Christian. None could doubt the perfect amenableness of his nature to the law of Christian principle. He made, therefore, through all his ministerial course, one identical impression, and could have left no difference of opinion about his character among all the observers of his consistent life.

The heat and passion which were in his native blood gave a vigor to his convictions and utterances which made them effective beyond the mere terms he used. His commonest speech had a glow of suppressed feeling that can alone explain the effect of his preaching, which was much better than his manuscripts might lead a reader to suppose.

Injustice, cruelty, selfishness, had his indignant abhorrence. He was a hater of slavery in all its forms, political, moral, and intellectual. Conservative in his education and associations, he was without intolerance, and far from lacking sympathy with progressive thought in theology. He watched it with interest and without a morbid anxiety, and was wholly opposed to ostracism of free inquirers, or separation between the two schools of thought in our body.

Rhode Island and Providence have testified eloquently to the value of Dr. Hall's influence as a citizen. A man of the rarest and most persistent public spirit, no good object within his city or State- we may add, within the sphere of his possible help-ever lacked his earnest word, his faithful hand. He could be counted on, in advance, as the advocate and practical supporter of every worthy cause. Schools, libraries, charities, ministries at large, book-clubs,— any thing, in short, that tended to the enlightenment, elevation, and relief of his species, had his hearty, intelligent sympathy and furtherance. He believed in humanity, in its claims, its possibilities, its need of guidance, and in the duty of Christians to consecrate themselves, body and spirit, to its service.

A consistent, industrious, consecrated Christian life, spent in a ministry to one community and one congregation near four-and-thirty years! what happier, more useful, or more enviable lot? The admirable balance of Dr. Hall's faculties was matched by the excellent proportions of his career. Fortunate on the soil of his special field, he struck firm roots

at an early period, yet not before manly vigor had been attained, into the ground he was to occupy. He built up about him a large united, effective congregation, a first-rate power in the city and State, among the few leading churches of our faith in the country or the world. He impressed himself upon two generations, and left the tinge of his pure and worthy character and the savor of his spirit, as permanent elements in the civilization and Christianity of Rhode Island. His memory will never decay. His qualities were not evanescent, showy, dependent on immediate presence. His influence was serious, solid, sure, and will tell for many generations upon the children's children of those who personally knew and loved and revered him.

ART. VIII.-A POLITICAL NOTE.

CONGRESS and the President seem still to hold their relative positions, Congress holding tight to the substantial fruits of the war, the President holding equally tight to the Constitution. Whether the Constitution shall be read by its own light, or read by the light of the Declaration of Independence on one side, and the light of the war on the other, seems to be the question. The President makes himself the defender of the letter of the Constitution. He is particularly jealous for the reserved rights of the States, and makes the most of the theory that the States were not out of the Union during the Rebellion, much less since it was crushed; and, being in, are entitled to representation. In his judgment, the sole right in respect of the representation which Congress has, now that the war is over, and a proclamation of peace— omitting Texas-is issued, is to refuse to admit any senator or representative whose personal loyalty either house may doubt, fully acknowledging the right of any State to send loyal representatives. No doubt, the great principle, "No taxation without representation," is an American principle of the utmost historic value and importance. No doubt the

impossibility of secession is another principle of great worth, and fruitful in consequences. The war having no reference to the first, had very solemn reference to the last; and it is of the utmost consequence that the secession of the States should be declared legally impossible under any circumstances. But certainly the war was not waged by the victors to give the individual States any injurious power within the Union. It was not waged by them for the benefit of the States, or of any of their peculiar institutions or prejudices. It was waged in the interest of the Union; and it must leave the Union relatively stronger against its exposures from local, sectional, or state interests or jealousies, or it will disappoint the hopes and intentions of the American people, to which they made such enormous sacrifices of life and property.

There are times when there is something more binding than the fundamental law, and that is the national life and genius, the spirit of the nation. There is no manner of doubt that the interpretations of the Constitution for thirty years before the war- and perhaps its own letter-were opposed to the animus of the Declaration of Independence. When these interpretations, founded upon the original compromises of the Constitution, which themselves were founded on humiliating-not to say immoral-necessities, had accumulated and hardened into a final decision of the Supreme Court, which really made the Declaration of Independence seem that string of glittering generalities which Mr. Choate had profanely declared it, the nation was ripe for some radical change in its Constitution. The Providence of God sent it the opportunity, in the rebellion of the Southern, slave-holding States. It put that rebellion down, and abolished one cause of it, the institution of slavery. It means to abate and discourage the other cause of the Rebellion, the desire to break up the integral unity of the nation. It is because Congress does not trust, and cannot trust, the loyalty of the late rebellious States, that she refuses to admit their representatives. If it is not safe to have which the President allows - a disloyal senator or representative in Congress, is it safe to have a disloyal State represented in the national govern

ment? Can a loyal man represent a disloyal State? What can a senator's loyalty be worth, who undertakes to represent a disloyal State? And if Congress has a right to judge of the fitness of its own members, may it not say, No applicant for a seat, who represents a disloyal and ill-disposed community, is a fit person to share in the legislative and treatymaking power of this Government. This is substantially what Congress does say; and it is what the people back it in saying. We have had quite too much of the treasonable speeches of Davis of Kentucky and the half-treasonable speeches of Saulsbury of Delaware, to invite any more vain consumers of the nation's time and patience, and insulters of the great policy of our national war, into Congress for the present. Let the Government restore to the States in rebellion all rights and privileges, except those of balking and hindering that policy of moulding the Constitution to the Declaration of Independence, which the war has given the nation, by its tremendous sacrifices, the right to demand and accomplish. It is getting to be clear, and Mr. Johnson's policy is to be thanked for making it clear, that the statesmen of the South Mr. Stephens for example - do not think the South has abandoned the offensive doctrine of State sovereignty, nor lost its reluctance to the dominion of the Union. Under these circumstances, why invite them by a choice of pliable ' representatives, with custom-house oaths in their mouths, to come and perplex and imperil our federal legislation, and support the President himself, in a policy which already alarms the friends of national unity, the friends of the negro, — who gave himself so freely to sustain it, and the friends of liberty and continued peace?

Congress clearly knows its duty, and intends to fulfil it. We were disposed, at the issue of our last number, to think the President not more extreme than some part of Congress. But, while Congress has been growing temperate, he has been growing hot, and exhibiting an obstinacy, an over-confidence in his private judgment, which it ill becomes a President to show in the presence of the direct representatives of the nation's wishes. Himself an accidental President, it would

better become him to be as passive as his station allows. His temper has proved hasty; his self-reference, mortifying; and his demagogical tendencies, alarming. It may prove a serious obstacle to the usefulness of this whole Congress, that the energies of the executive and the legislative departments of the Government are wasted upon each other, instead of being expended upon the public good. It looks very much as if the President were going to prove that most difficult of all persons to deal with, a self-made man, jealous of those educated to statesmanship, hating refinement, despising any philanthropy not his own, and obstinate in proportion to his narrowness and inexperience.

The passage of the Civil Rights Bill over the President's veto is a magnificent triumph of national wisdom and duty. The nation cordially acquiesced in the President's first veto: the prompt and significant refusal to acquiesce in the second veto shows just what was meant by the approval of the first, and limits very narrowly the swing which the people are disposed to allow the judgment or caprice of Mr. Johnson. We feel quite safe in the hands of Congress and the people since the Civil Rights Bill passed over the President's head, and met the public approval so widely. We can now wait a policy of reconstruction from Congress very patiently.

ART. IX.-REVIEW OF CURRENT LITERATURE.

THEOLOGY.

By general consent, the most remarkable work of recent years, in this department, is the biographical sketch or study entitled "Ecce Homo." It is understood to be by the hand of a layman of the Church of England; and conjecture has assigned to it no less a source than Mr. Gladstone. It is a work characterized by the vigorous, independent, first-hand dealing with the historical, and still more the ethical, mate

Ecce Homo; a Survey of the Life and Work of Jesus Christ. Announced for immediate republication by Roberts Brothers, of Boston.