CURRENT LITERATURE.
A Life of Archbishop Laud. By "A Romish Recusant." (Kegan Paul, Trench, and Co.)—This book is noteworthy for two reasons. (1) It is the result of a very careful study of the whole subject. Many collateral issues concern the career of Laud ; many things in which he was not directly concerned have to be considered before any attempt can be made to form a complete judgment on his character. The author of this biography has spared no pains to make himself acquainted with all this mass of material. (2) It takes a standpoint not before occupied, as far as we know, by any biographer of Laud,—that of one who has been an Anglican and is now a Roman. Did Laud approximate to Rome ? Our author unhesitatingly answers " No." Did he approach Roman doctrine, in the matter of Apostolical Succession and the Real Presence ? "No" again. He was not as near it as Anglicans who hold high doctrine on these points. He had strong views of his own on these points ; but "I emphatically deny that he believed in what Catholics understand by these terms, or anything at all approaching to it." Laud most emphatically declared that he was a " Pro- testant ;" that, cf course, every Anglican divine of any note up to fifty years ago, was in the habit of doing ; he was strongly averse to Rome, though to an outside spectator he seemed to stand much nearer to Rome than to Geneva. Of the Archbishop's personal character " A Romish Recusant " tries to speak candidly and even kindly; but he does not always succeed. Indeed, there are things about Laud which the most partial advocate can hardly get over. There was something small about him. And he was scandalously compliant to bad men. That he should have been so adulatory to Buckingham, so savagely critical of Abbott, is an irremovable blemish on his character. He was no Saint, according to our author not to be compared with a list of Roman Saints whom he names. " He died a brave man ; I hope a good one." Yet even about his courage the " Recusant " permits himself a somewhat spiteful remark. He repudiates the malicious sug- gestion that he painted his face on the morning of his execution ; but he cannot help suggesting : " It may be well to remember that there is such a thing as eczema, which would give a colour more permanent than paint." Is it too much to call that I spiteful" ?
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