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Grimm’s “ Invincible Powers.” 249
certainly commands our best wishes
and hopes.
Is there so little good poetry in the
land that “ Old and New” could find
only Mrs. Stowe’s pleasing, thoughtful
Hymn, for a first number ?
Other new journals are—1. The
“ Index,” published in the interests of
“ Free Religion,” at Toledo, Ohio, un
der the very able charge of Francis E.
Abbot. The “ Index ” says “ it shall be
the organ of no party in politics and
no sect in religion. The editor will
speak for himself alone, and so will
each contributor; neither will commit
the other.” We presume that the
editor speaks for himself in saying
that " to reject the Christian name
does not necessarily mean to despise
either Jesus or his religion.”
2. The “Monthly Review and
Religious Magazine,” at Boston, to
be edited by Edmund H. Sears and
Rufus Ellis, of whom we may speak in
the same language as of Mr. Abbot.
This is an enlargement of the “ Month
ly Magazine.” “It is to be a peri
odical, theological, religious, and de
nominational, whose object shall be still
to gather and express the best and pro-
foundest thought of the Unitarian body,
applied to life and practice, and bearing
on individual and social progress, upon
the renewal of the Unitarian body
within, as well as its growth, exten
sion, and influence without. It is to
be not only a religious magazine but a
monthly theological review, popular
and distinctively denominational, but
not sectarian. It shall be liberal, and
at the same time Christian; liberal to
wards Trinitarians, and open to all the
light and the genial influence to come
from the church of Christ universal;
liberal towards radicalism or unbelief,
candid in receiving and profiting by its
criticisms, by standing ever on the
revealed Word of God, and owning the
leadership of Christ alone.”
3. " Wake and Play,” a newspaper
for the young, published at Springfield,
Massachusetts.
GRIMM’S “INVINCIBLE POWERS.”
Hermann Grimm, the author of
the interesting life of Michael Angelo,
has lately published a novel of modern
society in three volumes. 1 Its heroine
and her mother and other characters
are American, and a great part of the
action of the novel takes place in
America. It is therefore as interesting
to the American as the German reader.
A young count comes to America to
find a solution of the enigma offered by
the present state of society in Ger
many ; and it is in the study of those
questions that are now discussed in
German society, that the interest of the
book lies. It brings up the subject of
the nobility, of caste, and class, a sub
ject which it is difficult for an Ameri
can to appreciate in all its intricacies;
and it shows how this question is seeth
ing in Germany, and what a sea of
troubles we are freed from in America,
from the non-existence of such a class
as the nobility. “ What is to become
of our counts, our nobles, in these
days ? ” is the question which the char
acters of Grimm’s novel set themselves
to answer.
The hero is, for a long time, one of
the least interesting personages in the
book — from his lack of firmness of
character. He is a count of a long
line of descent. His father has dissi
pated all the riches he inherited, and
the family estates have necessarily been
sold. Arthur is forced then to live in
seclusion, on the little that remains of
his property, with an old cook, his
horse, his family pictures, and' just
enough to support life, — too much,
one of his friends thinks ; for if he had
been forced to labor, he would have
1 Uniiberwindliche Machte (Invincible Powers).
Roman von Hermann Grimm.