CURRENT LITERATURE.
The Theological Review. April. (Williams and Norgate.)—This number is one of unusually great and varied interest, Miss F. P. Cobbe's essay on " Hereditary Piety," based, of course, in part on Mr. Galton's book on that subject, being, perhaps, the ablest of the articles. If only Miss Cobbe would not seek to be playful on religion, one might read what
she writes with almost unmixed pleasure and interest. In what taste, for instance, is the last sentence of the following passage, in all but this well enough put :— " To us in our day it is undoubtedly somewhat of a blow to be told that Religion, instead of being (as the old Hebrews believed) the cor- relative of health and cheerfulness and length of years, is, on the con- trary, near akin to disease ; and that he among men whom the Creator has blessed with the soundest body and coolest brain is, by some fiendish fatality, the least likely of all to give his heart to God, or devote his manly strength to His cause. The Glorious Company of the Apostles is reduced to a band of invalids, and the Noble Army of Martyrs is all on the sick list."
It is not that Miss Cobbe herself feels or thinks in this way; on the contrary, she argues strongly in another sense, making a very valuable distinction between different types of piety. But the sentence is an affectation, however it may be used. But the essay, on the whole, as it is, is closely reasoned, and, this fault apart, is admirably written. Another paper of much interest is to be found in Mr. J. E. Carpenter's "The Apostles' Creed," a paper with the object of which we have no sympathy, and to which, we believe, a very sufficient answer may be made, but which must command the respect of all readers by the learning and ability which it displays. Mr. Carpenter reviews the history of the
Creed, and examines its theology, with the view of showing that it is not capable of being made the "platform," so to speak, of a common Christianity. We find ourselves more in harmony with a short paper in which Presbyter Anglicanus defends, or rather gives some hints towards defending, the belief in immortality against the intolerable dogmatizing
which thinks to force us from our best hopes by its theory of "protoplasm." Mr. C. Began Paul gives us an "In Memoriam" sketch of the late Dr. Rowland Williams, a worthy tribute to one who earned by laborious truth-seeking the honours which, we may hope, another age will yet give him ; and we have also an interesting article from Mr. R. A. Armstrong on " Buddhism and Christianity," and a review by Mr. C. Beard of " Roma Sotterranea."
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