now known to science. Normal insensibility to these rays must be ascribed not to the retina-which seems really to detect them when in contact-but to the defective transparency of the crystalline lens. The brochure discusses the possibility of our sometime coming at a means of rendering all these rays perceptible by means of instruments. 18. It is with a feeling of pleasure that we take occasion to recommend to our readers the work of Professor Ramsay on the credibility of St. Luke's account of the Nativity. Professor Ramsay's name is known to every living student of Christian origins. His works on the relation of the early church to the Roman State, and on the life of St. Paul, have placed his reputation so high that few scholars in his department of research are equal to him. But it is on the little book we are now reviewing that rest his fairest fame, and his unquestioned right to the veneration of the Christian world. Every one is aware that it has been the fashion from long past in critical circles to despise the historical value of St. Luke's writings. Both in the third Gospel and in the Acts-so we have been and still are eruditely informed-Luke is guilty of an entire lack of the historical sense, and passes before us under the guise of authentic fact what modern scholarship has demonstrated to be empty report, downright contradiction, and patent impossibility. And his blunder of blunders, so runs on the impeachment, is his account of the Saviour's nativity. He tells us of an enrollment made under Augustus, when as Gardthausen, the great authority on Augustus, assures us, such an enrollment never existed, and would have been futile if it had. Secondly, even on the supposition of an imperial census, Palestine, being an independent though tributary state, would have been excluded from it. And finally, even granting a Palestinian census, the alleged journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem would have been entirely against Roman usage, which numbered people, as we do, in their own homes. The case against St. Luke seemed apparently to have strength. Professor Ramsay takes issue with this prevalent criticism, utterly demolishes it, and demonstrates the thesis he has upheld for years, that St. Luke is one of the most reliable * Was Christ Born at Bethlehem? A Study on the Credibility of St. Luke. By W. M. Ramsay. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. historians and careful chroniclers we can read. Recent discoveries of enrollment lists in Egypt show the periodical census-taking of the Roman emperors; an investigation of the official states of tributary countries like Palestine proves that they were bound to observe these enrollments; and, finally, the whole history of Herod's reign assures us that he would almost certainly order his subjects to be numbered in the Hebraic manner of tribal connection, so that the hated Roman law might give them less offence. This tribal enumeration would require precisely such a journey to the native city as we see Joseph and Mary making from Nazareth to Bethlehem These three counter-positions to the critical arguments are established by Professor Ramsay with a vast store of learning handled with consummate ease. The book is already a classic the world over. It has profoundly modified the critical thought of recent years, and for many years to come it will be the unrivalled treatise in its own sphere. To our readers who engage in such studies we highly recommend it. 19. A new volume in the Oxford Library of Practical Theology, by the Rev. Leighton Pullan, and entitled The Christian Tradition, is in many respects a noteworthy book. It is first of all remarkable in the variety of its contents. Its nine chapters deal with The New Testament, The Creed, Apostolical Succession, Episcopacy, Western Liturgies, Festivals, National Churches, Penitence in the Early Church, and Monasticism. Some of these topics are treated in a masterly manner. The chapter on the New Testament is a fine summary of the main positions and of the vital weaknesses in rationalistic criticism. The discussion of Episcopacy and Penance presents the classical arguments for the Catholic position on these doctrines. Indeed, it is not difficult to perceive that the author has gone more than once to the researches of Roman Catholic scholars; he gratefully acknowledges his indebtedness to Mgr. Batiffol, the rector of the Catholic University of Toulouse, whose essay on Penance he has largely used. We rejoice to see so much of the book uncompromisingly Catholic. The author is an advanced Anglican who loves to describe his belief as that of the first six or seven ecumenical councils, and consequently that of the undivided *The Christian Tradition. By the Rev. Leighton Pullan. New York: Longmans, Green & Co. primitive church. Naturally, however, he comes into conflict at times with positions dear to Catholics. For instance, speaking of the Quartodeciman controversy in the second century, he refers to St. Irenæus as rebuking the Roman Bishop, and thus proving how in primitive times the successor of St. Peter was on a perfect level with his colleagues in the episcopate. The action of St. Irenæus in that dispute was, on the contrary, more like that of a suppliant than an indignant remonstrant, and his appeal to Pope St. Victor not to excommunicate the Quartodecimans is one of the strongest witnesses to the undisputed primacy of Rome even in that very dawning of Christianity. The author contends, too, that Roman Catholicism stands today for undue interference with the privileges and liberties of national churches. The precise limits of autonomous action within these churches have from the beginning until now formed a vexing problem, and rash would he be who would presume to give a final and irrevocable solution of it. But it is a problem after all of accidentals. Rome as the centre of infallible Christian teaching is the main point to be settled, and that clear issue should not be clouded with considerations and controversies about disciplinary regulations, for these will soon adjust themselves peaceably when once unity in Christ's doctrine has been reached. And indeed, on reflection, our author himself, we think, would admit that the inconveniences, as he deems them, of Papal rule are far preferable to the misfortunes that multiply over the head of a Christian communion when it becomes too national. Stagnation in the Greek Church and appalling Erastianism in his own Anglican body, have a more disastrous history than can be found in the external government of any national church that looks to Rome for guidance. We take leave of this book with sincere respect for the author's wide learning, tolerant spirit, and love for many things which we are one with him in venerating. To meet men like him fills the heart with hunger for the Saviour's heavenly ideal, "that they may be one as Thou in Me and I in Thee." 20. We had already at hand a rather full knowledge of the life of Max Müller, from the reminiscences published in his lifetime. But most decidedly was there need for the two volumes of his letters just brought out under the editorship of • The Life and Letters of the Right Honorable Max Müller. Edited by his Wife. New York: Longmans, Green & Co. 2 vols. his wife. There is in these documents of the great scholar's intimate life and thought a fascination far surpassing any merely biographical interest. In reality these two volumes form a fairly complete biography, so well is the disposition of the correspondence made, and so good is the running sketch of the very capable editor. The early letters tell of the heroic struggle made by the young man to secure an education and a name despite the obstacle of poverty. The letters of his middle life show how wide an influence he exercised in the world of scholarship. Burnouf, Bunsen, Renan, Pusey, Tyndall, Gladstone, and scores of other eminent men in school, church, and state corresponded and took counsel with him; and that counsel is given with so genial a temper, with so warm a human interest, with so clear a personal tone that we find ourselves reading at the same time the records of a wonderful mind and the sentiments of a tender heart. His letters to his mother are more than charming; they are edifying. Beginning with his first hard struggles, when there were many days without a dinner, but never one without hope, these affectionate notes to the one he loved best continue until her death, when his name was known in honor the world over, and express throughout the deepest filial solicitude, reverence, and devotion. The spirit of his German home and the traditions of the Fatherland grew green in his heart to the end. He is a typical Teuton. In a kindly but unmistakable manner he holds to the superiority of the northern over the southern nations of Europe, both in general civilization and in religion. On this topic he once or twice speaks in a way from which Catholics would dissent. 21. In the well-known French series of lives of the saints we have a new biography of St. Alphonsus. It is a brief sketch which vividly presents all the authentic incidents in the life of a great servant of God. For ever beautiful and for ever sad will be the story of those last terrible trials which beset St. Alphonsus in his extreme old age. That story is touchingly told here, and of itself would be enough to win many readers for this book. There is an attempt to consider the writings of *St. Alphonse de Liguori (1696–1787). Par le Baron J. Angot des Rotours. Paris: Victor Lecoffre. St. Alphonsus, but so brief is the notice that it can hardly be called satisfactory. Finally, we must express our regret that the author, in his preface, has placed before us as worthy of credence the story of the celebrated assemblage of Jansenists at Bourgfontaine. It will be remembered that several eminent leaders of Jansenism are said to have met at Bourgfontaine in 1621 and devised means for the destruction of Catholicity. The story has found place in reputable history, but it is too improbable to be believed, and weakened by too many decisive arguments to be honored at this late day with insertion in a serious composition. 22. The life of St. Philip Neri by Pietro Giacomo Bacci,* which was first brought out at Rome in 1837, and ten years later. translated into English, has just been reissued, in an elaborate two-volume edition, under the supervision of Father Antrobus, of the London Oratory. St. Philip is esteemed by multitudes as the most winning, most lovable, and most wise of all the church's canonized heroes. No saint is so well adapted to be the patron of the lives of modern men; for none has been so devoutly ingenious in devising means for sanctifying the ordinary avocations of secular activity. We need to know St. Philip well. A life of him should both give us the inner spirit of the saint, and commend itself to commend itself to our minds and hearts by a sane and sympathetic treatment. We regret to say that from this twofold point of view Bacci's Life is a failure. The historic position of St. Philip, and his true and complete character, are missed in this feeble delineation. And from the stand-point of rational piety the work is repulsive. We object to nothing in hagiography or in any other department of history which has evidence to rest upon. But when miracles are accumulated by the hundred, great numbers of them puerile and unworthy of a divine Agent, and some of them shocking to reverence and delicacy, we strenuously object. The Catholic spirit does not require food of such a sort; on the contrary, it finds it revolting. Bacci's book should never have been placed before English and American readers. It The Life of St. Philip Neri. From the Italian of Father Bacci. New and Revised Edition. Edited by Frederick Ignatius Antrobus. St. Louis: B. Herder. |