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NEW PUBLICATIONS.

The current number of the London Quarterly Review, now lying before us, contains the usual quantity of interesting reading matter. The opening article, on the “French Constitutionalists” is an able and elaborate disquisition, founded mainly on De Tocqueville’s essay “On the State of Society in France before the Revolution of 1789, and of the Causes which lead to that Event.” No. 2, on “Electioneering” is lively and trenchant, tracing the system, so far as England is concerned, from the regions of historic doubt to the present day and giving a graphic picture of its humors and peculiarities. In article 4, the writer, taking as his text Sir George Nicholls’ “History of the Irish Poor-Laws,” discusses the “Irish Question” in an earnest and thoughtful spirit. We quote a few of the concluding lines:

“We speak of Irish crime, Irish filthiness, Irish ignorance, Irish falsehood, Irish vulgarity, Irish provincialism; as if Ireland was the only country where such vices or weaknesses prevailed, and especially as if we were without sin and above reproach in all such matters ourselves. Moreover, when we so speak, we forget how many of our own blood and race are to be found in Ireland who are proud of the nationality and sensitive of the honor of their adopted country; men who with the courage and energy of their Saxon ancestry, partake by a strange assimilation, of the mercurial temperament and the generosity of emotion of the Celtic population. In abstract science, in administrative government, in the senate, and in the camp, Ireland has produced foremost men of whom any nation might be proud. Let us draw the bonds of brotherhood tighter, ‘and let the dead past bury its dead.”

Ireland may congratulate herself on receiving such a patronizing pat on the back from the dignified Quarterly. “Praise from Sir Hubert Stanley is praise indeed.” Article 4 is on “The Internal Decoration and Management of Churches” in which a vast deal of ecclesiological learning is displayed, and an instance afforded of the manner in which even the driest subject may be made interesting in the hands of a competent writer who thoroughly comprehends and is in love with his subject. M. Huc’s “L’Empire Chinois” furnishes the material on which to found the next article on “Travels on China.” The works of Robert Fortune and Sir John F. Davis are also incidentally referred to. The paper is most interesting, and embodies the latest information in regard to the Celestial Flowery Land. Artists and all persons having an average interest in aesthetics will peruse with pleasure the entertaining article on “the Manchester Exhibition,” which follows. The description makes us long for the time when similar art-exhibitions will not be altogether matters of impossibility in this country. Article 7th, on “Homeric Characters in and out of Homer” is pleasant and profitable reading for the classical scholar and literateur. Article 8th and last discusses a subject that has lately attracted a large share of the attention of the leading minds of our transatlantic cousins, viz: “The Bill for Divorce.” As may be expected, the Quarterly opposes with acrid zeal any attempt to alleviate the burdens of, or afford any loop-hole of retreat to, the unfortunates who have, from any cause, committed a fatal error in assuming they also—.[incomplete text]

The Edinburgh Review for the present quarter contains nine articles, several of which are noticeable for more than average interest. “The Confraternity of La Salette” opens the number, in which an analysis is given of a most singular superstition. A paper on “Electric Science” follows, suggested by De la Rive’s recently published treatise on electricity. Article 3d is on “Marshal Marmont’s Memoirs.” Article 4th takes up the work of Sir George Nicholls on the “Irish Poor Law,” and deals with the subject of social progress in Ireland. The writer indulges in a hopeful vein of anticipation in like manner with the author of the article on the same subject in the Quarterly. Perhaps the article that will be most widely read, however, is that on “The License of Modern Novelists,” in which the author takes Charles Dickens to task for his biting satire on the “Circumlocution Office,” contained in his “Little Dorrit.” It is needless to refer to the paper more particularly, for almost everybody who takes any interest in these matters has by this time some inkling of the charges made with such owlish gravity and of Dickens’ triumphant reply made through the columns of “Household Words.” A most ably written and altogether admirable article is that upon “Goethe’s Character and Moral Influence.” The great German is convicted of the most intense egotism, selfishness and want of patriotism. For the first time we have a true and succinct version of the touching little episode of Frederica of Sesenheim, and a clear history of Goethe’s real relations with Kestner and his wife, from his intimacy with whom sprung the world-renowned “Werther.” Neither of these episodes represent the character of the “many-sided man” in an enviable light. Mr. Lewes, in his biography of Goethe, published some two years ago, says, in the course of a long special plea for his idol, that “domestic duties seldom have the power to the shape the career of genius. There is a latent antagonism between domesticity and genius which sometimes rises into terrible warfare. What is called the egoism of genius is but another name for the tyranny of ideas; against this tyranny, the affections, even in the affectionate, are powerless, the kindest natures become cruel, the softest, pitiless.” Against these and various other apologies for the shortcomings of the great man, the reviewer enters a vehement protest, and certainly brings plenty of proof, and to spare, that Goethe was morally obtuse, especially in his relations with the fair. However, it is a universal truth that men of genius are not made as the Frenchman phrases it, du bois dont on fait les maris! The remaining articles which compose the present number are respectively entitled “Merivale’s Romans under the Empire;” “Schoelcher’s Life of Handel;” “Representative Reform.

Blackwood’s Magazine for August opens with a continuation of Bulwer’s novel—“What will he do with it?” So far, this new work of the author of the Caxtons, has not impressed us favorably. We are loath to say of a man of such vast intellectual wealth, that he has “written himself out,” but all great authors have their culminating point, from which the descent is usually very sudden, and it is not impossible that Bulwer may have reached his, in the “Caxtons” and “My Novel.” The remaining articles are quite up to the standard of this favorite monthly. The “Life of Sir Charles Napier,” a model of concise and elegant biography, is continued. So also are the pleasant series of papers entitled “Afoot.” The titles of the remaining papers are as follows: “Manchester Exhibition of Art Treasures;” “New Sea-Side Studies;” “North on Homer;” and “Scenes of Clerical Life.”

“Blackwood” and the four leading English reviews are, as most of our readers are aware, republished in this country by Leonard Scott & Co. No. 79 Fulton street, New York. In no manner can a few dollars be more profitably invested than by subscribing for these highest exponents of the intellect of the age.