The Sun. — London, England, 1866-03-06 00:00:00

The Religious Controversy of our Age. Within the last quarter of a century an extraor fainary animation has been evidenced, now in this country now in that, but more particularly amongst ourselves, in the diffusion, the maintenance, and the general development of Religious Controversy. Belief and Unbelief, within the interval just named, have been not only very frequently in direct colli sion, but all the while they have been assiduously and energetically working, each in its own way andquite irrespectively the one of the other. As illustrative of the intensity of the intellectual warfare now more especially alluded to, we would here very briefly recall to mind a number of hitherto scattered, but — us will be seen upon the instant, we conjecture, when they have been once brought into juxtaposi tion —wonderfully significant particulars. The Spectacle presented to view, indeed, upon our taking the merest casual glance of r etros p ection down the vista of this last past quarter of a century, is one indicative of so great a ferm ent and agitation of Religious Opinion in Western Europe, but more especially in England, that it will be found to have extended, upon the one hand, to the wildest extra vagances of fanaticism and, upon the other, to the deadliest blasphemies of infidelity. Yonder, on the right hand—raving, shrieking, foaming at the mouth, as if in what is spoken of in Holy Writ as actual possession by the devil—appear the Revivalists. Yonder upon the left—cynically sneering at the belief of millions upon millions, of many successive gene rations, of philosophic intellects as profound and comprehensive as those of Blaise Pascal and Isaac N e wton, of hearts as pure and gentle as those of Jeremy Taylor and Thomas a Kempis—appear that over-abundant, self-sufficient throng made up of the Deistical,Atheistical,Materialistic, so-called Logical, soi-disant Rationalist writers of this Nineteenth Century ! Scoffers at the day-dream (as it seems to them) of Revelation—deriders of the fantasy of a hereafter—mockers at the notion of a soul—men tracing back the origin of the human race to an ape— laughing to scorn the Divinity of Christ—denying even the existence of a God. Within the comparatively brief interval of the last half century, indeed, what extravagances of all kinds—old ones revived, new ones, bran new ones, freshly invented—have we not witnessed ? The mesmeric agency of yesterday has ripened into the odic force of to-day. Materialism has been running its career meanwhile cheek-by-jowl with a some thing-or-another, vulgarly known as. Spiritualism. A Spiritualism so petty, and utterly contemptible, and impish in its manifestations that its loftiest achievements have been but as the fabled feats of Puck or Robin Goodfellow. Table-turning, spirit-rapping, tying and untying knotted cords in the dark—writing in the name of Shakspere and with the orthography of a kitchen maid—twanging the strings of a guitar with aerial fingers about as musically dexterous as those of a street banjo-player—behold ! the achievement's of that preposterous science affecting to open up to the world through the intervention of some illiterate Medium, direct communication—visible, audible, even (save the mark !) tangible communication—with the awful Spirit-World. Meanwhile, in the loftier regions of philosophy what have not modern inquirers been resorting to, as in the instance of Mr. Darwin—what have they not been rising or falling to, what, at any rate let us say, have they not been wandering to wards, by many devious tracks, as in such instances as those of M. Comte, of Mr. Mill, and of Pro fessor Huxley. Mr. Darwin's theory is, after all, in point of fact, nothing more than La Marck's theory, the once famous Lamarckian theory redivivus—the theory of development Mr. Mill's logic, again, while it would lead his disciples to regard mankind at large as little better than amiable repeti tions or reduplications of the Monster in " Franken stein," has resulted, in his own instance, in landing him, from the outside sea of politics, as a bore of the very first magnitude, within the walls of the British House of Commons. Professor Huxley for his part would fain indnce us, if he could, to re gard the whole universe as presenting to view —as clearly as we can put it in words—a maze of chemical and mechanical phenomena, originating, as precisely as may be conjectured, in the Unknown and Unknowable! M. Comte mean - while having already, in his time, with the matchless audacity of a French metaphysical theorist, subli mated all the philosophies and all the religions of preceding ages—Christian, Pagan, Heretical, and Schismatical—into his own transcendental creed, science, dogma, or whatever else we may like to call it—now familiarly known the wide world over by the name, style, or title of Positivism. As a little episode or interlude among the grander and more audacious speculations of intellectual giants like Auguste Comte and Stuart Mill, it may be remembered, again, that while Thomas Carlyle was oracularly issuing to his fellow-men his series of " Latter Day Pamphlets" (whatever that title may have meant), there appeared, to the shuddering marvel of the ordinary run of believers, a terribly cold-blooded deistical Dialogue demonstrative, or, at any rate, designed to be demonstrative, of such heartening truths (!) as these that human emo tions and human affections are nothing better after all, than—let us say by way of homely illus tration—the electric thrill that can be produced upon the palate, by bringing together the edges of a zinc and silver disc placed the one above the other below the tongue—a deadly deistical Dialogue, maintained between Miss Harriet Martineau, that archetype or highest exemplar of your strong-minded woman and a congenial male disputant, by name Mr. Atkinson. It may be remembered, moreover, by those who still retain any recollection at all of that ephemeral publication—ephemeral even though emanating partly from the usually vivifying intelli gence of Harriet Martineau—that the preposterous non-sequitur arrived at, •as the result of that ques tionably philosophic argument, was happily hit off at the time by the exquisitely paradoxical witticism —expressive in point of fact of the whole drift of the Dialogue—_ " There is no God—and Atkinson is His Prophet !" Somewhere about the same time that Mr. Atkinson and Miss Martineau were • thus confabulating in a stage whisper (audible all over th e l an d) a b ou t the infinitudes that, according to them, were really little better than a vacuum, and about the eterni ties that, contemplated through their judgment, were of no more worth, when all had been said and done, than the single throb of a pendulum—there appeared a now famous book entitled " The Vestiges of Creation." A book modestly given to the world by an anonymous searcher into the Mysteries of Comogony, a writer of most picturesque style and of singularly vivid imagination, in regard to the prob lem of whose identity all sorts of conjectures were for a long while indulged in—fastening at one time on Lord Byron's daughter, Ada, the late Countess of has been sentimentalised in point of fact through the more recently published " Life of Christ," that Vie de Jesus of the speculative Frenchman—has been absolutely sentimentalised into a more familiar profanity by the tender imaginings and emotional eloquence of Renan. And all the while the religious ferment going on around was such, was so conspicuously manifested in various ways amongst ourselves, that not only were the Spirit-Rappers holding their seances with the aid of their money-fingering Mediums in one direction, while the Revivalists were holding their frantic and fanatical assemblies in another, but in various forms the devotional fervour of the age was revealing itself, by new and unaccustomed manifestations of ardour in the popular belief, both within and without the Church Establishment. What has since acquired for itself the incongruous title of Muscular Chris tianity found at the very outset in the Rev. Charles Kingsley and his sympathisers able, and, in many respects, brilliant exponents. The philosophic party looked to Professor F. W. .Newman for guidance—whither it would, perhaps, be diffi cult to conjecture ! The gentle, heartening, cordial influence of Dr. Arnold, of Rugby, was commemorated gently, cordially, hearteningly by the now member for Lambeth in his first and most delightful story, the book known to us all as" Tom Brown's School Days." The "Religion of Common Life" was, in another direction, des canted upon in a charming sermon by the Rev. John Caird, thus virtually memorable as the author of one sermon—for, while he may have writ ten many others, that one alone of his has attained anything at all like popularity: so that we may really in this way speak of him as virtu ally the author of one sermon, as Beckford was the author of one romance and Hamilton of one solitary speech in the House of Commons. The Rev. Mr. Maurice, elsewhere, by word of mouth, enforced and endorsed most persuasively the growing unbelief as to the Eternity of Punish ment. The Rev. Frederick Robertson, with the air and nature of a knightly gentleman, charmed his hearers, day by day, week upon week, year after year, over the pulpit cushion, first in Cheltenham, afterwards at Brighton, until he was prematurely prostrated by consumption in that grave of his which is still looked back to wistfully by a throng of loving admirers. The Rev. Dr. Cumming, again, on his part, while disdaining to " deal damnation round the land" like so many an earlier Boanerges, as a means for rousing an indifferent generation to some better sense of the necessity there is for religious zeal, certainly strove to— " Fright the isle from its propriety," with the most pertinaciously reiterated and Moore's almanack-like predictions of the advent of the Great Day of Retribution. As Solomon Eagle, during the Plague of London, is related to have gone about the streets stark-naked, carrying a burning chaldron of coals upon his head, and cry ing aloud that the Day of Judgment was at hand, Dr. Cumming, clad in sober broadcloth and scattering from his hand shoals of prophetic pam phlets and sermons, went hither and thither all over the country, during several years, until people got tired of the monotony of his non-fulfilled pre dictions, announcing to us again and again the same appalling catastrophe. So persistently in point of fact, and pertinaciously did he persevere in thus writing and in thus speaking —after the manner of those whOm it has become the familiar slang of our day to designate Sensationalists, that we have a distinct recollection of having, but a very few years since, seen the walls of the city of Bath placarded conspicuously with a wonderfully consolatory announcement to the effect, that for some . rea son, now forgotten, probably the unexpected en gagement of the popular preacher and lecturer elsewhere—" The Last Day," meaning by that the delivery of Dr. Cumming's then anticipated discourse upon the subject, was unexpectedly nut off, or—as the posters read at a little distance— THE LAST DAY UNAVOIDMILY POSTPONED ! Turning point blank from the Terrible to the Humorous—we might almost say taking the one step that proverbially separates the Sublime from the Ridiculous—Mr. Spurgeon, in a very different mood indeed from that within the range of Dr. Cumming's philosophy, contrived somehow to charm others than the Tozers who thronged around him by his extraordi nary combination of unctuous devotional enthusiasm and racy facetiOusness. Accomplishing his object after a very different fashion, again the Rev. Mr. Boyd,better-known under his initial title(A. K. H. B.) as a magazine contributorand miscellaneous essayist, has enabled us to become pleasantly conscious of how the more delicate, not to say the more seemly and befitting humour of a clergyman, discoursing through his pen rather than from his pulpit, might cultivate in the interests if not of re ligion at any rate of kindly Christian fellowship, the amenities of literature, of popular, even of the lightest, of light literature. Finally, upon the appearance of Dr. Colenso, the Bishop of Natal, (bearing in his hands his Commentaries upon the Pentateuch) we beheld a new and wholly un looked-for importance attached to the incre dulity of those who had been so long examining with cynical and depreciating eyes the venerable records of the Holy Scriptures. Examining one by one the astounding arguments put forth by that Right Reverend Arithmetician, who found in the the person of a captious Zulu, a darker and wiser Gamaliel, it was, as though we were watching the researches of one who was complacently and with a sublime self-confidence undertaking to measure the depths of infinitude with a two-foot rule. But, all the while, in the midst of this varied and widely contrasting religious agitation, in the very thick and throng of so much sincerity, affectation, passionate enthusiasm, and frivolous pretence—out of all this wonderful jumble of piety and profanity-- out of the astounding confusion of this age of Mesmerism and Mormonism, of Spiritualists and Revivalists, of systematic deriders of Revela tion and pretentious interpreters of the Apocalypse, there has been growing ap, gradually, almost im perceptibly—growing up as some stately fir tree might grow from among— Agarics, and fungi, and mildew, and mould pointing ever more and more directly heavenward —a Religious Controversy of a very notable kind, a Controversy in which the disputants are among the most earnest, the most gifted, and the most honoured we d amongst o pn o t the irio g l r s e e a 7 t mass of contemporary Thi n k ers and Believers. Into th e mer it s o f t hi s controversy here, of course, in any way, even partially or indirectly, to 7 adventure.: Our intention, our one wish in the matter, being simply to afford by the sequential enumeration ntly sometimes, the works (books pamphlets more f reque) that have been elicited, n ow f rom one side now from another— some more accurate notion of the growth and de velopment of this s ame controversy which has so rapidly sprung up —now in one shape from an apparently frivolous Taunt, now in another from a purely incidental Comment —to its present (to say the least of it) very appreciable magnitude. Lovelace, but eventually settling down, resolutely, and we believe with reason, upon Mr. Robert Chambers, the well-known publisher of Edinburgh, as the real Simon Pure, the author of the Dis quisition. Subsequently, indeed some considerable time after wards' the and speculations thus indulged in by geological if astronomical inquirers with a view to the solution, if of some at least among the countless cluster of the Physical Universe were applied by a regarded as orthodox lnenkrb:f it might the Church Esta blishment, to the investig a ti on s ° r o u f traobinel 0 1 ot g y . human rea to the elucidation, by the sheer moreeitiosfe larys_ soning, of some among the far terics of the auguster and diviner science Their labours in this way resulting i n the well-known " Essays and ,I:,eviews"—the AY rit y err of which thereby immediately acquired for themselves the title, still current, of Essayists and Reviewers. D r . Whewell at Cambridge and Sir David Brewster in Scotland, might, if they so pleased, keep up the ball of conjecture between them as to the existence or the non-existence of other worlds peopled like our own by intelligent beings. The Essayists and Reviewers aimed higher than that and further than that — immeasurably. They were bent upon looking into the abysses of light without any fear at all apparently of being blinded by the over-brightness. Their endeavour was to sift and analyse to their very uttermost the dogmas hitherto accepted with reve rent and believing confidence. The Eternity of Punishment, for example, they were prepared to The Tat tnt--flung out, to all appea rance qu it e a t argue out as a problem admitting of logical solution random. , by Mr. Kingsley, through the pages of in many ways—among others, almost, it might be Macmillan's Magazine—resulted in Dr. Newman's said, through the Theory of Probabilities. So reso- " Apol, ogia." The Comment—penned seemingly lutely, indeed, a nd persistently were the p ros with th, e u tmost possible deliberation by Dr. Manning and cons thus bandied to and fro between —ledto the production of Dr. Pusey's " Eirenicon" them, that the solution of that awful problem was and of those other already numerous publications at last to fall from oracular lips, from the lips of the which the appearance of the " Eirenicon" has very keeper of the Queen's conscience (and of the con- rapidly and very recently elicited. siences, we are to presume, of course, of her Majesty's Referring, for a moment, to the origin of the lieges into the bargain), the occupant of the Wool- earlier of the - two famous works but just now sa ck, the Lord High Chancellor of England ! mentioned, naa nely, Dr. Newman's " Apologia"— Dignitaries of the Church might argue— (and reserving until afterwards a similar passing Convocation might hold its sittings—Orders in reference to - the origin of Dr. Pusey's " Eireni -1 Council might be issued—but the Lord Chancellor con")—it should be remarked here at once that spoke and Eternal Punishment was abolished, all the particulars as to the circumstances under The rage thus setting in, the fashion it might al- which it was called forth are to be found in , most be termed, of doubts the most astounding in re- a little pamphlet of 34 pages octavo, entitled— gard to the validity of Revelation, advanced and ex- A Correspondence on the Question whether Dr. 113 anded. Herr Strauss of Tubingen found in M. Newman teaches that Truth is no Virtue— , Renan of Paris a congenial disciple and an (Longman). A pamphlet written throughout i impassioned successor as the biographer of with all the clearness and precision of that almost % Him whom between 300,000,000 and 400,000,000 peerless master of our language. It comprises %of Christians still to this day—in spite of M. Renan within it (this pamphlet)—besides a fragmen . and of Herr Strauss—regard with love and adora- tary passage quoted from • a Review of tion as their Redeemer and their God. The Froudo's " History of England," in Macmil ' cynical incredulity of Strauss, it may be said, lan's Magazine, a review signed C.K., and _ written in reality by the Rev. Charles Kingsley— ten letters, the purport of which was thereupon, at the close of the Correspondence, set forth or analysed in a few sentences of inimitable humour, presenting to us, within the compass of two printed pages, a perfect masterpiece of irony. What, then, Does Dr. Newman Mean? A Reply to a Pamphlet lately published. By the Rev. Charles Kingsley. (Macmillan) —Was the bold and lengthened, if not exhaustive rejoinder, issued with all convenient speed, by the Rector of Eversley. The original taunt had been—(who can have forgotten it?)—that Dr. Newman was, so far, like the Father of Lies, that he taught lying upon system—inculcating that truth not only never had been a virtue with the clergy of his Church, but need not be, and, on the whole, ought not to be. Challenged to make good these statements, by the naming of page and volume in which any such atro cious opinions had ever been expressed by Dr. New man,the reverend reviewer, having failed to make good his assertion, widened the field of argument and, by so doing, led unconsciously to the production of what observers on all sides recognised upon the instant, and must always recognise, as a masterpiece of subtle, refined, and profoundlyphilosophic intro spection. This same masterpiece being the— Apologia Pro Vita Sua: Being a Reply to a Pamphlet, &c. By John Henry Newman, D.D. (Longman). —A work published origi nally in a periodical form at uncertain inter vals, until its instalments, eight in number, including the appendix, amounted to the size of a goodly octavo volume. Later on, upon its revision in a second edition, this famous work, a work that we are fain to regard as the magnum opus of the Author of " Callista," of "Loss and Gain," and of so many other notable, and some of them very noble productions, including among these, the most recent of them all, the haunting poem, en- titled, " The Dream of Gerontius "—has been re- named : the "Apologia," now appearing as the— History of my Religious Opinions. By John Henry Newman, D.D. (Longman).—A Confidence such as the world has seldom if ever had, one admit ting us to the core of the heart so to speak—to the very sanctuary of the conscience—of a fellow mortal the whole passion of whoselife manifestly has been a hungering search after that very Truth the eliciter of the " Apologia " inconsiderately declared him to have absolutely repudiated. The foregoing discussion, while, as must have been apparent, it was in a manner purely acci dental in its origin, was also obviously and essentially, from its very outset, one of a sim ply personal character. It rose into importance, however, by reason of the genius of the man who had been thus conspicuously arraigned at the Bar of Public Opinion ; and who, while scattering into nothingness charges that he, upon first hearing of them, instantly proclaimed to be slanderous, signally availed himself of the opportunity thereby afforded, in the mere process of his self-vindication, of opening to view for once that window in the human breast which had been dreamt of and pined for by the pagan philosopher. The bearing of the argument involved in the first unconsidered taunt thrown out by the Author of " Hypatia," and in the consequent " Apologia pro vita sua " which that taunt elicited with such astounding swiftness from Dr. Newman, was only one which became wider and wider by the sheer force of implication. The personality, in other words, that had been dropped like a pebble into still water, spread in its effect wider and wider by implication upon implication. Insomuch that the one apparently isolated accusation involving within it, as it proved to do upon examination, a whole congeries or ganglionic cluster of correlative it might perhaps rather be said of congenital accu sations —accusations affecting, in truth, the character of a whole church rather than the consistency of an individual necessitated, in the repudia tion of that one first charge, the laying bare of the entire inner history of the religious opinions of the eminent man who had been thus assailed without the smallest provocation. Hence, indeed, the extraordinary interest, value, and importance attached to the " Apologia" thus called forth by so trivial an accident, by such a series of trivial acci dents-*—such accidents, let us say, as an incidental illustration introduced almost parenthetically into his argument by a magazine reviewer, an observation pencil-marked in the margin of the magazine page by somebody or other (no one knows by whom) and sent by this happily officious somebody through the book-post to Dr. Newman's address at the Ora tory in Birmingham. Another and a very different Religious Contro versy—already referred to by us as having been kindled by a Comment of Dr. Manning's—we would now briefly particularise. A controversy involving within it no personalities whatever, and springing up, almost we might say in the natural course of things, certainly in no way either abruptly or unexpectedly. The Workings of the Holy Spirit in the Church of England. Bvo., pp. 45 (Longman)—A letter ad dressed to the Rev. E. B. Pusey, D.D., by Henry Edward Manning, D.D., was the spark that fired the train, was in plainer words, the calm, but potent signal for the Religious Controversy that has since then been aroused. It was a summons spoken, al most we might add, sotto voce, but it was one that upon the instant awakened echoes far and wide, echoes of which we are still hearing the reverbera tions. The Church of England a Portion:of Christ's Holy Catholic Church and a Means of Restoring Vital Unity : AN EIRENICON. By E. B. Pusey, D.D. (Parker).—Was the answer vouchsafed, after much consideration, to the newly-installed Catholic Archbishop of Westminster by his friend and associate of former days, the veteran Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford. Ostensibly, it was addressed to the au thor of " The Christian Year." But, in talking to Mr.Keble the author of the "Eirenicon" was unmistakably talking at Dr. Manning. His pamphlet, or rather volume, of the "Eirenicon" was formally offered, in point of fact, to the public by the booksellers as—Dr. Pusey's Reply to Dr. Manning ! An "Eirenicon" was the conciliatory and poetical name given to it by its author, but it was an Eirenicon flung with such a will into the op posing camp, the camp that it was intended (ac cording to its own account) to win by conciliation, rather than to conquer by force, that it was spoken of by one of its ablest reviewers as a work that ' was—" to one an olive branch of peace ; to the other a firebrand." Otherwise—as Dr. Newman himself has since wittily expressed it—it is an olive branch hurled from a catapult ! However regal dod, it was so far satisfactory, upon all hands, as au utterance. The silence of a score years was at length broken, It was a distinct declaration, or manifesto, or what the Spaniards call a pronunciamonto. Roused like a warrior at the sound of the trumpet, Dr. Pusey answered the summons of Archbishop Manning, and has thus fairly entered once more into the arena of Religious Controversy—ready to give an account of the faith that is in him—prepared to receive blows or to administer them— being to that end, armed cap a pie, both defensively and offen sively. Ilistorical Notes on the Tractarian Movement. By the Very Rev. Frederick Oakeley. (Longman).—ls the title of a contemporary publication that has minutely related in a compendious and popular form the various phases, the growth and development, the commencement and the conclusion of that period of extraordinary controversial excitement which extended over an interval of two-and twenty years in its duration. The Tractarian Movement (proper) had begun, in effect, as far back as 1833, and was only in a manner brought to an abrupt oonclusion in 1 8 45. Then another movement of a congenial kind commenced, though not one that could, strictly speak ing, be accurately defined as any longer tractarian. The Tracts had for some time ceased altogether by reason of their repudiation collectively and still more by reason of the express condemnation (authoritatively) —upon the dictum of the abdomidal Board—of Tract Ninety. Another and a perfectly congenial movement, we say, was there upon in 1845, so to speak evolved or superinduced out of the old and now historical movement, which was con ducted so assiduously, as we have seen, during a period of two-and-twenty years by the Tractarians. Appearing companionably with the "Notes " of the Rev. F. Oakeley, there has been recently issued moreover from the press with the readily-granted consent of Dr. Newman himself a reprint from the stereotyped Fourth Edition of Tract Ninety; on Certain Passages of the Thirty-nine Ar ticles. By the Rev. J. H. Newman, B D., 1841. (Parker.) A reprint preceded by a Historical Preface of peculiar interest, penned during last Advent (1865) by the Rev. E. B. Pusey, D.D.; and followed up by a letter addressed to Mr. Justice Coleridge in 1841 by the Rev. John Keble, —one who is honoured and, by very many, beloved also as the author of " The Christian Year,"— a com munication widely circulated at the time (privately) but never before published. Aided by the combined light thus afforded, in one direction by the vivid retrospect of Mr. Oakeloy, and in another by the lucubration (illustrative of the bearing of Tract XC)* penned in 1841 by Mr. Keble, and in 1865 by Dr. Pusey himself—the reader of to-day can now appreciate more accurately than might otherwise have been practicable, the force, influence, and tendency of that even yet bolder religious argument of now-a-days, the original source of which may be traced back to the movement set on foot so many years ago by the Tractarian Controver sialists. Stepping into the lists, as it were, and there accepting the gauge which had been flung down to him in all knightly courtesy by his archi episcopal ] challenger, the Regius Professor of He brew at Oxford forthwith frankly responded to Dr. Manning's summons, as we have seen by the publication of his "Eirenicon"—to which formal declaration of his opinions, of more than his opinions —of his dearest hopes and fondest aspirations—he has received already in his turn many and some among them very notable, replies. The Leading Topics of Dr. Pusey's Recent Work. By the Very Rev. Frederick Oakeley, M.A. (Longman) —assumes, in a manner by right the foremost place among the answers thus vouchsafed to Dr. Pusey, not only rapidly, but in very truth con amore, for it is especially noticeable that there is no sign in any way discernible upon either side of anger or even irritation in the development of these recent discus sions. It assumes this foremost place, moreover not only by right of priority, but also and in a particular manner by reason of its being in some sense the vicari ous answer given to Dr. Pusey's "Eirenicon" by the Challenger himself. It was, in point of fact, according to the very announcement upon the titlepage, that "Eirenicon" itself "Reviewed in a Letter addressed (by permission) to the Most Rev. H. E. Manning, D.D.," by Canon Oakeley. It is true that at the bottom of the very first page of this pamphlet in reply to " The Eirenicon," the author took great care to premise that the dignitary of his Church to whom it was addressed, had in it no other responsi bility than such as might be implied by the fact of its -having thus appeared with his knowledge and approbation. Still, the responsibility was thus implied by the very inti mation of its appearing under those circumstances. And hence (so far) the reply of Mr. Oakeley was virtually the anticipatory response of the Archbishop himself, was at any rate the indication beforehand of what • since then have been Dr. Manning's own avowed opinions and senti ments in regard to the drift and tendency of "The Eireni eon." The Register's Review of Dr. Pusey's Work: Reprinted in Bvo. pp. 36 (George Cheek) —ls, in many respects, worthy of remembrance and of preservation among the brochures issued from the press, now by one, now by another, of the more noteworthy disputants. And it is worthy of this consideration not merely by reason of its intrinsic value as a candid resume of the arguments advanced by Dr. Pusey in his doubtless well-meant but wholly and utterly impracticable project for the negotiation of a compromise. For, after all, it really does amount to that —to the suggestion of a compromise where a compro mise is clearly altogether out of the question! But it is of yet further importance and value in the furtherance and development of this remarkable Religious Contro versy, because of its having elicited—this able review of the Eirenicon in the Register --two very important let ters from Dr Pusey himself, in further illustration of the eagerness of his hopes in regard to the Reunion of the Churches : and together with these two letters, others also from Dr. Newman and Canon Oakeloy. A correspondence that altogether imparts to this pamphlet-reprint of the criti cism a very appreciable value and importance. Two other answers, however, have yet more recently been accorded to " The Eirenicon" which have not failed to eclipse in interest and attraction all other criticisms or commen taries, especially such as were purely anonymous. A Letter to the Rev. E. B. Pusey, D.D., on his Recent Eirenicon. By John Henry Newman, D.D. Bvo., pp. 159. (Longman).—May be described as a direct response, as the other (afterwards to be particularised) may ba defined as an indirect response to "The Eirenicon," or reply simply by implication. From Dr. Newman's answer to Dr. Pusey we have already quoted the remark that the latter's " Eireni con" was, after all, but little better than:an olive branch flung from a catapult. According tan expression put forth in the current number of .Macmillan—a magazine which still, by the way, very shabbily persists (in spite of the Apologia)in paradoxically taunting Dr. N ewman with a sort of honest unveracity—the Rejoinder,to "The Eirenicon" is as a shaft from a silver bow ! In style it is as perfect as anything that Dr. Newman has ever written. Its main purpose might be described as a vindication, not simply of its author, but of the whole mass of his co-religionists from the charges known, in their fearful aggregate, as the imputation of Mariolatry. Those charges, numbering them all up, one by one, in language painfully clear and distinct —and so numbering them up manifestly with a very shud der of abhorrence—Dr. Newman sweeps aside as accusa tions that are to him simply incomprehensible and revolt ing. "Sentiments such as these," he says, " I never knew of till I read your book, nor, as I think, do the vast ma jority of English Catholics know them." Nay, more— " They seem to me," he exclaims, " They worn to me like a bad dream!" So repugnant does he declare them to be to his very soul and conscience. The Reunion of Christendom: a Pastoral Letter to the Clergy, &c. By Archbishop Man ning, Bvo. pp. 113. (Longman)—ls the indirect, or implied, response to Dr. Pusey's " Eirenicon" already referred to as having emanated from the successor of Cardinal Wiseman as head of the Roman Catholic Hierarchy in England—from that very dignitary, in point of fact, to whose courteous, oven it might be said, courtly challenge to Dr. Pusey the production by the latter of his "Eirenicon" is directly attributable. This same Pastoral of Archbishop Manning's, by the way, is in truth quite manifestly the mere application or enforcement of the views set forth by the same eminent hand—only it should be added with more elaboration, and it might even be said With more deliberation, in that work of his immediately preceding it The Temporal Mission of the Holy Gh ost, o r R eason an d Revelation. By Henry Edward, Archbi s h op of Westmin ster (Longman) -A Treatise that, regarded simply in the light of a theological exposition, assumes to itself a weight and an importance that even here in England are ungrudgingly recognised and admitted. It is but another evidence, though probably among them all by far the most remarkable, of the industry, of the enthusiasm even, with which Archbishop Manning manifestly has undertaken to acquit himself of the responsibilities devolving upon him in his capacity as Cardinal Wiseman's successor, as the hierarchical head, that is, of the Roman Catholic body hero in England. Not very long prior to the demise of his predecessor, he had discussed in a wholely uncompro mising spirit no doubt, but with singular precision and distinctness in the enunciation of his views, one of the most delicate and complicated problems of our day, a problem still requiring a definitive solution either one way or other in the very heart of Christendom. The Temporal Power of the Pope, by H. E. Manning, D.D. (Burns)—Was the title of the recent disquisition, in which that same most delicate and complicated problem was calmly, and by reason of its very calmness, almost, it might be said, irritatingly taken into consideration. However alien to English hearts were the sentiments, or rather the con victions, therein expressed, it was impossible not to re spect convictions so outspokenly and uncompromisingly avouched. We who, as a lettered community, had come long since to know by heart, as it were, that magni ficent eulogium of Lord Macaulay's—all things considered perhaps the noblest passage ever penned by that great mas ter of English rhetori c — the one b eg i nn i ng " Th ere i s not and there never ha s b een, " and end i ng w ith th e world famous allusion to the New Zealander, taking his stand upon a broken arch of London Bridge to sketch the ruins of St. Paul's —can surely comprehend quite readily the entertaining of 'views such as those articu lated by Dr. Manning in his bold and almost defiant treatise, a treatise that if for no other reason assumes its place, by right of its lu c idi ty, side b y s id e w ith th e well known and far subtl er treatise , 6 Du Pape," penned many years previously by the h an d of the Coun t J osep h D o M a i s t re. The See of Peter. T.W. By Allies, M.A. (Burns)— A work of which a third Edition has but just now been pub lished, undertook upon a very different, though upon an entirely congenial system, to insist upon the recognition of the claims of the Roman Primacy, as tho Rock of Foundation, as the Centre of Unity, and as the Source of Jurisdiction. Even hero, in this reissue of Mr. Allies' work, in relation to the Roman Pontificate, we have that writer's views also upon the " Eirenicon," views set forth in a letter to Dr. Pusey, ostensibly in the form of a Preface to the Third Edition of this same book on the "See of Peter" penned by the author of the still more comprehensive work relating to the kindred theme of "The Formation of Christendom." Reverting, however, to the Pastoral in which Arch bishop Manning has • descanted at length, not upon the Formation, but upon ,4 The Reunion, of Christen dom," we would here observe, in conclusion, that if any thing could possibly tend to dissipate this strangely cherished daydream of Dr. Pusey's (enunciated in the " Eirenicon") and of so many others besides Dr. Pusey and his own immediate followers—the daydream that is to say of a compromise being effected between two churches, one of which admits of no possibility of any compromise whatever—it must certainly be this same Pastoral of Dr. Manning's upon the hypothetical "Reunion - of Christendom." Its influence can hardly fail to'prove, in a great measure, repressive, almost, we had said, repellant. Its argument throughout is not only, in common parlance, as plain as a pike staff, but as rigidly unyielding and as poignantly pointed. It says virtually— On our part there can be no concession—lt is idle talking about compromise —Truth is one, is indivisible, magna est et prevalebit. The Reunion of Christendom is avowed in truth by Dr. Manning to be among his own most cherished aspirations ; but it is a Reunion, he takes occasion to intimate quite plainly, that must bo gained other wise than by means of any compromise whatever. We will receive you with open arms—he here says as plainly as words can express his meaning—We will re ceive you with open arms, but you must come to us ; wo cannot meet you half way. That is so far the plain and honest English of Dr. Manning's Pastoral on The Reunion of Christendom. It is a declaration in truth so plain, 'so honest, so directly to the purpose, that we may surely hope to hear henceforth somewhat less about these fantastic and utterly impracticable suggestions, which, according to the day-dreamers who throw them out, are to lead through a nicely-balanced series of compro mises or of coneessions, now on this side, now on that, to the Reunion of Christendom, or, in other word; to the halcyon epoch of the Millennium. That supreme re sult or ultimate climax of the Christian Dispensation is hardly, we take it, to be arrived at after the manner in which a quotient is worked out in the calculations of an arithmetician. KapX. SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS. TIMES. —The Army Estimates are necessarily re garded from two very different points of view by soldiers and the general public. Both, of course, think of the efficiency of the service, but the former are naturally led to consider the professional inte rests of those engaged in it, the effect which this or that change will produce on a complicated organisa tion, and the parts of the system that may have to be rearranged if the force is increased or diminished. The public, on the other hand, is apt to look at the matter in the gross, and, leaving details and techni calities, to ask what is the amount which the nation must pay for the coming year. It may be an un reasonable temper, or an " ignorant impatience of taxation," which possesses people, but undoubtedly they couple efficient administration both of the army and navy with a reduction of the expenditure. This year, we fear, the Government esti ma t es w ill be received with a certain• feeling of disappoint ment. The country has indulged the hope that the' great armaments which for 12 years have pressed upon us were about to be materially lessened. The rumours of a reduction in the army gave rise to the belief that a substantial diminution of expenditure would be announced for the year 1866. We are at peace with all the world; even the Caffre is leaving us alone, and the New Zealand colonists are settling with the Maori without our help. India is quiet, and becoming very rich ; the disputes and petty revolu tions of the Continent cannot affect us—our only trouble—Fenianism—is now likely to die out with out the necessity of any appeal to force. But with all this the nation is paying 14 millions a year for its army, almost as much as both army and navy cost in days which are not long past. What, it will be asked, is the use of extended education, increased commerce, and the union of nations by the new ties which our time has produced, if we are to go on thus, year after year, defying each other with these costly armaments in a time of profound peace? Lord Hartington's speech was such an answer to these natural complaints as the Head of a Depart ment, master of all his details, would produce. He made an able and elaborate statement, and showed that he will be quite able to meet any advocate of economy who may rashly attack him. The nation ought, we suppose, to be content to spend any amount of money when it sees what pains are taken to account for it all, just as creditors are mollified by the sight of a bankrupt's well-kept books. The country is informed that the Estimates show a re duction of over £250,000 as compared with last year, but it is admitted that this is a reduction on the Estimates which the house will be called upon to vote, and not on the net sum which will be re quired. The reduction on the net charge of the army will be only £6,500, since there has been a diminution of the payments which were:expected from the Governments of India and New Zealand. In short, the actual cost of the army to the country will be almost precisely the same as last year. But, though the cost is not diminished at present, there is reason to believe that the recent changes will eventually have this effect. A reduction of the actual number of men has been made. The strength of the army will be decreased by 4,523 men, and 82 captains and 164 subalterns will be placed on half pay. The causes which still maintain the cost of the army at its former standard are, according to the Secretary for War, first, the increased price of meat, which has made a considerable increase in the Commissariat;:secondly, the expenditure of a larger sum on the militia, in consequence of certain charges which it was impossible to control having fallen due this year; thirdly, an increase in the cost of the Volunteer force, through the number of effec- tives having been considerably increased ; and, fourthly, the construction of military works. The first item is unhappily unavoidable ; and, indeed, Ito impartial critic will make light of the argument Used by Mr. Laing the other night, that the increase of expenditure on the two warlike services is in a great degree caused by the rise in prices. Not only meat, but clothing, the building and repair of bar racks, the construction of military works—in short, everything into which the price of materials or labour enters—must be more expensive every year. We have, of course, the satisfaction of knowing that other countries share almost equally with ourselves this increase of burdens, and it may be that this common pressure may some day bring us all to a common resolution to retrench. There is one item of increased expenditure, 'however, which will not be grudged. The account Lord Hartington gave of the Volunteer Force is full of interest for the coun try. The excess of the vote this year over last is £13.200, and is entirely caused by the increased number of men who are entitled to claim the allow ances of £1 and £1 10s. for efficiency and for extra acquirements. On the Ist of December last year there were 178,000 enrolled Volunteers, compared with 170,000 at the same date of the preceding year. The number of efficients last year was 133,000, compared with 123,000 in 1864, and 66,000 were entitled to claim the extra 10s., com pared with 52,000 in 1864. Nothing can be more satisfactory than to find that time has brought no weariness to the Volunteers, and that though nearly seven years have elapsed since the first regiments were established, the number has been and still is steadily increasing. As fast as the older members resign or relax in their assiduity their places are taken by a younger class, and the re mus t now b e at least a quarter of a million of Englishmen who have received some kind of military training through their connexion with the Volunteer body. While, however, the Volunteers are flourishing, recruiting for the army itself does not go on so prosperously as could be wished. The two things are quite reconcilable, and, indeed, the one would rather lead us to expect the other. The Volunteer body increases owing to the general prosperity and contentment of the country,' and gives proof that a large proportion of the . youth of the country have leisure and means for patriotic exertion. The same causes lessen the number of those who care for re gular enlistment. The rate of wages is rising through the comparative abundance of employment; ; emigration has taken away the Irish peasantry which used to fill our armies ; and, consequently, there is a short supply of men. Lord Hartington announced that there is to be a commission on the subject, and though no inquiry can remove the main causes of the present embarrassment, still it is possible that the inducements to a military life may be presented more attractively to the class from which the army is recruited. The service is, indeed, much better than is generally thought, and there are few unskilled labourers who might not improve their condition and prospects by taking the Queen's shilling. Any reasonable bounty which may be necessary to fill the ranks will not be grudged by the country. The explanation regarding Fenianism will tend, we hope, to reassure the loyal population in Ireland. No ono will believe that the fidelity of the army is really endangered, but it is so certain that in several regiments there is a Fenian element, which not only encourages the audacity of the con spirators, but spreads distrust in the army , that we are glad to learn the Government does not neglect it. The suspension of the habeas Corpus Act has had its effect upon the civil conspirators, and it may have convinced the more sensible of the disaffected soldiers that their schemes are desperate ; but some thing more than the power of arrest is necessary to frighten men who are always unde r discipline, and we trust the authorities will not shrink from sup pressing at all cost treason in the army. It is hard indeed if, after paying fourteen millions for a national defence by land, we are to find that they bring us a menace, and not a protection. HERALD.—In a work of fiction here and there we find one of the most lamentable foibles of human nature turned to account as the basis of a painful story ; and when the story is artistically told, and the hard, ugly facts are toned down with a left handed attention to the moralities, society enters a mild prop pudor protest, shrugs its shoulders, and perhaps pronounces the book a deeply interesting one after all. This toned down, this attention to what we may call moral probability, must, however, be prominent features of the production. It will not do to exhibit vice running riot for nothing, and shamelessness exchanging fine linen merely for foul rags. A gross of green spectacles is a better bargain than a handful of dust, or hands completely empty after going to market. The novelist knows this, and so he or she takes care that th e h ero i ne d oes no t sin altogether without cause, though that cause may be born of mistake or delusion. Even with this care the story is unpalatable to many readers, for there are minds that regard with considerable distaste the use of such painful material for the mere purpose of amusement. They will scarcely admit the existence of social treacheries of the kind in real life ; but, if they are driven to the admission by pertinent in stances, they would at least keep such " real life" out of the circulating libraries. The least straight laced of us are disposed to be incredulous, however, of guilt without cause, of lapses from truth and honour, apparently for caprice or through a morbid leaning towards domestic wickedness. We can understand how the greatly tempted may greatly err, but it is difficult to comprehend the rationale of a false step which is, in every possible sense, a descent, and which, from the lowest point of view—that of mere every-day comfort and con venience—is a wilful exchange of good for bad. We look for a motive, for a ray of light, to make the dismal fall less obscure and mysterious ; and when we find that the very last thing a woman could be expected to do she has done, and only too thoroughly, the riddle seems inexplicable. It is impossible to avoid this train of thought when a case like the cause cenbre of " Cavendish v. Caven dish and Gordon," makes its appearance in the records of the Divorce Court ; for that painful story of deceit and marital wrong discloses acts that on one side at least have the most inadequate of causes, or, to speak more plainly, no palpable cause at all. A young wife, the mother of three children, and united to a gentleman of good family position, leaves her home to accompany a man of 60 years of age, whose circumstances appear to have been inade quate even to his own support. She is shown to have lived happily enough with her husband, in the ordinary sense of happiness, and to have been up to the very moment of her departure on the best of terms with him and his family. Yet with all this she perpetrates towards him the cruellest wrong of all, and elopes with a sexagenarian, married and the father of nine children, to live at Nice under the questionable shield of an assumed name. Truth is here, indeed, stranger than fiction ; for no periodical pander to the demand for sensational reading would have dared to outrage probability by picturing so lamentable and perverse a history. The facts are these :—On the 24th of April, 1856, Mr. Francis William Henry Cavendish married Lady Eleanor Sophia Diana Fitzgibbon, a daughter of the Earl and Countess of Clare. The lady's half sister was allied to Lord Cecil James Gordon, and thus a close intimacy sprung up between the latter and the husband he was to outrage and the wife he was to ruin. In 1864 Lord Gordon while on a visit to Mr. and Lady Cavendish at Silverlands was taken ill, was nursed with the greatest atten tion there, and even laid under " obligations" of a pecuniary nature. This visit led to his taking a house near Silverlands, and residing there--with what object subsequent events go far to explain. Naturally, the close intimacy of this old man of sixty with the young wife of twenty-seven was re garded without the least suspicion. There was not the slightest idea of harm in the occasional associa tion of a gentleman of mature age with a lady re lated to him by marriage, and the wife of a friend upon whose association he had so largely drawn. Lord Gordon was bound by every tie of honour to respect the sanctity of the roof that had sheltered him ; while the fact of his being a married man with a large family no doubt went a great way towards ensuring for him a freedom of action that might have been denied to a less responsible person. However, on the 30th of January, Lord Cecil James Gordon dined for the last time at Silverlands, and on the 2d of February Lady Eleanor Cavendish, on the pretence of visiting her mother in town, left her home for the new and degraded life she had chosen. There was no letter, no leave-taking, on her part ; but after a time her inexplicable absence was ac counted for by her being traced to Nice, where she was residing with Lord Gordon, under the name of Graham. By this miserable elopement two families of high position have been grievously wronged. Lady Cavendish left her husband and three young children to bear the burden of her infamy ; and Lord Gordon deserted his wife and nine chil dren to afflict them with a grief that will not easily be cured. A poor man himself, he has been con demned by a jury to pay the large but not exces sive sum of £lO,OOO damages ; so that the co respondent, who is described as " a man of plea sure," will possibly feel some of the pains and penal ties of social treachery. Certainly he and the unhappy woman from whom Mr. Cavendish has just been properly severed have done harm enough to call down upon them the severest retribution ; and it would be a sad failure to justice should they escape some of the usual consequences of deeds which have been rightly described as gross beyond measure. That, however, as the case stands, belongs to a higher dispensation, and will depend upon an event over which earthly justice has no con trol. It was suggested that Lord Gordon, in break ing up the home of a bosom friend, and plunging his own family into the deepest grief, had one motive, a mercenary one ' • and that he contemplated enjoying the " bountiful fortune" which will fall to the partner of his guilt on the decease of her mother. This may have been so, and, indeed, from any other point of view Lord Gordon's proceedings have an air of careless vice about them not at all in conso nance with his age and experience. But if he had this motive Lady Cavendish had none that can be understood by ordinary minds. Plainly and unmis takeably, she left good for evil, youth for age, family and a position of honour for a wandering life of shame. There is not one feature of the whole story that affords her so much as a bad excuse ; and it is no wonder that, in his summing up, the Judge Ordinary used the strongest possible language to denounce her heartless treachery to a husband against whom she did not allege the slightest com plaint. " They could," said Sir James Wilde, "hardly find any case where the obligations violated were so numerous and so strong, or in which the consequences were so painful." This is unfortu nately true. The case of " Cavendish v. Caven dish and Gordon" will be remembered as one dis playing a cruel perversity of mind, and a heartless indulgence in passion, unparalleled even in that terrible record of wrong which the Divorce Court produces. Oxford and Cambridge Athletic Sports. OXFORD, Saturday Evening. The Oxford University sports, from which, as at Cam bridge, the representatives of the "dark blue" will be chosen for the inter-University competitions on the 10th of March, were concluded at the Christchurch Ground this afternoon, in the presence of a very large number of spectators. The entries for the various events were not so numerous as last year, but the qualitrof the competitors in the majority of cases was better, and the Oxonians may congratulate them selves in having such good men to uphold their honour as E. Nolan, Johnson, Knight, Derbyshire, Colmore, Vidal, Morgan, and Laing, who are all of them first-class pedes trians, and will take a deal of beating, especially the first and last. The final heat of the Hundred Yards was the first event sot down for decision in the programme, and shortly be fore two the firsts and the seconds of the previous day came to the scratch, viz., Colmore, Brasenose ; Darby shire, Wadham ; E. Nolan, St. John's ; R. W. Vidal, St. John's ; and D. Morgan, Magdalen Hall. Derbyshire, although beaten on his beat yesterday by Colmore, was the favourite, while Nolan, Colmore, and Vidal came in for a fair share of support. The men got off to a very bad start, Colmore getting a manifest advantage, Nolan, Vidal, and Morgan getting much the worse of it. Darbyshirestruggled hard to reach Colmore, but wasquite unsuccessful, the lat ter running in one and a half;yards in advance, in 10 secs. 3-sths. Vidal, although behind at the start, ran on with wonderful determination, and got within a foot of Darby shire at the finish. Nolan slipped at the start, and was out of the hunt. The winner has taken part in the University sports on two previous occasions, when he won his heats, but generally mot with the same fate as his compeers in the present race. He appears much improved since last year' and, having acquired the art of starting well, must prove a good man man for Oxford on the 10th. Derbyshire was not at all himself this afternoon, and although he ran second we understand he will resign the honour of representing Oxford in company with Mr. Colmore to some one else, perhaps Mr. E. Nolan or Mr. Vidal. LONG Jumr.-1, Toswill, Oriel, 18ft 11in; 2, Williamson, Pembroke, 18ft lin. Mr. Toswill was the favourite, and Mr. Williamson was the only other competitor. Mr. Mait land, of Christ Church, was compelled to leave Oxford on family matters, and could take no part in the sports, but it is hoped he will go in with Mr. Toswill for the long jump against Cambridge. The winner has done much better in his college sports and practice, but considering the ground was very heavy and slippery, the performance is not a bad ono. Mr. Gooch, the Oxford winner of last year, has gone down. QUARTER.-MILE FLAT RACE.—TIIIB race caused more ex citement and speculation than either of the other events, as it brought out those clipping runners B. Darbyshire, of Wadham (who won the 100 yards and quarter mile races against Cambridge, in 1864, in fine style), G. Knight; Mag dalen (who represented Oxford in the quarter mile against Cambridge last year, and has carried everything before him this term in his college sports), E. Nolan, St. John's (who has gained a variety of open prizes at 300 yards and quarter of a mile, defeating, amongst other good men, the celebrated P. M. Thornton of Jesus College, Cambridge, at the former distance), and C. Y. Fell, of St. John's (who was victorious in the quarter mile and 250 hurdles, at Wal- - ham-green, London, about a fortnight ago). The betting between the supporters of Darbyshire and Nolan was very spirited, and even when they had won their respective heats both had an equal number of admirers. Knight was backed at 3 to 1, and Fell at 4 to 1. Nolan had the outside place allotted to him, but notwithstanding this apparent disadvantage he gained the lead before he had traversed 50 yards, and took the inside station, with Knight second , and Darbyshire third. In this order they proceeded up the hill (the hurdle course), where Nolan's immense stride told amazingly, and he hold a clear lead of four or Ave Ya rds ; On rounding the top and last turn, Knight made a gallant but ineffectual spurt, and though he lessened the gap be tween himself and Mr. Nolan by several yards, he could a never reach him, and the St. John's champion was declare,. the winner of the prizo amidst tremendous cheering- Pas byshire spurted at the t o p, b u t w a s b e aten by severa l y eru . for second place. He has hardly run up to his trials or his form . of 1864, which is account e d for by the fact of his bas. mg been unwell since yesterday. N o lan and Knight will undoubtedly represent Oxford against Cambridge next week, when Mr. Pelham must look to his laurel s. The time of the winner was 55 seconds, which, considering the nature of the ground, must be regarded as highly satisfac tory. HURDLE RACE 250 YARDS OVER 10 FLIGHTS.---11°11. This event brought mostly the same competitors as in the short hurdles, and finished in almost the same manner. Fell (St. John's) easily gained the first heat. Billyard (Pembroke) and Bladon (Worcester) running a dead heat for second place ; time, 35} seconds. Morgan (Magda len Hall) and King (Merton) were the only runners is the second heat, and as first and second were eligible for rho final tussle, neither tried to win. Vidal easily defeated Rawnsley (Corpus), Powell (Brasenose), and Philllett (Magdalen) in the third heat. The final heat afforded some s peculation, Morgan and Vidal being freely backed at 2 to 1, and 4 to 1 was, accep t e d about King The latter went,off beautifully, and had a clear lead 1131 f" way down; but the favourities were at him from this dis tance, and as Vidal was getting up to him he stumbled at a hurdle, and Vidal took the lead and was an easy' wi ne° at the finish by four yards. Morgan made up a lot of ground at the finish and gained second honours. Ti"e 321 seconds. PUTTING THE STONE.—Morgan, Magdalen so, 30ft llin ; 2, Coates,Queen's, 30ft 4iin ; 3, Croker,Triuith 663 3}in. Two MILE FLAT RACE.—Laing, Christ Church, 1; J °l : son, Exeter, 2 ; Bowman, University, 3 ; Charlton, Chris' Church, 4; Ewell, St. John's, 0; Fletcher, Pembroke, 0; King, Merton, 0 ; Moncton, Christ Church, Christ Church, 0; Rawnsley, Corpus, 0; Smith, Worcester 0: Turner, Queen's, 0 ; Wright, Wadham, 0. Betting-6 to 4on Laing, 3to 1 agst Johnson, Bowman backed for a place. Johnson was at one time the Wear! for the two-mile encounter, but Laing having tv9n Chris' Church mile and two-mile, and the mile so eaeilY °ll Fri ; day, and done some good trials, he was easily supported ad the above odds. Smith led for a short time, but was Pas s t by Johnson in the first lap. At the half-mile the favourite took the lead, and although Johnson stuck manfully him he was never able to live with him throughout too remainder of the race, as Laing improved his a droi t gradually, and came in an easy winner by 50 yards. Ph. son, 2; Bowman ran well at the finish, and secured ew backers their money; Charlton, 4. Time, 1 0 min. 26 sec. This is thought good enough for Cambridge, and La ill will find plenty of backers on the memorable 10th. THE SACK RACE fell to Forster, New College, w ho *se t a great pot in Hall, of Christ Church. vibe THE CONSOLATION RACE, 300 yards, open to those had not won a prize, was won by Mr. Fell of St..l-,,'„,/10, the favourite, who had a hard fight with Dlr. 110°— Christ Chuh. Time, 35 sec ' s. A 100 YARDS rc MATCH between Mr. Hankey, of C° 1 7 1 .11 and Mr. Cookson, of New Inn Hall, which was won Ir. by the former; and another 100 yards spin betwe i e n 50 d Colmore of Brasenose, the winner of the 100 yera s ' 8, Captain ' Chadwick, who was present to witness the sP ° " re and which terminated in an easy victory for Mr. Colme4 passed off concluded the amusements, which on the whole most satisfactorily. THE OXFORD AND CAMBRIDGE Bli- LIARD MATCHES. OXFORD, Saturday Evening f The devotees of the beautiful and scentific genie :I billiards will be happy to learn that the annua l toure between the champion billiard players of Oxford and C f bridge will take place as usual during the boat-ritee If— to Practice has been going on at both universities for so . weeks past, and at Oxford, on Saturday night, the queehtets of superiority was brcught to trial betwesn Mess rs ' ° o rd Russell, of Christ Church (who played last year for Oxi ra against Cambridge in the double match, which 011°,0 won), and Mr. Rogers, of Exeter College, a gentleman 1/4 has come into residence since the last match. ? 11 It el3s° , from the prestige attached to his name as a first-chi/30st; tour billiard player, was made the favourite, but the S play of Mr. Rodgers in practice, and his defeat of his nents in the ties in which he has played, gain ed for wi„ nu merous admirers, who readily took 6to 4. The itttehliers ante of undergraduates at Mr. Russell's large room, ' e ;" b i s the match took place was unusually large, every 1113,i'3,v5, inch of ground being occupied, while ladders, Win° and door handles afforded temporary convenienc e for Wiof nessing the interesting event. The match proved c'e ° „ t the most exciting and interesting it has ever be en our to chronicle, the players being neck and neck from bet '' , ning to end (500 up). Without going into detail, we below the progress of the players throughout the gel" and showing their relative positions at each 100. Rodgers. R us sell. 99 102 102 ... . ..............1 14 201 ... *" 193 219 *" "" 200 300 ... •'' 801 401 398 ... , **' 400 - " 416 500 '" "'" 482 tor It will bo seen Roger; the non-favourite, was the by 18, which is much to his c re dit, see ing that he was up' wards of 30 behind his opponent in the last 100. Thdwinner was vociferously applaudedat the con elll ' 4° : of the game. It is not yet settled if Mr. Stokes (w b° . superior to eithor of the above players) will g o , a lert Cambridge this year, but h e is still eligible to against Cambridge should he elect to do so. COUNTRY MARKETS. COLCHESTER--MARcii 3. a AO Wheat was in moderate supply, and a fair busille-; o a done for anything in good condition. Barley, be an ' peas at last week's prices. 3s l Wheat, white S.IO , 2/ red 545 Beans, Mazagan•• "' '3ss I red 30s 48s Middle and small.- „,,, II Barley ... .285 40s Peas, white. ......... :r, 5 40 5 Oats ...... .... ..... 2os 25s grey ......... ...0" NORT HAMP T ON—MA=I I 3. ola New white wheat, 44s to 49s •, new red, 4 2 s to '1113,'c9, white, 49s to 51s ; old red, 45s to 48s per 36 stone:, ,„ r for malting, 37s to 40s per qr. ; gr inding, 26s to ds, s o re. stone. Oath, old, 30s to 34a • new 20s to 2 8 s per 2 1 pot Beans, old, 46s to 50s ; new, ' 368 to , 40s per 38 stone. 34s to 39s per 36 stone. CHELMSFORD-31AR= 2. lo t, 0 There was a moderate supply of wheat at ra 3r 4'2 5 trade was steady. Barley also firm. . 3 78 39 5 Whest, old white....4ss 52s Peas, Partridge .... .3ul; 3 0 new . .43a :Os White ...... .....35, 35e old red 393 43$ BtAling ...... ..31$ ~..e new. 35s 39s Dun.. ....••• ...... 0 .. ,„ 0 8ar1ey...... 24s 31s dit , o, acYl••":316 , j' s Chevalier 27a :.9,3 Beans, Tick, eld::" — 0 .....0 Grind ng e3s Os new• • ; 4 :3511 ,g Malt 58s COs Harrow Li ck ,e 7 0 Chevalier 6^s 624 ne l ' i " • .,:Jgs " Oats •• • 2os 26s liazsgatt • ... r ° A middling supply GßA _3. „, l e s We N of T w H h A ea li t, and good dig samples os ; s 4 at last week's prices. • Old white wheat, 54s to 535; old red, 480 *"."; ' tf- f white, 50s to 56s ; new red, 43s to 48s per 36 stonos I' ley for malting, 36s to 40s per qr. , grinding, 28s 6 ° For -1 30 stone. Oats, old, 28s to 308 . ; new, 20s to 2 -4 woo' s p to ea n s, e. 3 B ss ea t n o so s ld, pe 4 r 6 3 B 6 t s o to s n Os e. ; new, 40s to 44 8 P er ' ABERDEEN—MAncs 2. and Prices There was little doing- in our market to-dan are much the same as last week. 40 1 ' White wheat 40s Od to 4 8 s Od 621 b v bil Red wheat 40s Od to 45s 0(1 Potato oats Common oats 2 2 3 2 s s o Od d to to 2 24 2 : 6 Od 4 0Th V bug 1 ; 1 1 Bere 2Bs Sd 29s Od 53115 v bas B ar l ey 29s Od to 30 s Odj V r 140 1 D' Oatmeal 17 s 6d to 18s Od boll (N, , s o,D. Flour, fine 37s Od to 38s Od 13 s ack o f b KIRKCALDY—MAncx 3. per cl l. ' G oo d supplies of all kinds of grain. Barley 1-5 down. Wheat and oats unchanged. Wheat. Barley. Oats. First 42e 6d ' 338 Od 248 Od second 44s 6d 35e Od 258 6d Third 458 6d 37s Od 268 Od Births. a , o f W . FRY—On the 4th inst., at Wanstead, Essex, the lv-- S. Fry, Esq., of a so. GILLIAT—On the 4th inst., at 28, Oxford-sclu ar- „' e lirle park, the wife of Algernon Gilliat, Esq ,of a s ° "' lac e, -I' POWYS—On the sth inst., at 33, Great Cumber.l3nd the Hon. Mrs. Edward Pow e, f n the Wi fe WESTON-0 n the sth inst., at Y Cla o ph a am so cOra niont of Wm. Weston, Esq., of a daughter. Marriages. . vr olit DEAN—SIMS—On the 3d inst., at St. Giles', Ca rni nele pl ' C. Y. Dean, of Packington-street, Islington, to 1 ,0 ) 1. youngest and only surviving daughter of the law l' ar ...." 118 1 Esq., of Lyndhurst V, Peckham. 1 g i/OLMES—Annow -On the 3d illas inst., at the Cathedra-1 'Tope Chester, Frank Holmes, Esq., M.R.C.S., Londou, 01;;004.1 Cottage, West Gorton, to Annie Elizabeth, ~,t.,,nt. daughter of the late H. Arrow, Esq., Sevenoaks, I" Deaths. 0,110/ BEAUCHAMP —On the 4th inst., at 13, Belgr sle- Henry, fifth Earl Beauchamp. eh ~ j oew BINGLEY—On the 4th inst., at 130 8, Oxford-sire Bingley, aged 48. ~reell, How—On the 4th inst., at Gordon House, Turnlistry° Thomas How, Esq., aged 79 . , ,- WO' PAICE —On the 4th inst., Mr. John Pai ee, sen., 0. ' °7 street, Borough, aged 73. vne velgt REEVES—On the 2d inst., Major-General G. 9 9t h Be e t• C. 8., late Colonel Commanding her Majesty's */•—• -- - ~,..-) F O5 ' London : Printed and Published by WIL L lAlf Ai , - - 11 0. of No. 112, Strand, Painter, at Tnr. Sys 0 1114 a;;, ° tl GP Strand, in the Precinct of the So.voy . In ttiC fa' !4ddleffes.—Tuesday, hiarch 6, 1166. TIIE SUN, LONDON, TUESDAY EVENING, MARCH 6, 1866. The LA t D ew , It 18 I Inter ( Pak Pay cat( of I be Albers Ed ilia wa Colo n , J. sy Th e P ar i The A, Th e 1 1 ~es src a'essr; t Me ssrs Z 0 iLI 44,11 At onsii (16n, C ,11 tl 0 t a. Po f tail,