My Pilgrimage to the Wise Men of the East. By
Moncure Daniel Conway. (A. Constable and Co. 12s. 6d. net.)—Any one interested in questions of morality and religion may profitably read this volume, if he does not mind having his toes trodden, even trampled, on. Dr. Moncure Conway does not, we take it, mean to be offensive ; but he has gone a long way from his starting-point; and scarcely makes allowance for the feelings of those whom he has left so far behind him. We do not intend to discuss with him such matters as the relative merits of Christianity and Buddhism, or the question whether Dr. Conway's scheme of belief or unbelief, if it could be put into practice, would be to the benefit of mankind. Among his hopes for the greater happiness of the race is one that we may "cease to immolate one seventh of human time to the Sabbath idol."- Does he seriously think that the abolition of a day of rest will make men happier or better ? We see on p. 185—it is a characteristic specimen of some very hasty conclusions—that at St. Thomas's Day, December 21st, "day and night are Didymuses (twins)." One supposes twins to be alike ; how can they be so when both are at their extremes ? The twin condition of day and night must be at the equinoxes, Libra die samnigue pares ubi fecerit hares. Dr. Conway has something to say about theosophy, about Madame Blavatsky, and the cognate subject of Indian jugglers. One of the performances of these artistes he confesses to have puzzled him. The man made a number of little figures to dance and move about generally at will, they being wholly unconnected with him, a fact of which Dr. Conway satisfied himself.
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