Humanities. By Thomas Sinclair, M.A. (Milliner and Co.)—" To have
read an ode of Horace ought to correct for ever the delusion that Hebrew sentiment could be essentially worthy of the most momentary superiority over Latin thought and refinement." So
writes Mr. Sinclair in his preface. As he says elsewhere that the " Saturnian verse was a thousandfold the most promising part of all this people's [the Romans'] literature," it is not difficalt to see the proportion of value between the Saturnian verse (of which he seems to know a good deal more than most people) and the Bible which he would establish. He returns to this subject more than once. The final expression of his thought we may perhaps find in his verses written in Rome :—
" The brain of Christianity worked here, And this encircling Colonnade spread hands Of freedom for believers' craven foar,
Tall life was not the terror which disbands.
If kindness is the cause of all such work,
It needs a blessiug from the strongest heart ; But all among the Roman ruins lurk
Protests against the pride of lower art.
That dome is to Pantheon but a toy, Those crowds of priests are out of time and use, The Hebrew gallows has outworn all joy :
Will life return again from woes' abase ? "
A writer who can print such poor -stuff as this is scarcely qualified to be a preacher of the Gospel of Humanism.
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