WATTS’S LITERARY GUIDE B E I N G A M O N T H L Y R E C O R D O F L I B E R A L A N D A D V A N C E D P U B L I C A T IO N S .
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No. 78.]
MAY 15 , 1892.
[P r ice One Penny.
N E W P U B L I C A T IO N S .
O U R L I B R A R Y S H E L V E S .
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Messrs. Watts & Co. will issue early next month a valuable booklet from the pen of Samuel Laing, the author of “ Modern Science and Modern Thought.” The brochure, which will be entitled “ An Agnostic View of the Bible ” (6d.), is a reprint, with additions, of a paper contributed to “ The Agnostic Annual: 18 9 1 .”
Mr. G. J . H olyoake’s autobiography, the early publication of which we announced last month, will he confined to such incidents as have public interest in them. The narrative includes the origin of sundry social movements, such as English Socialism, co-operation, questions of the civil rights of women, and kindred subjects. Mr. Holyoake gives his opinion of the character of public men, as Mr. John Bright, Mr. W. E Forster, and others, and arrives at somewhat different estimates of them from those usually accepted. Stories of out-of-the-way men, and strange incidents having no other record, are said to abound in the book.
The N ew W orld is the title of a new American Quarterly Review of Religion, Ethics, and Theology. It is issued under the auspices of an “ Editorial Board,” consisting of Professors C. C. Everett and C. H. Toy, of Harvard University, and President Orello Cone, of Buchtel College. The contents of the first number are varied and interesting, the contributors being some of the foremost men of “ light and leading” in the liberal religious movement.
J udicial, dignified, philosophic Freethought is nowhere better expounded than in Mr. John Morley’s essay,
“ on compromise"
(Macmillan; latest edition; 18 9 1 ; 284 p p .; 5s.). The style is a model of pure English, trenchant, strong, and polished. Perhaps there is a tendency to over-much phrasemaking at times; but then the phrases are so neat and apt and compact that we promptly stifle our rising criticisms. The editors who like to snip telling paragraphs for chance corners and columns of miscellaneous reflections will find a noble quarry in Mr. Morley’s essay. Whole pages may be cut out which burn with the light of literary jewels almost as brightly without as with their context. The beauty of the treatise lies not in any wealth of information imparted, for it is not in the author’s mind to collate facts. Even when he calls in the help of historical illustrations he does so, in all cases, as one who takes for granted that the reader is familiar with the points cited. The value of the work consists in its incisive, direct, and lucid statement of the broad principles of intellectual progress. The main question is invested with an ethical significance, and driven home to the individual conscience. Mr. Morley is a severe censor; occasionally, we think, he is too ready to condemn. But it is well for us all to be brought face to face with such monition, and forced, even against our will, to search our hearts.
M essrs. W. Stewart & Co. have published a new edition of Saladin’s “ The Confessional Exposed ” (is.).
L ast year’s Hibbert Lectures, on “ The Origin and Growth of the Conception of God as Illustrated by Anthropology and History” (10s. 6d.), by Count Goblet D’Alviella, Professor of the History of Religions at the University of Brussels, are published by Messrs. Williams & Norgate. The volume is profoundly interesting, and contains a mass of most valuable information.
Miss H elen H. Gardener, the author of “ Men, Women, and Gods,” etc., has published, under the title “ Pushed by Unseen Hands ” (4s. 6d.), another volume of stories. The volume will be reviewed in an early issue of the L i t e r a r y Guide.
THE Open Court Publishing Company has issued the third edition, revised and enlarged, of Dr. Paul Carus’s “ The Idea of G o d ” (8d.).
A CHEAP popular edition of Mrs. Humphry Ward’s heretical novel, “ David Grieve ” (6s.), is announced.
“ I donea S inclair ” (6s.) is the title of the latest Freethought novel. The author is a lady, who writes under the nom de p lum e of “ Thalia Marsden.” The prom ism«-work will be reviewed in these columns next month
In the fifth and last chapter of the work Mr. Morlcythus gives, at a glance, the characteristics of the just spirit of compromise and the unjust: “ It is legitimate compromise to say : ‘ I do not expect you to execute this improvement, or to surrender that prejudice, in my time. Bui, at any rate, it shall not be my fault if the improvement remains unknown or rejected. There shall be one man at least who has surrendered the prejudice, and who does not hide that fact.’ It is illegitimate to say : ‘ I cannot persuade you to accept my truth ; therefore I will pretend to accept your falsehood.” There are two main currents of thought right throughout, the political and the religious. One cannot help feeling that, though Mr. Morley devotes a considerable space to the consideration of the duty of political independence, yet his chief purpose is to attack hypocrisy in religion. It should be clearly apprehended, too, that the writer does not attempt to plead with the convinced Christian. His appeal is to the priest who serves a Church while disbelieving most of its dogmas, and to the timid Rationalist who conceals his Freetbought in fear of social opinion. “ If,” says Mr. Morley, “ unbelievers and doubters were more courageous, believers would be less timorous. It is because they live in an enervating fool’s paradise of seeming assent and conformity that the breath of an honest and outspoken word strikes so eager and nipping on their sensibilities.”
The few brief notes of description above supplied will possibly be sufficient to mark the general scope of the essay, and we need only enumerate the sections and their
