Dean Inge says in the brief autobiographical notes prefixed to
his new volume of reprinted essays, Assessments and Anticipations (Cassell, 7s. 6d.),that Mr. Asquith in appointing him 'to the Deanery of St. Paul's in 1911, expressed the hope that he " would revive the old traditions of the Deanery as the most literary appointment in the Church of England." It may fairly be said that Dr. Inge has 'fulfilled Mr. Asquith's expectation, for a very wide public has come to look with interest for the Dean's views on religion, polities, social ques- tions, and literature, such as may be found in this volume. He may often seem too dogmatic, too hasty in his conclusions, too lacking in the careless optimism which is a characteristic of our bustling age. But the Dean charms us none the less by his wit and by his intellectual honesty, even when we disagree with him. Typical of his courage is the paper on The Future of Protestantism, with its argument that the Northern nations have yet to find a religion " which will satisfy both their conscience and their intelligence." " That this religion will be Christian need not be doubted ; that it will not be Latin Catholicism is certain ; but it is equally certain that it cannot be Protestantism as we have known it:'
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