Christian Counsels, selected from the Devotional Works of Fénelon. Translated by A. M. James. London: Longmans, Greene & Co. (New York: Sold by The Catholic Publication Society.)
Our Protestant friends have, of late years, set to work very industriously in translating Catholic books and in writing original works on Catholic subjects. Besides the Edinburgh edition of the Ante-Nicene Fathers, just completed, and individual and collective lives of the saints we could once enumerate, the English versions of Continental devotional works have increased so rapidly as to alarm those High Churchmen who are averse to any further investigation. Of course we can only augur favorably of such enterprises when undertaken in the right spirit, though we may fear lest formulas be adopted without the necessary accompaniments of faith and obedience. Their “starved imaginations and suppressed devotional instincts,” as Dr. Bellows once phrased it, cannot long be satisfied with words only, one would think. The writings of the Archbishop of Cambrai have been too long before the English-speaking public to need any characterization at our hands, and we therefore simply chronicle the appearance of a new edition of the Christian Counsels under Protestant auspices.
Public School Education. By Michael Müller, C.SS.R. Boston: P. Donahoe. 1872.
This is Father Müller’s contribution to the literature of one of the great questions of the day. It will have attained its end if it awakens Catholics to the importance of the general theme and their duty in its regard; and also enables judicious Protestants to comprehend why we are so solicitous that our children should receive their religious training at the same time that they acquire secular knowledge.
Sir Humphrey’s Trial: A Book of Tales, Legends, and Sketches, in Prose and Verse. By Rev. Thomas J. Potter. Boston: P. Donahoe. 1872.
Father Potter seems equally at home in addressing the young and the mature, priests and people; as witness his works on homiletics and those of a miscellaneous character adapted to different ages. He evidently believes that variety is the spice of books as well as of life, as will be seen by the title of the present volume; and readers indisposed to take up a more serious book will find this an agreeable substitute.
The Catholic Review of Brooklyn has already established its position among our best weekly papers. Its sound principles, and the tact and liveliness with which it is edited make it well worthy of support. We trust that it will soon attain a sufficient circulation to furnish the means of still further increasing its value and interest, and that it will prove to be permanently successful.
The Catholic Publication Society will publish at an early day a new work, now in preparation, by the author of The Comedy of Convocation, entitled My Clerical Friends. It will be published with the consent and approval of the author.