Mr. Haweis displays as much rhetorical vigour and perfervid in-
tolerance of " orthodoxy " as ever in The Conquering Cross, as he entitles the fifth volume of his series, "Christ and Christianity" (C. Burnet and Co.) With his theological views, perhaps not many readers who are acquainted with the literature of the subject will agree, e.g., with his description of St. John's Gospel, which "came into vogue soon after the death of Polycarp," as representing "the irresistible triumph of the gnostic-tinged Pauline theology;" but his sketches of persons and manners during the first three centuries of Christianity have in them at least the charm of freshness and rhetorical vivacity. And then he has no difficulties, no doubts, no reservations ; Dean Stanley, M. Ronan, and the Religion of Humanity are enough for him,— " cover the ground," to use his own phrase ; and his picturesque and imaginative descriptions, as Nero, Clemens Romani's, Polycarp, Blandina, Justin Martyr, Constantine, Arias, and Athanasius, follow one another rapidly over the stage, and make, if not history, at all events attractive reading that may be mistaken for it.
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