This is a work which fairly answers its title, and we have in its two handsome duodecimo volumes sketches and descriptions so graphic of the men and women of the English Reformation as to place them most vividly before us.
Beginning with the unlovely correspondence of Henry VIII. with Anne Boleyn, and recounting many interesting details of the divorce question, the narrative passes on to a review of the leading incidents and the principal personages of the reign of Henry. The political murders of Sir Thomas More and of Bishop Fisher, the death of Queen Katharine, and the fall of Anne Boleyn, are described with fresh details of interest drawn from newly opened sources of historic information.
On the subject of “Clerical Reformers and their Spouses,” there is a very readable chapter, and, with a full disquisition upon the “Religious Institutions of Old England,” we have startling statements concerning the character of the “Monastic Inquisitors” under that arch-villain, Thomas Cromwell, Henry’s Secretary of State, as will open the eyes of such as are unaware of the depth of infamy fathomed by the scoundrels who stole or wasted the wealth of England’s grand mediæval charities and robbed the poor and the sick of their sole heritage of succor and consolation. At the sight of the suffering entailed by the destruction of the monasteries, those glorious asylums of religion, charity, and learning, even as enthusiastic a panegyrist of the Reformation as Froude cannot help exclaiming: “To the universities, the Reformation had brought with it desolation. To the people of England it had brought misery and want. The once open hand was closed. ... The prisons were crowded.... Monks and nuns pointed with bitter effect to the fruits of the new belief, which had been crimsoned in the blood of thousands of the English peasants.”
The second volume gives us the principal events and personages of the end of the reign of Henry VIII. and of the reigns of Edward VI. and of Mary Tudor; and effective use is made not only of authentic documentary evidence which has come to light within the past seven years, but also of the important, because impartial, testimony of distinguished Protestant writers, such as Hook, Maitland, Brewer, Blunt, and Stephenson. We commend the work as one of exceeding interest.
The Life of Marie-Eustelle Harpain, the Sempstress of St. Pallais, called “The Angel of the Eucharist.” Second edition. London: Burns, Oates, & Co.; New York: The Catholic Publication Society. 1872.
This is one of the most interesting lives which we have read. The lives of the saints always should be interesting, but often the methodical and dry way in which they are, as we may say, constructed, has a discouraging effect upon the reader greater than that which the heroic virtues of their subjects can produce. This is not the case with this memoir of one whom we may be allowed to call a saint, though she has not yet been recognized as such by the church, always prudent, and especially so with regard to canonizations. Marie-Eustelle died in 1842, at the age of 28, and belongs entirely to this nineteenth century, which is so ignorant of its true glories. Her life is quite imitable in most respects, as well as admirable, which is an additional reason for reading a book that is so very readable.
The Parables of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. With twenty-one Illustrations, from original designs by D. Mosler, H. Warren, and J. H. Powell, engraved by Holman and Bale. New York: The Catholic Publication Society.
The Rev. Mr. Formby, whose zeal, learning, and taste have so enriched the library of Catholic books for the young, gives here a popular work on the Parables, which will be wonderfully attractive. The Parables are all given in full, with fine illustrations to fix them on the mind, and explanations of their spiritual sense, drawn from the holy fathers. These beautiful lessons of our Lord cannot be too deeply impressed on minds to serve as subjects of meditation, and, well understood, they will prove sources of many graces. Outside the church, they remain to most “mere parables, not unfrequently indeed admired, and even quoted, beautiful in their way as anecdotes, but without in the least disclosing their true meaning.”