Victorian Theology
ENGLISH THOUGHT, 1860-1900: THE THEOLOGICAL ASPECT. By L. E. Elliott-Binns. (Longmans, 28s.) THE opening chapters of this book are concerned with the impact of natural science, philosophy, and historical studies on Christian belief. There follows a survey of the course of Biblical studies, in which Dr. Elliott-Binns, himself a Biblical scholar, is particularly at home. Then, after a chapter on the comparative study of religions, the principal dogmas of the Church are considered in turn and the ways in which they were reinterpreted. The slender chapter entitled 'The Political, Economic and Social Background —Christian Ethics—Church and State' is no doubt a measure of the comparative indifference •of Victorian theologians to these topics, though more might have been said about them than is said here. Equally welcome would have been a fuller treatment of the theological implications of the general literature of the period. The concluding chapters on 'The Spread of Liberal Views' and 'The Position at the Close of the Century,' while they fasten on the main points that emerge, are unnecessarily wordy and repetitious.
The book will serve three useful purposes. The general reader, who wants a conspectus of the reactions of traditional theology to scientific discoveries and Biblicalocriticism, will find here what he wants. It will be a handy textbook for theological students who can hardly understand the present state of their studies if they do not know what their predecessors did and failed to do during this crucial period. It will also, no doubt, be used as a work of reference since a great deal of bibliographical information is stored within its pages. It is regrettable that this information is not more con- veniently assembled, and furnished with more detail in the way of dates.
ALEC VIDLER
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