BOOKS.
Israel's Messianic Hope. By George Stephen Goodspeed, (Macmillan and Co. 6s.)—Professor Goodspeed traces "the historical development of the foreshadovrings of the Christ" as this is to le traced through the Hebrew Scriptures. He begins with the ideal of the human destiny as it is given in the "Psalm of Creation" with which these Scriptures begin, and follows it through the earlier and later prophets. Every seer's thoughts were profoundly affected by the circumstances of his life, and by the work of his time. The Messianic utterances of David, which belong to, or at least represent, the ideals and hopes of the United Kingdom, differ widely from those of the "Second" or "Third" Isaiah in Isaiah liii. This historical treatment of the subject gives it a reality which it would otherwise lack. Bunsen, as some of our readers may remember, greatly scandalised the conservative divines of his day by maintainiag that the actual person whom the prophet of Isaiah liii. had in his mind was Jeremiah. This may or may not have been the case. What is abundantly clear is that the seer had in his mind some - actual person known to his
hearers,—if, as is likely, he had recited the prophecy to Borne assembly of his countrymen. A purely ideal picture would
have been unintelligible. Doubtless every detail of the deessip. tion has its significance. What meaning beyond this presest application there was is another matter. Professor Goodepeses volume is thoughtful and instructive in a very high degree.
The First Interpreters of Jesus. By G. II: Gilbert, D.D. (same publishers. 5s.)—The Gospels contain, or profess to contain, what Jesus said of Himself; in the Epistles we find what those who were closest to Him and to His times—some of them, it is probable, His companions, others early initiated into the tradi. tions of His teaching—said about Him. This latter subject is treated in Professor Gilbert's book. For much, we may say for most, of it we have nothing but praise. But on the fundamental point of the personality of Christ we find ourselves differing not a little. In treating Phil. iL 6-8 he discusses what was St. Paul's conception of a pre-existent Christ. The main purpose of the passage, he affirms, is ethical, not theological. He wishes to aeons humility, not to teach Christology. Then Professor Gilbert dwells on the difficult and unusual terms, making the passage "hardly available for dogmatic purposes." But he allows that pre. existence seems to be affirmed, and his explanation may be briefly described as an adaptation of the Platonic idea. "The passage affirms that in the historical Christ there was manifested the divine and eternal ideal of the Messiah." This is ingenious, and we cannot say more for it. And we must dissent from the doctrine that because St. Paul's "speculative conceptions" of Christ are few in number and briefly expressed, "they cannot be made fundamental in any theology which claims for itself tho authority of the Apostle." That is a large assumption. We would reply that the age of dogmatics was not yet come. But the formal creeds a the future were implicit in the genera conceptions of Christ as they were accepted by believers. II St. Paul did not formally assert that Christ was God, it was because he did not feel the necessity. What was actually press- ing upon him was the practical application to life. We have been led to emphasise in the small space that can be given to this volume our difference from, rather than our agreement with, Professor Gilbert. But we wish to express generally our obligation to him for a very enlightening and valuable book.—Unity in Christ By I. Armitage Robinson, D.D. (Same publishers. 6s.)—This title expresses exactly the subject of the twenty discourse included in this volume. Christ in many ways, and not least plainly when He called Himself the Son of Man, claimed to represent humanity. His Church is meant to show forth the unity which this claim presupposes; and its great act of worship, the Communion, ought to be its chief means of doing. so. Unhappily this is the very thing that divides it most, or, at least, most displays its divisions. We should all recognise," says Canon Robinson, "the sinfulness of being content with 'mini- mising differences' or 'agreeing to differ,' while we are separated one from another in respect of the most sacred act ef Christian fellowship,—the breaking of bread." This is the common sub- ject of these discourses ; they illustrate and expound it in various ways ; spiritual freedom, brotherly love, the inadequacy of outward constraint to touch the will (as in the admirable sermon, "Why not to the World? "), these and other kindred topics are treated with the same aim in view. In Sermon XLIIL, preached at St. Mary's, Cambridge, and the only one not delivered from a Westminster pulpit, the difficulties of the situation are discussed in temperate language and with no little insight. Why, the preacher asks, are churches and chapels empty, and why is the supply of candidates for Orden falling off ? He gives one answer,—the want of that faith which is not content but with the highest ideals ; but there is another which ought to be courageously stated,—we want more freedom; we cannot be bound with sixteenth-century, or for the matter of that, with second-century or fourth-century, fetters.— Word's from Bt. Paul's. By William Sinclair, Archdeacon of London, (T. Burleigh. 3s. 6d. net.)—Archdeacon Sinclair deals with a great variety of subjects, and. illustrates them, in a way that is always intelligible and sometimes felicitous, from the current topes of the day. Sometimes, we think, the discourses are wanting in logical coherence. We rise, for instance, from reading the first, "The Voice of God in Holy Scripture," without exactly learning what view the preacher takes. "St. Augustine," he says, " SS the strongest of all upholders of even literal and verbal inspire.. tion." It might have been well to follow that by an explicit statement that "literal and verbal inspiration" is a thing that is now impossible to conceive. The discourse on the term "Catholic," and that which applies Mr. Rndyard happy phrase of "The Ship that Found Herself," may be mentioned as good examples, of Archdeacon's Sinclair's style, —The Thee Life First.. By the Rev. C. W. Fullmer. (Skeffington and Son. 2s. 6d.)—Mr. Palmer's sermons (six- teen in number) are of the hortatory kind, with a certain amoimt of ornateness in the style, not more, however, than befits the pulpit ; practical in aim; and, so far as the subject calls for any expression of the kind, broad in their conception of the Christian position. It is a pity, by the way, that the preacher, wishing to enforce an unquestionable truth, uses a questionable quotation. "This kind cometh not out but by prayer and fasting" (St. Mark ix. 29). In St. Mark rat rstrrela is not authenticated, and the whole passage in St. Matthew is probably a gloss. It is absent in St. Luke. Surely the first duty of a preacher is to make himself thoroughly acquainted with the criticism of his quotations.-0Id and New Century Bells, by the Rev. John R. Vernon, MA. (Wells Gardner, Darton, and Co., 2s. 6d.), contains six Advent addresses on various subjects which may be described as coming under the sqcial aspects of religion. The preacher is a liberally minded man, though he seems to us to be somewhat wanting in courage. The "Standard of Faith," for instance, seems but a half-hearted concession to facts. "We no longer contend for verbal and literal inspiration. We conceive that dates and figures, in the many processes of copying, ere print- ing days, may have caused, in those minor matters, errors." This is very far from meeting the case. As for evolution, too, though Mr. Darwin's theories may not be wholly accept- able, something of the ,kind is now a commonplace of science. Nor is there any reason for thinking it adverse to a theistic theory of the univeise.—A Young Man's Religion. By the Rev. George Jackson. (Hodder and Stoughton. 3s. 6d.)—Here are some excellent, plain-spoken sermons on faith and practice. We may mention XII. (on the Epistle to the Galatians,—the Magna Chart a, we may say, of Christian liberty) as especially good. We would mention also the discourses on "Heredity," a difficult and obscure subject which demands the preacher's most thoughtful attention. "Christ's Appeal to the Intellect" is another much needed utterance.—Pro Patria. By Charles William Stubbs, D.D., Dean of Ely. (Elliot Stock. 6s.)— Here are " political " sermons in the largest and best sense of the word, instructions and expositions dealing with the Sperb mama-6 which expresses the idea of social relations and duties. The sermon which gives a title to the volume is a fine utterance of Imperialism of the purest kind. "International Peace," too, is a discourse which appeals strongly to our sympathies, how. ever difficult we may find it to reconcile the aspirations of the Czar with the actual conduct of Russian statesmen and soldiers. The academical discourses, one on Benefactors, preached in St. Mary's, Cambridge, the other on the Tercentenary of Sidney Sussex College, are good. So is the "May Festival of Church and Labour." "Successful Reforms," Dean Stubbs finely says at the close of this discourse, "are always in essence Puritan Reforms—for they are the Reforms, not of men whose cry was ' Ours the rights, yours the fault!' but of men who confessed 'Ours the fault!' and raised the cry of Duty. That was Christ's secret." "Religion in Village Citizenship" is a re-utterance of first principles in a subject which the preacher has made specially his own.—Shakespeare Sermons, edited by George Arburthnot (Longmans and Co., 7s. 6d. net), contains the eight sermons preached on the occasion of Shakespeare's birth- day celebration in Stratford-on-Avon Church. One discourse is common to it and the volume just noticed, Dean Stubbs's "Thanksgiving for Shakespeare." The other seven include dis- courses by Dr. Browne (now Bishop of Bristol) on "The Use of Works of Fiction" ; by the Rev. R. S. de Conroy Laffan, "Shake- speare the Prophet"; by Canon Ainger, "A Poet's Responsi- bility"; Dr. Nicholson, "The Man and the Poet "; Dean Farrar
on the same subject ; and two sermons by the editor, "A Poet's • Inspiration" and "Poet and Historian."
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