Prof.  Agassiz of Harvard College appears in the last number of the Christian Examiner—­an able periodical, which no degree or affectation of “liberality” should have tempted to the admission of such a paper—­in an elaborate argument against the Unity of the Human Race.  It is ridiculous to attempt a disguise of this matter:  the proposition of Prof.  Agassiz is an attack upon the Christian religion, and he is guilty of scandalous dishonesty in endeavoring to evade its being so considered.  He has undoubtedly a right to pursue any investigation to which he may be led by a love of science, and, guarding himself about with humility and candor, he has a right to accept the results which may be offered in the premises by a careful induction.  But the right to assail the commonly received opinions of mankind, especially the right to assail a people’s religion, has other and very rigid conditions, which will not, we are persuaded, justify this new outbreak of the restless spirit of Infidelity.  Certainly, it would have become Prof.  Agassiz, before venturing upon the course he has adopted, to dissociate himself from a University to which so many of the youth of the country have been sent without any thought on the part of their parents that they were to be exposed there to influences which they would dread above all others.  There is no right to offer, except to men, capable of its thorough apprehension, any new or questionable or unsettled doctrine.  Prof.  Agassiz should have been in a condition to receive in his own person the consequences of a failure to establish his theory.  We have no fears as to the result of the controversy upon which he has entered.  No man worthy to be called a Christian scholar, deprecates the subjection of the Bible to any tests that are possible.  It has withstood in the last two centuries quite too much of sham science to be in any way affected by the logic of Prof.  Agassiz.  Still, the appearance of such a paper in the Christian Examiner—­the chief organ of American Unitarianism—­is significant of a state of feeling and opinion to be regretted, and it should summon to the conflict the men whose predecessors made every similar wave of Infidelity bring support and strength to the bases of the rock of Christianity.

* * * * *

Letters from Dr. Layard have been received in London, to the 10th of April, dated from Arban, on the River Khabour.  The last account from this quarter mentioned his purpose of penetrating into the desert, which he has explored for three weeks, meeting with numerous traces of ancient population, though not so many antiquities as he expected.  His present site, however, is richer in archaeological remains, and is important, as they are undoubtedly Assyrian, and prove the extent of that empire.  Two winged bulls and other fragments are described as very remarkable, the meadows as rich in herbage, and the banks of the Khabour as literally gemmed with flowers; and Mr. Layard was desirous to examine this river to its mouth; but the Arabs were hostile to the plan, though it was trusted that arrangements would be made with the parties, wherever they interposed between Mr. Layard and his wishes.  In his letter, he says he thinks Major Rawlinson wrong in some of his topography, and that the chronological deductions cannot as yet be considered settled.