grant, is just enough against a certain conception of Kant, and we should entirely acquit an author who saw the matter in that light, and who was apprehending a misconception to which Kant is undoubtedly liable. But it is a mere fiction that such a conception is the correct or the complete one to be held of Kant.

Some of the criticisms of Kant's theory of obligation might also be the subject of remark. But they would lead us into too much discussion. Besides, most of the author's treatment of the subject is eminently judicious, and too many qualifications would have to be introduced into restrictions upon them.

Professor Dewey acknowledges his indebtedness to T. H. Green for the main principles of his own view. This is clearly true in the statement of his own ethical postulate on page 131, where self-realization in a community of persons and involving the equal self-realization of all others is enunciated as the formula of ethics. We have no objections to such a principle, but do not think it any better than a hundred others which might be framed. Indeed, we regard it simply as one of the many ways of stating the same truth, and would add that it is, to our way of thinking, identical with the completed form of Kant's formula.

There are some very strange statements about what morality is that deserve notice. The first is the following: "Anought' which does not root in and flower from the 'is,' which is not the fuller realization of the actual state of social relationships, is a mere pious wish that things should be better." Now we should ask how are we going to deduce the ideal from the actual unless the ideal has already been realized, and in that case there would be no use for ethics of any kind, Professor Dewey's, or any other. What actual state of social relationships ought to be more fully realized, the strifes, and quarrels, and thievery, and murder, and arson, and adultery of every-day life? Or should it be something else? Professor Dewey does not enable us to distinguish which of them is the truly moral. A similar objection can be made to his use of the term "moral," which is apparent in the opening of part second of his discussion. There he says that "the habit of conceiving moral action as a certain kind of action, instead of all action so far as it is action, leads us to conceive of morality as a highly desirable something which somehow ought to be brought into our lives, but which upon the whole is not." Now we should ask any man whether morality is not precisely what Professor Dewey here implies it is not. Would Professor Dewey say that all action is moral? If so it can be so only because of his failure to distinguish between the generic use of the term "moral" which includes the right, the indifferent, and the wrong, as subjects of ethical science, and the specific use of the same term as identical with the right. In the first sense all action whatever done by a conscious agent would be "moral." But Professor Dewey can hardly be ignorant of the very different use which both moralists and the laity give the conception. Besides, if "moral action were not "" a certain kind of action," what is the use of the term "moral" at all? Why has the human mind felt obliged instinctively to qualify action in this way?

These are crucial questions in an ethical theory, and we could wish that Professor Dewey had not laid himself open to criticism in regard to them. For there is too much value in his work to have it marred by defects of the kind we have indicated. There has been wide reading in the preparation of it, and the style is clear and inviting in most portions

VOL. XVI. — NO. 91.

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of the work. In the main, also, the views expressed are stimulating and suggestive, and more than all are an indication of the earnest endeavor of the age to get at a basis for its conduct or an ideal that will adequately express its aspirations.

J. H. Hyslop.

Exposé de Théologie Systématique, par A. Gretillat, Professeur de Théologie à la Faculté Indépendante de Neuchâtel. Tome Quatrième. Dogmatique: II. Soteriologie; Eschatologie. Neuchâtel: Attinger Frères, Editeurs. 1890. 8vo, pp. 639. The second part of the "Dogmatique" of Professor Gretillat treats in his intensely Biblical and thorough manner that portion of the subject extending from Hebrew prophecy, which, as "a unique and supernatural spectacle in the world," prepared the way for a Saviour, to those predictions of the Anointed himself which relate to the last acts of redemption in the consummation of the individual and of the universe. Christianity is the religion of salvation, or it is nothing. The author declines to see in it the conciliation of two opposed principles, one pagan, the other Jewish, of Immanence and Transcendence; for this pretended conciliation had been already made in Jehovism the authentic history of Israel. Christ was a true substitute for the race, and wrought a divine satisfaction for sin, the ground of which satisfaction is not merely demonstrative and pedagogical, but ontological. Penal suffering was necessary, any arguments to the contrary drawn from parables like that of The Prodigal Son being arguments e silentio. In deducing the apostolic doctrine of satisfaction from the epistle, little allowance is made by Professor Gretillat for the Jewish antecedents and environment of the writers. They speak to him, at all points, with an illumination which is achromatic, plenary, and of universal application: In determining whether the death of Christ was a fact of human consequence or of divine causality, it seems to us unnecessary to distinguish so sharply as does the author between these two spheres of action. We are unable to see why the conception of deliberate choice on the part of the Saviour himself may not reconcile both theories in a most natural way.1

Two currents of eschatological teaching, the author admits, run through the New Testament; the one favorable to a near return of Christ, the other to its remoteness in time. The evangelization of the world, he thinks, is to be achieved before the day of the Parousia, and "midway between the chiliastic insanities and a transcendental idealism" are to be placed his views of the millennium.

In treating of the Resurrection of Jesus the writer fails, as we think, to consider duly that view in which it is regarded rather as the miraculous proof than as the normal process of the resurrection of his disciples. Luke xx. 38 seems to us certainly not a proof text for the dogma that "the human personality can be complete only in and through the association of the soul and the body," even if the dictum of Oetinger, Die Leiblichkeit ist das Ende aller Wege Gottes, be any more so. Both leave untouched the question, "With what body do they come? If the necessary continuity between the present and the future body is to be maintained, as is asserted, only through "the accession of a celestial 1 See Dr. Thomas Hill's article in this Review for February, 1891, on "The Proximate Causes of the Crucifixion."

substance to the buried germ which survives the dissolution of the former organism," it may puzzle some to explain the author's insistence on the phrase, "the resurrection of the body"! Is "a new and celestial organism" fairly entitled to be called the body? The question, we think, is worthy of more attention than it has yet received.

Between (a) effective universalism, (b) conditional immortality, and (c) eternal suffering, Professor Gretillat refuses definitively to choose, preferring eschatological agnosticism, in which class of thinkers he would include the disputed name of Nitzsch. "The God of the Bible and of history is not a sentimental being." "Is the soul essentially immortal? We answer, no! To argue, from the simplicity of its substance, its indestructibility, is to beg the point in controversy, whether a simple substance can or cannot be destroyed. . . . The Bible is ignorant of an eternal survival of the soul, even of the just, in a state of pure spirit."

The impression made upon the reviewer by this able and interesting volume is that the advance movement in theological discussion in different countries is very irregular. To speak only of a single contrast, traces of the controversy over canons of interpretation seldom appear in the volume before us, as they surely would had it emanated from an American mind; while it is equally evident that some tentative eschatological speculations, met with in our own theological literature, have become the settled science of the Faculty of Neuchâtel.

Le Problème de l'Immortalité, par E. Petavel-Olliff, Docteur en Théologie. Etude précédée d'une Lettre de Charles Secrétan, Professeur de Philosophie à l'Université de Lausanne. Vol. i. 8vo, pp. 441. Paris: Fischbacher. 1891. The literature of Eschatology receives an important accession in the work whose first part lies before us, as does the theory of Conditional Immortality which it sets forth, in the adherence, now for the first time definitely announced, of Professor Secrétan. Of our author, it is enough to say that one might as reasonably ignore Cardinal Newman or Dr. Döllinger in the study of Papal Infallibility, or Pasteur and Koch while investigating bacteriology, as to neglect the writings of Dr. Petavel in the discussion of human immortality.

A general idea of the scope and value of the present volume may be had from the following words of review in the "Bibliothèque Universelle:" "It is not enough to say that his (Dr. Petavel's) work testifies to great erudition and a profound knowledge of the Bible and of theology; we must add that it is inspired throughout by a warm and living spirit, which engages and benefits the reader although he may not be convinced. We feel that the author has not written for the pleasure of writing, and because it is indecent nowadays not to have made a book.' He believes; therefore has he spoken. Animated by an energetic conviction strengthened with years, and which has been for him a source of light, of joy, and of power, M. Petavel has believed himself untrue to duty as a man and a Christian if he did not expound the truths to the investigation of which he has consecrated himself so long and so entirely, and which he believes to be founded upon Scriptural texts, the postulates of conscience and of reason, and the data of natural and philosophical science. It is not only with a special dogma that we are concerned in the book. When the second volume shall have appeared, if it fulfill the promises of the first, we shall have a theology, and a theology forming a homogeneous, logical whole, worthy already, from this

standpoint, of consideration. And perhaps, after its perusal, many ministers will recognize that Dr. Petavel has only said, a little in advance, what they will then be ready to avow; and will be surprised to discover, in the testimonies invoked by the author, that they are in numerous company, and that if, until now, the ancient fortresses have stood against new evangelical schools, the moment may be not far distant when they will be obliged to capitulate; a thought well calculated to encourage those who would lead the way but dare not.

"As for Professor Charles Secrétan, he has dared. In a letter-preface, in which he recognizes Vinet as among the precursors of Conditionalism, he writes thus: 'I was a candidate predestined to your doctrine, since I have always seen in evil, not simply an insufficiency, a defect of being, as have the logicians to whom we owe the infernal metaphysic, but a bent of the will—that is to say, of the being itself— toward nothingness.'

"Anything like a review of the volume before us is forbidden by the space at our disposal. If Dr. Petavel errs, it is perhaps in the direction of an overscrupulous reliance upon Biblical texts, into which excess his exact scholarship, provoked by a worse abuse of the proof-text method on the part of some of his antagonists, may have betrayed him. On the philosophical side he is especially strong, and it is temperate praise to say that, right or wrong in his conclusions, he is the leading champion, in this generation, of the doctrine that they only can live forever who will live unto God. His doctrine of Facultative Immortality stands equally opposed to the spiritualism of the Platonic school and the crass extravagance of Prophetico-materialistic notions about the life of the world to come." Les Droits et les Torts de La Papauté, par E. Petavel-Olliff. 8vo, pp. 74. Lausanne: F. Payot. 1890.. - Dr. Petavel believes that in the parable recorded in Matthew xxiv. 45 et seq., Jesus predicts some of the most considerable events in the history of his church,—the institution, the temporal and spiritual grandeur, and the decadence of the Papacy. "Like many other parables of Jesus Christ, this one is composed of seven verses, indicating seven phases of the history of the Papacy:" (v. 45) The establishment of a superintendent. (46) First return of the Master. (47) Promotion of the superintendent. (48) Demoralization of the superintendent. (49) Excess committed by the superintendent. (50) Second return of the Master. (51) Final punishment of the superintendent.

Those familiar with the rich exegesis of the writer (as seen in such articles as "The House of Gethsemane," translated for "The Expositor," March, 1891) need not be told how fascinating is this study from his pen. "From the practical point of view," writes the author, "the argument may furnish the ground of a profitable discussion between Catholics and Protestants." Exegetically, it is perhaps the most elaborate discussion of the text extant, and one whose conclusions have been pronounced legitimate by at least one of the foremost Protestant commen

tators.

Etudes Sociales, 12mo, pp. 338; Les Droits de l'Humanité, 12mo, pp. 350, par Charles Secrétan, Professeur a l'Université de Lausanne, etc. Lausanne F. Payot. 1890. Necessary Reforms, the Normal Working Day, Luxury, Relation of Political Economy to Morality,such are the sub-topics treated in the first of these interesting volumes by the eminent Swiss philosopher, Professor Secrétan. Upon pastors particularly the author enjoins the study of these questions, without know

ledge of which, he believes, they can exert but little influence upon this present world. "Happily we do not any more think of working out our salvation by doubtful disputation over the prophecies of the Book of Daniel, but, as in the days of Nehemiah, each must take hammer and trowel and build the walls of Jerusalem."

There is a social question: How shall the interests involved in production be harmonized? Our only aim should be liberty, but this liberty must be guaranteed to all. True reform will increase and fortify the liberty of the individual. Specific aims are just and worthy when they subserve (1) the most complete possible development of all the members of humanity, (2) the maximum of individual liberty compatible with the liberty of others, (3) the possession by each of the welfare and leisure necessary for the development of personal aptitudes. When disparity of condition places one class in permanent dependence upon another class; when inequality endangers liberty, - liberty must be abridged, but only in the interest of liberty.

It is unquestionably desirable that workingmen, the principal agents in production, enter some day into possession of the utensils and the capital necessary to their profitable employment, since only so can they receive the full value of their work. The great factor in the remedial efforts of society is, however, moral. Yet the author insists upon legal restraints, protecting minors from the necessity of labor, limiting that of women, securing weekly rest to all, and guaranteeing a normal working day. Professor Secrétan believes in an eight-hour day, and in international federation as the means of its realization. Like M. Simon, he speaks with expectancy of "The United States of Europe " as a Utopian calm likely to follow proximate political convulsions. Into his discussion of Luxury and the Relations of Political Economy to Morality, we must allow the reader to enter for himself.

"The Rights of Humanity," a companion volume to the "Social Studies," is more profoundly concerned with the basic principles of social reform as they inhere in personal rights. In treating of natural right it is the author's dominant idea that right is born of duty; but as the judge of duty is the individual conscience, the accomplishment of it is exigible by law only in the measure indispensable to the rights of others.

Dreams of equality are bad dreams. Collectivism is a bad dream. Inequality is life, uniformity is stagnation. "What heart and reason ask is, not that there be no more wealth, but that poverty be no longer insecurity, nakedness, and absolute dependence." The inequality which nature imposes, it is true, is a mobile inequality, but it is inequality. If the proletariat, however, is the correlative of landed property, the law is responsible for the proletariat. In older countries the nationalization of land is probably only a Utopia. Newer governments will do well to look, before it is too late, at the inevitable consequences of the individual appropriation of the soil. The right to assistance and

the right to work do not exist. Mere need cannot confer a right. Heirship is not a favor of the state, but testamentary rights are involved in the right to liberty. That the father owes an equal love to his children does not concern the law. Here, as everywhere, law transcends its proper function when it aspires to sanction the precepts of morality.

If the doctrine of these books is not that of "The Fabyan Essays," it is quite as far removed from the traditional social philosophy.

Professor Secrétan is a master. No one can be fully versed in the