pace with the ever-increasing demands of the Education Department, and that this additional support ought to be derived from public sources. Whilst this feeling is largely entertained by the friends of religious education there is a division of opinion about the source from which it is to be derived; and as our object is the good of the schools, and not the success of any particular scheme, we can cordially support whatever plan will be most likely to command success. Experience has shown that the difficulty of maintaining the independence and religious integrity of the denominational schools, if they are once made recipients of rate aid, has rendered the proposal most objectionable in many influential quarters. It is needless to say that to obtain such aid Church opinion must be expressed with great unanimity. At a large representative meeting held in the rooms of the National Society, at the invitation of its Commitee, on November 22, 1893, it was found that there was a great divergence of opinion on the subject, whilst it was generally felt that the voluntary schools must obtain a larger amount of public support than they at present receive if they are to remain as efficient as Board schools. To meet the opposing opinions expressed, it was suggested that the two Archbishops should nominate a Committee of representative men from their respective provinces to consider the question, and to recommend a policy to Church people. This has been done: the Committee has held many meetings, and has carefully discussed the various proposals that have been put forth, and has happily arrived at a unanimous conclusion, which it is to be hoped that the friends of voluntary schools will cordially accept, and do whatever they can in order that the proposals may receive that legislative sanction without which they are necessarily inoperative. Their main proposal is thus expressed in the Report which they have issued:

'Many of the objections which prevented unanimity as to getting aid for voluntary schools from the rates would not apply to proposals for getting such aid from the Imperial Government. It has been suggested that if the Imperial Government, as is done to a great extent in Ireland, were to take on itself the duty of maintaining the entire staff of teachers, allowing neither School Boards nor managers of voluntary schools to diminish or to add to the grant so made, the working of all the grants might be much simplified, and the voluntary schools might be relieved not only from some part of the burden which is now too much for them, but from the unfair competition in obtaining teachers to which they are now exposed. At present the School Boards, with practically unlimited resources at command, have undue advantage in staffing their schools. This is no gain whatever to education generally, since it only transfers teachers from one set of schools to another. Grants from the Imperial Revenue are always more fair to all sorts of schools than aid from the rates. Such grants involve no risk of any objectionable interference with the appointment of teachers, or with the management of the schools, since the interference is always strictly limited to the purpose of securing efficiency. Nor do such grants raise any religious question whatever, since the Government are compelled by Act of Parliament to regard such questions as outside their province.'

1 See Times, January 7, 1895.

Accordingly it is added

'The Committee is decidedly of opinion that if aid is to be sought from any public source for voluntary schools it is better to apply to the Imperial than to the local exchequer. The Committee submits that the form of grant most fair, and most likely to secure good educational results, would be one which should aim at providing an adequate teaching staff for all public elementary schools, Board and voluntary, whilst preventing much of the present competition between them. And the first recommendation of the Committee is that the efforts of Churchmen should be directed towards securing this result.'

If it be asked whether such a measure of assistance would not greatly add to the sums required from public sources, the obvious answer is, that it would be far less than what would have to be raised by rates or by taxes if the voluntary schools were compelled to close their doors. As a matter of fact such a grant as that suggested would be considerably less than a million beyond what is now paid out of the taxes in the form of a Government grant, and by the ratepayers out of the rates for the salaries of the teachers in Board schools. It would, moreover, put an end to the heart-burning which is daily finding stronger expression from the teachers in voluntary schools, who think themselves unfairly dealt with by the State, and is also felt by the managers of voluntary schools, who resent the injustice done to their teachers by the State regulation of public money.

The recent contest at the election of the London School Board has shown that whilst the great mass of the voters desire religious education in Board schools they have very vague ideas of what religious education is; and it has also made clear to those who have closely watched the contest that in the camp of the Progressives there is a strong desire for purely secular teaching in all Board schools, and that this desire was not more openly expressed only because it was feared that if it was insisted upon their candidates would be defeated. The great majority of elections for provincial School Boards have shown an increased uneasiness under the pressure of rates, and a consequent determination to eject from office all who favour a heavier expenditure. Under these circumstances we may expect a growing dislike to the present system. The friends of voluntary schools feel themselves unjustly treated, and that, as matters now stand, liberty of conscience in educational matters cannot be fairly said to exist in England the thorough-going admirers of the Board school system must, at no distant time, stand forth in their true colours as the supporters of purely secular education, whilst the great mass of ratepayers will insist upon some alleviation of the burdens under which they are groaning.

That the proposals of the Archbishops' Committee will satisfy all objectors, is more than can be anticipated; but of the three classes we have named the first and the third ought heartily to approve it ; those who favour secular teaching and desire to expel all definite religious instruction from the elementary schools of the country will naturally dislike what is proposed, as it would form a barrier against the end at which they are aiming. We trust, therefore, that men

of the various schools of religious thought, who desire definite religious instruction to be given in the truths which they themselves hold, will unite in support of the scheme now proposed. If they do we believe that they will succeed in obtaining legislative sanction for what is suggested by the Archbishops' Committee as an educational policy for the Church, and so secure a really efficient system of instruction in all schools without so large a share of the irritation that now exists. Hitherto we have not infrequently failed to carry measures that are desirable because of divisions in our ranks. Under the stress of existing difficulties it remains to be seen whether earnest men are more bent upon advocating proposals which they imagine to be the best, or whether, in consideration of the greatness of the interest at stake, they will be content to work loyally together to accomplish the object which they desire, in a way that has already secured support from men of somewhat different views, and which is, of course, open to such modifications as may be found desirable after it has been maturely considered.

SHORT NOTICES.

A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church. Second Series. Translated into English, with Prolegomena and Explanatory Notes. Volumes I.-VII. under the Editorial Supervision of HENRY WACE, D.D., Principal of King's College, London, and PHILIP SCHAFF, D.D., LL.D., Professor of Church History in the Union Theological Seminary, New York, in connexion with a number of Patristic Scholars of Europe and America. Vol. XI. Sulpitius Severus; Vincent of Lérins; John Cassian. (Oxford: James Parker and Company; New York: Christian Literature Company, MDCCCXCIV.)

OUR readers have already had before them our estimate of the earlier volumes of this series,' and may be aware that while we have found ourselves able to speak in terms of high praise of the conception and general plan of the work, we have been constrained to note several instances in which the execution of the plan seemed to us to fall short of the ideal which had been set before us, and not a few in which there seemed to be a lack of editorial supervision. The regretted death of the American general editor was, perhaps, sufficient to account in part for this omission in the last volume, but we have already had occasion to express the opinion that the subscribers had a right to expect a more explicit statement of the relation of the editors to the work which is guaranteed by their names, and the volume which is now before us produces the same feeling in a somewhat stronger degree. The title-page tells the reader that it is 'volume xi.,' though, as far as we have any means of knowing, vols. viii.-x., which were duly announced in 1 Church Quarterly Review, April 1892, vols. i. and ii. ; July 1893, vols. iii. and iv. ; July, 1894, vols. v.-vii. 'Short Notice.'

the prospectus,' have not yet appeared. This, however, may be due to accidents over which the editors could have had no control, and there would have been no ground of complaint if a note had been inserted explaining the change of order, and assuring the subscribers that the important works of Ephraem Syrus, Hilary of Poitiers, and Ambrose, promised under the names of Professor Gwynn, Professor Sanday, and Mr. de Romestin, would soon be forthcoming. But the title-page, which is in general appearance so much like its predecessors that few readers would perhaps observe the difference, bears the names of Dr. Wace and Dr. Schaff in large type, and in much smaller type tells us that it is volumes i.-vii. ' which had the advantage of their 'editorial supervision.' Now we can but think that it was due alike to the distinguished editors and contributors, to the eminent publishers, and to the subscribers that the fact of Dr. Schaff's death should have been noticed, with at least some recognition of the great work which he had done, and a statement as to what portions of the present volume, if any, had the advantage of passing through the hands of any general editor, and if of any one, then of whom. Had any part of the present volume been edited by Dr. Schaff before his fatal illness? Has any part been edited by Dr. Wace? If so what part or parts? If not, what is the meaning of the names on the title-page? Are the future volumes to be edited by Dr. Wace? Is anyone to take the place of Dr. Schaff, and if so who? These are questions which naturally occur, and the answers to them should, we think, have found a prominent place in the present volume. We have looked for them in vain.

Nor is the natural demand for explanation satisfied by a general survey of the volume. The copy of the prospectus which is in our hands led us to expect the following works: (i.) CASSIAN, Collations [sic] of the Fathers; (ii.) RULE OF ST. BENEDICT; (iii.) SULPITIUS SEVERUS, Life of St. Martin of Tours, Dialogues, Letters; (iv.) VINCENT OF LÉRINS, Commonitory on the Rule of Faith. Of these the RULE OF ST. BENEDICT has been altogether omitted, and more than two-thirds of the whole volume are occupied with the works of Cassian, of which we have not only the promised Conferences, but also The Institutes of the Cœnobia and The Seven Books on the Incarnation of the Lord. The order is changed, and is now chronologically right; but it has the inconvenience of placing the small but invaluable tractate of Vincent On the Rule of Faith in the midst of the monastic works of Severus and Cassian. When we come to examine the sub-titles we find that THE Works of Sulpitius SeverUS are 'translated, with Preface and Notes, by Rev. [sic] Alexander Roberts, D.D., Professor of Humanity, University of St. Andrew's, Scotland,' though all that we find by way of preface is included in two pages under the title 'Life and Writings of Sulpitius Severus ;' that THE COMMONITORY OF VINCENT LÉRINS is 'translated by the Rev. C. A. Heurtley, D.D., the Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity in the University of Oxford and Canon of Christ Church,' who exceeds the promise of the title by adding a short 'introduction' and some valuable notes; that THE WORKS OF JOHN CASSIAN are

'translated, with Prolegomena, Prefaces, and Notes, by Rev. [sic] Edgar C. S. Gibson, M.A., Principal of the Theological College, Wells, Somerset,' who does, indeed, give us some useful prolegomena, but adds nothing by way of 'prefaces;' and we are sure that it is without his knowledge that the original 'prefaces' of Cassian are assigned to himself, as in the sub-title they seem to be.

As far as we have been able to test the translations in this volume they are adequate, as was, indeed, to be expected from the scholars who are responsible for them, though we think that Dr. Roberts somewhat frequently escapes from a difficulty by simply telling his readers that it is obscure. We have, however, to remember that the greater part of the volume-all except the Commonitory-appears in English for the first time, and that the difficulties of such translation are neither slight nor few. Whether it was worth while to undertake so much labour for the purpose of giving the English reader the opportunity, which we should think that he will seldom use, of studying the untrustworthy History of Sulpitius or the detailed monastic Institutes of Cassian is doubtful, and the utility of the general arrangement is, in our opinion, more than doubtful when we remember what important works have been omitted in earlier volumes of this series. Most students to whom the works of Sulpitius and Cassian are in their fulness important would be able to read them in the original Latin, and would find in the editions of the text, or in such easily accessible books as the Dictionary of Christian Biography or Ceillier's Histoire des Auteurs Sacrés et Ecclésiastiques, information and assistance which we are bound to say he would often search for in vain in the present volume; and the ordinary English reader would have been well contented, as the Greeks were,' with a translation of one of the epitomes of the Institutes and the Conferences of Cassian, which were made at an early date on account of the extent as well as of the semi- Pelagianism of the originals, while the reader of Sulpitius might well have been spared many of the details of the Life of St. Martin, much of The Sacred History, and all the Doubtful Letters. Space might then have been found for the promised Rule of St. Benedict, for full historical and explanatory notes, for prolegomena on the scale of some which have already enriched this series, and especially for a full treatment, with these authorities as a text, of the whole subject of Eastern and Western monasticism.

As we proceed to estimate the different parts of this volume we cannot think that the choice of Dr. Roberts, as the sub-editor of the Life and Writings of Sulpitius, was a very happy one, or that he has realized the standard which some of his predecessors had led us to expect. He has apparently never arrived, though this would seem to be a necessary preliminary step, at a satisfactory conclusion on the alleged miracles of St. Martin, and, instead of helping the student by dealing with the subject as a whole, he gives a number of notes and quotations which are not always consistent, and which culminate in the following remarks that appear at the same opening of the page : 1 Photius, Biblioth. Cod. 197. See p. 194.