to the revival of an interest in the philosopher. His monograph is well fitted to bring the reader into intercourse with the great German, and with those numerous contemporaries with whom he maintained a "literary commerce" during the grand period in which he lived.
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz was born in Leipsic on the 21st of June 1646. He was descended of an ancient family, that had gained distinction in civil and ecclesiastical affairs. His grand-uncle, Paul Leibnitz, attracted notice in the wars in Hungary, and was highly honoured by the Emperor Rodolph II.
We must not omit a special allusion to the eventful epoch of the philosopher's birth. Just a hundred years before, Luther had rested from his earthly labours, during the excitement of the most memorable religious and social change which the world has witnessed since the introduction of Christianity. But soon after the Reformer's death, Christian doctrine, owing in a great measure to the want of Christian organization in the Church, became, especially in Germany, gradually separated more and more from the hearts of nominally Christian men. The coldness of mathematical demonstration represented Christianity in the pulpits and halls of the country of the Reformation, where, in the seventeenth century, the icy orthodoxy of Calixtus took the place of the fervid sermons of Luther.
The period of the Protestant Reformation was a time of much general excitement and progress in society, as well as the era of a great revolution in the Church. The
