dissimilar in themselves, I may observe that although among all the classical writers and orators of that age, Bossuet is the greatest in point of style, and at the same time the most solid and intellectual, yet the _naive_ loquacity and infantine simplicity which distinguish the incorrect, old French diction of St. Francis of Sales, are peculiarly graceful and attractive in themselves; while in the depth and clearness of the ascetic spirit, the Saint far surpasses the former writer more celebrated in the world. In the regular philosophy of the schools, the Latin was mostly the prevailing language during the seventeenth century. In this the system of Descartes then formed an epoch; or at least obtained very general credit. His fanciful vortices in nature, as well as his rigid demonstration by reason, of that principle which is exalted above all reason, comprise rather the first germ of the various errors in the physics and metaphysics of the succeeding age, than a sound basis of true science, and a Christian philosophy of the human mind. Spinoza was the immediate disciple of Descartes, but it is in Germany alone that his rationalist system of pantheism, expressed as it is in the forms of mathematical demonstration, and embellished by a morality pure and noble, (at least in appearance and in its general outline,) has been justly appreciated in its true metaphysical import, and has found philosophic critics and imitators. But in its negative bearings, the philosophy of Spinoza, together with other writings by that inquirer and others on and against revelation, had a very extensive influence in those times; and that philosophy forms the notable point of transition to the metaphysical speculations of our own age. Socinus had directed his attacks against the great mystery in the existence of the living God--the Christian dogma of the Trinity. In the system of Spinoza, philosophic Protestantism, or the progressive spirit of negation, advanced one step further; for he denied the personal existence, or the living personality of God, and endeavoured to substitute for the notion of the God-head the empty idea of the Infinite.