REVIEWS

JACQUES BENIGNE BOSSUET. A Study. By E. K. Sanders. S.P.C.K. 1921. 15s. net.

I DOUBT if any English writer except Mr. George Saintsburynot even Mr. Gosse-knows the French literature of the best age so well, and writes of it so well, as Miss Sanders. Her studies of French ecclesiastical literature and biography are, in their way, masterpieces of solid knowledge and intelligent criticism. It was a little unfortunate that her book on Fénelon came out just at the same time as the singularly brilliant monograph of Lord St. Cyres, but that did not prevent the merits of her work being recognized. It had been hoped that Dr. Figgis had left his lectures on Bossuet sufficiently prepared for publication, but it appears that this is not so, and Miss Sanders has no competition to fear in the biography which now appears from the press. Comparison is natural with the charming essay of M. E. Longuemare (Bossuet et la Société française, Paris, 1910), but Miss Sanders, whose aim is more distinctly spiritual, need not fear the association. She has written an excellent book which, in spite of the books with which we were familiar thirty years ago and more, must remain for some time the best English biography of Bossuet.

Solidity and intimacy are its marks. She writes from full knowledge, and she understands the character she draws. Briefly to call attention to the leading features of her book, I would say that she lays special stress on three points. The first is the extraordinary influence, compelling, almost hypnotic, which the idea of monarchy as exemplified in the grand monarque exercised upon Bossuet. This did not prevent the preacher using strong and clear language of condemnation, or cause him to relax his efforts to convert his sovereign; but it did cause him always to expect the best, and to interpret ambiguities favourably-perhaps a priest should always do this. He said of his royal master, "De loin, il étonne, de prés il attache "; and that, as Miss Sanders says, sums up the two stages of his relation to Louis XIV.

The second point is the treatment of Quietism and Mme. de Guyon. Here Miss Sanders shows true critical penetration, and her estimate of the positions of the two famous episcopal antagonists is as fair as it is convincing. Perhaps she sees the weakness of Fénelon more clearly than she did some years ago; but she sees the defects of Bossuet too.

The third point is the sound judgment of her general estimate of the character of the great Bishop of Meaux. She shows, more

clearly I think than anyone else has done, not only the mystical and the devotional aspects of his character, but also his failure, admitted again and again by himself, to reach the ideal which was always before his eyes. We are still not unaccustomed to find pious preachers showing arrogant self-assertion, and good men losing their temper if other good men disagree with them. But Miss Sanders in her analysis goes deeper than that, and her portrait of Bossuet is for that reason certain to be of real moral value to all who study it. Historically and psychologically she has written an admirable book. W. H. HUTTON.

STUDIES IN CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHY. BY W. R. Matthews. Pp. xiv+231. Macmillan and Co., Ltd., London, 1921. 12s.net.

LOTZE'S THEORY OF REALITY. By E. E. Thomas. Pp. 1+217. Longmans, Green and Co., London, 1921.

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MR. MATTHEWs's volume of Boyle Lectures may be most warmly commended to all thinking Christian men who are anxious to fulfil the Apostolic injunction to be ready to render a reason for the faith which is in them. There is nothing hard or repellent about the author's style or manner of treatment of his subject, though there is also no popularization" in the bad sense of the word. Mr. Matthews deals with the most fundamental problems that can possibly be raised in connection with our religion, and he deals with them thoroughly and at the same time so simply as to be readily intelligible to the average educated man, and in a literary style which has the great merit of being graceful and pleasing without conveying any impression of a deliberate pursuit of "style." Fortunately, too, he has no metaphysical system to push, and is quite free from the weakness of some distinguished philosophers who tend to use the Christian faith and the Christian life as mere advertisements for some highly controversial metaphysical set of dogmas. His main concern is to argue that, under all differences on speculative matters, there is a way of looking at life which is fairly to be called Christian in the sense that it is everywhere characteristic, if not, alas! of the practice, at any rate of the aspirations of modern civilized communities, and its absence characteristic of their ancient counterparts, and that historically the inspiration of this Christian view of the world has been drawn from, and is still sustained by, the unique position occupied by our Lord in the personal devotion and life of the members of the Christian community. The argument then proceeds to show that at the root of this whole view of life, and of the significance of our Lord for our own lives, lie one

or two very broad and simple ideas which are properly to be called philosophical," since they are ideas about the constitution of reality as a whole, particularly the conceptions of ethical theism, of personality as a fundamental character of the Divine nature, and of creation as the relation between God and the world. The alleged difficulties in the way of believing in a single supremely good God, in personality as characteristic of God, and in the creation of the world, are discussed with sympathy and insight, and found to be in the end groundless. One may specially commend that part of the argument of the fourth lecture which deals unanswerably with the contention that just the very hopes for humanity which are dearest to the heart of the "modern" modern" man, and most characteristic of him, are plainly quite unattainable if ethical theism is not the true solution of the "world-riddle." One looks forward with very keen anticipation to the subsequent courses of lectures, in which the central topics are to be Revelation and Incarnation.

If it is permissible to indicate any points of dissent from an author whom one finds in general so admirable, I should like to mention just two matters on which it may not be easy for all of us to see eye to eye with Mr. Matthews. It is not quite clear to me that when he makes the hope of continual progress, as opposed to a mere maintenance of the status quo or to cyclical recurrence, a feature of modern views of life which is absent from those of the ancient world and is directly due to Christian inspiration, he is not thinking of endless progress on this planet and under the ordinary conditions of secular history. If he is, is not any such anticipation in violent opposition not only to the known views of the early Church, and apparently of our Lord Himself, but to the whole historical Christian tradition down to a very recent time? I suspect that some of the things which Mr. Matthews says in this connection about the great Greeks have been too much taken on trust. When I am told that Plato never really attained to a genuine Theism, I ask myself whether a man who can make this statement has ever read the Laws, or has preferred to take his theories about Plato from some German handbook. And when I am told that the "democracies" of the Greek world were really aristocracies of slave-holders (and Mr. Matthews is not alone in this fancy), I cannot help wondering whether the authors of such a remark have studied Aristophanes and the orators.

Mr. Thomas's work on Lotze is opportune as filling a real gap. A great deal has been said from time to time by critics in our own language about Lotze's logical views and his theory of knowledge, and there has been a good deal of attention paid,

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as was only natural, to his vigorous defence against both materialists and "absolute idealists" of the genuine reality of the human soul and its interior life. But no one as yet has dealt systematically with the question of Lotze's general conception of the real world and what goes on in it, the consistency of his views, as expressed in a long series of works, with one another, and the difficulties which beset them. This is the theme of Mr. Thomas's work, which is marked by very full knowledge of Lotze's principal writings and great closeness of argumentation. Future students of the last of the great systematic" German philosophers are certain to find the book exceedingly useful. Possibly Mr. Thomas falls a little. short of being the perfect critic. I am not sure whether he has made the effort of imaginative "sympathy" needed to appreciate a system of thought as it appears to its author. A good deal of the criticism leaves on me the impression of coming a little too much from the "outside." And one is also a little baffled at times by not being able to discover from what precise point of view the criticisms are urged, whether they spring from a definite conviction about the character of reality incompatible with Lotze's or are merely a collection of 'sceptical doubts" with no definite central thought behind them. But, however that may be, the points are well taken and well argued, and, though the book would be hard reading for any but special students, it should not be neglected by anyone who is really intent on understanding and appreciating Lotze's thoughts. A. E. TAYLOR.

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SPACE, TIME, AND DEITY: THE GIFFORD LECTURES AT GLASGOW, 1916-1918. By S. Alexander. 2 Vols.: 2 Vols.: pp. xvi+347; xiii+437. Macmillan and Co., London, 1920.

The pages of THEOLOGY are no proper place for the full examination of Professor Alexander's monumental work, even if the writer of these lines were competent, as he is not, to undertake the task. Professor Alexander, with admirable courage, has attempted to lay down the general outlines of a theory of reality and to show, from a mind stored with wide reading in every department of knowledge, how the theory can be successfully applied to everything in heaven and earth from the crudest mechanical movements up to the "being than whom none better can be conceived of the saints' adoration. In the brief space which is permitted me I can hardly say more of the execution of this gigantic task as a whole than that Professor Alexander has touched no subject without adorning it, but, as I conceive, does not adorn all the many subjects of

which he treats with equal brilliance, and that, while I find repeated ground for admiration in many sections of his work, I still feel that he never succeeds in producing conviction of the truth of his main thesis. That thesis is, indeed, stated at the outset modestly enough as an hypothesis, and we are invited simply to consider whether, if true, it may not give an adequate account of all the facts of nature and of life. But it is not long before the author seems to glide insensibly from the contention that his hypothesis can account for all the known facts to the very different assumption that it is the only one which can do so. The main position of the whole book is never expressly proved, probably because Professor Alexander at heart holds that one has only to follow his analysis to see it directly in the facts. It may be so, but if one has not the vision, another man's claim to possess it necessarily leaves one unconvinced. One cannot live by an "act of sight any more than by an "act of faith" which is not one's own personal act.

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I propose, therefore, to occupy most of the brief space allowed me in merely raising one question. I will not ask whether Professor Alexander's main theory is true, or even whether, if true, it does justice to all the appearances theory of reality is bound to take account of. I prefer to raise the special question whether, true or false, the theory does justice to the facts of the religious life in particular. Is God, as God must be conceived of if the main theory be sound, such a God as the saints of the world, whether Christian or not, worship, and from living personal relation to whom they at least believe themselves to draw the inspiration which sustains their lives? Professor Alexander himself is quite explicit on the point that it is the duty of the metaphysician to take full account of religion as a great feature of human life as it really is, not to palm off some spurious substitute under the same name, and thus he cannot possibly object to the application of this test to his own theory.

I am obliged, of course, in the first place, to state what the theory, as I understand it, is, and I have to do this with a brevity which forbids all support of my interpretation by references. But I trust I shall succeed in avoiding any serious unintentional misrepresentation. The general theory is of a type ancient enough, though expressed in terms of the very latest physical and psychophysical speculation. The ultimate reality in the universe is nothing but what Professor Alexander calls Space-Time, though it will be more familiar to most persons under the name Motion. The universe consists of motions, some simpler, some more complicated, and it seems to be assumed that, in order of time, the simpler ones come