We have only to add the earnest wish that Catholics generally would read this book and profit by the instruction it contains. There are very many among us who might lead others to the truth, if they were better informed as to the grounds of their faith, and the points of controversy which separate the conflicting Christian sects from the church. Idleness and ignorance will be a fearful burden to bear before the Judge of all. The talent hidden in the ground will be demanded with interest, and the unprofitable [pg 575] servant will have to answer for light unimproved and grace unfruitful. The souls we could have saved will rise up against us in the day of our greatest need. “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required.”
T. S. P.
Three Essays on Religion. By John Stuart Mill. New York: Henry Holt & Co. 1874.
What John Stuart Mill was, and what his life was, our readers have been already informed in a review of his Autobiography. The prince of modern English sophists and sceptics, he was as miserable and hopeless in life and death as the victim of an atheistical education might be expected to be; as miserable as a man outwardly prosperous, enjoying the resources of a cultivated mind, and exempted by the moral force of his character from the consequences of gross crimes, could well become. These three Essays are essays of the unhappy sceptic to reduce his readers to the same miserable condition. Their scope is to overturn, not revealed religion alone, but all theism; to destroy the belief in God; and to substitute the most dreary atheism, fatalism, and nihilism for the glorious, elevating, consoling faith of the Christian, and the imperfect but yet, in itself, ennobling philosophy of the higher class of rationalists. It is a very bad sign for our age, and a worse omen for the future, that men can profess atheism without incurring public odium and disgrace, and that respectable publishers find it for their interest to flood the market with the deadly literature which is worse than that of France during the age of Bayle and Voltaire. A large class of book-sellers may always be found, not scrupulous or over-sensitive in their consciences about right and wrong in morals, when money is to be made. We suppose, however, that those of them who expect to make fortunes and transmit them to their children would like to have the good order of society continue. What can such gentlemen be thinking of when they help to lay the train under the foundations of order and social morality? We know of a man who helped to run his own bank, in which he had many thousands of dollars invested, by demanding specie for a hundred-dollar bill during a panic. Old John Bunyan tells of a certain person living in the town of Mansoul whose name was Mr. Penny wise-pound-foolish. Every one who helps on the spread of atheism, materialism, impiety in any shape, even if he makes money or fame by it, is helping to run his own bank. Moreover, he is helping to train the generation of those who will cut the throats of the whole class he belongs to. We are just now very wisely, though somewhat tardily, bringing the odious Mormon criminals to justice, by a kind of blind Christian instinct which still survives in our public opinion. What is the consistency or use of this, if we are going to look on apathetically and see the next generation all over our country turned into atheists? Practical atheism is worse than the most hideous and revolting form of Mormonism. Why mend a broken spar when mutineers are scuttling the ship from stem to stern? Would it not be well for those conductors of the press who have some principles and some belief in them, for the clergy, and for all who have access in some form to the ear of a portion of the public, to be a little more alive to the danger from the spread of atheism, and a little more active in counteracting it?
Pardon, gentlemen, for disturbing your nap. You are very drowsy, but is it not time for you to wake up?
Eagle and Dove. From the French of Mademoiselle Fleuriot, by Emily Bowles. New York: P. O. Shea. 1874.
This is a story of Breton life and of the events of the siege and the Commune of Paris. It is superior to the common run of stories in artistic merit, its characters and scenes have a peculiar and romantic interest, and its religious and moral tone is up to the highest mark.
The Works of Aurelius Augustine, Etc. Vol. XI. Tractates on the Gospel of S. John, Vol. II.; Vol. XII. Anti-Pelagian works, Vol. II. Edinburgh: J. & J. Clark. 1874. (New York: Sold by The Catholic Publication Society.)
Two more volumes of the splendid edition of S. Augustine's works are here presented, and deserve a warm welcome. It is difficult to see how they will serve the cause of the Church of England, but that is the affair of the editors, not ours. Of course they are mighty weapons for High-Churchmen against their Low and [pg 576] Broad Church antagonists. But they tell equally against these same High-Churchmen in favor of the Catholic Church. The treatise against Vincentius Victor, in Vol. XII., is crowded with denunciations of the Donatists, who are the prototypes of Anglicans, except in one respect, viz., that the former had valid orders.
Rhymes and Jingles. (Illustrated.) By Mary Mapes Dodge, author of Hans Brinker, etc. New York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1875.