ROBERT SOU111WELL, S.J., AND JOHN VIANNEY.
Robert Southwell, S.F., Priest and Martyr. By I A. Taylor. (Sands and Co. 2s. 6d. net.)—Mr. Taylor begins with a frank con- fession: "If to declare implacable war against existing institu- tions, whether spiritual or temporal, and to set himself in open opposition to the law of the realm, renders a man a legitimate subject for chastisement, it cannot be denied that Southwell justly deserved it." After that we can at least tolerate all the praises which Mr. Taylor bestows on his hero. The man had some strange fantasies ; he thought that Mary Stuart was an ideal of womanhood ; the tragedy of the Kirk of Field, the marriage with Bothwell, the alliance with assassins, did not trouble him. She was a staunch friend to the Pope, and that was enough. For all this, his story is full of interest. He was an enemy of freedom, civil and religious. If he and his friends had triumphed, we should have been slaves to-day. But fas set et ab hoste doceri.—The story of another eminent ecclesiastic is told in The Blessed John Vianney, Cure d'Ars, by Joseph Vianney, Translated by C. W. W. (Duckworth and Co., as.), a volume in "The Saints" Series. We do not care to criticise it. It is impossible not to believe that such men do a great work for God. Their ideals are not ours ; we do not think that it would be well for the Church or the world if they were to be universally accepted. Perhaps there is no need to fear or hope for such a result. But he was one among a million. His austerities were excessive ; but their object was not to save his own soul, but, as he conceived, the souls of his people, and sometimes, too, to benefit their bodies. His biographer compares him to a certain Cardinal who had a splendid-looking bed, but really slept on faggots. But John Vianney had given his mattress to one poor parishioner, and his pillow to another. That is a mortification with which one can hardly quarrel.
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