These are weighty considerations, and worthy of a much more extended development than the author gives in the lectures before us. His thesis affirmed as probable (and we deem it no less), Roman history would need to be re-written, and by one who should be not only an historian, but a philosopher and a Christian. The perusal of these lectures cannot fail to interest the student, and particularly those who pretend to study the philosophy of history. POPULAR LIFE OF DANIEL O’CONNELL. 1 vol. 16mo, pp. 294. Boston: Patrick Donahoe. Public attention in these days is being more and more turned to O’Connell and the work he wrought. No later than last year the Holy Father held him up as a guide to Catholics in their conflict with powers leagued together against the church, against Catholic rights, and, as a matter of consequence, against all right. The more the great Irish leader’s life is studied, the more evident becomes the fact that freedom, liberty, right, were not to him merely national but universal claims. What he demanded for his own he would have granted to all, and in claiming his own he asked no favor; he called for none of what are known as heroic remedies; he appealed simply to the spirit of all sound laws and the sense of right that is in the conscience of all men. It would be well if, in future lives of him, this great, this greatest perhaps, feature of O’Connell’s character were brought out in stronger relief. For it is just this that makes him more than a leader of his people; it makes him a leader of all peoples who have wrongs to right and abuses to abolish. The small volume before us tells the story of O’Connell’s life in the conventional manner. “Popular” is on the title-page, and there is no reason why the “life” should not be popular. It “has been compiled from the most authentic sources,” says the preface modestly enough, and in this the value of the book is rated in a line. It is a compilation, and no more. As a compilation there is no especial fault to be found with it. On the contrary, the various parts are stitched cleverly together, so as to make a sufficiently interesting narrative. Compilations, however, are becoming too numerous nowadays, and the literature in which shears and paste-pot play the chief part is growing into a school, and a school that cannot be commended. It is not encouraging to open what the reader takes to be a new book, and find in it page after page of matter that has been writ or told a thousand times already. ELMWOOD; OR, THE WITHERED ARM. By Katie L. 1 vol. 16mo, pp. 233. Baltimore: Kelly, Piet & Co. 1876.