19 OCTOBER 1878, Page 24

CURRENT LITERATURE.

though none of them riso noticably above the average of merit. We should be inclined to give the first place to that on "Leasing as Philosopher and Theologian," whore the writer defends with ability and, it seems to us, success, against Mr. Syrue, the thesis that Leasing was a theist and even a supranaturalist. The essay on "The Uni- versities and the Renaissance" gives the results of considerable reading, not always, we should say, well digested. We are afraid that the writer takes too favourable a view of the revival of learning in Oxford. Tho small body called the "Oxford Reformers "were a trans- ient phenomenon, a light succeeding and succeeded by a very thick darkness. It is a very curious anachronism, which indicates but a superficial acquaintance with University and College history, when the essayist speaks of students being attracted to the Theo- logical Faculty by the "fat College livings." College livings are, unless we are very much mistaken, almost entirely a post-Reforms - tion institution. Many of them were acquired at a quite recent period. The one College about which we have had the opportunity of inquiring since reading the article has bought every living that it possesses since the beginning of the eighteenth century. For the first three centuries of its existence, it had nothing of the kind. There is an interesting article on "Tent Work in Palestine," estimating, and estimating very highly, the work of the Survey. There is a refreshing variety in "Butter and Cream," amidst the hurry and heat of controversy and politics. The editor should assign some such subject to the very angry person who attacks Mr. Hughes and his book on" The Old Church." A writer who so far forgets himself as to charge such an antagonist with dishonesty is sadly in want of some wholesome neutral alterative. The other articles in the number are " Joubert," "Bosnia, Herzegovina, and Austria," and "The Three Treaties."