The Press.
London, England, 1855-07-14 00:00:00

PERIODICAL LITERATURE.

WE have three Quarterly Reviews on our table, one of
them, the National, being a first number. It is de-
signed, apparently, to represent the principles and
opinions of—to use its own words—" that section of
" the Anglican clergy, as yet unhappily a small one,
" which ranks itself neither under the banners of
" High nor Low Church." To that section, it is
said Mr. Kingsley belongs, " with his master and
" friend, Mr. Maurice ;" and if any section of their
brethren can claim to rank them in their line, " it
" is probably that one which, for want of a better
" name, has been styled the Broad Church,' of
" which Dr. Arnold is usually considered the prophttes."
The doctrines of this Maurice-Kingsley school are
somewhat obscurely expressed
Ita teaching is inspired by one fundamental and com-
prehensive belief, that the " Kingdom of God " is not to be
looked for in a future state, but lies round about us here,
and is visible in all that beautifies, ennobles, and sanctifies
life.

A long article, the principal one in the number, is
devoted to the novels and poems of Mr. Kingsley,
who is said to hold common ground with both
Dickens and Thackeray, but who is set above them
as a describer of nature, and still more by the moral
purpose of his works. At the close of the article the
principles and the position of the Maurice-Kingsley
school are more emphatically stated :

It is to the honour of the Church of England that in
Dr. Arnold, Mr. Maurice, Mr. Kingsley, and others of
their school, she has found clergymen to point the way, by
following which, if by any road whatever, that standing
point may be attained, through their teaching, namely,
that here, in this world, round about us, in our daily life
at home, in our dealings with each other out of doors, is
to be found the kingdom of God; and that 'he true func-
tion of the preacher, the teacher, and the worker, is to
reveal the law of this kingdom, and bring all into citizen-
ship thereof.
It remains to be seen how the Church of England will
view this teaching and its prophets. She looked an-
kindly on Arnold ; she has deprived Mr. Maurice of his
professorship at her pet college ; she listens, puzzled and
uneasy, to the trumpet blasts of Kingsley; and views with
alarm, but, as yet, without venturing a formal protest, the
efforts of these teachers and others like them among the
working men of our towns who have hitherto refused alto-
gether to listen to her teaching. All her antecedents lead
us to fear that she will end by rejecting these, her most
devoted and far most useful sons, from her pale, as she did
John Wesley.

The theology of this school is represented, we may
assume, in the article on Ewald's " Life of Christ."
It does not seem to greatly differ from what is essen-

671

tially the rationalistic system of Bauer and Stream.
As regards the miraculous portions of the Bible nar-
ratives, the reviewer would admit :

That there are some narrations, for example, In the
Bible—as that of the passage of the Red Sea, and the
similar one of the first crosaitg of the Jordan under
Joshua—which may, with great probability, be reduced
under the old rationalistic mode of interpretation, as exhi-
biting a common fact made wonderful by the natural exag-
geration of tradition ; some, again, like the temptation,
and perhaps the transfiguration of Jesus, which mast be
regarded as mythic or symbolical embodiments of a cer-
tain idea or belief; and, lastly, others, such as the innu-
merable instances of healing and restorative power,
described in the New Testament, which allow of no un-
forced explanation that excludes the presence of some
energy above what is ordinarily possessed by man.
The saving clause, as to the supernatural element
of Scripture, is surely too insignificant to be worth
much pains to preserve. The Review is remarkable
as another evidence of that rationalistic influence,
disguised under many names and shapes, which is
at work in the bosom of the Church itself. To an
ordinary observer it does not appear in what essen-
tial particular Mr. Maurice's " Kingdom of
God" (as here interpreted) differs from what
is commonly known as Pantheism. The other
articles are marked by that essayist kind of
ability which now seems common to all our edu-
cated classes. The first paper, on " Administrative
Reform," is very acute, and congratulates the country
"on having abandoned or postponed the demand for
organic changes, in favour of one for Administrative
Reform." This is the faith of political Conservatism.
The paper on "International Duties " is less satis-
factory, as it seems to justify the war with Russia on
the ground of the immense progress made by that
country during the last century. There is force,
however, in the following passage :

Unhappy Hungary! Who can now doubt the fatal loss
of opportunity by England in the spring of 1849, through
the yet clinging curse of the non•intt•rvention doctrine ?
For how much of the present entanglement of Europe
must Lord Palmerston himself feel that these few cold
words of his are answerable !

672

a •ery few days befiNre. had declared himself satisfied with
the Austnan pnvposal, and recommended it " with all his
influence " to his rAleaguet in the Cabinet! Are we not
justified, then, such being our rulers, in looking with the
most pnifound anxiety upon the results of a war in which
the honour of England awl the destinies of the world are
deeply c.ouccerated?
The country is earnest and trite, the national resources
are inexhaustible, the courage, discipline, and spirit of
our army were never exceeded. Yet advantages such as
few, if any, statesmen who have directed the affairs of a
nation ever po4sitestseil, have been thrown away, and a great
cause has been sacrificed to incompetent men and an
unworthy pulley.

The most remarkable article in the Westminster is
that on " International Immorality:* The reviewer,
in considering the degrees in morality of the various
Governments of the world, comes quickly to the
surface of modern events. India on one hand, and
Turkey on the other, offer, he conceives, notable
examples of miserable misrule through a policy of
expediency. In relation to our Government of India,
when the plain facts of the late Burmese war are
stated, "people will refuse to believe them—they
" prove too much—they make out Lord Dalhousie
"to be a high criminal!" Yet these facts are to be
found in Blue-books, acknowledged by the Govern-
ment, and admitted to be true. We had picked a
quarrel with the King of Burmah upon what was
acknowledged to be a false charge; we insulted him,
and then, to use Lord Dalhousie's own words,
" because the Government of India cannot con-
" sistently with its own safety appear for one day in
" an attitude of inferiority," we went to war, shed
blood like water, and took the province of Pegu from
the very man we ourselves had wantonly quarrelled
with. Such is the morality of our Government in
India; and it was from such gross want of principle
that the Czar, infers the writer, " unable to imagine
" that our Ministry had two consciences, one for
" Asia and one for Europe," endeavoured to entice
them to join him in partitioning Turkey :
Naturally be did not believe that we should have a
particle of moral repugnance to his procedure, and the
conduct of our Ministry through this war has justified his
worst opinion of them.

The weakness of the late Government is represented
as the temptation which induced Nicholas to put
his legions into motion
Every reader will remember the year 1853. The fulsome
adulation with which Lord John Russell declined the
Emperor Nicholas's wicked overtures, virtually yielded
over Moldavia and Wallachia to the Russians fur the latter
half of that year : fur it led, first, to the protest of our
Ministry against the ordering of the French fleet eastward
in March, to oppose a contingency which our Ministers
had chosen to assume would not occur; and next, when it
did occur, they had not strength of mind to acknowledge
that they were childish dupes, and flame out in indigna•
tion the moment the Pruth was crossed; but, trained to
courtliness, they still listened to promises, and went on tic•
ceptiug the " words of gentlemen," until Lord John Russell
declared in Parliament that the Emperor Nicholas " had
exhausted every form of falsehood against us." Perhaps
all now see the extreme folly of our Ministers in this
affair; in fact, it was a folly peculiar to themselves, for it
was from the beginning denounced by all the non-Minis•
terial newspapers.
Speaking of moral influence without a will, aptly
likened to the brute force of a tame or, the re•
viewer continues :

•
Our Ministers have in many ways plunged into so im•
moral an atmosphere that they utterly mistake wherein
moral influence consists. They do not know that the
verdict of a virtuous power has a moral influence (or
perhaps, rather, they think a virtuous power to be a
chimera), nor do they appear to see that the example of
enthusiasm and devotion ►s a moral influence : their notion
of it is wholly material. To possess a great fleet or agi eat
army, they suppose, at once confers "moral influence' on
a state, and at once gives weight to its negotiations and
its opinion, forgetful that the question underlies, "Is there
a will to strike?'

How different would have been the effect of those
"Moral Demonstrations" which were made in
1853 4, if we had possessed an honest Government at
home ! That the terrible calamities of this war are in
the main owing to the connivance of Lord Aberdeen
and the imbecility of his Cabinet, the most pre-
judiced cannot now deny. The other articles do
not call fox special notice at our hands, the one on
"Party Government" being little more than a
sketch of the political parties in existence, and of the
prospects of the nation. Lord Stanley is noticed as
one of the few rising statesmen of the day. In the
" Errors of Teetotalism " the assumption of the total
abstinence advocates, that what is true of the abuse
of stimulating drinks is true also of their moderate
use, is combated on the authority of Liebeg, Berard,
and many first-rate chemists and physiologists of the
day. In the "Review of Contemporary Literature,"
the Rev. Baden Powell's volume of essays is com-
mended as a book "distinctly in the right direction."
Praise from such a quarter ought surely to make
the reverend professor consider to what conclusions
his reasoning must inevitably tend :
He very distinctly clears the region of natnre from all
lIM pernatural interposition. He vindicates physics, as a