the fact that it is the thero of Camperdown, who filled the office with much honour; and at an earlier period the provost ship was held by James Halyburton, whom his contemporary, James Melvill, has described as that notable Provost of Dundee, and who was so highly esteemed by the Council for his great services, as well to the State as the burgh, that he was annually elected Provost for thirty-three years."

seems extraordinary. T of the sketches display sites power, and the bulk of merit, some of them are mad lessness of diction and ness, and one that devoted in the art of dyeing brought a discoveries of Mr. W. HP confusion of thought with Hanguage to an extent requ ntelligibility.

The History of Old Dundee. the Town Council Register tions from Contemporary Alexander Marwell Douglas.)

is book is a valuable cont
ory of the social and
dee during the last half of
the first half of the seretter
materials which have be
ecords in the town's are
ript of the earliest vol
er have been carefully en

and condensed into sera

The bells of St. Mary's Tower too often called the burghers to arms. There is no Scottish town within the period selected by Mr. Maxwell that was so frequently sacked. In 1547 the town was spoiled and burned by the English. In 1645, when the burghers had declared for the Solemn League and Covenant, Montrose swept the town with his Highlanders, and there was another scene of fire and bloodshed. In 1651, when Dundee was almost the only town which held for the King, Monk dealt with it as Cromwell had dealt with Drogheda. It was, as Carlyle says, a grim scene of flame and blood, rage and despair.

offenders were soon taught that to strike padding. As instances, take the long cab work was a transgression of the statutes route across London (i. 60, and again 91). which paternal rule would not tolerate. The Nothing can well be more tiresome than this. plague was a constant source of dread; and The hero is a priggish clergyman, who adopts though they did what they could to avert its Agnosticism and founds a new Transcendental approach by adopting rough-and-ready sani- Church; the heroine is his spiritual devotee tary measures, and by carefully guarding the and bride, a lady of vast beauty and fortune. gates to prevent the entrance of strangers, On one page (i. 147) we have two capital the pestilence too often made sad havoc in touches, the first probably unconscious. “A Dundee. The magistrates seem to have footpath much overgrown with grass crossed The magistrates exercised a sort of regimen realised that the virulence of the plague was from the church porch to a door in the morum with relentless severity. "The cuck-to a large extent owing to a disregard of vicarage wall." Again, "Miss Coombe " Jstule and the choks" were in frequent demand, cleanliness. We find that in 1591 a new (the Positivist leader, a character very whether it might be to tame the pride of a hangman, who had been installed into office, shrewdly and drolly drawn) "glanced at virago or to stop the mouth of a blasphemer. was nominated to be the first scavenger, and church and churchyard with the air of superior They endeavoured to suppress with a high furnished with a wheelbarrow at the expense enlightenment which a Christian missionary hand night revelry, rioting, drunkenness, of the town. This important official had also might assume on approaching some temple Sabbath desecration, and worse forms of full liberty to slay all the swine he could of Buddha or Brahma." The Rev. Ambrose immorality, with doubtful success; for "there apprehend within the burgh, "for at that Bradley, who is about to break with revelais no evidence that the public punishment time the pigs seem to have had the free run tion and tradition, makes heroic and very unof these offences against Christian morality of the streets," and the magistrates resolved clerical love to Miss Alma Craik, but discovers served any purpose of restraint, or raised the to put an end to this nuisance. that his first wife is still living, and living in tone of public virtue." The time when Mayinfamy. Divorce would be painfully public, poles and morris-dancers were encouraged had and truth painfully simple, so he writes a gone by; and, influenced by the Puritanical vague letter of renunciation to Alma. Well spirit which succeeded, rather than overawed might she feel that "the more she read it, by the measures which Parliament took to the more inscrutable it seemed." She is to suppress these pastimes, the people disconbecome his inspiring Heloise, and together tinued "guising and morice dancing, and they will build the Church of the Future. in the frequent quotatie began to take their pleasures more sadly." Their correspondence is too absurd. "In the The playfields where the inhabitants used to pulpit to-day," he says, "when I missed inal has been geted indulge in manly sports particularly in the your dear face," &c. the quaint and pity general And she: "Try to that local tradition, practice of archery, and to which they were forget your great persecution." "Many the father of lies, has wont to flock to witness, it might be the more letters were interchanged." "So the and that the rali: performance of Alexander Wedderburn's days passed on." "Meantime the Bishop of , realers: Dionysius, the Tyrane,' ," in which he the diocese had not been idle." This exple evidence for ev 5 the author. Still trapped the Papists, and lampooned the corcellent prelate seems to have put up admirably -were now deserted It is impossible, within the compass of a with Bradley's insufferable impertinence and in the body of the ruptions of the Church" tions from the old do and appropriated to other purposes. short article, to do more than touch upon a argufying, but at last got rid of him with The members of the various guilds or crafts few of the interesting details in this excellent every indulgence. The martyr travels. The readers and his bre: curing tenaciously to their privileges, and book. It will suffice if we have succeeded in French shock him. Very sensibly he says, despite his taste, condense, astringent measures were adopted to frustrate giving the reader some notion of the great They are not light, but with the weight of by to use the of the materials which Mr. their 66 own blind vanity heavy as lead. libertie and profit of the burgh;" and woe to has brought to light, and it is to be hoped The curse of spiritual dullness is upon them." the freeman who, against his oath and con- that he will be encouraged to continue his He turns to the pure "brave nation." But, science, dealt with "unfreeman's guids." At researches by the welcome which his book is alas! "This muddy nation stupefies me like one time the home-brewed ale was in danger sure to receive everywhere. its beer. Its morality is a sham, oscillating of being ousted from the market by the introbetween female slavery in the kitchen and duction of a superior beer brewed by their male drunkenness in the beer-garden." Mr. "auld enemies of England." This invasion Buchanan is very catholic and universal in of the privileges of the craft was promptly his denunciations, being quite impartial on checked by the Council, who enacted that the the Franco-German question. If M. Zola is English beer should be sold so cheaply as to a dirty, muddy, gutter-searching pessimist, yield no profit to the importers. who translates the anarchy' of the ancients into the bestial argot of the Quarties [sic] Latin" (whatever all this may mean), poor Schopenhauer is a "piggish, selfish, conceited, honest scoundrel, fond of gormandising, and a money-grubber, like all his race." The whole of this correspondence is curious, the subject of divorce to prepare (or poison) especially the way the man keeps edging in Alma's mind for the disclosure. But it is not pretty to speak of "Gladstone flinging mud in the blind face of Milton," nay, it is rude, and silly too. Farther on Mr. Buchanan flings a little more we will not say mud (for he is neither muddy nor piggish, like Schopenhauer, Zola, and the rest), but rose-leaves and comfits at Mr. Gladstone. It is really too bad to paint him as attending the Agnostic temple, and glowering over Bradley's great sermon in which his own Essay on Divorce is ruthlessly demolished. Prime Minister seemed about to spring to his feet and begin an impassioned reply, but sud

erials into a contine: id to relegate his appendices, has

's plan. His gene the old writings: d a deeply intere ot only to the all who take We not onl e of the old

very importan of great ast

and event

seem, on the ri

the sc

dat &

ful it with

a fathers rbitrary s

In a translation of the Latin Chronicles of
Hector Boece, who was a native of Dundee
and educated at the Grammar School, Dundee
is described as a toun "quhair mony virtews
and lauborius pepill ar in makying of claith."
There were, however, a considerable number
of rogues, who not only manufactured shoddy,
but stole the materials from which they made
it.
It is extremely creditable to the civic
rulers of the old town to find how strenuously
they endeavoured, not only to extirpate these
fraudulent weavers and dyers, but to check
the use of false weights and measures, and to
regulate the price and quality of bread and
ale, which were considered to be the principal
necessaries of life. The burghers of Dundee
were at times sorely tried by famine, pesti-
lence, and war. From 1587 to the end of
the century there was a succession of bad
harvests and great scarcity of food. Baxters
and brewers refused to supply bread and ale
at the prices fixed by the authorities, but the

GEORGE R. MERRY.

NEW NOVELS.

The New Abelard. By Robert Buchanan.
3 vols. (Chatto & Windus.)

We Two. By Edna Lyall. In 3 vols.
& Blackett.)

In

(Hurst

(Hurst

Omnia Vanitas: a Tale of Society.
& Blackett.)
Prusias: a Romance of Ancient Rome under
the Republic. By Ernst Eckstein. Trans-
lated by Clara Bell. In 2 vols. (Trübner.)
The New Abelard displays the author's
usual shortcomings with more than his usual
merits. Though in places very clever, and
often more than clever-sober, sensible, and
high-minded-as a whole it is an inadequate
handling of a badly conceived subject. To
reason good-humouredly with Mr. Buchanan
only rouses his resentment, and, as one finds
by experience, is not likely to make him any
better. So, protesting generally against his
specious and pretentious moral preaching,
we will merely run through a few of our
notes on the book. First, be it said, he has
adopted the terrible topographical form of

The

healthy sense and right feeling in painting the flimsy, sentimental, faltering morality of the "transcendental Agnostic," and Bradley's example may serve to open a good many eyes. Agatha Coombe saw through him clearly enough, and her arguments are clear, if not unanswerable. He "added the consciousness amusement of flirtation and the penance of our "Arry" and "Arriett." Much shrewd

of sweet and painless martyrdom to that of popular success," a bitter saying, which will fit too many of our well-advertised seccders, and which explains a good deal. Bradley, in fact, "had refined away his faith till it had ladyship seems to swim a good way beyond intended for the unscholarly general reader.

ons, come across nothing but ct-in the Marquesas, and y and maid, degraded by a vilainen, er-autobiographer. But are al e-ignorant as it was, it had s sh real human veracity whit yPrusias with all its leanin a power. For without death done his best, and done Tery ..

ject of the servile revet most stirring episode, and and, in many ways, modem es the vast social fabric of Rome appeals most to our curiost most provokingly. Syrus and more typical of the vast working our "Arry" and "Arrett" Quesswork has been built upon lea ided by archaeology and top is Dr. Eckstein, it is need ade the best use. His foottended for the unscholarly ey are useful and to the

of theology to other studies. The candidate for a theological degree in Utopia must know Greek and Latin not only as instruments of research, but because Christianity struck its Latin worlds. He will know Hebrew, Assyrian, deepest roots into the soil of the Hellenic and Accadian, Egyptian hieroglyphs, Chaldee, Syriac, Arabic, Aethiopic, and Armenian for the light they throw on religious antiquities; he must also be proficient in modern French history for its own sake, first to quicken his inand German and Dutch. He must know all sight into human nature, and then to enable him to judge of existing religious parties and estimate the probability of events in the narrower field of historical theology. He must know political economy and the natural sciences; the latter, at least, in their method and results, in order that he may distinguish the idola of scientific men from their real knowledge, and to qualify him

as a mediator between the falsehood of extreme

parties. He must understand the history and principles of art, for this, too, as shape, colour, language, or music, is but one mode of the religious spirit. So equipped, he prepares to enter the sacred groves of theology. But he cannot move a step without first reckoning with philosophy. Should he decide that the mind is not a mere function of the brain, and that the will is free, then at last the door is opened to him, and he may stray through the flowery spaces of hermeneutics, symbolics, patristics, liturgics, homiletics, poimenics, and paedeutics.

History. By Prof. C. A. Briggs. (Edinburgh: sympathy. In dealing with such a translation, T. & T. Clark.) Here is a theological writer, there is not much scope for the niceties of thoroughly scientific in his methods, and yet scholarship; it would not be fair to lay much not ashamed to call himself "evangelical." stress on the heretical opinion expressed (on and things which seem revolutionary from that follows instead of preceding the verb affected The secret is that he has had a German training, Ps. cxvi. 10) that the particle k sometimes eighteenth-century point of view which still by it. Conservative scholars will regret the predominates in England and America seem surrender of "Kiss the Son" in Ps. ii. 12; and, "aids to faith" to disciples of Dorner. "What indeed, what else can the words mean? May peril can come to the Scriptures," asks Dr. not the boldest supposition, that of interpolaof them? The peril is to scholastic dogmas and homage" is certainly a most unsafe rendering. Briggs, "from a more profound critical study tion, be also the safest? "Proffer pure to tradition!" Again, "It is a sad mistake to suppose that the Bible can be approached only in special frames of mind and with peculiar A Popular Commentary on the New Testament. Edited by Philip Schaff. Vol. IV. "The preparation. .. It is not to be regarded with Epistle to the Hebrews, the Catholic Epistles, feelings of bibliolatry, which are as pernicious as and Revelation." (Edinburgh: T. & T. the adoration of the sacrament." Dr. Briggs is Clark.) Of this fourth and last volume of not afraid of the higher criticism, and is willing the Popular Commentary it may suffice to say to modify his theories of inspiration in accord- that, in scholarship, thoroughness, and comance with critical results. But neither is he in plete adaptation to its purpose (which is apparbondage to great critical authorities. He leaves ently to bring the best results of recent Bibmany debated questions open, and encourages lical investigation before the mind of ordinary the student to read and examine for himself. readers), it is quite equal to its predecessors. One great merit of this handbook is the light The contributors-among whom, we notice, which it throws on the genesis of modern are Dr. Angus, of Regent's Park College, and criticism and exegesis; those who us me in the two Aberdeen Professors, Drs. Salmond and escape the crudities of many English advo- Milligan-are all men of competent learning, cates of half-understood theories. The head- and treat their respective subjects in the most ings of the chapters are, "The Advantages of able manner. We should not, perhaps, accept Biblical Study, "Exegetical Theology (the Most all the conclusions arrived at; but opposite General Term for Biblical Study)," "The Lan- opinions are generally discussed in a spirit of guages of the Bible," "The Bible and Criticism," praiseworthy fairness and impartiality. ExJudas Iscariot : an Autobiography. By The Canon of Scripture,' "The Text of the ception, however, must be taken to a statement James W. T. Hart. (Kegan Paul, Trench, Bible," "The Higher Criticism," "Literary Study of Prof. Milligan, who, in giving due credit to & Co.) Judas, we learn, was a sceptic, with his of the Bible," "Hebrew Poetry," "The Interpre- the "negative critics" for their vindication of heart set on pelf and place; he once forgave tation of Scripture," "Biblical Theology," "The the authenticity of the Apocalypse, neutralises a bad debt and even gave alms to the debtor, Scriptures as a Means of Grace." The book the value of his praise by the remark that they whose daughter fell in love with him. Being seems to us incomplete on its New Testament side, hoped by this means to be more successful in dissatisfied with his prospects as a vinedresser, but some incompleteness was inevitable in a first removing the Fourth Gospel from the Canon. he thought to better himself by turning fisher-edition. It is hostile to traditional orthodoxy, but Would it not be more generous to suppose that man in Galilee. When Simon Peter and the inspirit as "evangelical" as Henry or Scott. Not their object was simply truth? The Comor is it Utopia), bassons of Zebedee left their nets he was promoted the least of its merits is the well-selected cata-mentary, now that it is completed, may be not fail to be of the to be manager. The Master sent for him (we logue of books of reference, English, French, cordially recommended for family use. es for the ministry do not learn why). When he came he heard and German, the only flaw in which we have the promise of twelve thrones, and under the noticed is the spelling (adopted everywhere in were only by the res circumstances was glad to be called to follow, the book) of Ginsberg for Ginsburg. Without ire them for the st to teach. The band for the time was quite half converted by endorsing the author's personal synthesis of the Sermon on the Mount. But a rabbi who faith and science, we are sure that no student to the third, whither sympathised with the Master pointed out will regret sending for the book, even though it arious branches of that He was certain to fail- just when Judas has to be added (to our own great satisfaction) was disgusted by finding that the usurer with that there is no trace in it of its having been whom he had deposited the price of his vine- written with a view to an examination.

2.

tance of his adroit introducti
out-of-the-way points
"tabulae duplices" (p
obably as much in Prace
dius that throws light
ation of Christianity unira
e, though the light is ne

RECENT THEOLOGY

ion to the Study of rummond. (Macmillan Theology in Manchester Sa

first two are short at:

n in Germany as "But in the ren

t layman" to the yard had been arrested as a defaulter; thencetice to the mag forward he watched the Master jealously, and

An Old Testament Commentary for English
Edited by Charles John Ellicott.

Readers.

A Short Protestant Commentary on the Books of the New Testament. With General and Special Introductions. Edited by Prof. Paul Wilhelm Schmidt and Prof. Franz von Holzendorff. Translated from the Third Edition of the German, by Francis Henry Jones. Vol. III. (Williams & Norgate.) We are glad to announce the publication of the third volume of the Short Protestant Commentary. Of this here to say more than that it presents to the reader work, which is now complete, it is not necessary with exceeding brevity, but in general clearly

Deginning. After yet was irritated at being called a Devil. When Vol. IV. (Cassell.) The new volume of this and intelligibly, the results of the more adlogy, there fal published Judas took fright, and for the first the good predominates. The treatment of the

worth writing the "Importa heology, it is liberal culture

e "which see ght, or ot but which la intellected c tion the m

without an nt hype

inister i

Book of Job is most disappointing; the lover of
poetry will turn from it with as much regret as
the enlightened student.
Book of Job is in any sense authentic," &c.
"Of course, if the
Success, no doubt, was impossible, with such a
translation as the Authorised to work upon; but
least have shown that he enjoyed, and in some
a commentator of a different spirit would at
worthy sense understood, the original.
of Proverbs. Dr. Salmon's Commentary on
same remark applies to the portion on the Book
Ecclesiastes is well done, though dry and some-
what over-cautious; the book seems to have an
hardly help being being interesting and sym-
attraction for Irishmen! Dr. Plumptre could

The

and learning; and that it ought, therefore, to
criticism, that its weight
are all Biblical scholars of acknowledged
be acceptable to all who are interested in the
scientific criticism of the Scriptures, and who
are not afraid of "negative" conclusions when

time believed the warnings of the Passion. Between fear for himself and anger at having been made a fool of, he determined to save himself at the expense of the Master, and his resolve was clinched by being told that the ointment anoint His body for the burying. His fright which he grudged already had only served to enabled" Hanan" to bully him into accepting much less than he meant to ask for his treachery. He was brought to repentance unto death by the portents which convinced the centurion, having long ceased (in spite of the inference drawn by Whately and others from the First wish to force His hand. While he believed, it Gospel) to have enough faith in the Master to value of the events of the day. He continued to pathetic towards modern criticism; his Isaiah those who have not leisure or patience for more the last to apostrophise the "silent friendly Speaker's Commentary, though he provokingly of the New Testament during the last hundred will be more generally useful than that in the prolix Commentaries. The scientific criticism roll" transmitted to Mr. Hart by "Eubulus, stops just short of admitting a plurality of Disciple of the Lord," who is careful to subjoin authorship, which obviousily prevents an in- years has obtained some results which many

was his habit to take stock of the evidential

that if Judas had waited three days he might
have repented to better purpose. It would be
interesting to know if Mr. Hart thinks with
the author of the Epistle of Barnabas that all
the twelve were mauvais sujets till they were

called.

Biblical Study: its Principles, Methods, and

telligible account of the course of prophetic
thought. The Song of Songs is as well done
translation; but the commentator, Mr. Aglen,
as could be expected from the nature of the
shows his full ability in the excellent Con-
mentary on the Psalms, in which the results of
wide reading are happily vivified by poetic

they are supported by calm and temperate this country than those of Profs. Pfleiderer, reasoning. There are few names better known in Hilgenfeld, and Holtzmann, and all are conCommentary opposite views to those held by tributors to the present volume. It cannot, of course, be pretended that in this very brief the writers are at all adequately discussed, but brevity of the work should recommend it to there is certainly a great deal of solid learning compressed into a small compass; and the very

they be so or not, it is well that those results are inclined to regard as final; and, whether should be brought within the reach of others than students in such a compendious form as this.

Comparative Darstellung des Lehrbegriffs der verschiedenen christlichen Kirchenparteien, nebst vollständigen Belegen aus den symbolischen

gathered from Facts, Figures, Anecdotes, Books, &c., for Sermons, Lectures, and Addresses, by the Rev. G. S. Bowes (Nisbet); Present Day Tracts, on Subjects of Christian Evidence, Doctrine, and Morals, by Various MR. A. DATCHETT MARTIN, whose recent Writers, Vol. III. (Religious Tract Society); How is the Divinity of Jesus depicted in the contributions on the subject of Australian Gospels and Epistles? by the Rev. Thomas literature have attracted some attention, has Whitelaw (Hodder & Stoughton); Glimpses just been elected a Fellow of the Royal Colonial Institute. We hear that he has an article in through the Veil; or, Some Natural Analogies and Bible Types, by the Rev. J. W. Bardsley the press called "An Australian Novelist," (Nisbet); Here and There in God's Garden, by which deals with the life and writings of Marcus Fidelia (J. T. Hayes); The Saviour's Call, by Clarke, of Melbourne, whose His Natural Life the Rev. Frederick Whitfield (Nisbet); Is All made so much stir in England at the time of its Well? (Nisbet); Does the Revised Version affect appearance. the Doctrine of the New Testament? by E. F. O. Thurcaston (Dickinson); The Larger Hope, by Samuel Cox (Kegan Paul, Trench, & Co.); Best Gift of Heaven: Faith, Hope, Charity (John Walker); Manuale Parvulorum, translated into English (Dublin: Gill); A Summary of the Ecclesiastical Courts Commission's Report, and of Dr. Stubbs's Historical Reports, together with a Review of the Evidence, by Spencer L. Holland (Parker); Jesus, the Comforter: a New Imitation of Christ (Simpkin, Marshall, & Co.); The Communicant's Daily Help, by Walter Abbott (S. P. C. K.); Wounded in the House of His Friends, by F. M. (Nisbet); &c., &c.

NOTES AND NEWS. THOUGH we are unable to give any adequate account of the celebration last week of the Tercentenary of Edinburgh University-for the details of which we must refer our readers to the Scotsman-yet such a memorable event must not pass by altogether unnoticed. Its two principal features, as compared with anything of the kind that could be managed in England, were (1) the strictly academical aspect of the gathering, removed equally from politics and from ecclesiasticism; and (2) the representative character of the guests from the Continent as well as from England and Ireland. It may be doubted whether so complete an assemblage of the leaders of thought has ever been brought together in our time. To give the mere list of names would fill some columns of the ACADEMY. It must suffice to say that as a rule the foreigners were received with greater warmth than the English, and of the foreigners specially Pasteur, Virchow, Helmholtz, Laveleye, and Lesseps. The enthusiasm of the students for Browning was also a notable incident.

THE Senate of the University of Glasgow has resolved to confer the honorary degree of LL.D. on Prof. Holland, Prof. Osborne Reynolds, the Rev. Mandell Creighton, and Mr. Henry Craik.

THE Berlin Academy has made overtures to Prince Bismarck with a view to his being elected an honorary member; but Prince Bismarck replied-so say the German papers-that he is astonished anyone could suppose he would become "the colleague of a Mommsen and a Virchow"!