Advertiser (Adelaide, SA : 1889 - 1931), Saturday 2 April 1904, page 9


LITERATURE.

THE BOOK OF THE WEEK.

.The Gospel and the Church." By the Abbe Loisy; translated by Christopher Horne. London: Isbister and Company.

This .book, as we are reminded by the translator, created an enormous sensation throughout the Catholic world, when un-der its French title, "L'Evangile et l'Eglise," it was published nearly two years ago. Consisting largely of a criticism of Harnack's famous lectures on the "The Essence of Christianity," it ventures also on "a positive statement of Christian doc-trine," and, above all, it is a presentment of the case for the "progressive party,"' which claims to embody the "best thought" in the Roman Catholic Church A work of this kind cannot be neglected by those who make a study of the great religious move-ments of the time, especially as the author, like Herr Harnack, whom he criticises, aims at providing 'a "satisfactory meeting ground for several forms of belief." Har-nack, whose lectures for a time exercised co remarkable an influence over the mind of the Kaiser, essayed, from the Protestant standpoint, to reconcile religion and Chris-tianity, but-as the Abbe Loisy thinks-re-ligion, in Harneck's hands, is reconciled with science "only because it no longer en-counters it." That is to say, Harnack's fundamental formula that "the essence of the Gospel consists solely in faith in God the Father, as revealed by Jesus Christ," is too attenuated a thing to be used as the basis of a creed that shall'harmonise Pro-testantism and Christianity. What, for instance, asks the Abbe Loisy, of the hope of "an eternal kingdom, constantly preached by Christ, and never allowed to perish by the Christian Church? What of the mission of the Apostles charged to propagate this hope? What of Christ himself, whose place as Messiah be-longs to the Primitive church, and has never ceased to occupy-the thought of the church''from the beginning?" Harnack fortifies his position by such texts as "The Kingdom of God is within you," but these, the Abbe replies, are the least indisputable pf the passages of Scripture, and might well have been influenced, if not produced, by the theology of the early times. No, he argues, the truths of Christianity are not to be tested by a stray Biblical passage here or there; they must be judged by the words of its Founder, by the general impression they produced on those about Him, by tra-dition, and, lastly, by the movement He initiated. The essence of Christianity must be in the work of Jesus or nowhere; it will be vainly sought in scattered fragments of

His discourse.

If a faith, a hope, a feeling, an impulse of will, dominates the Gospel, and is per-petuated in the Church of the earliest times, there will be the essence of Christianity, subject to such reservations as must be made on the liberal authenticity of certain words, and oh such more or less notable modification that the thought of Jesus must of necessity Have endured in transmission from generation to generation.

It, is Loisy's complaint that Harnack treats Christianity as something complete and full-grown, as a ripe and more than ripe apple, so over-ripe that it "must be peeled to reach the incorruptible kernel," whereas—and this is the fundamental idea of the teaching of the Progressives—it is rather to be viewed as a plant which sprang from a seed, and which is still living, and still growing.

The historian will find that the essence of Christianity has been more or less pre-served in the different Christian commu-nions: he will not believe it to be compro-

mised by the development of institutions, of creeds, and of worship, so long as this de-

velopment "has been ruled by the principie verified in the first commencement.' He will not expect this essence to have been absolutely and definitely realised at any point of past centuries;: he will believe that it has been realised more or less per-fectly from the' beginning and that it will continue to be realised thus more and more so long as Christianity shall endure.

It would, in Loisy's view, be at once a needless and erroneous course to treat tie Gospels as simple historical docu ments—erroneous because too little of their authority as historical documents has been left unimpaired by the higher criticism, and needless because, after all, what has really to be looked at is the great movement that proceeded from the preaching of Jesus, of which the Gospels are but a partial exprès sion. -' Some' of the miraculous narra-

tives, as, 'for instance, that of the withéred fig tree, or the feeding of the mul-titude, may or may not be what Harnack holds them to be, the materialisation in succeeding generations of the parables ut-tered by the Saviour. The believer whose belief is worth anything will not find it un-duly tried by any historic analysis of these traditions, if he does no more than perceive in them' what is common to all—attesta tions, however feeble and legendary, of the faith of the early Christian world in the benficent activity of its Sublime Head. And as these t narratives are, rightly re-garded, only an expression and an assertion of the faith of the early Christians in the Messiah, so the assumption of the title of Messiah by Jesus was the inevitable con

dition of the acceptance of His message by the world in which He lived.

Nothing could make Jesus other than a Jew. He was only man under condition of belonging to one branch of humanity. In that in which He was born, the branch that may well be said to have carried in it the religious future of the world, this future was known, in quite a precise manner, by the hope of the reign of God, by the sym bol of the Messiah. He who was to be the Saviour of the world could only enter on His office by assuming the position of Messiah, and by presenting Himself as the founder of the kingdom come to accom-plish the hope of Israel. The Gospel, ap pearing in Judea, and unable to appear elsewhere, was bound to be conditioned by Judaism. Its Jewish exterior is the human body, whose divine soul is the- spirit of Jesus. Take away the body and the soul will vanish in the air like the lightest

breath. Without the idea of the Messiah the Gospel would have been but a meta-physical possibility, an invisible, intangible essence, ever unintelligible, for want of a definition appropriate to the means of knowledge, not a living and conquering

reality.

The Abbe Loisy repudiates the suggestion, favored even by some learned Catholics, that the title of Messiah was attributed to Christ by the Early Fathers, who labored under the apocalyptic illusion, and was nob claimed by Himself, or attributed to Him by His immediate disciples. His death, which might have destroyed the faith of His followers, was counteracted by the gjory of the resurrection, which with many did more even than His life to exhibit Him in the charac-ter of the Messiah. As for the resurrection, the Abbe Loisy is content to say that the empty tomb and the subsequent apparitions do not supply an "irrefutable argument from which the historian can conclude witn entire certainty that the Saviour rose in the body from the dead." Nor, he be-lieves, is the case one where complete proof

is possible.

Christ risen from the dead does not be-long to the order, of the present life, which is that of sensible experience, and conse-quently the resurrection is not a fact that can have been directly and formally estab-lished. The cure of the sick can be verified ; even the return of a dead man to natural life would be susceptible of proof were it to occur: but the entry of a dead man into immortal hie escapes our powers of obser-vation. The empty tomb is only an indi-rect argument, and not decisive, since the only established fact, the disappearance of the body, can ¡be explained in other ways than by the resurrection. As for the ap-paritions, the historian will reserve his con-viction, because the objective reality of the appearances is not defined for him with sufficient precision. The critical examina-tion of the narratives wdl confirm him in his doubt, because it will be impossible for him to reconstitute with sufficient cer-tainty, according to the Gospels of St. Paul, the series of apparitions in sequence wich the circumstances under which they

occurred.

Bue when Herr Harnack claims for the doctrine of the resurrection that it had ita sole origin in a belief in the Christ, the Abbe Loisy demurs. The religious evolu-tion of Judaism, just prior to the Chris-tian era, helped greatly to prepare the soil tor such a belief. It was a belief which Jesus found existing among the Jews, and He spoke conformably to it. Faith in the resurrection of Christ gave an impulse to the belief m a general resurrection, but Loisy doubts whether this would have been possible did the belief not correspond to an innate desire in humanity*. Again the Abbe warns his readers against the attempt to resolve Christianity into a few texts, in-stead of basing our belief in its truths upon the whole course of its history, and upon its adaptability to human needs in all ages. Christianity, he insists, .never came into the world as a sudden revelation, absolute, and unchangeable. ^

Jf it was not (and it was far from being), che chance product of a combination 01 hetereogeneoos beliefs, from, Caaldeu, Egypt, india, Persia, and Greece; if it was bom of the incomparable word and action of Jesus, it is none the less true that Jesus gathered up andwivified the beat of the re-ligious wealth amassed by Israel before Him,' and that He transmitted this weaitn. not as a simple deposit that the faithful oí all times had to guard, but as a living faith in the form of\a collection of beliefs, which had to live,and grow after Him, even as they had grown and lived be-fore, by the preponderating influence of the

spirit that anointed them.

Here the German writer and his French critic are in practical agreement. Both reco<mise the need of greater flexibility in the presentment of the teaching of Chris-tianity. But while Harnack would make simple faith in God the Father the touch-f stone of religious belief, Loisy objects that'

such a limitation would exclude from Chris-' tianity, as forming no part of it, "the whole development of the church, hierarchic, dog-matic, and ritual." Of course, to one of Herr HarnacFs way of thinking this would

be no loss,,for the earlier.^'society of 1 pura spirits," haying "no other bond than a-com-mon sentiment," has given place to an organisation which in the days when it w«s invested- with a greater temporal power than it now possesses, ^aspired to make itself the final judge in all human causes and controversies, and used its power too often for its own aggrandisement. It is natural that Loisy should view with more indulgent eyes the history of his own church, and he reminds Harnack that with all its drawbacks the proud temporal posi-tion of the Popes of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries was the only safeguard of their independence in the. spiritual sphere, and the only guarantee of their ability to "continue to represent Chris tianity and the religion of Jesus."

From the fourteenth century onwards th& general conditions of Catholic society were modified. There was no longer a Christian republic, but Christian states, sufficiently strong in themselves, and never again to be united by a common faith or a common danger in a common course of action, as they had been for the erusadan. The authority of the Pope was exercised with more and more difficulty in the political sphere,, the church, rich and powerful ia every^ state, was sapped with increasing corruption. Regarding events from this distance of time, after allowing that the Papacy of the fifteenth century waa ,too much preoccupied with its own interests, and not enough with the reform that was always more urgent, it is evident that if by force of circumstances, the poltical in-fluence of the church steadily decreased the spiritual power of the Pope as steadJy increased, and became thal which it had to become if the Catholic Church, were to be preserved in the midst of the revolutions and troubles of modern times. It is easy to'perceive that the Pope's power will never again be exercised in the forms it assumed in the middles ages, but 'this power ia of constant importance for the preservation of the Church, and the preservation in the Church of the Gospel.

The Roman Church, the Abbe Loisy is convinced, has further trials; perhaps, a limitless series before it. But it will sur-vive them all, he is persuaded, in virtue of the capacity of adaptation which has en-abled it to survive so many. - It is a politi-cal power still. But it was not always, and

it will not always he. The actual situation is a legacy of the past, to be dealt with cautiously. The flood-gates of democracy have been opened, and what is not built on the imperishable rock of justice will be swept away. In a day, when kings and rulers generally will be required to show their credentials to the possession of privi-leges which are not accessible to all, it is possible that the "members of the eccle-siastical hierarchy may be less great per-sonages in the eyes of the world than they now are,"' but their power as moral

structors jnay wax greater. The Abbe re-gards it as a danger to Catholicism that it desires "too much to govern men instead of simply elevating their souls." But it is a passing phase, he adds, like the political power still enjoyed by the church. The church, he believes, will survive the growth among its members of a consciousness that "the life of a religion consists not in its ideas, its formulas» and its rites as such, but in the secret principle which first gave an attractive power, a supernatural efficacy, to the ideas and formulas, and rites." The progressives, whose case is thus stat-ed by the Abbe Loisy, are far from con-demning "the worship of saints, of relics, of the Virgin, and of the Saviour Himself, merely because such worship appears to the historian a concession" to the religions in-stinct. Neither the worship of Christ, nor the worship of the saints, it is contended, forms any part of the Gospel of Jesus, or belongs to it, and it might be wise, the au-thor thinks, to modify this worship in some of its manifestations. Nevertheless the "apparent puerilities of devotion are less removed from religion than they seem," and the prayer of a man of faith is not less effi-cacious, because it reaches God through Jesus, and Jesus through the saints. All is well, the abbe adds, so long as the forms of worship are not esteemed beyond, and at the expense of the spirit that should ani-mate them. We may close our description of this much-debated and much criticised work-a work which, according to a recent cablegram, the Vatican has thought proper to include in its Index Expurgatorius-by the following' passage, which may fairly be I said to summarise, its whole spirit:

I Anyone who has followed the progiess of Christian thought from the beginning' must perceive that nei I ther the Chnstilogical dogma nor the dogma of grace, nor that of the Church, is io be taken for a summit of doctrine, beyond which no prospect opens for the believer, 01 can ever open except the dazzling d'stance of infinite mystery; it is not to be expected that these dogmas will remain firmer than the rock, inaccessible even to accidental change, and yet intelligible for all genera-tions, and equally applicable without any new translation and explanation to all state» and to every advance of science, life, and human society« The conceptions that the Church presents as revealed im dogmas are not truths fallen from heaven and pre served by religious tradition in the precise form in which they first appeared. The historian sees in them the interpretation of religious facts, acquired by a laborious ef-fort of theological thought. Though the dogmas may be divine m origin aid sub-stance they are human in structure and composition. It is inconceivabe that their future should not correspond to their past. Reason never ceases to put questions to faith, and traditional formulas are sub-mitted So a constknt work of interpretation wherein "the letter that killeth" is effec-tively controlled by "the spirit that giveth

life.'* _

FICTION.

"Stella Fregelius" (Longman's) reveals Mr. Rider Haggard in a new vein, and one for which, indeed, he "feels that he owes some apology to his readers," as the pre-fatory note puts it. His story is, as he ex-plains, in no sense a romance of the charac-ter that perhaps they expect from him. Here is no stirring tale of wildest Africa no record of adventures in the bowels of the earth, no lust of gold or of blood\ Mr. Rider Haggard's bold imagination takes a still more daring flight. His-theme is noth-ing less than the tremendous problem of a conflict, to quote his own words, "between a* departed-and 'a present, personality, of which the battleground is a bereaved human heart, and the prize its-complete possession." It is not difficult to see that Mr, Rider Haggard has put his heart into this work. It breathes sincerity in every page', and one feels ' that the author is

deeply interested in the problem he has raised, and in the gifted creature he has chosen for a heroine a wealth of physical and intellectual charm is lavished by Mr. Haggard upon Stella Fregelius. "It was a fine face," he tells us, "and beautiful in its way. Dark eyes, very large and perfect, whereof the pupils seemed to expand and contract in answer to .every impulse of the thoughts within. Above the eyes long curv-ing lashes and delicately-pencilled, arched eyebrows, and above them again a forehead low and broad. The chin rounded, the lips full, rich, and sensitive, the complexion of a clear and beautiful pallor, the ears tiny, the hands delicate, the figure slim, of medium height, and alive with grace; the general effect most uncommon, and, with-out being lovely, breathing a curious power and personality." Besides, being a beauty, Stella is a musical genius. She has a voice of glorious quality and power, and beneath her bow her violin speaks like a living thing. She has charm, refinement, culture, wonderful courage, and an indomitable will. Apparently she is Mr. Haggard's ideal woman; certainly she is not real. The dash of mysticism revealed in Stella's character at the outset hardly prepares us for the amazing discovery that she could summon a departed spirit back to earth, and for all his skill and strenuous sincerity Mr. Rider Haggard fails to render this tremendous proposition convincing. The story some new does not "grip." Instead of Stella's brilliant gifts lending an air of reality to the miracle, the effect is merely to make the fair heroine herself seem utterly unreal. In due course Stella makes a romantic exit from the world, and her heart-broken lover, a mystic like herself, and also a brilliant man of science, mortifies his flesh and con-trols his spirit -until he too acquires this weird, unknown power over the invisible, and gazes with a fearful joy upon the spirit of his departed Stella. Truth to tell, how-ever, the human element in the story is of more interest than the supernatural Morris Monk, the scientist in question, falls in love with the mysterious Stella after he has be-come engaged to his cousin Mary, and in the absence of the latter. The situation is in-teresting, and promises to become more so. However, by the time Morris' fiancee re-turns, Stella has lost her life by drowning, and the practical Mary does not consider that Morris" avowed love for the departed need prevent him keeping his promise and

marrying herself, and so she marries him. Having thus summarily solved the complica-tion, the author proceeds to develop the mystical side of his romance. He regards the death of Stella as the real beginning, whereas it is really the close of whatever human interest the tale possesses. In what follows Morris is to all intents and pur-poses a madman, and his visions are noth-ing more than the wild delusions of a dis-ordered brain. Mr. Rider Haggard has aim-ed high, but one is forced to the conclusion that "Stella Fregelius," despite many ad-mirable touches, falls short of the mark.

A welcome contribution to the fist of his-torical tales is "The Master of Gray," by H. G. Bailey (Longman's). The story is dated in those spacious days when Mary Queen of Scots lay in an English prison and her great relative ruled with potent skill and masculine courage the spreading des-tinies of England. Patrick Gray, a hand-some young Scotsman of charming presence, son of Lord Gray of Ridlaw Tower, is the central figure of the narrative, and amidst the shifting scenes of strife and bloodshed, plots and counterplots, his character stands out in hold relief. There was no hes tation with the Master of Gray where love, dan fer, or worldly advantages were concerned,

te secretly changed his political creed (re-ligion never troubled him muclf) m order to come in on the winning side and gain besides the girl of his heart, who he knew would never wed an enemy of her country. But. by the machinations of his enemies, his treachery is revealed, and his English friends and patrons turn from him in hor-ror. Gray, the brave and resourceful in all manly perils, trembles before a young girl's flaming scorn. "He caught her dress and pleaded with uplifted hands. 'Ah, lady,' he said, 'to your cause I gave myself body and soul. Nay, 'twas for our loves' sake, all for love!' . . . 'Love!' she cried 'to lie, cheat, betray!' " The story rushes on from tragedy to tragedy, and ends with a broken-hearted Master of Gray departing on a new adventure to stifle bitter memories. It is a book of considerable power. The interest is well sustained, and the narrative is marked by many striking situations. The hero's com-plex character is consistently delineated. The author, wisely, makes no attempt to moralise in a study of its analysis, but leaves the problem tacitly to the judgment of the reader. One fact seems to' redeem in some measure the character of the rene-gade Scot, and shines with welcome ray over the blackened page of his life. Sir Philip Sydney, the soul of mediawal honor; was his unfailing friend to the last, and when dying on Zutphen's bloody field he painfully traced a farewell message to his

'most honored brother, the Master of Gray." «^

Miss Helen Mathers has written some very readable books, for example, "Comin' Thro' the Rye." but it is questionable whether her latest unconventional tale con-cerning unconventional people will please so much as that work, or even "My Lady

Greensleeves." In "Griff of Griffiths court" (Methuen), her "unconventional" folk are more or less preposterous carica-tures. One of the female characters ia a child name'd Dan. She is 13 at the opening of the story, and her leading cha-racteristics are that she gets expelled when-ever she goes to school, and that she tells stories to a two-year-old baby with a morah "You must' never tell a he-except to shield a pal." "Dan's particular "pal" is Angel, fhe wife of Griff, who has exquisite beauty, a perfect taste in dress, and gratifies all her fancies with regard to the fact that Griff is a comparatively poor man. Then there is her mother-in-law, Elizabeth, who is represented as adorable, and declares in a moment of confidence that she has'"never had her whack." When she is a grand-mother she is talking to a man who- has long loved her, and she 'laughs, clasping both hands behind her head." Hence you are not surprised that the lover remarks, "You're no side-show," or that her daugh, ter-in-law regards hef as rather younger thari herself. There is also a very un-pleasant millionaire who is enamored i of Angel, and the story is made up of his infatuation,- Angel's extravagance, and Dan's devotion. Miss Mather once lost the MSS. of a novel in a cab, or some such public conveyance. One feels disposed to grieve that it was not "Griff of Griffiths court-" But'tastes-happily for authors -differ, and as' the 'bus conductor said of the weather, "F*r them as, likes this kind o' thing' its just all right."

-- Mr. T. Fisher Unwin has just published "The Fdigree Ball," by Anna Katherine Green. The book is a detective» story on a One, with the author's famous "Leaven-; worth Case," with a mystery equally diffi-cult of solution. A woman, young, ^beantf ful, rich, and the fortnight's bride of 'the, "man she loves, 'is found lying, shot tot,tue heart, in the ancient deserted home of her ancestors over which a curse has long hung. She had an eccentric callous'uncle to whom .her property descends on her death, a beautiful sister deeplyjri love with tho dead woman's husband, and a husband from whom she had become .estranged in her fortnight's married life. " The evidence seems clear against each in turn, and not till the very end of the book is the mystery cleared up, and then in. most unexpected fashion. ¡

Another of Mr. Unwin's publications in his Red Cloth Library, is a novel which fossesses uncommon freshness and charm

ts title is "Myra, of the Pines," and its author, Mr. Herman K. Viele, author of "The Inn of the SJver.Moon." The,boofe open«! out to English readers entirely new ground-the great, solitudes of the American Ínnelands. an the=e solitudes, hardly the e»s lonely for the existence of a new wooden town' a few miles off, dwelt one of the strangest and most humorous households, that ever appeared in fiction; the factor, a quixotic experimentalist in science, the mother, a wrong-headed compounder of pro-vincial newspaper stories, and Myra herself viewing her parents with a tolerant defe-J renee borne of necessity, till a certain' stranger came that way casually, then again privily, and again openly, and finally car-ried her away from the pines to be his

. wife.

Readers of Mr. Guy Boothby know pretty well what to expect in a new story from his pen. That it will be a record of exciting experience goes without saying, and- it need, scarcely -be added that what is lacking m the way of probability will be made up by the vigor and narrative power which the author when at his best, as he is in "A Queer Affair" (George Bell & Son), invari-ably infuses into his work. A murder has been committed, and the reader is kept till the close in suspense as to the perpetrator. The victim is a sea captain, whose daughter his captured the heart of Earl Rippingdale's eldest son.. As the match* meets with the earl's disapproval it' is a fair presumption that his lordship may know more about the crime than he admits, especially as the body was found on the premises of an old flame

of his own. Evidently^ says the reader, the victim was inveigled into the house ana then killed, probably by the earl, as the re-sult of a quarrel. ' The earl's son, at all events, is of this opinion, ai\d his suspi-cions are strengthened by his discovery in his father's room of the murdered man'b

missing cane. Just when it seems that jus-tice is about to pounce upon the only pos-sible criminal the real Simon Pure turns up in an obscure ne'er-do-wejl, who, imme-diately after a full confession of 'his guilt, makes an end of himself. It is needless to add that the earl gives his consent to the marriage.

MISCELLANEOUS WORKS.

Last year Methodism celebrated the bi-centenary of its founder's birth. A popu-lar "Life of John Wesley," by Mr. G. Hol-den Pike, which has just emanated from the publishing house of the Religious Tract Society, may serve as a souvenir of the oc-casion. It gives in a succinct and pic-turesque form the story of the great tea-cher and of the great religious revolution he accomplished; a revolution which in "real importance" Lecky ranked higher than "the career of the elder Pitt, and the splendid victories by land and sea that were won during his Ministry." Successive chapters deal with Wesley's birth and ear-ly days, his university life, and ordination, nis visit to America, the beginning of the great revival, Wesley's helpers and; soldier friends, the places he visited.'the remark-able persons' noted in his diary, and his later years. The degraded condition into which the Church of England had fallen in the middle of the eighteenth century, is described, and it is shown that if the do I mestic chaplain no longer loaded dung

carts, or nailed up the squire's apricots, or ' carried his coachhorses; if he was better mannered, he was not as a rule much bet-ter off in pocket or more respectable than his grandfather. As for the common people they were often, as Wesley found them, "though nominally Christians, as ignorant of true Christianity as infidels or

heathens." It was with this society that the Methodists had to deal, and we are re-minded by Mr. Pike's graphic pages how quickly the bttle band of earnest workers began to make disciples. The story of the way in which one congrega-tion of Methodists sprang up after another in the mining villages 01 Cornwall, in the half-wild districts of the Welsh mountains, in the dim little Northumbrian and Lan-cashire hamlets, reads like a romance. The volume contains several illustrations, and its value as a work of reference is greatly enhanced by the addition of an excellent

index.

A selection from the many "Retreat Ad-dresses given to Religious Communities, and their Associates," by the late Mr. J. P.. F. David«», vicar of St. Matthias!,

Earl's Court, London, is published by Messrs. Wells, Gardner. Darton, & Co., London. Mr. Davidson's own notes, which were full and distinct, are used in the compilation, which in regard to sub-jects, if not their treatment, is similar to the companion volume of "Addresses to Clergy." noticed in these columns some months ago. For the purpose of supply-ing spiritual aid to congregations of devout people, it would be difficult to find a work

more suitable.

A new shilling edition of Bunyan's "Pil-grim's Progress" has reached us from the Religious Tract Society. John Bunyan made many alterations in the various edi-tions published during his lifetime. The text of this new edition has been carefully collated with the one finally revised by the author, and publshed in the year in which he died. Embellished, as it is, with colored pictures by Harold Copping, the edition deserves to be described as one of the best and cheapest ever issued. It may be added, as an interesting fact as showing the universal suitability of Bunyan's alle gory, that missionaries have translated and the Religious Tract Society has prepared editions in no fewer than 104 languages and

dialects.

Mr. Heinemann's series of photogravure reproductions from the Great Masters con-tinues with na abatement in the merit of the works represented. The ninth section m the series, which is now to hand, con-tains examples of the work of Venneer, Carpaccio. Bray, and Velasquez. "The Ar-tist in his Studio." is a typical Dutch scene and possesses the strong human element so characteristic of ah" Dutch art. In the in-stance under review, Venneer of Delft in-tended originally to develop a fancy sub-ject out of the plain studio and the simper-ing model, but he changed his plan, and gave the world studio, model, and himself exactly as they were: with this difference that he painted mto the picture the glory and beauty which his artist's eye saw in the common thingp of life. Carpaccio's "St Ursula's Dream" is the best of the series of nine which the Venetian artist painted on thp subject of the legend of the holy ma den. Jan de Bray's depiction of a charity board meeting is in the style of Franz Hüls, and has a reposeful seventeenth century at-mosphere about it that is refreshing in this time of bustle and hurry. The equestrian portrait of the Infante Don Balthazar Car-

los of Spain, painted by Velasquez, is in the Prado, Madrid, but the reproduction before us gives an admirable notion of the life-like original. In the series which Mr Heinemann ÍB publishing, illustrated, as they are, by the introductory notes of Sir Martin Conway, a short history of painting m correct chronological order is given.

The seeond number of Tlorlick's Maga-zine, which ostensibly caters for a measure of colonial patronage, does not contain à 8:ngle line about Australia, India, or the colonies, but it is nevertheless a very in-teresting publication. The editor has ap paren tly profited by criticism on the first issue, which possessed high literary mer-t, but of an uncompromisingly solid order, and has devoted vthe second "number en-tirety to fiction, verse, and humor. Some well-known writers are represented, and the magazine evidently intends to make a high bid in the market of reputations.

Mr. Arthur H. Davis, better known as Steele*Rudd, has retired from the post oí 'Under Sheriff at Brisbane, and has started a new magazine, which bears the significan!, title of "Steele Rudd's Magazine." A speci-men copy of the number for February ia to hand, and a perusal of its interesting pages justifies its recommendation to the public as a thoroughly Australian publica-tion, the Work entirely of Australian writers; Australian 'artists, and Australian Êrmters. The ideals of the editor and of

is contributors are, too, plainly of a natural mould. One of the most interest-ing'sections is an article on "The Drift of Australian Politics," by Mr. Peter Airey, the present leader of the Queensland Par-liamentary Labor Party.\ Mr: Airey has some fame outside "riolitics, for his con tributions of verse to various" newspaper under the pen-name "of P. Luftig are of such "merit as to entitle him to not'ce. apart from any claim he may have to ooli tical distinction. His-views, in politics are. however, broad and sound, as expressed in the article under review. Mr. George .Essex Evans, the author of the prize Com-monwealth ode, has more than one poetical contribntion of the" lighter sort in the num ber, and Steele Rudd is himself represented j by a story entitled "Sandy's Selection." .The magazine has a bright appearance, be-1 ,jng well printed and illustrated. I

?I»-;. LITERARY NOTES. ,

jV The New York Herald points out thaï .the 'poem attributed, by a writer in the Fortnightly Review, to Edgar Poe, and de Scribed as hitherto unpublished, Tras print fil in 1876, in the Indiana Sentinel, and waB reallv written by Mr. Whitcomb Rley who had laid a wager that he could deceive ¿he ' critics. William Cullen Bryant wat among those who were thus imposed upon.

""In a work which Messrs. Methuen have included in their "Little Biographies" Mr. A. G. Benson indulges in some plain speak-ing about Tennyson. The .< poet, we are told, very, frequently put no restraint upon his talk, which was "Rabelaisian in its. plainness." He expressed his opinion vers freely about others, but no one was more sensitive as to what others said about himself. A school magaz-ne. made a dis-paraging allusion to Tennyson, then on such a pinnacle of fame that criticism of all kinds should have left him unmoved But for dayB,, "no matter what subject was started, no matter how much interested/he himself became in pursuing a train of thought, he always came back to the same grievance. No amount of influence with other minds could atone for what 'those young gentlemen' had said."'

The late Frederic R. Coudert, ihe well known American lawyer and wit, had a great fondness for children. ? He collected radefatigably the quaint sayings of chil-dren, and one of the treasures nf his lib-

rary was a small manuscript volume filled I

with definitioné that eluldten had com posed'. This volume was called a "child's

I dictionary." and these are some of the de-,

I finitions that Mr. Coudert would read from

it:-"Dust-Mud with _ the juice squeezed out of it; Snoring-Letting off sleep; Apples t -The bubbles that apple trees blow; Back-

biter-A1 mosquito; Fan-A thing to brush the warm off with; Ice-Water that went to sleep in the cold."

In an article in the Pall Mall Magazine, entitled "Avowals," Mr. George i Moore passes in review the great names in the .Victorian "period of literature and pro-nounces judgment upon them. Thackeray, he says, is now regarded as "no more than an eminently respectaba and commonplace person." Tennyson he describes as "a man

I of mediocre intelligence," who "versified agreeably the ideas of his time,| and it was the tradition of English poetry," adds Mr Moore, "that «aved him in a measure from his congenital commonplace." The sen-tences in Scott's novels, "roll aB easily a9 empty barrels," but "the staves are begin-ning to falloutof Ivanhoe' and 'Rob Roy!"'

Mr. Moore proceeds to exercise his wit

upon the names of some of England's lite-rary celebrities. He is srruck with the ugliness of the name of Dickens-r^a mean name, a name without an atmosphere, a blade, ont-at-elbows, backstairs name-a name good enough for loud comedy and louder pathos." Scott's, again, is a "jog-trot name, a round-face 'name, a snub nosed, spectacled, pot-bellied name," &c, &c. As for Thackeray's name, "the syl-lables clatter like plates. 'We Bhall want the carriage at half-past two, Thackeray.' " "George Eliot's real name was Maria Evans, which ¡Mr. Moore is pleased to term "a chaw-bacon, fchick-loined name." The pseudonym is pronounced to be hollow, barren, without a sign of human presence in it. "George Eliot" reminds Mr. Moore of strange sea-shells in a suburban parlor, "striped-backed, white-lipped " shells, in which it is impossible to believe that a liv« ing creature ever dwelt."

PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.

"Myra of the Pine." by Herman K. Viele. T. fisher Unwin, London.

"Temple Bar." Messrs. Macmillan & Co., Lon-

don.

"Uacmillan's Magazine," Messrs. Macmillan and Co.. London. s

"The Empire Review." Messrs. Macmillan and

Co., London.

The Century Illustrated Montly Magazine. Messrs. Macmillan & Co., London.

St. Nicholas. Messrs. Macmillan & Co., Lon-

don.