coloring to well-known facts; he gathers up the threads of philosophy which are interwoven with the narrative so that nothing is lost.

The remainder of the book is occupied with the religious history of Russia-a subject very little known in this country, but which the late Dr. Robert Baird has done much to popularize. The Russo-Greek church is the established church of Russia. It was the child of the Byzantine church; but long ago it became the leading church of the East and is almost the only communion which shows a vigorous life in that part of the world. To most of us this part of the work is new; the materials which Dr. Stanley uses are not generally accessible; much he derived only from personal observation; hence the story is fresh and interesting. You here find a venerable church endowed with all the apparatus of early Christianity, unchangable from the very nature of the people who support it, having a remarkable hold upon the nation, and if less active than we are in the Christian life, yet showing no signs of decay. It is to our shame, that we have been so long ignorant of the Russian church. Had we spared some anathemas against the Pope and learned more of a more ancient church, we might have shown more charity and gained more knowledge. We find from the pages of Dr. Stanley that the Russian church has reflected every movement which has taken place in other parts of Christendom. It has had a Reformation; it is bound up with the State, like the Church of England; it is surrounded by dissenters. But we are not giving more than an analysis of the contents of this volume; we have no space to give a digest.

This work may altogether be taken as one of the signs of the times. It may not be generally known, that since 1860 a movement has been in progress to unite the Russo-Greek church with the Anglican communion. The late Dr. Joseph Wolff took the lead in this matter by making proposals to establish a hostel for members of the orthodox Greek church in the University of Cambridge. The Rev. George Williams, of King's College, Cambridge, was united with him in this effort. He went to Russia to explain the hostel to the higher ecclesiastics of the church, and was very kindly received. At the last

meeting of the General Convention of the Episcopal Church in this country a committee of bishops, clergy, and laymen was appointed "to consider the expediency of communication with the Russo-Greek Church." This was the first step in ecclesiastical action. Since then, the attention of the Anglican clergy and also of the Russian has been drawn to this proposal. The Anglican clergy have already sent a petition from the Lower House of Convocation to the House of Bishops on this subject; and at the next meeting of Convocation, some definite action may be expected. In the meantime, the Russian clergy are informing themselves in regard to their western brethren; and we learn that the Russian mind is gradually being prepared to listen to proposals from the Church of England and from the Episcopal Church in America. The volume of Dr. Stanley has done more than anything else to bring about this movement. It has furnished actual information; it has removed the prejudice of ignorance; it has gone far to show the possibility of such a movement. If this union should be effected, it will be one of the memorable events of the age.

The volume upon the "Jewish Church" does not carry us far from the scenes of the foregoing work. That was only a section of the Christian church. This is the primeval section of the religious institutions which Christ superseded—the history of the Jewish church from Abraham to Samuel. It is the first instalment of a history from Abraham to Christ. It is an attempt to do for Jewish history what Grote has done for the Grecian. Dr. Stanley tries to examine the sacred record by the same rules which we apply to secular history. He shows you the sacred drama from the lowest, the Gentile, the footlight point of view. He divests the Bible of any conventional haze which may have enwrapt it in the minds of devout men. It must stand or fall upon its own merits, like any other history. He adopts that view of inspiration which considers the Hebrews an inspired people, a people to whom God came nearer than to the Gentile world. He feels justified in letting in the light of tradition and contemporary history to illuminate the dark points in the Scriptures. Hence this volume has a character which may be called unique. It is the ablest specimen we have seen of the free handling of sacred subjects. Dr. Stanley's affluent

learning, his excellent common-sense, his skilful disposition of materials, are everywhere manifest.

But we cannot entirely approve of this volume. It is a bold attempt to secularize biblical history. We are not bibliolaters; and we know perfectly well what we are saying. We know from experience the danger and the fascination of Dr. Stanley's position. He has no doubt come honestly into it. But in opposing textual fanaticism he verges to the extreme of what is called spiritual Christianity. This is the only really dangerous (and it is dangerous enough,) element in this book. We are ready to believe that it comes from the school in which he has been trained; that it is not the man Stanley, but the spirit Arnold. The element does not show itself in the Eastern Church," but here it is painfully manifest. You feel that the men and the places are immensely lowered from their position in the Bible. Moses is hardly the divinely appointed leader of the Host of Israel; he is the great prophetic hero. That wonderful march of forty years through the wilderness is described as you would picture one of Napoleon's campaigns. The giving of the law on Sinai is a very business-like affair. The sacrifice of Isaac is held to have had hardly more typical bearing than many events in Grecian and Roman history. The miracles are sometimes happily left in the dark, glanced over, but more often shown to have been merely natural phenomena which happened just so. Where the Bible ascribes events to God alone, Dr. Stanley tells them simply as history. He looks at his whole subject from a worldly point of view. He has written the history of the Jewish church, with the Jewish church left out. The theological element which you might justly expect is not here. He does away with those numerous little points in the sacred narrative which show to the careful reader that the Jewish church was only a preparation for the Christian. This is not atoned for by the general references which he frequently puts in. Compare his work with Dr. Jarvis's Church of the Redeemed," and you will see the difference at once. Dr. Stanley is far more elaborate; but you miss the special element which goes to make a history of the Jewish church. He lowers his whole subject into nearly a worldly history. This is the grand defect of the book. Want of space alone prevents our

quoting many of these offensive passages; but we can put the reader upon his guard. He avows himself an open sympathizer with Bishop Colenso in a note at the close of the volume. What more could we expect from the Regius Professor who has treated the Scriptures with such a liberal air? His case is not nearly so bad as that of Colenso, because he treats, for the most part of only plain undisputed matters of fact; but there are abundantly enough sore spots in his history which even the common reader cannot pass over. And when you can see fault enough in these plain matters, it is not necessary to go into minute points of criticism, for which, indeed, our author shows little relish.

We now turn to the good points in this work. It is full of life-no mere compilation of dates and names; the author tries to make you see Abraham and Moses, and the great Hebrew leaders as they appeared in their own times. He throws into them so far as he can the throbbings of a human heart. He unfolds the meaning hidden in Hebrew names; he studies the LXX; he contributes the results of two visits to the Holy Land; he shows you traditions which may possibly contain a kernel of truth. He illustrates his subject with the studies of a lifetime. He employs all the resources of literary art to render his sketches attractive. And we need hardly add that his history is brilliant, fresh, life-like, glowing like a landscape in June, or like the many-hued autumnal forest. His work is by far the liveliest contribution to sacred history made in English during this century. There is not a dull line in it. It must be popular. You read it as eagerly as you would the latest story. Although not continuous, it gives you new views of the chosen people; and had his own theological standard been higher, he would have imparted that reverence which belongs to the sacred story, and which is necessary in order to leave a right impression upon the mind.

Perhaps the most brilliant part of the work is the history of the Judges. The battles are described in a masterly manner. The lectures on the Prophets and their office are fresh and new. He here combines a wealth of information which we have often sought for in vain. And here he sets forth a higher degree of inspiration than the other parts of the volume acknowledge.

His illustrations also of many passages in the Bible make his work as useful as a commentary. His illustrations of the Psalms are specially happy and give us an insight into many passages meaningless in the English version. It is wonderful how Palestinian is the imagery of the Psalms. Dr. Stanley brings this out very often, and thus invests his pages with new interest.

We have thus shown that these volumes have all the excellences and many of the defects of modern historical and religious composition. They are written by a man singularly impartial in his sympathies, but somewhat biased in favor of a peculiar and modern school in theology. They show the research and thoroughness of an English scholar, while they exhibit the broadness, the humanity, the earnestness, and the deference to sceptical unbelief which belongs alas! to many of the best minds of this century.

ARTICLE IV.

GAME FISH OF THE NORTH.

Game Fish of the Northern States of America, and British Provinces. By BARNWELL. New York: Carleton. 1862.

IF any of our friends purpose to take for a vacation motto the apostolic resolve, "I go a fishing," we advise them to drop this volume into their pocket alongside the never to be displaced Walton. Like its inapproachable prototype, it is learned in the nature and habits of the finny tribes, in the mysteries of bait and tackle, catching and landing. But, instead of trolling along the sedgy banks of such tiny though immortal rivulets as the Trent and the Dove, whiling away whole mornings in poetical, philosophical, and moralizing dialogue, until you begin almost to despair of your dinner, this author has you away, with modern speed, " down between the grand old hills of the majestic Saguenay," where dark precipices a thousand