and as Martin V. looked down on the whole proceedings with a lofty unconcern, they next appealed to the Future Council. The interdict was but partially observed: we regret to say that the Brothers of the Common Life obeyed it. Dom Pitra, in his 'Hollande Catholique,' lauds them to the sky, forgetting to state that by the successor of Martin V. the interdict, and all other proceedings of Sweder, were quashed as invalid. So much for the consistency of Ultramontanism.

When Eugenius IV. succeeded to the Papal chair, the Estates implored his assistance. He could not afford to treat the matter with the unconcern of his predecessor, for the Council of Basle was sitting. After despatching the Bishop of Macon to make inquiries on the spot, he, by a bull of Oct. 13, 1433, declared that his predecessor had been mistaken in refusing to confirm the election of Rodolph; that the crimes of Sweder were of the most gross and glaring character; he annulled all the acts of that intruder, and confirmed the election of Rodolph. And yet, in spite of all this, Dom Pitra has the impudence (for, with all our respect for his learning, we can call it nothing else) to talk of 'the schism of Robert'-he means Rodolph-'Diephold!' That Bishop survived the pacification twenty-two years, and governed his Church with great prudence. Sweder, after having vainly appealed to the Council of Basle, from whom he could obtain nothing but the empty title of Archbishop of Cæsarea, died of a broken heart in that city. His partisans chose Walraff, his early competitor, as his successor. He obtained the confirmation of the Duke of Savoy, called Felix V. in his obedience, and returned to Arnheim; and, more fortunate than his predecessor, he obtained the bishopric of Münster as his reward for ceasing to vex the Church of Utrecht.

The successor of Rodolph, Gisbert de Brederode, had a cruel war to maintain against David of Burgundy, the natural son of Philip the Good. This personage partly forced Gisbert, partly brought him to consent, to abdication. His arbitrary government, supported as it was by the authority of his brother, Charles the Bold, roused the citizens to revolt, and a long war was the result. David, however, maintained himself till his death in 1496. He is praised for some good qualities, especially for insisting on the necessity of learning in his clergy. Having heard great complaints of the laxity of the episcopal examinations, he once went through them himself, and only admitted three out of three hundred candidates.

Amidst scenes of worldliness like these, the Institution of Gheert Groot continued to propagate itself. By the end of the fifteenth century, it numbered seven provinces, a First and Second Belgic, the Germanic, the Genoese, the Italian, the

Portuguese, the Gallican; and possessed about one hundred and forty houses. It, however, fulfilled the prophecy of one of its early ecclesiastics: The first generation will be devoted; the second, learned; the third, relaxed.' Yet, in the second generation it produced a writer who has been called the second to A Kempis-Gerlach Petersen. He was received very young at Windesheim by Florentius; and, while he was distinguished for his gift of meditation, he was also distinguished by his determined opposition to the austerities which had brought so many of the brethren to an early grave. And from that time,' says the chronicler of the order, it has been a custom among 'us to demand, whenever any clerk presents himself for ad'mission, these three points: whether he can eat well; whether 'he can sleep well; and whether he is willing to obey; because 'we know that on the answers to these three questions depends, 'in.great measure, the likelihood of his perseverance.' Petersen, however, was as short-lived as the others, dying at the age of thirty-three, in 1414. He is known by his work, Ignitum cum Deo soliloquium, which has been translated into Flemish and French, and which was a great favourite with the Port Royalists. Some consider it the masterpiece of mystic theology.

Thomas à Kempis himself died on the 25th of July, 1470, and was buried in the Church of Mount S. Agnes. But in 1672, his remains were translated to Zwolle, where they are preserved with great veneration. Although we certainly are not to call him the author of the 'Imitation,' yet we may well place him in the very first rank of writers in that school. We are not aware that any of his works have been translated into English, with the exception of 'The Valley of Lilies,' or rather, portions of it; but his Garden of Roses,' and 'Book of the Three Tabernacles (i. e. poverty, humility, and patience), would well repay a translation. The most interesting, however, are the memoirs to which we have already so often referred. Although we cannot call him a great hymnographer, we will take the liberty of quoting a few of the verses which close his works.

With the death of Thomas the learned generation' may be said to have commenced. Overyssel and Guelderland were

undoubtedly, at the epoch of the invention of printing, the most learned countries in Europe; and the first leading colleges were at Deventer, Zutphen, Zwolle, and Kampen. The Cardinal Cusa and Pope Hadrian VI. owed their erudition to these institutions; and in 1476, a young lad named Gerard was received at Deventer, who afterwards became known to all the literary world as Desiderius Erasmus. From these, as from a centre, radiated schools into every part of north-western Europe. Rodolph Lang established that of Münster; Louis Dingenberg that of Schelstadt; here he had for pupils, Murrho (founder of the college at Colmar), Wimpheling, and Simler, the master of Melanchthon. Rodolph Agricola was the master of Beatus Rhenanus, the first editor of Tertullian, and one of the most eminent scholars of the fifteenth century.

Such an order naturally seized with avidity the invention of printing. The wooden blocks of Laurence Jansz, commonly called Coster, at Haarlem, may have familiarised them with the idea before John Gutemberg invented his movable metallic types at Mayence. Certain it is, however, that among the most valuable volumes to be found in the Incunabula of German libraries, the Canons of Windesheim have their full share. In 1474, those of Val Sainte Marie, near Mayence, printed a psalter and a breviary; and those of S. Michael, at Rostock, the Editio Princeps of Lactantius; in 1476, those of Nazareth, at Brussels, the Speculum Humanæ Salvationis '-the first work printed in that city.

It may be truly said, that the stimulus to the revival of ecclesiastical learning came from Windesheim, as that to profane learning from Rome. And it should be a humbling thought for educated, wealthy, intellectual Holland that, in her Catholic times, the north-eastern provinces were immeasurably superior to their present condition in that mental culture which Protestantism is usually supposed to foster.

The congregation of Windesheim had a golden age of about one hundred years. After 1500, we hear little of it. Swept out of Holland by the whirlwind of the Reformation, it had not the vitality to propagate itself in more happy countries. Though it continued to exist, it did not continue to spread, and became, as it were, a mere fragment in the institute of Canons Regular. In this respect, the well-defined existence which the Beguines have kept up is not a little remarkable; and the wisdom of Gheert Groot in avoiding any close assimilation to, or amalgamation with, the Canons Regular, will, perhaps, be acknowledged.

We have on another occasion taken up the history of the Church of Utrecht from the point at which we now leave it. It will be sufficient to say that the work which stands first on our

list is that which we then announced as forthcoming. It is a most valuable enlargement of M. de Bellegarde's History, published from the MSS. of that author himself. The death of the editor, the Abbé Van der Hoeven (December 30, 1851), unhappily prevented the promised continuation from its termination in 1778 to the present time. We trust, however, that some one of the faithful sons of the Church of Utrecht will carry on her annals during the seventy years of which a full account yet remains to be written.

The Hollande Catholique' of Dom Pitra is a collection of letters addressed to various ecclesiastical friends during a tour in that country. The Ultramontanism of the writer is as well known as his learning; but we were scarcely prepared for the extreme distortion of facts, and the almost savage bitterness of tone, which characterises his account of the Church since its disestablishment. The letters devoted to its history in Catholic times, though sketchy, are interesting, and derive additional life from being written on the spots of which they treat. Any one, however, who will read Dom Pitra's narrative, will be convinced of the justice of the cause for which the Church of Utrecht has suffered so much-an attack in such a spirit carrying as much conviction as the most laboured defence.

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ART. III.-The Life and Epistles of S. Paul; comprising a complete Biography of the Apostle, and a Translation of his Letters inserted in Chronological order. By the Rev. W. J. CONYBEARE, M.A., late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, and the Rev. J. S. HOWSON, M.A., Principal of the Collegiate Institution, Liverpool. London: Longman & Co.

WE are inclined to welcome the historical part of this work, as containing a retractation, in great measure, of the somewhat extravagant claims which have of late years been urged at times in favour of the critical study of the Holy Scriptures. There is, we doubt not, a sense in which criticism of the Holy Scriptures is by no means un-English or alien. If the term is so defined as to be almost synonymous with accurate study and careful investigation, proceeding on in orderly development from the known to the unknown, neglecting no hint or indication, thinking nothing too trivial or unimportant to be searched into, and loving to view each part as connected with the whole, and illustrated by the ideas which pervade the whole, then we venture not only to adopt criticism as an English science, but even to claim it as in a great degree indigenous to our own soil. The countrymen of Hammond, Paley, Lightfoot, Macknight, and others, have no need to go abroad in search of a science of which the principles are those which we have described. We consent to discuss, with Origen and S. Jerome, the authorship of the books of Holy Scripture. We do not shrink, any more than S. Chrysostom would have done, from examining into and illustrating the rhetorical force of the divine writings. The very question of inspiration, dangerous though it be, is one which we feel cannot always be safely declined. It is one about which every Christian teacher ought to have an opinion, reverently conceived and cherished, which he is to defend against gainsayers. Indeed, it is not too much to hope that English writers, by the help of the deliberate reason and gravity which their daily occupations without have a tendency to form in them, may yet do more good Christian work in unfolding the meaning and urging the importance of Holy Scripture, than those of any other nation at present existing.

But there is a science, or rather pursuit, laying claim to the