y is attained without Pantheism.

We have purposely confined ourselves to the most general feature of
the work, because it is this which gives it its great and distinctive
importance; yet the whole structure is as elaborately and beautifully
wrought as it is fitly grounded in the truth of Nature.

_The National Almanac and Annual Record for 1863_. Philadelphia:
George W. Childs. 12mo. pp. 600.

Volumes like this are the very staff of history. What a stride in
literature from the "Prognostications" of Nostradamus and Partridge,
and the imposture of such prophetic chap-books as the almanacs of
Moore and Poor Robin, to the bulky volumes teeming with all manner of
information, such as the "Almanach Imperial," the "New Edinburgh," or
"Thorn's Irish Almanac"! In the list of superior works ranking with
those just named is to be included the new "National Almanac." We have
here assuredly a vast improvement over anything in this way which
has heretofore been attempted among us. A more comprehensive range of
topics is presented, and such standard subjects as we should naturally
expect to find introduced are worked up with much more copiousness and
accuracy of treatment. It is evident on every page that a thoroughly
active and painstaking industry has presided over the preparation of
the volume. Statistics have not been taken at second-hand, where the
primary sources of knowledge could be rendered available. The details
of the great Departments of the Federal Government have been revised
by the Departments themselves. In like manner, the particulars
concerning the several States have in most cases been corrected by a
State officer. Thus, as respects the leading subjects in the book, we
have here not only the most accurate information before the public,
but we have it in the latest authorized or official form. Facts are
as a general rule brought down to date, instead of being six or
twelve months behind-hand, as has been the case heretofore in similar
publications, the compilers of which were content to await the tardy
printing by Congress of documents and reports. Hence the work is
pervaded by an air of freshness and vitality. It is not merely
a receptacle of outgrown facts and accomplished events, but the
companion and interpreter of the scenes and activities of the stirring
present. It strives to seize and embody the whole being and doing of
the passing time.

It is quite impossible to exhibit in these few lines any adeq