REUNION ALL ROUND.*
* Reunion All Round; or, Joel's Hammer Laid Aside, and the Ha of Human Kindness Beaten up into Butter and Sere'd in a Lordly Dish. B the Anthour of Absolute and elbitofholt. London : Samuel Gurney. [6d. net.] MR. RONALD KNOX'S skit upon Foundations in the trenchant manner of Dryden was a brilliant piece of work. His Reunion All Round, from the point of view of form, is far more adventurous and no less successful. The turn of Swift's .sentences is admirably caught, and the writer moves easily in the bright harness of one of the greatest of English pam- phleteers. But there the likeness stops. There is all the difference in the world between the swordsmanship in the one case and in the other. Mr. Knox's wit, audacious as it often is and surprising, has none of Swift's subtlety. The irony of Swift is so delicate that the reader has not unfrequently to stop and consider whether a particular statement is meant seriously or not. Mr. Knox inspires no such doubts; his effects are broadly farcical, and raise an immediate laugh. Of course it must be admitted that Swift had an immense advantage in the object of his attack. The Whig Christianity of his day was not many steps removed from infidelity. In his view, the Christian religion had practically been abolished by what was then his own party. The plea, therefore, that nevertheless, in other interests, it ought not to be entirely destroyed had cogency from the Whigs' own point of view. Mr. Knox is presumably attacking the Kikuyu advocates of reunion ; but when it is remembered that these proposals for reunion were made by missionaries in the interests of presenting a united front against Moham- medanism, there is not even the semblance of reasonableness in the suggestion that reunion should be extended so as to embrace the Mohammedans themselves and the heathen generally. However, having borrowed the idea of his pam- phlet from the advocates of reunion, Mr. Knox leaves them severely alone, and directs his attack mainly against "the man in the street," or " the man about town," or " the woman of fashion," who are quite guiltless of any desire to reunite with anybody. It is, therefore, in the incidental blows delivered against the enemies of any of his favourite idols- „ the Atbanasian Creed, the indissolubility of marriage, the practice of fasting, the plenary inspiration of Scripture, or the Church of Rome—that the author's purpose must be found ; and those who share his views will no doubt consider that the blows are well aimed and effective. To us, on the contrary, the wit, even at its best, seems too remote from reality to effect anything. It will make the laughter of an afternoon and be forgotten. We may give, for a specimen, the para- graph headed "The Muezzin Mnzzl'd ":—
” There is another Custom prevailing in Mahometan Countries,
of such doubtful Advantage that we could not agree to conform to it without earnest Consideration. I mean the Custom by which people are woken in the Morning by a Fellow bawling out from the Top-of a Minaret, to the Effect (unless my memory plays me false) that Allah is great. It will seem shocking to minds habituated to our Western Standards of Taste, that these Muezzins, as they are calrd, should give a Pronouncement so public to so controversial a Statement. We could not allow it : for it would manifestly cause the most grievous Distress of Conscience to any Atheist or Agnostick who happened to bo within Earshot. Yet is something to be said for the Practice in general Outline ; who has not wished, as he turn'd over in bed at eight of the clock on a Sunday morning, that there were some less noisy means of awakening a few devout Women, than making a great Clanging of Bells, as if the whole City were afire ? Would it not be well to introduce the Muezzin into our Church-towers, and at the same Time to see to it that his Announcement was both less provocative, and more appro- priate; that he should either shout out, The early Bird catches the Worm., or, if he were musical, even intone to some simple Anglican Chant the Words :
Early to bed and early to rise Makes a Man healthy, wealthy, and wise ?"
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