New-York tribune., 1907-01-12

oughly alive.
MI GIoVer should have taken lessons in theme
writing under Miss Gardner While his Studies
In Virgil match her Theodore OF Studiur,," aa
proof Of the worth of ancient literature Miss
Iardner knows how to use her laborious notes
as plotting paper. Only here and there some
shred2 of them cling to the ink Of her ESSAY
Miss Gardners aim has been about the same as
Mr.. Glovers, namely. to reveal the state of the
world through the life of one man. Few of us
recognize in the name Of Theodore the greatest
enemy of the iconoclasts. Still fewer of us an
precate the subtle psychological factors COM
pounded in this advocate of holy pictures and the
profound significance his standpoint has for re-
igion and religious art. Theodore. Abbot of
Studium. the greatest monastery of the Eastern
world was curious blend of piety dogmatism,
diplomacy and organizing
genius. Miss Gardne calls him a Puritan and
not inappropriately. His innumerable long let
ters TO everybody who wished to correspond with
MIN suggest seventeenth century sermons; the
microscopic ritual he forced upon the submissive
brethren of Studium, and the almost lustful
pleasure he took in imposing work and penances
upon the monks, suggest Connecticut blue laws
and their gleeful enforcers. Miss Gardeners re-
mark that the good abbot hankered after mar
tyrdom, and to this end fought the authorities on
the slightest provocation. is uncharitable but
very near the truth. Theodore lived in the tur-
bulent days OF the ironically named Empress
Irene, who, like all other politicians of her gen.
Grafton, found it expedient TO favor the sup
preston of picture worship and then. Miss
Gardner thinks It strange that keen statesmen
could have risked much by entering into petty
theological controversies: but here the authors
judgment errs. for such topics as that of holy
pictures were alive among the masses, we
know from the fact that Irenes Asiatic troops
were rabidly iconoclastic while the thousands
OF monks and priests scattered throughout the
Eastern empire were devout image worshippers
The book takes the reader through the twisted
skein Of embroiments, trea acheres and persecu-
tions called by historians the iconoclastic con-
troversy In all this occasional sidelights are
thrown upon the wider problems involved in the
use Of religious art. Perhaps the severest ad-
verse criticism to be passed against Miss Card
ner's present volume is that it handles the great
issues too briefly. The historical reader can, Of
course fill IN the sketch, but the ordinary man
will surely be driven TO unsympathetic en-
cyclopRdia to inaccurate village parson
for further illumination. Without a clear vision
of the issues at stake in iconoclasm one cannot
Judge Theodore fairly. Taking Miss Gardner's
essay at face value It makes of the abbot an in
tolerable bigot whose interest in holy pictures is
stupidity theological rather than religiousy
aesthetic. Without denying altogether the justice
of this verdict. we must file demurrer. Theo-
dore seems to have realized, though imperfectly
the dependence of live religion upon art. He
followed the "sanctifed common sense" of the
great Basil in separating picture worship from
picture Salvation or contemplative alteration
He was no moro an idoater than Is the super
fine atheistic aesthetic who trembles before the
Sistine Madonna One need not be a Russian
IN order to believe that the Eastern Church,
even unto this day, has been fairer to tho re-
ligious claims of art than has the Western
Church. Western Europe. in fat contradiction
to its own glorious artistic history. still persists
IN denying that work of art is a sight draft
on heaven But there among who
would like to have Theodore called 10 the stand
again as first witness in a reopened controversy.
Perhaps Miss Gardner will succeed in doing this
for u.s. for in spite Of her discounts. she IS still
glad TO rate Theodore a truly great man.
Andrew Langs volume on Homer and His
Aee'' can hardly be classed as either apology
or an appeal for classicism. 1t is the work Of
2 serious scholar little concerned in missionary
enterprises The entrance fee TO his
trtb1Ition to the Homeric problem is so high
that It can be paid only by those who possess
large funds of Greek, anthropology, archaeology
and critical method. The uninitiated reader
might put the book the same shelf with the
tones Of dear old Ignatius Donnelly. In reply
to that old riddle of the sphinx: Who wrote
Homer" Mr. Lang answers with a skifuly
launched. eaboratey calculated defiance Of the
popuIarly accepted solution. The notion that
four centuries OF rhapsodists built up the "Iltad'
and the Odyssey" from an original ancient
kernel" and that in the days of Pisstratus or
thereabouts an editor appeared who crystallized
those minstrel lays in carefully revised written
ahS artificial
He calls the theory this because it has arisen
out of the hypothesis that the length OF the
original 'Iliad" must have been compatible with
the conditions of oral delivery. Such a hypothe-
sis ignores the fact that minstrels, singing 10
court audiences. recited their lays night after
night; 1t also overlooks the fact that writing
was prevalent even before the Phnncian alpha
bet reform, so that, as Mr.. Lang conjectures,
Homer was committed TO writing by many per-
sons early as 900 B. c. BY exhaustive study
of Homeric instances and archaeological discov-
cries Mr.. Lang places the author Of the great
epic between the Mycen@an and the Dipylon
epochs The rites feudaIism, arnor. metals,
buildings religious ideas and the consistent
styIe of narration discoverable in the "liiad'
and the odyssey" all convince Mr.. Lang that
his theory, If not correct, is at least more ten
able than the current one.
For those readers who cannot keep pace with
the writer's stream Of information and theoriZ-
ing there still remains the pleasure Of watching
Mr. Lang smite the ranks Of word splitting
critics who have ceased to read Homer and
taken to perusing his accents and punctuation
The book abounds in serious charges and jibing
sallies against those luckless experts who have
forgotten what human nature is in their eager
ness to explain its fruits We are made to over
look the roughness here and there conspicuous
in this genial scholars literary style; it is a