FRATRIBUS.
Frafribus. By John Trent Bramston, M.A. (E. Arnold. 5s. net.)—Twenty-three out of the twenty-six sermons contained in this volume were preached in the school chapel at Winchester; and they are, we should say, exactly suited to the audience to which' they were addressed. Boys are appreciative hearers of sermons of the right sort, more appreciative than one might, perhaps, expect. They like more rhetoric, a word which we use in a good sense, than most preachers are willing, or, it may be, able, to give. And they absolutely demand that the preacher's personality should be in general accord with what he says. With that personality they are sure to be pretty well acquainted. No disguise can quite evade the keen scrutiny of a boy public ; the presence of this accordance here is, of course, beyond a critic's ken. We can only say that there is all the ring of sincerity and earnestness about these appeals to experience and conscience. Of the literary quality of the discourses we can speak in high terms. They are not in Dean Farrar's style, a style of which we would not say a word in depreciation, for he was, as a matter of fact, a singularly effective preacher to boys, but they all have a great charm, not merely as written, but as spoken words. If any one will read one of them aloud, he will see at once how finely rhythmical they are. We have not seen for a long time a volume which has commended itself to us as more exactly fitted to its occasion and purpose.
Previous page
