20 MARCH 1886, Page 22

Ulfilas : Apostle of the Goths. By Charles A. Anderson

Scott, B.A. (Macmillan and Bowes, Cambridge.) —This is an interesting study, not so much of a great man as of a great work. The person- ality of Tilfilas, indeed, is clearly defined. We have a distinct idea of what manner of man he was, but Mr. Scott has been able to add bat very little to our knowledge of him. It is, unhappily, beyond the power of man, it would seem, to do so. Bat to the history of the great religious movement in which Ulfilas took a part, and to the clearer definition of the doctrinal position which he and his converts took up, he makes in this volume a valuable contribution. IIIfilas was undoubtedly an Arian—it is envious that one of the greatest preachers of the Cross since St. Paul should be outside the boundaries of the Athanasian Creed—but the Arianism of the Teutons was, as Mr. Scott points out in an excellent chapter, different from the Arianism of the Greeks. This important part of Church history has, of course, an intimate connection with those important series of political events which culminated in the disastrous defeat of Valens at Adrianople. Here, too, and also in the subsequent history of the Gothic peoples, we find valuable help in Mr. Scott's excellent monograph. We welcome the book not less heartily because we may regard it as one of the fruits of that excellent form of endowment,— the encouragement to learning afforded by studentships. A " student " in this sense may be defined as a scholar who has not the fear of examination before his eyes.