A commentary on Ecclesiastes

by Thomas Pelham Dale

STONES OF THE TEMPLE; OR, LESSONS FROM THE FABRIC AND FURNITURE OF THE CHURCH. By Walter Field, M.A., F.S.A., Vicar of Godmersham. With numerous Illustrations. Crown 8vo. 7s. 6d.

“Anyone who wishes for simple information on the subjects of Church-architecture and furniture, cannot do better than consult ‘Stones of the Temple.’ Mr. Field modestly disclaims any intention of supplanting the existing regular treatises, but his book shows an amount of research, and a knowledge of what he is talking about, which make it practically useful as well as pleasant. The wood-cuts are numerous and some of them very pretty.”—Graphic.

“A very charming book, by the Rev. Walter Field, who was for years Secretary of one of the leading Church Societies. Mr. Field has a loving reverence for the beauty of the domus mansionalis Dei, as the old law books called the Parish Church.... Thoroughly sound in Church feeling, Mr. Field has chosen the medium of a tale to embody real incidents illustrative of the various portions of his subject. There is no attempt at elaboration of the narrative, which, indeed, is rather a string of anecdotes than a story, but each chapter brings home to the mind its own lesson, and each is illustrated with some very interesting engravings.... The work will properly command a hearty reception from Churchmen. The footnotes are occasionally most valuable, and are always pertinent, and the text is sure to be popular with young folks for Sunday reading.”—Standard.

“Mr. Field’s chapters on brasses, chancel screens, crosses, encaustic tiles, mural paintings, porches and pavements, are agreeably written, and people with a turn for Ritualism will no doubt find them edifying. The volume, as we have said, is not without significance for readers who are unable to sympathize with the object of the writer. The illustrations of Church-architecture and Church ornaments are very attractive.”—Pall Mall Gazette.

A SHADOW OF DANTE. Being an Essay towards Studying Himself, his World, and his Pilgrimage. By Maria Francesca Rossetti. With Illustrations. Crown 8vo. 10s. 6d.

“The ‘Shadow of Dante’ is a well-conceived and inviting volume, designed to recommend the ‘Divina Commedia’ to English readers, and to facilitate the study and comprehension of its contents.”—Athrnæum.

“And it is in itself a true work of art, a whole finely conceived, and carried out with sustained power,—one of those reproductions and adumbrations of great works, in which mere servile copying disappears, and which are only possible to a mind which, however inferior to its original, is yet of the same order and temperament, with an unusual faculty for taking the impressions of that original and reflecting them undimmed. It is much to say of a volume like this. But it is not too much to say, when, after going through it, we consider the thorough knowledge of the subject shown in it, the patient skill with which the intricate and puzzling arrangements of the poem, full of what we call the conceits and puzzles of the contemporary philosophy, are unravelled and made intelligible; the discrimination and high principle with which so ardent a lover of the great poet blames his excesses; the high and noble Christian faith which responds to his; and, lastly, the gift of eloquent speech, keen, rich, condensed, expressive, which seems to have passed into the writer from the loving study of the greatest master in his own tongue of all the inimitable harmonies of language—the tenderest, the deepest, the most awful.”—Guardian.

“The work introduces us not merely to the author’s life and the political and ecclesiastical conjunctures under which he lived, but to the outlines of the Catholicised systems of ethics, astronomy, and geography which he interpreted in classifying his spirits and assigning them their dwellings; as also to the drift of his leading allegories; and finally, to the general conduct of his poem—which is amply illustrated by citations from the most literal verse translations. We find the volume furnished with useful diagrams of the Dantesque universe, of Hell, Purgatory, and the ‘Rose of the Blessed,’ and adorned with a beautiful group of the likenesses of the poet, and with symbolic figures (on the binding) in which the taste and execution of Mr. D. G. Rossetti will be recognised. The exposition appears to us remarkably well arranged and digested; the author’s appreciation of Dante’s religious sentiments and opinions is peculiarly hearty, and her style refreshingly independent and original.”—Pall Mall Gazette.

“It bears traces throughout of having been due to a patient, loving and appreciative study of the great poet, as he is exhibited, not merely in the ‘Divina Commedia,’ but in his other writings. The result has been a book which is not only delightful in itself to read, but is admirably adapted as an encouragement to those students who wish to obtain a preliminary survey of the land before they attempt to follow Dante through his long and arduous pilgrimage. Of all poets Dante stands most in need of such assistance as this book offers.”—Saturday Review.

PARISH MUSINGS; OR, DEVOTIONAL POEMS. By John S. B. Monsell, LL.D., Rural Dean, and Rector of St. Nicholas, Guildford. Fine Edition. Small 8vo. 5s. Cheap Edition, 18mo, limp cloth, 1s. 6d.; or in Cover, 1s.