"HIGH CHUBL'11" . AND " THE CURATES OF B.ITERSDALE."

Two works, neither of which seems to be below the common average of ephemeral novels, have been sent to us for reviewal ;

• High Church. In two volumes. Published by Hurst and Blacken. The Curates of Riversdale, &c. In three volumes. Published by Hurst and Blacken.

and as they both are more or less concerned with matters clerical, we have coupled them together for the nonce.

Moderate Anglicans have, we think, reason to complain that their views are not unfrequently identified with those known as Tractarian. Was there, it may be asked, no High Church theo- logy before Keble sang or• Newman wrote ? Were Beveridge and Bull " Puseyites ?" Is not the doctrine of baptismal regeneration, is not that of priestly, absolution, is not that of occasional con- fession, is not that of episcopal conseoration and commission, en- forced or countenanced in the "Book of Common Prayer ?" To speak of all who hold Church principles as Tractarians, or to con- demn thosewho in part adopt the views of the Oxfordtheologians, as unfaithful ministers of the English Communion, seems to us hardly fair. Among them, no doubt, hive been found. men with Romeward sympathies; among them are men whose zeal has outstripped their discretion; among them are men whose excesses deserve rebuke, or whose love of ceremonial has led them into ill-advised display. But that High Churchmen are often earnest, hard-working, devout, and loyal men, we know to be a fast ; that the High Church party has in our own day shown an active interest in the education and social well-being of the people: that ithas favoured the development of taste, through its cultivation of architecture and music, and in general exerted a beneficial didactic influence i reviving, in however poor a way, something like a sense of what men believe to be the high and solemn purposes of existence, we think few candid persons will deny. High Churchmen are so far as we know them, as pious, as laborious, as learned, as faith- ful as their opponents. As a rule, we think they have more cul- ture than the latter ; possibly, too, they are sometimes dis-

tinguished by a more ethical earnestness a more thorough recognition of the stern realities of life. /While therefore, we concede that the individual indiscretion of High Churchmen is a fitting subject for censure, we think that a sense of justice should deter those who impugn their principles, from the expression of a collective or indiscriminate condemnation. We could wish High Church. and Low Church alike, as long as there is . an ecclesiastical nationality which includes both, to abandon their mutual animosities, to unite, if possible; in some scheme of reciprocal relief, as regards articles, rubrics, and creeds, and to cooperate in the endeavour to make English men and 'women wise are good, and true and happy.

The second of the two works which have suggested. these re- marks is entitled The Curates of Ripersdale. It professes to embody the recollections of a. clergyman as written by. himself. To what extent it reports fact, and to what extent it is fictitious, is not readily determinable. It introduces us, directly or in- directly, to such men as Whately, Archbishop of Dublin, Neander and Mezzofanti. Whately is made to call Pusey's system of re- ligious thought " German-plated theology" and Newman's "Brummagem Popery ; " Mezzofanti to express an opinion "that the writers and admirers of the Tracts ought to a man either to return to the bosom of our Church (' Rome '), or at least cease to be members of the Church of England, as at present, constituted." " Neander, notwithstanding his neologian taint, is the object of i the author's fervent admiration. A " Jenny Neander " is men- tioned, between whom, and Elinor Holdsworth, the wife of the

narrator, an intimate friendship springs up. Is this fact or fiction, and who, we should like to know, are meant by the

Bishops of Churchleechton, Clutchfat, Fleshpotbury, Chambering- fold and Grabball ?—bishops, it seems, whose servants would thrust the emaciated Christian divine (Neander) from their episcopal palaces with indignant disdain. There are various persons, men-

tioned in these volumes, whose names are equally strange with those given to these unrecognized prelates. Among them we may particularize Blenheim Bulcan Birchmore, Jaudice Silligo

O'Bray, and Mr. Grovelminster. The writer tries to be facetious, but the wit is not very exhilarating.. The blunders and absurdi- ties of certain. religious professors or preachers are exposed in his pages ; or some slightly comic scene, or adventure is described, which you read without much difficulty, if with no great enjoy- ment. The sketch of Monteleone, the fine-hearted Hebrew gen- tleman and that of his son, somewhat interested us ; and we were amused with an account of a clerical party at the Archbishop of Dublin's. It should be understood that the work is not properly a novel, but a kind of semi-real, semi-fictitious biography. There is some reason to think that the author is a. man of considerable erudition. He apparently possesees a competent knowledge of He- brew, and one or two biblicalexpositions which he introduces denote a degree of learning unusual in a novel or quasi-novel. Though

anti-tractarian, we should not call the writer Low Church ; he professes rather to avoid extremes, and the casual criticism on the famous Oxford tracts seems fair and discriminating,

Perhaps the author of our second work, which bears the omi- nous name, High Churcla, for a title, and is furnished with a vitu-

perative motto from Cowper about " Histrionio mummery," must also be described negatively as not a Low Churchman. We cannot say that any particular views are asserted, and. only two usages are directly censured. The story is evidently suggested by the long-continued disturbances in a celebrated metropolitA*--- church. The town of Tenchester is a large town ; it delights lip jog on in its usual fashion;. dislikes the shape of its pews to lie altered ; dislikes the new organist; dislikes innovations in gen ral. The new rector Mr. Stone, and Geoffrey, his son and our are High Church, They wish to introduce certain improveme into the service celebrated at St. Jude's ; a regular choir emir ingly is substituted for " a screechy lot " of charity childrei

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at Easter the interior of the sacred building is decorated with flowers, and wax-lights are allowed to burn on the altar. Geof- frey Stone is a really earnest, high-minded man, anxious to do his duty, a brave, iron-willed man, strong, tall and muscular. He is one of the most prominent characters in the book. Miss Cheyne is his fiancee. We cannot quite ascertain the origin or reason of his engagement. In the sequel, it appears that he either never has loved or has ceased to love the lady. His affection we are told is really given to another woman—that woman, Ada Chester, the bride of the merchant, Martin Chester. Beyond the fact of his considering himself under an obligation to marry the lady w.bom he does not love, and his secret attachment to another man's wife, no moral imputation is brought against the Tractarian clergyman. Ada Chester, again, is tenderly attached to her hus- band, and only accidentally and towards the close of the second volume discovers Geoffrey Stone's love for herself. Miss Cheyne, meanwhile, cherishes a latent affection for Frank Chester. Ada learns her secret ; learns how she had loved Frank almost from girlhood ; how when a bolder rival stepped in, her mother's manoeuvres ended in the rejection of the old, and the acceptance of the new lover. The two ladies then become fast friends. Each essays to prove her friendship practically. Mrs. Chester's repre- sentations induce Geoffrey Stone to abandon the matrimonial alli- ance with Miss Cheyne; Miss Cheyne's remonstrances decide Martin Chester to seek a reconciliation with his wife. They have long been secretly separated. The estrangement arose in their divergency of opinion on the High Church proceedings at St. Jude's. The husband required that the wife, on one particular occasion, should not attend service there. The wife, considered it her duty to go. A coolness ensued. This coolness congealed into complete alienation, after Mrs. Chester had imprudently accepted Mr. Stone's indiscreet invitation to confess her sorrows to him in the vestry of St. Jude's. The advice which he gives her would be pronounced irreproachable, even by his opponents, since the doc- trine he teaches is that of submission. He afterwards accompanies her to her home; their way they meet her husband ; an angry scene with the cergyman is followed by one still more painful between husband and wife. He has been informed of her inter- view with Geoffrey, and is haughty, angry, hot-headed, unjust and imperious. He now requires Mrs. Chester's promise that she will never again, during the existing dynasty, enter St. Jude's. Think- - ing it wrone-° to turn from the Church in which she has been ac- customed to worship, and " to treat with contumely a man whose only fault was not that of the Church in general—too much zeal in its cause," she refuses to give the desired pledge. Martin.then determines on a virtual separation, and arranges that they are to live for ever apart. The friendly intentions of the two ladies, mentioned above, are realized only as regards one of them. A second interview of Mrs. Chester with Mr. Stone is discovered by her infuriated husband, who waits under the dark trees, till Mar- tin passes, to revenge his wrongs. All this time the parish has been in a ferment—the Church the scene of discord and riot. In the commencement of the book, the-Stones have dismissed a some- what objectionable tenant, Richard Buries, in favour of a poor woman, who is a member of their congregation. After this " Iron Sam" ate son of old Buries, nourishing wrath in his heart, at- tempts, with the aid of other vagabonds, to block up the right of way, when Geoffrey- Stone is passing. Nothing daunted, Stone advances towards his tormentors, requestspermission to pass on the pavement, is resisted, insulted, and finally involved in a struggle with " Iron Sam." The clergyman gets the better of his ruffianly antagonist and gives him into charge. Sam is committed to prison ; comes out more vindictive than he went in; sets fire to St. Jude's ; and has to stand his trial. Martin Chester is accused of murder, and his wife dies " the victim of High Church."

Such is an analysis of the plot of this anti-Tractarian novel. How far all the miseries of the tale are fairly chargeable on eccle- siastical doctrine and practice, and how far they are the conse- quences of unreason, imprudence, jealousy, misconstruction, and blackguardly vengeance, discerning readers will judge. Religious differences will always tend to produce alienation between hus- band and wife, where both are equally earnest in their devotion to a cause All attempts at reform social and political are dis- turbing. Reformers are often intemperate, impracticable, and fanatical. Some High Churchmen we fear, are so. We can comprehend their theory of a beautiful ceremonial; but is their application of this theory well-timed ? is their symbolical decora- tion intelligible, is it always marked by good taste, and does it tend to edify their congregations ? The age, we incline to think, must advance much further in knowledge, wisdom, and aesthetic culture, before the masses can appreciate a noble ritual or a splen- did ceremonial. The introduction, meanwhile, of such superflu- ous ornamentation as only exasperates ignorance or provokes ridicule, ought, in our opinion, to be carefully eschewed. If the rubric stands in the way of a reasonable surrender to popular clamour,--and we are not convinced that it does,—would it not be possible to devise some provisional measure of relief, or might not High Chnrchmen conscientiously regard the nature of the case as in itself supplying that measure ? Meanwhile, this novel of " High Church," which is not with- out interest, and which, if by manufacturing incidents it makes out a strong case against doctrines and practices which it disap- proves, is at least not characterized by abusive misrepresentations, may be allowed to read its moral to indiscretion' and misdirected zeal.