12 DECEMBER 1868, Page 17

CURRENT LITERATURE.

St. Cyril of Alexandria on the Minor Prophets. Edited by P. E. Pusoy, A.M. 2 vols. (The Clarendon Press.)—We cannot pretend to discuss the merits of St. Cyril as a commentator, but the labours of his editor demand a few words of respectful recognition. This work, indeed, recalls tho zeal of a bygone generation of scholars, bygone, that is, as far as England is concerned, for it still flourishes in the univer- sities of Germany. In two large octavo volumes, containing together about 1,500 pages, Mr. Pusey gives with elaborate care the text of his author and the various readings of the MSS. on which it is founded. Not a noto breaks the uniformity of a labour which modern English scholars regard as insufferably tedious, not to be endured except by the more patient industry of the Germans. From the actual labour of colla- tion, which we are generally content to leave to others, Mr. Pusoy has not shrunk. He visited St. Catherine on Mount Sinai, and all the monas- teries of Mount Athos, where there was any hope of finding MSS., and pursued his work in one of them, the Batopa3dium, where a valuable codex was found, till he was driven away by marsh fever. In a singularly pleasing and modest preface Mr. Pusey gives an account of his labours and of his obligations, and in the simple words " Patri moo " dedicates to his father a work of which the venerable professor has every reason to be proud.