who has an object, and goes right on to accomplish it, will compel the attention of his readers. But it seems, that in art, as well as in morals and politics, the plainest truths are the last to be understood. We make these strictures with reluctance. This biography, in many respects, is valuable, and Mr. Randall might easily have made it interesting. He had a subject worthy of any pen, and an abundance of new material. He does not lack skill. His unstudied passages, though never elegant, are well enough. He is industrious. Though we must dissent from some of his conclusions, he is entitled to the praise of being accurate, and is free from prejudice,--except that amiable prejudice which has been well called the _lues Boswelliana_.[1] His delineations of famous personages, though marked by the faults of which we have spoken, show quite unusual perception of character. He has a thorough appreciation of Jefferson's noblest characteristics, and an honorable sympathy with the philosophy of which Jefferson was a teacher. [Footnote 1: _The Life of Thomas Jefferson_. By HENRY S. RANDALL, LL. D. In three volumes. New York: Derby & Jackson. 1858.] With resources and qualifications like these, he might have produced a biography which the country would have received with gratitude, and which would have conferred an enviable reputation upon him; as it is, through his neglect of a few wholesome rules which he must have learned when a school-boy, the years of labor he has spent over this book will go for nothing, and the hopes he has built upon it will be disappointed.