Of course, such a work does not profess to be critical. It aims rather at being interesting. Dr. Geikie has drawn for his materials upon every available source. From Ewald to Renan, and from Milman to the author of "Ecce Homo," he has taken everything that came to his band, and has, as a result, produced a book which, considering the popular object in view, is very successful. It is profusely illustrated; the style is picturesque, not to say turgid; and much, if not all, the information highly interesting. It is not a book for students, as may be inferred from the summary manner of disposing of the criticisms of the authenticity of the fourth Gospel adopted. In vol. i., pp. 457 and 579, Dr. Geikie says:

"We owe our knowledge of the period immediately following the temptation, to the narrative of the fourth Gospel, written after the others. The splendor of the later ministry in Galilee seems to have overshadowed the humbler beginnings of the earlier period, in the other Gospels, so that they are almost passed over by them. Happily, however, John preserves for us, in comparative detail, the incidents of these silent months in which the public life of Jesus was slowly opening into full flower. How much would have been lost had his record not been given! There is a peculiar charm in the glimpses they supply of the early spring-time of the Saviour's ministry; a tender fragrance all their own."

In a note on this passage he adds:

"I confess I have no sympathy with the critics who would seek to invalidate the fourth Gospel. To me it carries its evidence in itself, for of it, as of him of whom it tells us, we may confidently say, 'Never man spake like this.'"

"Critics" who examine any external evidence with regard to the authenticity of the Gospel would hardly have much patience with this way of treating the question. But, as he says, Dr. Geikie is no critic. His object is picturesque and readable sacred biography, and in this he succeeds.

4.-New Ireland. By A. M. SULLIVAN, Member of Parliament for Louth. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co. 1878. Pp. 532.

THE history of Ireland during this century presents an interesting picture of the gradual but steady extinction of bitter religious hatred and class feuds by means of social and political reform, ending in the elevation of the people from a condition not far removed from that of savages to that of an industrious, free, modern com. munity. Through this period Mr. Sullivan has lived, himself taking

part in many of the stormy scenes which make up its annals, and his book consists chiefly of sketches of the most interesting events of recent Irish history. It is a book which ought to be widely read in this country, where delusions on the subject of British tyranny and the aspirations of Irish agitators have been the source of much misunderstanding, and even loss of property and life. It is only a few years since one of the anniversaries celebrated regularly in the streets of New York with violence, riot, and not infrequently bloodshed, was that of the battle of the Boyne. The Irish vote has always been a powerful force in city politics. We have seen nativeAmerican mayors masquerade in Irish colors, and heard nativeAmerican orators arouse the wild enthusiasm of native-American audiences by glowing descriptions of the wrongs of Erin. We have had even an Irish republic established on our soil, and had our neutrality laws defied by Irish expeditions setting out from within our borders to prey upon neighbors with whom we were at peace. Besides all this, we were dependent on Ireland for half a century for domestic service-reason enough of itself for a keen interest in the progress of the country.

The fundamental mistake we made at the outset in dealing with the Irish, as will be apparent to any one who reads Mr. Sullivan's book, is in treating them like citizens of a modern civilized state, accustomed to well-defined rights, to respect for life and property, to the exercise of political franchises, and having political feelings, aims, desires, and ambitions, only different from our own in the fact that they had been suppressed by arbitrary power. On the contrary, the Irish who emigrated here until very recent times came from a country in which the mass of the population had never emerged from the clan-condition, in which they were totally unaccustomed to political combination, as we understand it, or to parliamentary customs, but followed blindly, with absolute confidence, the leaders whom they had been taught to trust, not because they had by any rational process arrived at a belief in a coincidence of aims, but because either it was a matter of religion to trust them, or a matter of inheritance, or because in some faction-fight they had proved their friendship. Down to a comparatively recent period the English were accustomed to speak of the Irish "savages," and we are not, even on this side of the Atlantic, unfamiliar with the expression "wild Irish "-neither epithet being given in derision, but growing out of the actual condition of the population. The "stage Irishman," for whom Mr. Sullivan, in common with all true patriots, has a VOL. CXXVI.-NO. 260.

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supreme contempt, was, after all, a sort of laudable æsthetic compromise between the barbarian himself and a certain ideal which he may be supposed to have kept in view-equally distant from the type from which it was taken, and the type into which reform has finally developed it. But we are trespassing on Mr. Sullivan's ground. In his book will be found a good many lively sketches-now and then perhaps a little too Irish in tone, but always entertaining-beginning with quite a charming picture of the Ireland of his boyhood, and coming down to the year of grace 1877.

5.-Modern Philosophy from Descartes to Schopenhauer and Hartmann. By FRANCIS BOWEN, A. M., Alford Professor of Natural Religion and Moral Philosophy in Harvard College.

ON taking up this work we were partially misled by its title. It is by no means a history of modern philosophy from Descartes to Hartmann; for it says little or nothing of the foremost names among British philosophers, and omits even many Germans who are included in all other histories of philosophy. One chapter is given to Berkeley, but only the merest mention to Bacon, Hobbes, Locke, Hume, Reid, Stewart, Mill, Hamilton, Calderwood, and Bain; and, out of the whole line of German metaphysicians between Leibnitz and Hartmann, Prof. Bowen discusses only the doctrines of Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, and Schopenhauer. He tells us, indeed, in his preface, that it has not been his purpose to write a complete history of modern philosophy, but to present a full analysis and criticism of the systems only of those great thinkers whose writings have permanently influenced the course of European thought. Yet surely it can neither be affirmed nor taken for granted that the works of Bacon and Locke were not among the most influential in shaping modern thought, and that Hume's speculations were merely a minor force in producing the great resultant. Had it not been for Bacon, we might have known neither a Hobbes nor a Berkeley nor a Locke; had it not been for Locke, we might not have had a Hume; and, had it not been for Hume, we might not have seen an Immanuel Kant. In fact, the influence of Hume in modern European philosophy appears to us to have been greater than that of any other thinker, not excepting Kant himself, whose "Critique" Prof. Bowen analyzes and expounds with unrivaled skill. The truth is that, considering the enormous labor of master

ing the works of all the distinguished philosophers from Bacon and Descartes to Schopenhauer and Hartmann, Prof. Bowen, with all his patience and perseverance, could have mastered only a limited number of them, and that, as was natural, he has probably given us a history of his own reading and thought-the rise and progress of speculation in his own individual mind. And for this we are abundantly thankful. His task has been performed so well that the restriction of it is a recommendation, and we are better instructed and more gratified than if he had expatiated over a wider field. Even had he bestowed on us nothing more than his admirable treatise on Kant, we should have been his perpetual debtors. To one who is not a German scholar Kant cannot be made intelligible in a translation, and we do not know where so complete an explanation of Kant's philosophy can be found in the English language as in Prof. Bowen's five long chapters on that system.

His two chapters on Schopenhauer are extremely interesting as containing an account of the latest development but one of German speculation.

The two concluding chapters of the work-those on Hartmann's "Philosophy of the Unconscious "-are equally interesting, and for a similar reason. He proves that the philosophy of the unconscious is a great improvement upon the doctrine of Schopenhauer, though built on the same foundations. But we cannot go all the way with him when he endeavors to show that Hartmann often approaches the teachings of Christianity. No Christian believes in an unconscious intellect. To all believers an intelligence without consciousness is a contradiction in terms. Nemo, ceu potius nil, sentet, nisi

sentiat se sentire.

We recommend Prof. Bowen's volume to all students of philosophy as bringing down its history to its latest period, and containing the freshest thought of an avowed Christian philosopher on the great subject.

6.-Californian Pictures in Prose and Verse.

By BENJAMIN PARKE AVERY. New York: Hurd & Houghton; Cambridge, The Riverside Press. 1878. 8vo, pp. 344.

SOME of the sketches contained in this volume originally appeared in the Overland Monthly, but they have been, the author says, "retouched" for this volume. His aim has been, as he modestly says, merely to give a few pictures of California scenery

from Nature, true to local color and form, and barely indicating the "salient characteristics of plant and animal life, and rocky structure." The book consists partly of verse, which, Mr. Avery tells us, makes no poetical pretension. But, whether it does or not, some of it contains much better poetry than is written in verses which make a great deal of such pretension. We have not space to quote, but must refer the reader to the book itself, in proof of the truth of what we say. Mr. Avery's "Pictures" would make, with some revision, a guide-book of a very high order; but the prose style would need a little looking after by some remorseless reviser.

7.-Money and Legal Tender in the United States. By H. R. LINDERMAN, Director of the Mint. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. 1877. 12mo, pp. x.-173.

In this little manual Mr. Linderman has collected the laws relating to coinage, legal tender, and the money standard. The infor mation at the present time, when the currency question is undergoing, as it usually does in Congress at least every five years, a thorough reexamination, is valuable. Mr. Linderman does not share the delusions of the silver agitators, and his opinions on the subject of resumption and silver coinage are such as we could wish every one connected with the financial administration of the country held. He even goes so far as to intimate that the issue of forced paper legaltender currency by the Government is invalid under the Constitution; but, as he is aware of the decisions of the Supreme Court on the subject, we hardly understand his position-though, to speak it with reverence, it may be doubted if the Supreme Court itself does.

8.- Victor Hugo: Histoire d'un Crime-Déposition d'un Témoin. I. Première Journée Le Guet-apens. II. Deuxième Journée -La Lutte. Paris: CALLMANN LÉVY, éditeur. Ancienne Maison Michel Lévy Frères. 1877. 8vo.

TWENTY-FIVE years ago, or even twelve-nay, even five or sixthis book would have been regarded on all hands as the most important of the day. It is the narration, by an eye-witness, of the memorable coup d'état of 1851, which put Louis Napoleon on the throne of France, and that eye-witness one of the most noted of living Frenchmen. It was written at the time, and by a succession of