NEW PUBLICATIONS. INSPIRATION AND MODERN CRITICISM.

Evening Post, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 129, 27 November 1909, Page 13

NEW PUBLICATIONS. INSPIRATION AND MODERN CRITICISM.

"Modern Study of the Old Testament and Inspiration." By T. H. Sprott, M.A., Vicar of St. Paul's, Wellington, New Zealand. Cambridge : University Press. In little more than three years, three notable books in the department of Biblical and theological study, the work of Wellington clergymen, have been issued by London publishers. One, a study of the Book of ' Job, for general readers, has taken its place in a popular series; another, an enquiry into the traditional doctrine of the Atonement, attracted wide attention on account of the doctrinal issues raised ; • the third, the one now before us, bearing the imprimatur of a great English university, deals with certain basic problems which no thoughtful man of our day may ignorej and which, in fact, are, as they have been for a generation past, very much before the minds of men. As the preface sets forth, Mr. Sprott's book contains the substance, with considerable expansion, of lectures delivered in Lent, 1902. The author has not confined himself to the merely historic and critical aspects of his subject — the traditional and mechanical notion of inspiration which is comparatively recent, and which is now pretty generally admitted to be untenable, and ihe deductions and hypotheses of modern criticism. Holding that inspiration is a fact, he sets out a higher and deeper conception of that inspiration than that which, excluding the human element, maintains that \ the. letter is all in all, and the narratives an mei Irant record of human history. He finds the tokens of inspiration in the Biblical conception of God, which, as he shows, is unique, and, in three striking chapters, enlarges on the Old Testament interpretation of the self-manifestation of God in nature, in man's moral constitution, and in history. Into these regions it is not possible here to follow the author, but every page bears^ witness of profound: study and, original thought. In the closing chapters, he touches on the mystery of pain, and the treatment of the subject by Old Testament writers. He finds that they look on vicarious suffering as involved in the solidarity of mankind and as fruitful not to the sufferers alone, but to the race. But he is careful to discriminate between vicarious suffering and vicarious punislunent of the innocent, holding that confounding the two leads to grave error. His general conclusion is : "When criticism has done its work, the Old Testament remains." To the question, ''How came it about ( that the Biblical writers, and they alone, attained to this interpretation in all its fulness?" 'his reply is, that they "were the subjects of a special inspiration of the Spirit of God, which quickened their intellectual, moral,' and spiritual faculties, and so enabled them 'to read ariejht the open secret of God's selfmanifestation. Inspiration is certainly an adequate explanation. Is there any other equally adequate?" The book is marked as distinctly by its modesty as by its scholarship. Necessarily it contains debatable matter, but the author is never dogmatic, never censorious nor intolerant, and his appeal is to the reasoned judgment of the reader. The honesty and sincerity with which the problems are handled will impress every careful student, and the book should be helpful to those — young men in particular — who find little satisfaction in the many superficial and obsolete popular treatises on the profound questions dealt with in Mr. Sprott's book. "A Man's Man." By lan Hay, 'author of "The Right Stuff" and' "Pip." London : William Blackwood and Sons. Mr. Lan Hay, in a very short period, has earned a wide popularity, and has fairly gained it by sound work. His earlier books were noticed in this column as they appeared ; and "A Man's Man" should confirm the reputation its author has gained. As in his previous novels, the hero is strenuous and resourceful, meets with adventures, some adverse enough, but wins through by pluck and determination. He is one Hugh Marrable, an engineer, who goes over to the United States, and meets with success, but has a singularly unpleasant experience. He offends one Noddy Kinahan, a wealthy "boss," part of whose business is to send unseaworthy ships to sea, have them scuttled, and collect the insurance. Noddy has Hugh "shanghaed," and sent, an alleged stowaway, across the Atlantic on one of these steamers. But Hugh, even in these circumstances, holds his own, and when the officers leave the ship, with the water-plug drawn, and hastily take to the boats, he and three others contrive to remain, stop the leak, and run the vessel to port, not only securing salvage, but bearing with them incriminating papers that secure for Kinahan a well-earned term of penal servitude. The story is told with characteristic humour, and the interest never flags. «'Love the Thief." By Helen Mather, author of "Comin" Thro* the Rye," etc. London : Stanley Paul and Co. ' Brief reference has already been made in our columns to this novel. St. James's Gazette writes of it ■ thus :—: — "Love the Thief" has the pathos of all last things. The author has announced her determination to leave literature and take to "business/ because literature ,to put it shortly, "doesn't pay." This is rather distressing to hear at the close of so long a popularity, but Miss Mather is neither sentimental nor grandiloquent as to her claims upon her public's gratitude. While hoping that the new career will be all that she so pluckily expects, we can take leave of her with the assurance that her last book is as bright and entertaining as anything she has, done. It is not pretentious, and it avoids all problems. It is the story of a splendid girl, unjustly suspected of a crime that is, in the end, ingeniously made clear, without melodrama or heroics of any kind. "The February Boys." A Story for. Children. By Mrs. Molesworth, author of "Hoodie," "Hermy," "Tho Bolted Door," etc. With eight coloured illustrations by Mabel L. Atwell. London and Edinburgh : W. and R. Chambers, Limited. Mrs. Molesworth needs no introduction to such as are acquainted with the best class of literature for the boys and girls of the family or school. Her work has a vividness and charm not unlike that which gave Mrs. Ewing's books so lasting a popularity. "The February Boys" opens with the disappointment of a little fellow of five, the sole and somewhat spoiled child, who, a week after his birthday, his parents being from home, has a message from his father concerning a, "birthday present" — a baby brother. He had expected a pony, and lakes the message as literally as any five-year-old boy would do. But a judicious aunt interposes to check the rising jealousy in the bosom of the little king who must share his throne with another, and the reader finds how jealousy gives way to fraternal pride, and the happie&t relations follow between the little "February Boys." The coloured plates, by Mabel AltweK, are not only nil that could be desired as illustrations, but even apart from the text have a value of their own as exquisite studies of child -life.

In Messrs. Duckworth's latest list of forthcoming books one is included which should be of local interest, as tho author, Miss A. D. Bright, already known as a writer of charming children's stories, and the artist, Mr. Harry Rountree, are both New Zealanders. The book, which, we understand, is somewhat on the lines of the author's "Three Christmas Gifts," will be produced in attractive form, and freely illustrated, both in colour and in black-and-white. Tho Windsor Magazine for November (Gordon and Gotch) opens with an illustrated article,, by Austin Chester on "Tho Art of Mr. J. Young Hunter." Mr. Wiseman's interesting articles on the inland navigation of Great Britain are continued, as also Max Pemberton's serial, "White Walls." Other story-writers represented are Messrs. Justus M. Forman, Barry Pain, C. G. D. Roberts, Harrison Rhodes, and Miss G. B. Lancaster. "The Birmingham Festival," by E. A. Baughan, should interest musical readers. It is illustrated with many portraits of ladies and gentlemen celebrated in the art. Tho usual departments of verse and humorous sketches are as usual well selected, and arranged by the editor. Pears' Annual for 1909 keeps up its excellent- Dickens tradition as well as that of high-class art work so long associated with its publishers. Both covers, "fore and aft," are triumphs of chromo-lithography, and four of Dickens's minor Christmas stories — not so well known as they deserve to be, are included in the text, with illustrations profuse and admirable. One of them is "Boots at the Holly-Tree Inn." There are four coloured supplements, the largest and finest being a facsimile ("printed in England") of Briton Riviere's thoroughly English painting, "Compulsory Education," in which a sweet little maiden endeavours to initiate a large and much-puzzled dog into the mysteries of the alphab&t. The Evils of Deforestation," by J. P. Grossman, M.A., director of the School of Commerce, Auckland University College (Gordon and Gotch), is an impressive indictment of the unsystem-a-tic and reckless deforestation of which New Zealand is just beginning to' realise the mischief. The tostly Timber Commission paid very inadequate attention to this important question, but the official departments concerned seem to be taking the subject somewhat more seriously. Mr. Grossman's book is interesting on account of its valuable photographs, illustrating not only typical progressive examples of denudation of great tracts of fine land in these islands, the shoaling of rivers and consequent floods, the formation of river bars, etc., but show the complete ruin of large districts in China and other parts of the Old World. It would be well if lantern lectures explaining these instructive pictures could be giver in every public school in the land. "Arbor Day" would then have more significance. The author deserves congratulation on his valuable pamphlet. "Ihe Revelation of Britain," by Charles C. Reade, a shilling pamphlet, published by Gordon and Gotch. is an extended reprint of certain letters published in a group of colonial newspapers. It deals with the difficult social problems, such as unemployment, poverty, and vice, which Britain has to face, and which the author attributes to "the traditional individualsim" of tho Old Land. Individualism he defines as "that particular form of politica l and social thought which takes for its cry 'The liberty of the subject.'" It was with a freafc price that the Briton gained his reedom, and the centuries of conflict by which it was gained "brought out to a marked degree the passionate racial instinct of the Englishman for what he calls liberty," which liberty, the writer contends, the progress of science and discovery has converted into the' liberty "of privileged individuals to exploit the mass," The book isi a special plea for the "supremacy of the civic function," and Germany is cited as au example ot its success ; but that success may strike the reader as very superficial compared with what has been done by private energy in such cases as the Port Sunlight experiment. The author ignores the demoralising exercise of the "civic function" in well-meant experiments like those of 'West Ham and Poplar. The pamphlet is illustrated with pictures of slum life and of model homes.