[TO TIIR EDITOR OF THE " SPRCIATOR."]
SIR,—In the Spectator of October 21st your reviewer quotes an isolated paragraph from my book of three hundred and thirty-five pages, with the prefacing remark : "Here is his conclusion of the whole matter.'" By using the word "his," and by putting the five words between quotation-marks, your reviewer creates the impression that those five words are mine. They are not • mine, and the paragraph he quotes, apart from its context, is in no way representative of the body' of the book. Your reviewer adds a gibe, and states : "our function in these columns is discharged.'! The only possible conclusion to be drawn from your reviewer's words by any one who may compare the book with your reviewer's treatment of it is that your reviewer excludes from the function of a critic any attempt to give to his readers an honest or competent description of a book under his review. To quote (with a polite inflexion) from a well-known ballad, I apply to your reviewer the words : "Thy way thyself must find, Thou mis- directing churl ! "—I am, Sir, &c.,
JOHN HOLT SCHOOLING.
[Our correspondent curiously misunderstands the situation. The reviewer put the words " concluston of the whole matter" within quotation-marks, not because they were Mr. Schooling's, which they certainly are not, but because they are a quotation from the Bible.—En. Spectator.]
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