Christianity East and West. By Thomas Grieve Clark. (Redder and
Stoughton.)—Mr. Clark describes his book as an " ecclesias- tical pilgrimage." We may begin by saying that the experiences therein related would have been better put in a simpler form, even at the risk of some seeming egotism. Here is a cumbrous sentence to express the fact that the author entered as a Divinity student at Glasgow :—" At Glasgow, as, one autumn, the Red Togas students in college garb began to cluster in the court of the old University, the home of him who had been a while under the training of the world, and residing in the western court, was enrolled with a view to the Church." It is in Scotland, then, that the pilgrimage begins. One of its earliest experiences was the Disruption. The " pilgrim " has something to say about it, but he wraps it up in a mass of words, as, indeed, he does everything else. The book has value, for the -writer is a cultured observer, with an open mind and wide sympathies ; but it is really very difficult to read. From Scotland the writer travels to the Con- tinent, and finds opportunities for telling us something about Anglicanism, about Greek Christianity as seen in Russia and the East, and about Rome and the Papal System. Finally, as we understand him, he comes back to Scotland and takes Presbyterian orders, beginning his career with the admirable sentiment that "how faithful soever his convictions were to his profession, never could he be alienated in affection from other Churches, nor cease to welcome with docility and thankfulness the lessons which they might have to teach him."
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