men as Jeffrey and Chalmers, of Brougham and Macaulay? Still, there is one capital error, which pervades the work. The author says in his preface, that the men he has selected are the leading lights,-the decora et tutamina of their age.' Mr. Gilfillan has, it will be perceived, therefore, very peculiar ideas of what 'the age' is, seeing no 'lights' in it out of the English language, and having his mind filled with the image of a class of writers, many of whom are nothing more than minor essayists, and second rate poets, to the exclusion of those men who really constitute the great lights of their age. Indeed, at the close of the book, when taking a retrospect of what he terms his Gallery of Contemporary Genius,' he begins to have misgivings as to the propriety of the ambitious elevation he has been giving to some very ordinary writers even in the English language, and to concede that Byron and Scott are men of genius, as well as Keats and Lamb. In the body of the work, however, he speaks of Wordsworth, Southey and Keats, as the leading stars in the bright host of our literary heaven,' (vol. i., p. 17,) and of Emerson, as the greatest of all the minds of America, (vol. ii., p. 329.) If we bear in mind, then, that Mr. Gilfillan's definition of greatness and genius' excludes all the eminent names in science and in art, in government, in diplomacy and in war, in parliamentary and forensic eloquence, and active life generally, and that his definition of literature excludes history and philosophy as well as all other classes of extended composition,-in a word, if we take up this book in the simple purpose of reading critiques on the writings of a certain number of persons, chiefly essayists and minor poets, and if, while reading these critiques, we remember the author's peculiar notions of greatness, and his limited conception of what the age is, and of what literature is,—with these reservations, we shall be prepared to derive pleasure and instruction from sketches of such eminent men as Jeffrey, Brougham, or Macaulay, and seem to be willing to know something of persons no more known than Thomas Aird. Mr. Gilfillan professes to be 'aware that he may be accused of exaggeration and extravagance;' but he so often recurs to the idea, that the very persons whom he sketches are the peculiar and more illustrious luminaries of our time, that his error is a much greater one than mere exaggeration or extravagance. It implies utter confusion of mind to suppose that Belles Lettres constitute the highest walk of intellect, and in essay writing or poetry, to propose a standard of greatness which shall make of Lamb or Keats the decora et tutamina of the modern world. Indeed, whilst literature itself has loftier paths of distinction than those of mere Belles Lettres, there is still a loftier path of intellect than any which literature alone affords; and that is intellect in action; for as a great writer has well said, words are bu the sons of earth, while things are the daughters of heaven. In fact, Mr. Gilfillan has undertaken for the 'dii minorum gentium' of cotempora neous English literature, and especially for the secondary Scottish writers, that which Lord Brougham has done, in a series of sketches of the same class, for the truly high divinities of the intellectual Olympus. The Vigil of Faith, and Other Poems. The contents of this neat little volume cil. "Eros and Anteros," is a sweet and melodious collection of love poems, in which the phases of love and passion are drawn with great feeling and beauty. The remainder of the poems are miscellaneous. There is a native impulse in Mr. Hoffman's muse, a heartiness of purpose, and a cheering vivacity, which commends him to the favor of all tasteful readers. His range of poetic experience may be limited, but he has had the good sense to write from genuine emotion, and therefore his effusions have the unfading charm of reality. WILEY & PUTNAM'S LIBRARY OF CHOICE READING, No. xxxiv. xxxv. The Life of Conde, by LORD MAHON, 2 vols. Lord Mahon is a historical writer of a class which used to be more commonly met with than it now is, and which is always agreeable. He is not a mere book man, compiling in his closet, and describing from afar, and with indistinct vision, men and events, whereof he has no means of judging by his personal experience. Historians of this description are in their way instructive and useful. But it is refreshing now and then to encounter an author, like Mahon, who writes as a well-informed man of the world speaks, without parade of learning, and without systematic philosophising as it were of set purpose, but with the keen observation, pointed remark, and true philosophy, of one who is himself personally conversant with life, and who can rightly appreciate the past, by studying in it that play of the human passions which is the same in every age. It is this, and the nature of the subject, which give interest to the life of Conde. The life of Conde brings before us the times and the men of one of the most brilliant periods in the annals of France. Not Conde himself, only, but Cardinal Richelieu, Louis XIII., Anne of Austria, Cardinal Mazarin, Louis XIV., Turenne, and all the heroes and heroines of the Fronde, with the stirring incidents of the close of the reign of Louis XIII., and the commencement of that of Louis XIV.,all these pass in rapid succession before the reader, in the pages of Lord Mahon. But the prominent figures, of course, are, those of the Prince and Princess of Conde. Louis, first prince of Conde, was brother of Anthony de Bourbon, King of Navarre, whose son, Henry IV., brought the French crown into the family of Bourbon, The fourth in descent of the Condes, Louis de Bourbon, is the hero of Lord Mahon's work. This Prince, called in his youth Duc d'Enghien, was educated by his father, in the same way Louis Phillippe has educated his sons in our days, at a public College, where he had to gain his way by hard study, as if he had been the son of a peasant, instead of the first Prince of the Blood. He possessed, undoubtedly, like many others of his family, a strong head and a bold heart, to which, with these traits as the starting point of the man, was added every thing which training could do to make him a statesman and a soldier. His military qualities, however, chiefly distinguished him; and, by his genius in the art of war, he rose at once, in his first campaign, as commander, and at the age of twenty-two, to the reputation of the best (or one of the best) of the generals of Europe. This was the campaign of the battle of Rocroy, in which the Spanish infantry lost their character of invincibility, it is true, but without tarnishing their reputation, since they fought and died in their ranks where they stood with no more thought of breaking or of flight, than if it were a holiday parade. Conde continued to distinguish himself in Germany, in Flanders, in Catalonia, and again in Flanders, during the four successive years. Afterwards, loaded as he was with honors by Mazarin and the Regent Anne of Austria, nevertheless proceeded to intrigue with the Frondeurs, in consequence of which, he and his brother, the Prince de Conte, and the Duc de Longueville, husband of his sister, were arrested by the Court and imprisoned in the Castle of Vincennes. There ensued a civil war, between the partisans of the Court and those of Conde, headed by the Princess, and by the Ducs de Bouillon and de la Rochefoucauld, which, after many vicissitudes, first of the liberation of Conde, and the flight of Mazarin, then of the restoration of Mazarin, and the flight of Conde, ended in the latter quitting France, and entering the service of Spain against his native country. Here he continued until the conclusion of the Treaties of the Pyrenees, when he was allowed to return to France. After this, he lived in comparative tranquillity and retirement, for many years, chiefly at Chantilly, the embellishment of which constituted his chief occupation and amusement. Thus far, we can see in the public career of Conde, the marked features of a brave soldier, an able general, a rapacions courtier, a rebellious subject, and a traitorous citizen. We have now to contemplate him in his domestic relations, and then to add, the traits of a selfish and bad man. Conde, when Duc d'Enghien, and only nineteen years of age, was married by his father, and against his own wishes, to Claire Clemence de Maille, niece of Cardinal Richelieu. This lady was then a pretty child, only thirteen years of age, whose character, of course, was not yet developed. Conde treated her with great indifference, in the early years of the marriage, devoting the intervals of his campaign to making love to almost any body that came to hand, except his wife. When Conde was arrested and imprisoned by the Court, the Princess was at Chantilly with her only child, a little boy, called Duc d'Enghien. Neglected as the young Princess had always been by her husband, and held, hitherto, of no ac count by any one, and free from the habits of gallantry, which gave fame, or at least notoriety, to her sister-in-law the Duchesse de Longueville, and other ladies of the Court, the world was not prepared for the greatness of spirit, and other striking and beautiful qualities, which the Princess of Conde displayed in this emergency, and which place her high in the list of the truly eminent women of France. She placed herself at the head of the party of the Princes, and in the civil war which ensued, performed with consummate grace and ability the functions of a partisan leader, with all the good qualities, and none of the bad ones, of a true heroine of civil war. With all this, she never gained the affection of her husband, and so little his gratitude, indeed, that, at a later period, towards the tranquil close of his life, he availed himself of a false pretext to shut her up in his house at Chateauroux, where she remained a close prisoner, until the time of her death, a period of twenty years, for the malice of Conde pursued this great lady even on his death-bed, since the last favor he asked of Louis XIV. was, that she should never cease to be detained in close prison at Chateauroux. We heartily recommend this entertaining book, as uniting all the liveliness of the old memoir-writing with the research and accuracy of modern historical composition. The Pilgrim's Progress, with a life of John Bunyan. By ROBERT SOUTHEY, Esq, LL.D. 1 vol. 12mo. Harper & Brothers, N. Y. The numerous editions in our day of Bunyan's amazing work, are one of the happiest signs of the times in the literary world. All that art can do in illustration, or literary genius in elucidation, has been honorably, and, as it proves, gainfully devoted, to the setting forth of new editions of this majestic composition. We cannot withhold terms even so exalted, in reference to a book like this. It is one which will co-exist with the language of man, and will be regarded with increasing interest and reverence in future generations, as a monument of human genius, and an exhibition of divine instruction to an unlettered human mind. Bunyan has slowly won his way into the honorable and proud circle of literary notice. For generations he has been loved and read in the cottages of the poor, and the closets of the pious. Now it is at last discovered, that there is genius there, which is an honour to his nation, as well as piety and truth which has long been a comfort and blessing to the church. That a man so jealous of his own reputation, and so conscious of his own standing as Dr. Southey, should feel honored, and hope for increase of fame, in editing the work, and preparing a biog raphy of "the Bedford Tinker," is one of the most remarkable proofs, how completely he had already worked his own path to favorable notice, and gained an eminence which asked for no aid from any other source. The stirring power of Bunyan's genius, Southey could well appreciate. But the deep mines of his religious emotions and his "travellings in the way of godliness," we think this biographer hardly understood, and was not able adequately to appreciate or display. The American publishers have brought out the work in good taste. The Oath, a Divine Ordinance, and an Element of the Social Constitution; its origin, nature, ends, efficacy, lawfulness, obligations, interpretations, form and abuses. By D. X. JUNKIN, A. M., Pastor of the Presbyterian Church, Greenwich, N. J. New-York, Wiley & Putnam, 1845. In this neat volume, which has been the expansion of a discourse originally prepared for his own pulpit, the author has discussed at some length the source and nature of the Oath. He regards it as an appointment of God, the result of Divine revelation, and as involving an act of Divine worship. He defeuds, at much length, the use of this form of attestation under the gospel, against the objections of the Quakers and others. He supposes the civil government, the Church, and the family, competent to administer it; but questions the right of voluntary societies so to do. As to its obligations, especially when administered by the latter class of organizations, he expresses boldly strong opinions. The ordinary form of the administration by kissing the gospels, he opposes as an idolatrous relic of earlier superstitions, and as giving to the mere page and type of the scripture, undue honor. He would therefore, as many Protestant divines have done before him, prefer that it should be made, by an immediate appeal, as it were, to the Deity, the hand being uplifted to heaven : and he wishes, as all thoughtful men must do, that more of solemnity and less of indecent haste accompanied its general administration. He seems to regard perjury as on the increase; and holds language with regard to the views of the Roman Catholic communion, respecting the obligation of oaths, which will be to them abundantly offensive. The work is not without indications of acuteness and research. It is comprehensive and systematic. Indeed, the latter trait is perhaps red dant, and the syste |