14 FEBRUARY 1925, Page 24

AMERICA'S diagnosis of the Restoration fever comes late but explores

fresh ground. Dr. Krutch describes the progress of critical theory in the seventeenth century and its attitude towards the morality of the theatre, shows that Jeremy Collier's attack instead of being a spontaneous generation followed tardily the general stream of feeling, and shared with that stream the responsibility for the sentimental comedies of Steele. The author carries his learning lightly and reserves for an appendix his valuable bibliographies of seventeenth century critical theory and the Collier controversy. Although but lately printed, the volume was completed in 1920 and deserves an honourable place among the studies produced by the revived interest in Restoration literature.