SOME BOOKS OF THE WEEK.
[Under this heading we notice such Books of the week as hove not hems reserved for review in other forms.] The London Quarterly Review.—We much regret that for reasons of space we are unable to deal regularly with this periodical. The current number, however, contains an article on " How to Defend England," by Mr. Coulson Kernahan, which is of such interest that we feel compelled to recommend it to our readers. Although Mr. Kernahan addresses himself primarily to Nonconformists, his words deserve a wider attention. His essay is devoted to showing that there is nothing in national defence and universal training which need in any way conflict with the precepts of Christianity,
He points out the virtue of the military spirit. It makes for patriotism, and " the great of this earth and of all times—those who are honoured not only in the history of England but in the history of the world—were patriots." Mr. Kernahan urges finally that war itself may sometimes be a duty. " Unchristian, inhuman, and wholly damnable as I hold the waging of war, merely for the purpose of aggression, to be, yet I say deliberately that there have been, and may be again, occasions when the waging of a righteous war in defending her own children, in defending a great principle, or in defending the defenceless against the aggression of a monster and a tyrant, has left no alternative to a Christian country. I say, too, that the one and only way to avert such war is to be ready for war."
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