'Sweet as the tender fragrance that survives
When martyred flowers breathe out their little lives,
Sweet as a song, that once consoled our pain,
But never will be sung to us again,

Is thy remembrance. Now the hour of rest
Hath come to thee. Sleep, darling; it is best."
The sonnets are, on the whole, the best of the
volume. We are rather sorry to find anything to
praise in them, for the fact that the sonnet is the
fashion, nowadays, is not a good omen. A pat-
tern of versification so stiff and artificial is not
likely to be the vehicle of any high inspiration.
It is only when poets have begun to put the form
of their verse above its content that they become
much addicted to such measures. Of course there
are many noble sonnets; but the reign of the son-
neteer in literature is the reign of affectation and
superficiality. Yet Mr. Longfellow's sonnets
show very little artifice; blank verse could hardly
be more direct and simple. The art is so perfect
that the limitations of the form are not felt. In
this sonnet entitled "Nature," as in others, there
is a masterful artlessness:

"As a fond mother, when the day is o'er,
Leads by the hand her little child to bed,
Half willing, half reluctant to be led,
And leave his broken playthings on the floor,
Still gazing on them through the open door,
Nor wholly reassured and comforted
By promises of others in their stead,
Which, though more splendid, may not please him

more;

So nature deals with us, and takes away

Our playthings one by one, and by the hand Leads us to rest so gently, that we go Scarce knowing if we wish to go or stay, Being too full of sleep to understand

How far the unknown transcends the what we know."

Into this strain of gentle sadness the verse of the great poet often falls in these latter days, but the aftermath is, if possible, more tender and sweet than the earlier growths; and the consciousness of having done good and not evil all the days of his life, of having mingled with the pleasure that he has so bountifully given to his fellow men not a shade of skepticism, and not a trace of bitterness, and not a suggestion of impurity, ought to fill the afternoon of his life with peace and thankfulness.

As a theologian, the Rev. M. J. Savage is something of a novelist; but as a novelist he is one of the worst of theologians. The method to which in this amazing fiction1 he has freely resorted is a method not unknown to theology, but it is only the least reputable of disputants who employ it. It is the practice of representing all the people who disagree with you as hypocrites and knaves. Perhaps Mr. Savage believes that the great ma

1 Bluffton: A Story of To-day. By M. J. Savage. Boston: Lee & Shepard. Springfield: Whitney & Adams.

jority of the Christians with whom he formerly associated are of this character; if so, he is to be pitied for his ignorance rather than blamed for his injustice. But no tolerably well-informed person will need to be told that the force of misMr. Savage has carried it in his delineation of representation could not much further go than the characters that make up what are known as the Orthodox churches of to-day. If the picture that he has given us be a true one, the members of these churches, almost without exception, are mean, false, cowardly and contemptible creatures. A glimpse is given us in one chapter of one "quiet, firm, lady-like woman who, while evangelical, believed that a tree might be safely judged by its fruits; and [who] preferred a good apple grown on a heterodox tree to a rotten one whose trunk person named or described who is really worthy was orthodox." But she is the only "Orthodox" of respect. Madge Hartley, the "Orthodox" heroine, is, of course, even before her conversion to Radicalism, everything that is lovely; but she is also everything that is soft and weak; the luxury of thinking she scarcely allows herself; and her final submission to Pope Forrest for matrimonial reasons is no very great triumph of "Rationalism." The author probably means that we shall think well of Judge Hartley; but how he expects us to do so after he has represented him as secretly favoring, though not assisting in, an attack upon his minister in which every principle of decency and fair-play is set at nought, we do not quite understand. Of course we are told that there were others in the Bluffton church who were inclined to be just and fair-minded, but they are not of sufficient importance to be named in the record of its doings.

The hero of the story is the Rev. Mark Forrest, a Congregational pastor who begins his ministry with Liberal tendencies and turns out a Radical. Tho experiences of this man in his brief pastorate in Bluffton, while he is moulting, constitute the story. Many of the occurrences described in it are in the highest degree improbable. Mrs. Gray, a lady of Liberal notions in theology, but of a her life in caring for the sick during the prevamost beautiful and blameless character, sacrifices lence of an epidemic; and Mr. Forrest at her funeral dares to express the belief that, no matter what her creed has been, her life has been a Christian life, and that she is reaping its reward. This utterance causes Mr. Forrest no end of trouble; and the implication is, that sentiments of this nature are not tolerated in "Orthodox " circles. But the fact is that many people of irregular belief who have lived as Mrs. Gray lived and have died as she died, have been spoken of at their funerals by "Orthodox" ministers in terms similar to those used by Mr. Forrest, without any trouble arising on account of the utterance. Orthodox people are not, generally, such

inexpressible bigots that they are offended when heaven is opened to one who has lived purely and died sublimely. There are such people, of course; but it is not fair to insinuate that the average church-member is of this quality.

The worst misrepresentation of the book is, however, the description of the ecclesiastical council by which the Rev. Mark Forrest is tried for heresy. After the charges of doctrinal unsoundness had been sustained by vote of the council, a leading member of the church is represented as springing upon the council charges against the pastor of scandalous immorality,charges of which he has not been notified, and which are accompanied by a resolution deposing him and warning the churches against him. Against this outrageous attempt at ecclesiastical lynch law nobody in the council utters a word of protest; and it is reserved for certain Liberals in the audience not members of the council, to rush forward and rescue the accused from the hands of these "Orthodox" assassins. Does Mr. Savage wish to convey the impression that practices of this nature are common in the sect to which he formerly belonged? Not only are they not common, but such a thing was never heard of.

A story of this character, which undertakes to deal with movements and conflicts of religious thought, ought always to be just and true in its representations of life. Exaggeration or caricature introduced into a work of this nature, is a

crime against the truth. And this story is made up of exaggeration and caricature of the most bitter and virulent sort. We know something of the unreasoning bigotry that exists in "Orthodox" circles; we know that there are certain men who try to assume the leadership of the "Orthodox" forces, and who care more for "Orthodoxy" than for honor or justice or fair-play; but we know too that the rank and file of these forces as well as many of their leaders are sound and true at heart; that they love the things that are honest and fair and of good report; and that Mr. Savage's sketches of them are masterpieces of distortion. The religious teacher who can resort to devices of this nature would better not talk too loudly about his own exceptional loyalty to the truth.

THE hand of Mrs. Stowe has not lost its cunning. This latest story is scarcely inferior to "Oldtown Folks." As a sketch of New England life in the early years of this century it is as faithful as a Dutch genre picture. The society which Mrs. Stowe describes was the society in which she lived; and the keen perceptions of an unusually sagacious child furnished her with the materials which a remarkable memory has enabled her to combine in this picture. Such novels

are in the truest sense history. One can learn as much from this story of the ecclesiastical and political complications and struggles of fifty years ago, as he would find by long researches among the archives. The downfall of the standing order in Connecticut, and the curious combination of the Episcopalians, representing aristocracy, with the fierce democracy of the period, in opposition to Federalism in politics and the Congregational establishment- are admirably sketched. Mrs. Stowe's recent connection with the Episcopal church has not at all warped her judgment; there is no trace of partisanship in the story; the Congregationalists as well as their foes are treated not only fairly but sympathetically. The characters are distinctly drawn, and the story is brimming full of genuine Yankee life. There is a school of little Bohemian critics about New York who amuse themselves by pecking at Mrs. Stowe, and ridiculing her stories of New England life; but these stories will be classics in our literature long after these little Bohemian critics are forgotten.

WHAT sent Miss Trafton to the plains of the West in search of a plot for a story does not appear. That has been supposed to be the preserve of the Dime Novelists. Perhaps life on this side the Missouri river is overworked, so that the blase story-teller as well as the seedy artisan finds his profit in going West. Certainly there is on the part of western readers a somewhat shrill demand that the literature of the period shall devote itself chiefly, if not exclusively, to the delineation of western life. To this demand our novelists are quite complaisant; and this may account for the scene of "His Inheritance." The story, at least, cannot be complained of as not sufficiently American. The life of a garrison on the head-waters of the Platte river cannot be said to have in it a very strong infusion of European conventionalities. The problem would seem to be to find enough of incident in such a society to serve the purpose of any other than a Dime Novelist; but that problem has not been a difficult one for Miss Trafton. It is none of our business how she has learned all about the life of the plains; but she seems to be at home in it; and the sketching is done with an assured hand.

The story owes very little of its interest, however, to the exploits and the tragedies of Indian warfare; it is the story of the love of a young officer for the pretty daughter of a sutler; and of the intrigues of the other ladies of the garrison, who had designs of their own upon the young officer and could not at all tolerate the disposition that he was bent on making of himself. The tragedy of the story is the carrying away and hiding of the heroine, after her marriage, by her

1 His Inheritance: By Adeline Trafton. Boston: Lee & Shepard. Springfield: Whitney & Adams.

half-crazy mother, while her husband was away on an expedition against the Indians, in which he was reported to have been killed. Husband and wife were thus parted forever. It must be owned that probability is strained a little in this abduction of the daughter by her mother; and many things in the story savor of the romantic. But some of the characters are well drawn,-notably that of Captain Elyot, and, among the women, that of Miss Laud. Blossom is a somewhat unsubstantial person; the promise of the earlier chapters is scarcely sustained in her portraiture. It is not reassuring to be told that envy and jealousy and exclusiveness have found their way as far west as the bases of the Rocky Mountains; but it is impossible not to believe it. The ladies of the garrison at Atchison behaved themselves much as ladies sometimes do in regions less remote; and Miss Trafton must be credited with a keen insight into many of their less amiable works and ways. We could have wished that she had shown us a little more of the nobler nature that belongs to women. The action of the story is for the most part clear and vigorous and the style is exceptionally strong and pure.

ate its value in her estimation. She does recognize it, however, as a book of religion, though in her selections she gives much less space to "Moses, Hebrew," and to "Jesus Christ, Israelite," than to "Manu, Hindu," and to "R. W. Emerson, American." To show that worthy thoughts of God and immortality and duty have been spoken by wise and good men who knew not the religion of the Bible would be an excellent service; the lesson is one that Christians need to learn. But if that were the object of this collection it would not be necessary to include any portions of the Bible. The intent of this book is, of course, to give a proportionate view of the religious ideas of the world; and the small space accorded to the selections taken from the Bible indicates the estimate taken of the relative importance of the book. To the comprehensive mind of the compiler, all books that contain the truth are lights of the world, yet there are degrees of brightness in these luminaries; "one star differeth from another star in glory," and the works of Moses and David and Paul and Jesus are lights of lesser magnitude than those of Confucius and Marcus Aurelius and Emerson and Frothingham. This is the impression that THE author of "The New Timothy" is a clever any visitor-from the moon, say-would surely artist. His genre sketches are always individual and not unpleasing; and although the dramatic get, if this volume were put into his hands as a manual of the earth's religions. This practice of faculty is not strong in him, his stories are pic-discriminating against our Sacred Book is quite

turesque and readable. The last of these1 is one of the best in its motive and in its treatment.

The characters are drawn with great distinctness;

the social life of the South to which it introduces us is sympathetically described by one who knows it well; and there is action enough to hold the interest of the reader.

JUST what "The Present Problem "2 is, the reader of this little book may be puzzled to tell. "How to be good" is, perhaps, a succinct statement of it. "Intemperance and immorality" are mentioned in the preface as evils to be exterminated. But this is not in any exclusive sense

a present problem; it is about as old as the theoretical question respecting the origin of evil. The temperance question is, however, the one about which the story chiefly revolves, though other social immoralities come in for a rather frank discussion. The story has not much unity, but the purpose of the writer is a good one, and the influence of the book ought to be wholesome.

MRS. CHILD Would scarcely assent to the statement of the authors of "The Religion of Israel," that the Bible is "the book of religion." To apply to it the definite article would be to exagger1 A Year Worth Living. A Story of a Place and of a People One Cannot Afford not to Know. By Wm. M. Baker. Boston: Lee & Shepard. Springfield: Whitney & Adams.

The Present Problem. By Sarah K. Bolton. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons.

common in these days; but it may appear to the philosophic historian who, at the end of another thousand years, shall make up his verdict upon the religions of the world, that Christianity and its Scriptures are entitled to a little more respect.

The introduction is a clear and generally fair account of the elementary religious ideas of several of the peoples. One or two statements in it are, however, not quite accurate, as for example this sentence on page 38: "The Scriptures speak of no gradations of rewards and punishments." Luke xii: 47-48, and other passages, contradict this assertion. Some of the judgments of the writer indicate, also, a partial comprehension of the truth she is considering. Here, for example, is a pronouncement that will bear reconsidering:

"If Christianity had been true to its professions, the whole world would have been attracted by it, as bees are by sweet flowers. But the mournful truth is that its practice has been the reverse of its theories. It does great harm to the souls of men to make noble professions which they do not manifest in actions; and as the tallest mountain casts the deepest shadow in the water, so the higher the assumed standard the lower is the state of morals produced by a practical disregard of it."