LITERARY NOTICES, 



563 



lishing enterprise seems not to be up to the 

 requirements of home authorship. And then 

 the meanness of the American commercial 

 system comes in to aggravate the difficulty. 

 If a writer produces a work of great value 

 for American circulation, he is driven abroad 

 to have it printed, and then our enlightened 

 Government forbids its entrance into the 

 country until every copy has paid a tax, 

 which heightens the cost and virtually em- 

 bargoes its circulation. 



The dedication of Mr. Thompson's book 

 is especially interesting as a happy tribute 

 to one of the greatest scientific minds which 

 this country has ever produced. It reads 

 as follows : " These volumes are inscribed 

 by a kinsman of a later generation to the 

 illustrious memory of Sir Benjamin Thomp- 

 son, Count Rumford, a philosopher, states- 

 man, and benefactor of mankind, a great 

 prophet, who, while living, was not without 

 honor save in his own country, and upon 

 whom dead that praise justly due to a merit 

 almost unrivaled among American men of 

 science has been but tardily and incom- 

 pletely bestowed, both by his own family 

 and his countrymen at large." 



The Reality of Religion. By Henry J. 

 Van Dyke, Jr., D.D. New York: Charles 

 Scribner's Sous. Pp. 146. Price, $1. 



The contents of this book are neither so 

 broad as its title, nor are they of the char- 

 acter which would be indicated by it. Re- 

 ligion is a very comprehensive term, of which 

 all systems of religion must be regarded as 

 but partial modifications. " The Reality of 

 Religion," therefore, should involve an in- 

 quiry into the element of validity or truth- 

 fulness that is common to all religions. But 

 Dr. Van Dyke enters into no such investiga- 

 tion. His book is an ardent pietistic defense 

 of the importance of Christian theology. 

 As a series of vivid and fervid appeals to 

 poor sinners to awake and flee from the 

 wrath to come, it will be appreciated by 

 many, but it will not give much help to those 

 who are grappling with the urgent religious 

 problems of the times. When Dr. Van Dyke 

 says of the dogmas of theology, " They are 

 certainly as important as the dogmas of sci- 

 ence," we hesitate, and should be better 

 satisfied if he had indicated in what sense 

 " important " ; but, when he says of ques- 

 tions of ritual, " They are at least of equal 



consequence with the questions of social 

 order," we have no hesitation in saying that 

 he is entirely mistaken. 



Thomas Cakltle : A History of his Life 

 IN London, 1834-1881. By James A. 

 Froude, M. a. Two volumes in one. 

 New York : Charles Scribner's Sons. 

 Pp. 392 and 417. Price, $1.50. 



Mr. Froude's method of portraying the 

 Carlyles has become widely known from 

 his previous volumes. To quote from the 

 present work, "In representing Carlyle's 

 thoughts on men and things, I have confined 

 myself as much as possible to his own words 

 in his journals and letters." These charac- 

 teristic impressions of John Mill, Landor, 

 Dickens, Tennyson, and other celebrated 

 writers and their works, abound in the let- 

 ters herein presented. The story of the 

 first three years is a record of discourage- 

 ment and pecuniary anxiety. Better times 

 began with Carlyle's appearance on the lect- 

 ure platform in 1837. An interesting item 

 for a history of Yankee " book-pirates " is 

 that, within the next two years, Carlyle re- 

 ceived a hundred and fifty pounds from the 

 United States as royalty on his "French 

 Revolution," when " not a penny had been 

 realized in England " by the author, al- 

 though the receipts of the booksellers had 

 been over a thousand pounds. Carlyle often 

 bewailed his own choice of occupation, and 

 his advice, when consulted by young men, 

 was of the following tenor : " Literature, as 

 a profession, is what I would counsel no 

 faithful man to be concerned with, except 

 when absolutely forced into it, under pen- 

 alty, as it were, of death. The pursuit of 

 culture, too, is in the highest degree recom- 

 mendable to every human soul, and may be 

 successfully achieved in almost any honest 

 employment that has wages paid for it." 

 Mr. Froude says of his first meeting with 

 Carlyle, when the latter was fifty-four years 

 old : " I did not admire him the less because 

 he treated me— I can not say unkindly, but 

 shortly and sternly. I saw then what I saw 

 ever after — that no one need look for con- 

 ventional politeness from Carlyle — he would 

 hear the exact truth from him, and nothing 

 else." An occasional letter by Mrs. Carlyle 

 appears in this work ; especially interest- 

 ing is her written report on the domestic 

 finances, headed " Budget of a Femme In' 



