Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-03-22
THE LIBRARY TABLE
By the Booklorer


DR.. John Rathbone Oliver of Balti-
more, who is to lecture March % at the
Mount Pleasant Congregational Church,
has had and has today life of many
currents, many sympathies. He has four
professions, In all of which he has won
distinction. In his autobiography. -Four
Square," published last Autumn he tells
the story of most varied and interest
ing life and how he came to be at the
same time psychiatrist, criminologiSt
college professor and scholar, and priest
OF the Anglican Church. DR.. Oliver is
chief medical officer and criminologist
to the Supreme Bench Of Baltimore, a
psychiatrist In private practice, pro-
fessor OF the history Of medicine at the
University of Maryland, warden of
Hopkins and a member of the clerical
staff OF Mount Calvary Episcopal
Church, Baltimore. For recreation he
studies Greek, in which he took the
degree of PHI. D. at Johns Hopkins after
he was SO, and writes books. Differing
from many psychiatrists, DR.. oliver
thinks that there is distinct danger to
a psychiatriSt of mental infection; the
best preventive of this, he believes is
some absorbing interest far removed
from human ills. AS an author, DR.
Oliver first became widely known
through his book victim and Victor,
published in 1928, which was chosen for
the Pulitzer prize by the preliminary
committee. though 1t did not finally re-
ceive the award. In this work of fiction
the priest Michael Mann and the psy-
chiatrist DR.. Claude Monroe, who work
together for the restoration and saliva
ton OF certain mentally Ill human
beings, are easily imagined to be the
dual personality Of DR.. Oliver himself
The reading of Victim and Victor
caused many persons TO discover an
earlier book of DR.. Oliver, Fear" In
which psychiatrist who has himself
suffered and through suffering learned
understanding is able to help those
who are being driven by fear over the
boundary line of sanity.
X X X
The title of DR.. divers most recent
book, -Four Square," is taken from the
Book of Revelations: "And the city
heth foursquare, and the length is
as large as the bredth." The intro
duction. which is called my Great
Uncle Henry" acknowledges indebted
ness to that early relative. HE had
not been satisfied with being Just one
kind OF man: he had been many
kinds. A fairly successful business man
then a scholar and a dis
tinguiShed teacher later on
a soldier, adjutant general and a great
executive. And. at various periods dur
ing these other shifting activities,
Mayor of Salem. Perhaps
some few drops of his active blood
or of the blood that he inherited from
some distant, common ancestor, some
uneasy Oliver-uneasy in any Zion
without the possibility of some future
migration-may run in my veins" The
book is divided into four parts: "The
Courts" THE PsychiatriSt's Office,
The University" and THE Altar" All
four parts reveal a personality in love
with life, full life, and SenSitively SYM
pathetic with human beings. In con-
nection with his court work as a Grim
inologiSt, DR.. Oliver has arrived at
some interesting conclusions on many
subjects. among them capital punish
ment, British judicial procedure as COM
pared with ours. insanity as a reason
or excuse for crime, intelligence tests
versus emotional tests, conflicts in exN
pert opinion, prohibition and anti-nar-
cotic laws. AS psychiatrist, DR.. Oliver
has an Office which Is a pleasant sit
ting room. without any evidence OF
its medical purpose. He never takes
notes while interviewing a patient, but
writes up all his cases at night and
then promptly forgetS the details. He
has two chairs of different heights, one
for himself. the other for the patient
If patient is obviously suffering from
an inferiority complex. he is given the
higher chair: II his difficulty is an ex-
aggerated ego, he finds himself in the
lower chair. The chair assignment
seems to be the first step in the cure
Every week end, from Saturday noon
to Monday morning, DR.. Oliver spends
in residence at the clergy house OF
Mount Calvary Church and celebrates
mass each Sunday at IL am. On Mon
day morning he returns to lay life
when he leaves for the court house and
he says humorously that he inStinctively
puts his hand to his throat to be sure
that he has laid aside the clerical collar
1t Is impossible to read this autobi-
ography with its reserved account OF
the suffering experienced during the
years after the author had resigned his
orders, to which he was restored in
1927, without realizing that his religion
means much in DR.. divers life.
$3.50 -
BENJAMIN Franklin, during his long
stay in Paris, when he was besieged by
numerous applicants for letters of in
sons OF importance in America, worked
out technique which might serve as a
model under similar circumstances to-
day. Bernard Fay, in his Franklin.
the Apostle of Modern Times" quotes a
standard letter used by Franklin to suit
his purposes. Strange to relate, the re-
ceivers Of the letter did not, according
to Mr.. Fay. feel offended by the letter,
but considered 1t an evidence of Prank
1N.,te ,.II akRAr a., ~ 1AANa
THE bearer of this, who Is going to
America, presses me to give him letter
of recommendations, though 1 know
nothing Of him. not even his name. This
may seem extraordinary, but assure
you 1t is not uncommon here. Some
times, indeed. one unknown person
brings you another equally unknown
to recommend him; and sometimes they
recommend one another AS to this
gentleman, must refer you to himself
for his character and merits, with which
he Is certainly better acquainted than !
can possibly be. I recommend him,
however, TO those civilitieS, which every
stranger, Of whom one knows no harm.
has a right to; and request you will
do him all the good ofilces, and show
him all the favor. that on further ac-
quaintance you shall find him to de-
serve"
Another volume of Pierre Lofts I'm
innate Journal has been published,
covering the years 1885. Pierre Lofts
real name was Julien Viaud and he was
an officer in the French Navy as well
as one OF the leading romantic writers
OF France during long period Some
of his chief novels are "An Iceland
Fisherman" "Aziyade," 1.-THE Romance
of Spahi. Madame Chrysanthemum''
and THE Marriage of Lott"
Il 4 4
Andre Maurois. the French biog-
rapher of Disraeh and Shelley. has
written new biography of Byron, re-
Gently published. Maurois has described
his new book as follows: This Is the
first life of Byron written since a