is rather because God must first be revealed through the moral and religious nature of man, in order to be discerned in Nature (241). "All the orchestras in the world would in vain pour forth their harmonies, if there were no 'music in the soul.' No truth can be gained by the seer, or imparted by him to another, which cannot become the mental property of him who hears the message, by the co-operation of his intelligence and feeling" (250). The main criticisms to be passed upon the book relate to blemishes that might easily be removed in a second edition. In the first place, one lights upon some dogmatic statements far too bluntly put. For example, those on the origin of religion (9); that on a postulated Unity of Being (117); that about an "immanent unitary will" (131); the whole reasoning on p. 151; the treatment of freedom (167 and 173); the remarks about personality at the foot of p. 211; the round condemnation of T. H. Green (229). Once more, several times throughout the text, one is jarred by an unnecessary carping at modern psychology. Occasionally, too, Professor Tyler accepts doubtful positions too easily, as that of Maine (76); and the value of the various authorities cited by him is at times unequal (e.g., 150). Surely Burke, Carlyle, and Romanes loom large enough to forego the prefatory "Mr," especially when "Jackson," whoever he may be, goes without it. "Thiele" and "Weissman" are bad misprints, and in the note on p. 143, "130" has crept in for 157. The brilliant writer, who has chosen to be known as A Troglodyte," can well afford to dispense with the "doctorate" conferred upon him by Professor Tyler, if not by Professor Tyler's university. A more serious defect is the number of second hand references, and the absence of "chapter and verse" from many of those cited at first hand. Both these oversights ought certainly to be removed, for they impart an unscholarly air to the book which it does not merit, and detract from its undoubted qualities as a manual for students. R. M. WENLEY. The Rational or Scientific Ideal of Morality. By P. F. Fitzgerald. London: Swann, Sonnenschein & Co. 1897. 8vo, pp. xi. 357. Price, 78. 6d. THE author of this interesting and suggestive volume-perhaps I should say the authoress has already issued several volumes on kindred or related themes. The Philosophy of Self-Consciousness is designed to present an analysis of Reason and the Rationale of Love. A Treatise on the Principle of Sufficient Reason is designed to show the reality of Faith, Love and Hope; or, to quote the writer Fitzgerald's Rational or Scientific Ideal of Morality. 33 and to give a specimen of the phraseology with which the reader has to contend, to give "the synthesis of the spontaneously associated forms of thought in the reflective, introspective, ontological representations of causality which determine the Science of Logic. A Protest against Agnosticism furnishes a plea for the reasonableness of belief and a protest against the excessive study of the works of the Physicists. The present volume is intended to describe the Principle of Moral Evolution, morality being defined as "the subsumption of feeling, intelligence and benevolent will in the unity of Being," and the principle of evolution being love. In the sub-title, the volume claims to contain a theory of cognition, a metaphysic of religion, and an apologia pro amore. The work is divided into three Parts. In the first of these the author lays down a variety of positions. The rational ideal must be sought in the domain of metaphysics. The term rational ideal is an ontological expression, seeing that we owe the conception of the ideal, in all forms of it, to transcendental reason. All our noblest aspirations emanate from the same source. A primal instinct makes us seek the Best for Being. The scientific or rational basis of morality lies in correspondence in feeling, intelligence and will with the reflective principle of sufficient reason, this principle being the actualisation and fulfilment of love as it regards self, society, and God: that this love may be actualised and fulfilled is why we act morally. Feeling, intelligence and will must all be satisfied, which can only be where love is supreme. The condition of our spiritual evolution is our being fast bound by love. Love constitutes happiness; but human love without divine love is a house built on sand. The Ideal is not complete or efficient, in the highest sense, without religion. Self love or prudence, social love or sympathy, and divine love or adoration, all play their part in duty, for duty, or God's will, can only be done in our whole being. The ideal conception of Deity is the reflection of a moral consciousness, of which religion is the outcome and the sanction. In natures in which reflective reason is little developed, the ideal of God is anything but that of a just and benevolent Being. Harmony of spiritual Beings, like that of matter and mind, is that from which the happiness of social beings results. The perfection of being is where all divinely established relations hold without contradiction or hindrance. A true moral judgment is the outcome of the complete evolution of the three sources, or principles, of thought, that is of feeling, intelligence and will. These-feeling, intelligence and will-being only imperfectly fulfilled here, we expect their perfect functioning, under more favourable circumstances, in a better land beyond the grave. In the second Part of the work the author proposes to exhibit Vol. VIII.-No. 1. с the processes that lead to the conclusions in regard to the moral sense which the third Part is designed to state. Morality is the crowning outcome of spontaneous and reflective thought. As a science morality regards the end or purport of all rational activity, the aim and goal of which is the realisation and the conservation of the integrity of Being. The moral law of action is for the Best for Being. Being, as a whole, must be regarded, divine and human, and what is best for this. Psychical evolution means the development of our faculties of feeling, intelligence and will in the light of the end of these. Spiritual love is God's last and best gift to man : its fulness completes the evolution. The writer of this volume is endowed with the gift of copious and suggestive expression, and with varied and ample learning. The gift of lucid and convincing exposition is not so apparent. It is often difficult to feel the progressive movement of the intellectual proofs of the positions laid down. The progress of ideas, and the conclusiveness of the chain of reasoning, are obscured by too copious remark. Those who agree with the gifted writer will be content with the illustrations of the main positions, but the gainsayer will, I think, hardly be convinced. The reasoning is not lucid enough; the compulsion is not urgent enough for the conviction of the adversary. The points to be established are too often rather illustrated than proved. Then technical modes of expression abound, and sometimes obscure the writer's meaning. There is also a lack of precision in the use of terms which is confusing to the reader, hindering his just appreciation of what is said. The perceptive powers of the writer seem to be of a higher order than the reasoning powers. Nowhere is the author at any great pains to be clear and concise. The literary style lacks simplicity, and there are signs of haste in the composition and structure of the book. There appears to be no distinction between morality and religion, while happiness rather than holiness seems to be not simply the goal of human desire, but its proper goal. It must be added that the volume is a mine of apt quotation and suggestive remark. The writer is a transcendentalist in the best sense of the term, and reveals a mind busy with ideas that have a higher source than the senses, and reach to the highest. Lofty and quickening impulses the work can hardly fail to arouse in those who read it, and there is an evident and burning desire to deliver an ennobling message. VAUGHAN PRYCE. Morale Chrétienne. Par Jules Bovon, docteur en théologie. Tome Premier. Lausanne: Georges Bridel et Cie.; Paris: Fischbacher. London and PROFESSOR BOVON's outline of Christian Ethics is part of an extended work on Christian belief and practice. He follows up his two volumes on New Testament Theology and his two volumes on Dogmatics with two on Christian Ethics-the whole to form a comprehensive Study of the Work of Redemption. Only the first of these concluding volumes is published at present; but that which is still to appear will be occupied with the detailed application of principles, and in the volume before us we find Professor Bovon's general conception of the place of 'Christian Ethics' in Theology and of Christian conduct and character as the 'Practical Consequences of the Work of Redemption.' It must be admitted that Professor Bovon scarcely fulfils the expectations raised by this imposing array of themes and of successive volumes. We should naturally look for systematic order and systematic completeness, as leading features of a work so carefully concatenated. But while the author possesses many qualifications for his large task-piety, sympathy, learning; moderation and good judgment; a lucid and unpretentious style; as well as real spiritual insight and a certain quiet originality-he does not add to these the gifts of the system-builder. Anything less systematic than these pages can hardly be imagined. It would be useless to quote the elaborate division into sections and sub-sections, which certainly would not tell its own story. Many topics are discussed with sense and wisdom; every page is readable; and the whole has the freshness and reality of first-hand thought, the true and unaffected originality of the man with a mind of his own. But that simple and convincing order, which is the proper aim of a treatment so slight and inexhaustive, as it is the only thing that could give it distinction, is altogether lacking. The introduction is meagre and unenlightening; matter that naturally belonged to it is found loading and obstructing the subsequent argument; and all through we miss the grasp and penetration, the tact and felicity, of truly systematic thought. Four subjects should naturally fall to be considered in an introduction to a study of Christian Ethics. Something must first of all be said about the presuppositions of the ethical idea and ethical experience generally; this implies at least an indication of the method and results of a philosophical criticism, and some sort of Moral Philosophy. Secondly, the presuppositions of Christian Ethics should be pointed out; the argument of Theism, and of Christian Theism, being suggested, and the ethical bearings of these beliefs discussed. Thirdly, since in speaking of Christian Ethics we are on definitely dogmatic and theological ground it is necessary to determine the place of Ethics, viewed in a theological light, within the encyclopædia of the theological sciences. Lastly, the history of Christian theological Ethics would form a natural subject of introductory treatment: the history of moral thought in the Church. The prolegomena to Christian Ethics, that is, should be philosophical, apologetic, encyclopædic, and historical. Professor Bovon has not cared to distinguish these various lines of thought; and while he touches on them all, it is in a confused and unsatisfactory manner. He devotes a part of his Introduction to the theistic argument, that God is the postulate of morality. But he gives us on this point only a few pages of somewhat perfunctory and inconclusive suggestions, and turns with manifest preference to the historical question of the relations between morality and religious faith, sketching with a hasty but rather a happy touch the moral effects of the various historical religions and the various types of Christian belief. The history of moral reflection within the Church is only indicated in the barest outline. Stress is justly laid upon the occasional nature of the moral teaching of the New Testament, and on the unsystematic character of the ethical thought of Christian theologians before they began to be influenced by Kant. The review of the history is followed by an attempt to arrive at the conception of a method in theological ethics and of their place in the theological system as a whole. This is sought by means of a criticism of the ideas of Rothe on the subject. Professor Bovon's objections to Rothe's programme of 'speculative' theology, and to speculation in theology as a substitute for fact and experience, might be met by a distinction of philosophy, and the philosophy of religion, from theology proper-theology as a science, making inductions from its own subject-matter. But taking theology, as the author does, in the latter sense, he has not much difficulty in shewing the legitimacy of an analysis of Christian conduct as a part of it. "Revenons donc à la morale en tant que branche théologique pour en marquer la place dans la théorie du fait chrétien.” L'ethique est donc englobée, avec raison .. dans la théologie systématique, qui se subdivise en dogmatique et en morale." "D'après ce point de vue, la dogmatique partirait de Dieu et la morale de l'homme, c'est a dire que les mêmes sujets reviendraient dans l'une comme dans l'autre sous des aspects divergents. Ainsi la sanctification, traitée au point de vue dogmatique, aurait le caractère d'une œuvre divine, alors que la |