Science. Let scholastic metaphysicians be physicists, or with the physicists, and they may yet win back the sceptre from Hegel.' These sentences have the genuine scholastic ring. Whereas if we eschew contemporary science, as 'D.Ph.' would apparently have us do, what shall our metaphysics be but that construction of straw, gibbeted as the laughing-stock of all generations by positivists, and unrecognizable by the leaders of Scholasticism save as a caricature at which also they and theirs may make merry: Metaphysica est scientia bombinans in vacuo.

I have delayed longer than I intended over this Tablet controversy, and now that my limits are running out I must be content with noting only the general contents of this manual. Its first one hundred and fifty pages are devoted to Cosmology: the philosophy, according to Professor Nys, of the inorganic world. It is startling to find in these pages no reference whatever to those discoveries that within the last fifteen years have revolutionized the sciences of physics and chemistry: the facts of radio-activity and of the electronic disintegration of matter. True, the first French edition was issued at a date when such advances were not sufficiently assured to compel for their inclusion a recasting of the eighty pages devoted to the exposition and criticism of mechanical atomism. So much may be granted. Still textbooks, like men, have their day; and there is no justification for presenting the public in 1917 with physical and chemical theories current in 1905, but outgrown since then. This step is all the less excusable when one remembers that the new views raise fresh difficulties against hylemorphism as a philosophy of minerals. But while allowing all this, I would insist not merely that Nys's Cosmology was in its day one of the best defences of modern hylemorphism, but that even at present it excels the vast majority of our manuals. The reason is not far to seek. It was written by a metaphysician who was also a physicist: a doctor of philosophy who was a graduate of Ostwald's chemical school at the University of Leipzig. Its author was able, accordingly, to set before his readers the facts of chemistry and physics as known in the beginning of the century; and in spite of the fresh crop of difficulties sown by subsequent advances in these sciences, students will get from his work a better grasp of the live issues between mechanism and hylemorphism than from most other textbooks. His exposition affords, as I have insinuated, but a scanty clue for hypemorphistic exploration of the newlyconstructed scientific labyrinth; still, it brings before the student's mind facts and hypotheses which, though rarely expounded in scholastic summaries, are absolutely necessary for a solution of the cosmological problem. Moreover, while it cannot be denied that chemistry and physics have outgrown many of the doctrines ascribed to them in this translation, the advance has been in the true sense a growth; and these older doctrines mark a stage of knowledge needful for the grasping of the reigning theories. Taken all in all, then, this summary of Cosmology is, in spite of its blemishes, one of the most helpful textbooks in the market for beginners.

The remaining portion of this first volume contains summaries of

Cardinal Mercier's Psychology (170 pages), Criteriology (60 pages), and Ontology (170 pages). The Tablet critics fastened, as we saw, on the Psychology. It was said to be defective on the problems of experimental psychology: Professor De Wulf partially admits the charge, so we may take it as proven-but really within the limits allowable for experimental psychology in so brief a summary, this omission is scarcely noticeable. These critics have emphasized, more specifically, the absence of reference to Driesch, J. A. Thomson, and MacDougall. I would urge this time in favour of the manual-the dates of textbooks: the fame of these three was not in 1905 what it is to-day, and the best that might have been done was a mention, for display purposes, in a note of this English edition. I go further. MacDougall's methods and results are well worth the attention of scholastic psychologists: he does their work better than do many of themselves. But while acknowledging Thomson's pre-eminence as a biologist, I am not quite so enamoured of his contribution to Vitalism: he knows his facts as only a biologist can know them, but he shuffles them quite nervously when coming to his conclusions. I am not denying that this may be the proper attitude towards such data: I am merely protesting against the implied suggestion that Thomson is a coryphæus of Vitalism whom no scholastic author can, without sealing his own incompetency, omit from his pages. As to Driesch, he is in the first rank of biological specialists and he plumps for Vitalism; better still, he has concentrated most of his attention of late years on this particular problem. I trust, however, that I may confess without offence a certain weariness of the hymn of praise continually chanted in his honour by some Catholic writers: so weary had I grown that I felt an unholy joy when J. S. Haldane, Reader in Physiology at Oxford and a Vitalist of long standing, though as one might expect more Hegeliano, pointed out the flaw in Driesch's armoury-the likelihood that each cell is determined by special physical and chemical stimuli peculiar to its position relatively to the other cells and to the external environment.' And returning from the critics to the summary, I think it contains, as fully as limits permit, the main outlines of a plausible plea for Vitalism. The remaining chapters of the Psychology deal with the Nature, Origin, and Destiny of Man; they are written in the Cardinal's best style and will repay close and untiring study.

The following sections deal with Criteriology and Ontology. Criteriology has ever been Cardinal Mercier's forte. The larger treatise caused a sensation both in Thomistic and Kantian circles: some in both schools voting it a success, others a failure. Time told on it as on all things; yet no lapse of years can obliterate the impression that its author grapples boldly and fairly with Kant's theory of knowledge. The kernel of Mercier's Criteriology is a re-interpretation of the traditional definition of truth with the purpose of ridding the copy theory of its more objectionable features. That re-interpretation cannot be said to be even yet domiciled in modern Scholasticism; its influence is visible, however, in every subsequent attempt by scholastics to meet on its own conditions Kant's Criticism. The present summary, little in bulk, is bullion in

value; enshrining as it does Mercier's theory of truth, which, whatever may be thought of its validity, is not so familiar as it deserves to be to students of Scholasticism. To these students at handgrips with Kant, I would say: buy or borrow Mercier's Criteriology. Ontology succeeds Criteriology and concludes this first volume. The headings here are of the stereotype kind: Being, Transcendental Properties of Being, Substance and its Determinations, The Causes of Being, The Order of Nature. Not much fresh ground broken here, one thinks, as the eye scans the headlines. Read through the text, however, and you get a way of regarding the old problems which never struck you before. Multitudinous distinctions no longer bewilder you: big questions stand out in proper perspective; and you begin in a short time to realize how close to the world of daily experience lie, after all, the bloodless abstractions of Ontology.

These laudatory remarks must not be taken as implying that this first volume of A Manual of Modern Scholastic Philosophy contains a full and satisfactory summary of the results reached so far in Cosmology, Psychology, Criteriology, and Ontology through the revival of scholastic philosophy. Every intelligent student is aware that, as regards the intellectual formulation of certain theories, or the due development of them, or their bearings upon each other, much remains to be done; the limits of fair compromise touching the divergent views of contemporary schoolmen or the relations between some recent advances in Science and the doctrines of Scholasticism, the best modes of teaching and of attacking or of repelling and receiving attacks in many matters, are still to be ascertained. The successful accomplishment of this gigantic programme is impossible without the organized co-operation of leaders of thought in all seats of learning throughout the Catholic world, knowing one another and acting together. But you cannot force this organized co-operation : it will come of itself when individuals and nations have, as such, done their part. Almost forty years ago the Scholastic Revival began, as do all similar movements, with the spasmodic efforts of individuals working in isolation. Their success led to the growth of schools in various Catholic countries: a repetition on a world-wide scale of the Nations' which grew up in the medieval universities. We may be said to be at present living through this stage of Neo-Scholasticism. It has given us many elaborate treatises on scholastic philosophy from continental Catholic universities: the Stonyhurst series and other Jesuit volumes in England; the works of Dr. Cronin, Dr. Coffey, and Father Hickey, O.Cist., in Ireland; the writings of Father Driscoll and others in America. By a natural process this national stage grows into a national synthesis whose methods and conclusions bear the mark of the psychological atmosphere whence they spring; for instance, the professors of the German Universities were gathering together their national synthesis of modern Scholasticism in 1914, and have probably already published it. It is from this point of view that the importance of this Louvain manual ought to be gauged. It is not, confessedly, Louvain at its best: still it presents, in English dress, the methods and conclusions of

a continental school of contemporary Scholasticism, and that a school famous throughout the Catholic world; for, as Father Maher truly says, Cardinal Mercier has been regarded as the most influential professor, reformer and organizer of philosophical teaching within the Catholic Church and, through him, Louvain University the most progressive and fruitful centre of Catholic philosophy. Now, Mercier's aim, expressed in his own words, is to make use of the teaching of St. Thomas as a starting-point from which we may go further afield in original speculation and as a constant stand of reference.' Qui habet aurem, audiat. The present volume, notwithstanding its drawbacks, embodies this splendid purpose. Hardly anywhere else will the student meet so genuine an effort to carry St. Thomas faithfully forward through the past seven centuries with due regard to those reserves which, in every branch of human learning, are necessarily imposed by the progress of knowledge. The student who masters its pages will have got an intellectual training that will elicit whatever capacity he may possess for philosophical speculation. Best of all, he will be initiated into the largest and truest philosophical methods, and, henceforth, will feel nothing but impatience and disgust at those collections of formule which are, first, ruthlessly hewn from medieval tomes, then dressed and chiselled into a textbook, and finally paraded thus mutilated as modern Scholasticism, whereas, in fact, they are merely the membra disjecta of psittacism.

JOHN O'NEILL.

LETTERS FROM AN IRISH MISSIONARY IN CHINA. By Rev. Edward Galvin, Apostolic Missionary, Che Kiang, China. With a Preface by Most Rev. Dr. Fogarty. Dublin: Dollard. THIS little brochure contains four letters written by Father Galvinone to a personal friend, one to the students of the Apostolic College, Mungret, and two to the students of Maynooth. They are simple and earnest. They speak directly to the heart, and ought to do more in awakening missionary zeal in their readers than more formal works. They are living evidence of the splendid zeal which is at the root of the now famous Maynooth Mission to China. They place us in the right focus for understanding the work that lies before the infant Church in China. There is not an uninteresting page in the little work, and through its underlying note of seriousness there is ever heard the merry, cheerful laugh of the good Irishman. The work is heavy, it is true, but evidently the hearts of the workers are light. As an example we would commend readers to turn to Father Galvin's account of a sick call journey of twenty-seven miles, and if it does not win his sympathy, practical sympathy, for Father Galvin's work, nothing in this world is likely to do so. In the eloquent God-speed which the Most Rev. Dr. Fogarty gives the little volume he advocates the great cause in glowing words, which we may be permitted to repeat here: 'The missioners,' he says, 'will require a sum little short of £100,000 to organize this Irish Mission

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to China and to provide for a stream of Irish Priests and Sisters to it in the years to come. What folly what madness! the world will say, especially at a time like the present. We should rather exclaim what divine audacity have we here, and how characteristic of God's omnipotent ways and His contempt for the petty movements of men. They will get it-or, rather God, Who doth the ravens feed," will bring it to them. We have not the exaltation of spirit which would enable us to follow them in their perilous mission to the heathen. Ours is not the grace of martyrs and apostles. But we can, and I hope will, every one of us, identify ourselves with, and share in their apostolic work by helping them with our pennies, pounds, or shillings, as the case may be. He has but a sick and dying faith who looks askance at a supernatural mission of this kind, and thinks he satisfies his part by giving a half-crown or five shillings to it out of abounding wealth. Millions of gold are being shovelled daily into the hell-furnace of the war. Have we nothing for Christ. Do we begrudge Him a pound when Satan commands millions. I hope that every man, woman, and child will do themselves the sacred privilege of contributing some little mite, however small, to these young and heroic Apostles of Christ, and thereby help to set up amongst the heathen an apostolic mission worthy of Catholic Ireland, that through the mercy of God has so long and so happily enjoyed the riches of the Kingdom of Heaven.' We need add nothing to this glowing appeal of the good Bishop, save to express the hope that it will be responded to throughout the length and breadth of Ireland.

EDITOR

A CATHOLIC DICTIONARY. By William E. Addis and Thomas Arnold, M.A. Revised, with Additions, by T. B. Scannell, D.D. Ninth Edition. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Treubner & Co. 1917. We welcome the ninth edition of this useful Catholic Dictionary so long and favourably known to Catholic readers. Since its first publication great advances have been made in Catholic scholarship, and it has not failed to keep abreast of them. The present, the ninth edition, has the advantage of having at its disposal three Encyclopædias, one in English, one in German, and one in French. It will be found to be, in addition to original features of its own, a handy synopsis of these larger orks, and the busy priest will find in it an ever read yhelp. The editors have gone to the best sources for information, and the reader may feel sure that, in consulting it, he is in possession of the fundamental facts on the subject inquired about. The authorities are given at the end of each article, and in this way the reader is provided with an extensive bibliography which will enable him, if he desires, to proceed further in his inquiry. The type and general 'format' are excellent.

P. M