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 IC A T IO N S .

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No. i o i .]

A P R IL 15, 1894.

[ P r i c e O n e P e n n y .

N E W P U B L IC A T IO N S .

OUR L I B R A R Y S H E L V E S .

M e s s r s . W a t t s & Co. will issue on the 28th inst. the long-promised brochure by Professor Johnson dealing with “ The Pauline Epistles ” (3s. 6d.). The work has been written in response to the request of several friends who are interested in the remarkable theories set forth by the author in “ The Rise of Christendom.” It is urged that “ St. Paul ” is the imaginary creation of Benedictine monks, and the construction of the Epistles associated with his name is traced to what is regarded as their inception.

M r . L e s l i e S t e p h e n is to write the life of his brother, Sir James Fitzjames Stephen. The heretical views of the illustrious judge arc well known, and they will he sympathetically treated in the forthcoming biography.

M e s s r s . G . P . P u t n a m ’s S o n s are issuing a volume dealing with “ Secularism: Its Progress and Morals” (7s. 6d.). The author is Mr. John M. Bonham, whose work on “ Industrial Liberty” may he familiar to our readers.

M e s s r s . W i l l i a m s & N o r o a t e have published the Hibbert Lectures for 1893. Mr. Charles B. Upton is the author, and the volume is entitled “ Lectures on the Bases o f Religious Belief” (10s. 6d.).

W ith the view of helping to counteract the reactionary policy of the London School Board, Mr. Charles Watts has written a pamphlet on “ Education : True and False ” (2d.), which he respectfully dedicates to that body.

T h e new number of the Monist, a quarterly which should have an increasing circulation among Rationalists in this country, opens with a paper by Professor C. Lloyd Morgan on “ Three Aspects of Monism General M. M. Trumbull writes on “ The Parliament of Religions Professor Max Verworn contributes an article on “ Modern Physiology Professor H. H. Williams expounds “ Kant’s Doctrine of S c h e m a t a Mr. Lester F. Ward deals with the problem of “ The Exemption of Women from L a b o u r P r o f e s s o r Hermann Schubert chooses as his theme “ Notion and Definition of Number;” while the Editor discourses on “ Ethics and the Cosmic Order.”

Mr. C h a r l e s W a t t s has published in pamphlet form his reply to I)r. R. B. Westbrook, entitled “ Is there a Life Beyond the Grave?” (3d.).

Mr. J a m e s P l a t t , J uil, is courting popularity with a promising booklet having for its theme “ Tales of the Supernatural ” ( i s .).

“ T h e Philosophical Remains of George Croom Robertson,” which Messrs. Williams & Norgate announce for early publication, have been edited by his old friend and collaborator, Professor Bain, who also contributes a memoir of the author.

P r o f e s s o r S a y c e always strikes us as a man who knows more than he utters. Some invisible hands seem to hold him back from unveiling all the secrets which he is familiar with. But whatever he deigns to publish is worth study. No Assyriologist has a better heart of making plain to the average reader the deep things of Biblical history and related subjects. Even the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge is interested, or thinks the public is, in his expositions ; and so they have recently issued a work by the Professor on “ The Higher Criticism and

“ t h e v e r d i c t o f t h e m o n u m e n t s ” (S. P. C. K. ; 1894 ; 575 pp., 10s. 6d.).

In a very nervous special preface the Tract Committee snatch at a few scattered observations of Professor Sayce, which ap.pear to imply that the Bible is not heavily jeopardised by the archaeological discoveries in the East. But it matters very little what the Tract Committee feel on the subject. The plain truth about the book is that it makes for a Rationalistic view of the Old Testament. Our only concern with this nervous Tract Committee is to grumble at their niggardliness in not furnishing good illustrations, say, of the celebrated Chaldaean Genesis Tablets, the Moabite Stone, or the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser, or even maps of Palestine and Babylonia, etc.

Two introductory chapters contain many facts which will be new to the orthodox, and to some part of the unorthodox, world. Even those who have become familiar with the idea of a rich Babylonian literature, preserved in the cuneiform characters of the clay tablets, may be astonished to learn that the Babylonian tongue was used as a medium of literary intercourse even so far west as Egypt. The next two chapters gather up the Babylonian, Canaanite, and Egyptian elements in the book of Genesis. The Professor makes a great show of fighting for the historical credit of certain passages in Genesis, and perhaps lie is right in affirming that certain statements about Chcdorlaomcr and other kings are backed up by monumental testimony. But behind all this lies his admission that the book of Genesis is a compilation from the manuscripts of different authors. No doubt it is ; nor does the discovery make Genesis any the less fascinating a document of antiquity. It docs, however, make a big leak in the theory that Moses wrote the Pentateuch ! Another point is scored against Bibliolatry, when the Professor reproduces the Egyptian parallel to the story of Joseph in the tale of the “ Two Brothers.” It is true he speaks with a piously declamatory air of the general credibility of the Joseph legend, and its harmony with Egyptian customs and conditions. But it must strike the orthodox reader as suspicious that Egyptian libraries contained a version of the unfaithful wife episode which may be as near to (or as far from) historic truth as the Genesis narrative. A chapter on the Exodus and wilderness journey deftly keeps clear of the absurdities of the Biblical miracles.

At the very best, when apologists assert that the monuments support the Bible, it only means that som e 'geographical or chronological or personal allusion in the