Life of Viscount Bolingbroke. By Arthur Hassell, M.A. (W. H.
Allen and Co.)--With this volume, one of the "Statesmen Series," there is little fault to find. Some partiality for his sub- ject must be allowed to a biographer, who, indeed, must be either more or less than human if he can always hold the balance quite straight. Bolingbroke hitherto has had scant justice, though. indeed, there can be little doubt that his schemes were mischievous. How any man can read the history of England from 1603 to 1688 and feel any kind of sympathy for statesmanship that would have brought back the Stuart, passes comprehension. It is somewhat absurd, too, to talk of the Whig families as a " Venetian Oligarchy ;" it was a telling phrase when Mr. Disraeli invented it, but it does not bear a second use. But, generally, Mr. Hassell has given us an instructive, as it is certainly a readable volume.
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