Welsh Journals

all these orators their great voices were flexible and carried the emotion as well as the sound to the furthest limits of the crowd. t But to-day a City Temple audience of a couple of thousand is the comfortable size for Front Bench statesmen if the audience is to take fire. If the purpose is to chill t Gofynwyd i un chwaer sydd yn arfer eistedd yn nghapel Prince's Road, Liverpool, mewn cryn bellder oddiwrth y pwIpud.-Ø a oedd hi yn gallu clywed yn weddol o'r He hwnw ? YdwyI.' ebe hithau, yn clywed yn dda iawn ond fe fydd y bwyd, rywfodd, wedi oeri cryn lawer cyn iddo gyrhaedd atom ni i'r fan acw.' Ond yr oedd y pethau, gyda Mr. Ebenezer Morris. gan rym ei lais, yn myned yn eu holl wres i gyrrau eithaf y dorf." Coliant y Parch. John Jones, Talsam. Can Owen Thomas. Cyf. ü. tud. 841. "Restatement and Reunion." A Study in First Principles. By B. H. Streeter. Macmillan and Co. Pp. 194. 2s. 6d. net. Of all the contributions called forth by the Kikyu controversy none can compare in thoroughness, candour and fearlessness with this of Mr. Streeter's. Readers of Foundations" will be led to expect these qualities in anything from his pen, and they will not be disappointed. In the introduction to this brief, though deeply interesting study, the author, in whose recent appointment to a Canonry at Hereford all liberal Churchmen will rejoice, takes up the appeal of Bishop Gore to Churchmen to consider their principles. Although three-fourths of this volume, he tells us, were already in proof before the publication of the Bishop's pronouncement cn the Basis of Anglican Fellowship, this book is essentially a response to that appeal. Canon Streeter's book consisted of four essays (1) The Simplicity of Christianity; (2) Authority, Reunion and Truth; (3)What does the Church of England stand for ? (4) The Conception of the One Church. Believing as the author does that the centre of gravity of Christianity does not lie in theology," the first essay takes the form of an interpretation of the essence of Christianity. Stated in the barest outline, this seems to be included in six main ideas: (a) A disposition of soul; (b) a resultant course of action (c) a consequent achieve- ment (d) a promise of a Divine response and co-operation (e) an assurance that failure can be retrieved; and (J) a sure and certain hope of life eternal. In this summary of the Christian message, the audience, then vast refrigerators like the Cardiff Skating Rink will serve admirably. We have wandered far from the little book of big speeches on war and peace. Speakers and audiences for the most part have passed away to the everlasting silence. The immense excitements, the surging crowds, the swelling cheers, the torchlight pro- cessions-all are extinguished. But something remains in our national character-faith in a moral government of the world, the love of freedom, the desire to help the weak against the brutal, these priceless principles which sent us into the present conflict and which sustain us in it, we owe in no small degree to the British statesmen who, though dead, yet speak to us from these pages. REVIEWS there is nothing that human thought and human progress have transcended or are ever likely to transcend." We have no need to wait for the findings of historical critics or of the judgments of philosophical theologians before we can enter the Kingdom of Heaven. In the second essay, in many respects the most suggestive and helpful in the book. Mr. Streeter discusses in a constructive way the principles which governed the formation of certain Church dogmas as well as those which must govern the re-statement of the truths which these dogmas enshrine. The principle of authority is necessary in religion, but authority by itself can at most procure acquiescence. No religion can expect to survive unless it can express its fundamental convictions in such a way as to show them to be intrinsically reasonable." The new knowledge calls for readjustment: we can no longer fall back on the infallibility of the Bible or of the Church. For the strictly authoritarian position has broken down. Where, then, do we find final certainty ? While so many men of the noblest character and of those whose first passion in the search for truth stand outside the Church, she has little hope of the allegiance of the plain man. Add to this our unhappy divisions.' and it becomes evident that the authority of the Church will be little more than a paper unity until the question of Christian unity is settled." Now that we have come to recognize that every section of the Church stands for some aspect of truth, the next duty is that each religious body should learn to discover and eradicate the errors in its own views. In other