modern disciplines of the Philosophy of Religion and Christian Ethics. But while there is reason to complain that the lecturer has not sufficiently filled in the historical background of his argument, it must be heartily acknowledged that he has contributed a thoughtful, able, and useful book on a subject which continues to gain rather than lose in practical importance. For there is again the same need felt which roused Schleiermacher to assert the claims of religion upon "the cultured among the despisers thereof;" and if these lectures lack the eloquence and vehemence which immortalise the "Reden über die Religion," they at least similarly vindicate the sovereign dignity of religion, and expose the shallowness and the peril of an ethical culture which has lost the vision of God.

The determination of the relationship subsisting between religion and morality, announced as the object of the book before us, proceeds on the following lines :-(1) An examination of the nature and implications of morality; (2) a similar analysis of religion; (3) an exposition of their mutual relations; (4) the verification of the results by comparison with the testimony of Christ. The plan is certainly comprehensive; and as worked out it issues in an apologetical treatise, which is at the same time a collection of well-informed and suggestive essays on Moral Philosophy, the Philosophy of Religion, Comparative Religion and the Biblical Theology of the Gospels. That at times the general argument, owing to the independent interest of these branches of Theology, disappears below the horizon, is as easily excused as explained. It would be a serious task to follow the lecturer through this wide region of philosophy and theology, and it will be sufficient to indicate the heads of the various arguments most closely relevant to the main purpose of differentiating and relating the spiritual phenomena under discussion. The essay on Ethics, containing chapters on "Conduct and Motive" and "The Moral Ideal," yields three main propositions bearing on the matter in hand-firstly, that the object of morality is "the action of a rational being as such," more precisely, our self-determined attitudes and activities; secondly, that the moral ideal is the self-realisation of man as a being placed in a sphere of social relations; and thirdly, that the moral ideal, inexplicable and impracticable on the principles of naturalistic ethics, implies God alike as its source and as the condition of its actualisation. The next division furnishes a parallel analysis of religion, prefaced by a chapter on method, and concluding with an incursion into the region of the heathen religions—which, it may be added, are rapidly acquiring the same reputation as statistics. The general conclusions reached in the analysis which occupies itself with religion as exemplified in the perfect type of Christianity, may be summarised in the statements that the essence of religion is " reverence for the

Best and Highest known to us or conceivable by us," and that this sentiment by an inward necessity reveals, bodies itself forth in two characteristic forms-on the one hand in the adoration whose mothertongue is worship, on the other in aspiration or a self-renouncing endeavour to grow in likeness to, and thus to enjoy and preserve communion with, the object of religious reverence. In the light, now, of these parallel analyses it would appear that very definite affirmations can be made as to the distinction and the connection of the subjects under review. As regards the distinction, morality appears as a manifestation of will, religion as an evolution from a sentiment or feeling; the end of morality is self-realisation, of religion communion with God. As regards the connection, morality has its spring in religion, while religion inevitably issues in morality. Taking first the distinctions, it must be said that Mr Kidd's argumentation undoubtedly connects itself with the theory which has grounded the distinction of religion and morality on a distinction of the faculties primarily associated with each-viz., feeling and will; for although he afterwards tones down the distinction of the inner states and activities with which they are associated to the distinction between self-surrender and self-determination, this is not consistent with the earlier treatment of "the religious sentiment," where reverence is defined as the essence of religion, and as "the spring and animating breath" of ritual and conduct, if not of creed. The temptingly easy hypothesis which Mr Kidd embraces in reality but afterwards renounces in appearance-the hypothesis that morality is in essence an affair of the will, religion of the feelings, is in truth not tenable, and must give way before the sounder psychology which teaches that, in both, thought, feeling and will are found in primitive union. The real distinction is to be sought, as Mr Kidd adds later on, in the difference of the objects or spheres of morality and religion, and of the ends contemplated in each. The solid distinction doubtless is that morality is concerned with our relations to the world, religion with our relations to God, and that the summum bonum of the former is of the nature of obedience to law, of the latter akin to friendship. In reference to the ends, it may be doubted, in passing, if the vague conception of self-realisation is the ultimate philosophical formula for the ethical ideal. In the third division mutual relations of morality and religion are drawn out at length on the lines indicated in the earlier analysis. First of all, the distinctions previously dwelt upon are shown to be relative, in fact to merge in a close connection, and in the succeeding discussion the nature of the connection is determined in the sense of the subordination of morality-" a subordination analogous to that between a member and the organism of which it forms a part." In the second chapter of this section we are taken on to

consider the possibility of the spiritual phenomena happily expressed by a recent German writer in his two headings—“ Gut aber nicht fromm," "Fromm aber nicht gut"; and the conclusion reached, after an argument of sustained strength and lofty tone, is that in neither case is the isolation possible-that a genuine morality presupposes religion, and that a genuine religion must utter itself in morality. This third section, which deals at close quarters with the leading thesis, is indeed the best part of the book-combining, as it does, with ample evidence of independent speculative power, a mastery of the best thoughts that have been thrown out by recent masters who have laboured in the field. The concluding section is a less important contribution to the discussion, but has very considerable independent merit as a study of the teaching of Jesus, little hampered by the traditions of the discipline. So sound, indeed, is the criticism of the accepted treatment of the subject-matter which subjects it to the category of the Kingdom of God, and so good some of the detail, that it is to be hoped Mr Kidd will return to Biblical Theology in another capacity than that of the raiding apologist.

From this general outline we may now briefly turn to the more distinctive positions of the lectures, which, while not the most valuable portions, are of considerable interest. As such we may fairly regard the fundamental position assigned to reverence, and the conception of the mode in which religion creates a moral dynamic. In reference to the former of these doctrines, it has already been stated that, in Mr Kidd's analysis, reverence appears as the germ which, by the grace of God, unfolds into worship and the other religious phenomena. In it there lies the promise and the potency of the various developments of subjective and objective religion. Now, while reverence is doubtless a sweet and saintly grace, the time seems to have come to protest against the exaggerated honours which are being heaped upon it. Since the publication of Wilhelm Meister, we have so often heard that we almost believe the statement, that reverence is the truth of all the positive religions, which differ only according as they revere what is above us, around us, or beneath us. By modern ministers reverence is commended and extolled before the congregation until an impression is created that it marks the summit of Christian attainment. And now we have Mr. Kidd's argument that it is not only the omega but the alpha of religion-not only "the sea to which it goes " but also 66 the hills from which it flows." In general it may be observed that the importance recently attached to this grace is unwarranted and pernicious, and in particular that it does not occupy that fundamental position, as spring and animating breath," which is here assigned to it. Tested by the facts of Christianity, it appears that it is not primary,

but a secondary result of the cardinal, and most truly characteristic religious act, known as faith. Experience shows that reverence is commonly absent, or so weak as to be negligable until, by the sovereign act of faith, the soul passes into a filial relationship with God; and it is only at a later stage, and as a result of the vitality and power of faith, that it comes to play any important part in colouring the character and in moulding conduct. At the very most it could only be conceded that reverence is part of the emotional side of faith, and as such it is by no means the most important part of that whole-souled spiritual act in which man has in all religions cast himself upon his God for protection, help and life.

The second important position which may be referred to is the account given of the special conditions under which religion issues in morality. That a pious man is a good man, that justification is followed by sanctification, is of course axiomatic in theology. As to the conditions, however, under which the root of piety bears the fruits of righteousness, there is room for difference of opinion. It is not sufficient to say that under Christianity the pious man is a good man because he has been born a new creature, and because the Spirit of God dwelleth in him. From Paul downwards it has been seen that the divine influences work in and through definite human springs of conduct; and it is in his conception of the subjective link between piety and righteousness that Mr Kidd has emphasised a comparatively neglected factor. His characteristic contribution to the doctrine of the Christian dynamic is that reverence involves desire of imitation, and that religious reverence necessarily issues in a desire to become like Him who has moved us by His excellence. "Having seen and acknowledged our ideal, we cannot help feeling a desire to rise towards it. . . On this side, if anywhere, a connection between religion and morality will be discovered." The factor thus emphasised is certainly important. The oldest religious usages, according to a writer quoted with approval by Pfleiderer, were "acts which imitate the doings of the higher powers;" the view further has support in the sayings of Jesus, which propose the example of God to the disciples, and in Paul's exhortation to be imitators of God; and it has moreover been powerfully operative in Christendom. But the desire to become like the object of religious reverence is not to be emphasised as the exclusive, or even the principal, factor in the dynamic furnished by Christianity. Within the sphere of Christian experience the impulse to holiness of life mainly springs, as Paul and Luther saw, from a sense of gratitude for the unmerited blessings bestowed by God upon His unworthy creatures; and this view of the pre-eminent importance of gratitude as the spring of

sanctification is confirmed by the observation that works of Christian beneficence are commonly motived by the phrase "for Christ's sake." It is less the desire to imitate God than gratitude for what He has done, along with the hope of what through Him shall yet be, that explains how piety has produced its plenteous harvest of integrity and philanthropy.

Reference to what are taken to be distinctive doctrines of the lectures has entailed the disadvantage of so far diverting attention. from the great wealth of material which they contain, and the value of the general argument, which is in fact sustained by remarkable analytical power and fulness of thought. The vigour to which the style, sometimes too hurried and diffuse, can attain, may be illustrated by the sentences in which the writer embodies his capital conclusions. "Divorced from morality, religion will become a sickly sentimentalism, or a fitful superstition, from which keen healthy virile natures will turn with contempt as a caricature or a delusion. Divorced from religion, morality will become a calculating prudence whose only principle is self-interest, or a fickle expediency, which will debase instead of elevating men." W. P. PATERSON.

The Psalter, with a Concordance and other Auxiliary Matter.

London: John Murray, 1895. 32mo, pp. 260. Price 3s. 6d. THIS dainty booklet challenges attention before the reader has formed acquaintance with its contents or read so much as the titlepage. For the lettering on the flexible binding informs him that within is to be found "The Psalter, with Concordance, &c., by W. E. Gladstone." Anything from the pen of that venerable Nestor of British statesmanship has a claim upon our respectful regard not to be set aside. As the seven volumes of his "Gleanings" amply testify, Mr Gladstone has, all through his busy life, found diversion and recreation in widely apart fields of literature, scholarship, and the fine arts. Among these fields the Biblical and Theological are known to have a fascination for his versatile genius not surpassed if even equalled by any others. The author of "The State in its Relations with the Church," whom Lord Macaulay described, when that work appeared in 1839, as "a young man of unblemished character, and of distinguished parliamentary talents, the rising hope of stern and unbending Tories," might have been Primate of the Church of England had not politics claimed him and then rewarded him for his splendid devotion to her service by making him Prime Minister of State.