in the way of their own self-interest. It is in that assurance that we have thought it expedient to call attention to the present aspects of the Irish problem, as we believe it to be modified by recent events. Convinced that whatever difference of opinion there may be as to details, the validity of our main propositions is unimpeachable, we invite for them the attention of the public in the spirit which animated Edmund Spenser, when, three centuries ago, he recommended the application of very different remedies to the same inveterate disease:

:

Thus have I, Eudoxus, as briefly as I could, and as my memorie would serve me, run thro' the state of that whole country, both to let you know what it now is, and also what it may be by good care and amendment. Not that I take upon me to change the policy of so great a kingdome, or provide rules to such wise men as have the handling thereof, but only to shew you the evills, which in my small experience I have observed to be the chiefe hinderance of the reformation; and, by way of conference, to declare my simple opinion for the redresse thereof, and establishing a good course of governement.'

So far we have spoken only of England's Opportunity in Ireland, and of the policy which, in our opinion, it is the duty of Unionists to adopt. From that policy we trust that no wars or rumours of wars will divert our statesmen. But recent

events warn us of the possibility, that a section of the Irish people may seek in our European or American difficulties an opportunity against England. If there is any disposition on the part of professional politicians in Ireland to pass from treasonable bluster to treasonable action, we have every confidence that our Government, while still pursuing a policy of just conciliation, will meet such disaffection with the firmness, vigour, and decision which have made, and can alone maintain, the greatness of the English nation.

ART.

THE

QUARTERLY REVIEW.

ART. I.-1. The Life and Letters of George John Romanes. Written and edited by his Wife. London, 1895.

2. Christian Prayer and General Laws, being the Burney Prize Essay for the Year 1873. By George J. Romanes, M.A. London, 1874.

3. A candid Examination of Theism. By 'Physicus.' London, 1878.

4. Thoughts on Religion. By the late George John Romanes, M.A., LL.D., F.R.S. Edited by Charles Gore, M.A., Canon of Westminster. London, 1895.

5. Mind and Motion and Monism. By the late George John Romanes, M.A., LL.D., F.R.S., Honorary Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. London, 1895.

6. Darwin and after Darwin. Part II. Post-Darwinian Questions. By the late George John Romanes, M.A., LL.D., F.R.S. London, 1895.

WE

E offer a cordial welcome to the book which stands first on our list. Mrs. Romanes has brought to her task not only the intimate knowledge and warm sympathy of a wife; she has also shown the high purpose and the deep interest in modern trials of thought, without which no account of her husband would be complete. We use no conventional words of praise when we say, that the memory of Romanes will be cherished by all who in any measure learn what manner of man he was. Nor can any book so vividly portray his fine character as this biography, which paints the man in his home life and among his friends. A few pages written by one of his children will do much to make strangers understand him. It is right that a child should contribute to the biography of one who loved children warmly, and, because he had their own Vol. 183.-No. 366. singleness

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singleness of heart, always made them happy in his society. In saying this, we do not mean to suggest that his own systematic writings do not reflect his personality. On the contrary, he had no professional pursuits which were not linked to his deeper mental interests; and his controversial writings, like his scientific experiments, were sustained by the same spirit of earnest enquiry which was the motive power of his personal development. But it is precisely this unity of work and character which is here represented with success.

Mrs. Romanes has not failed to give welcome guidance to those of her readers who are not naturalists. But we think that she has judged rightly in leaving her husband's experimental work to speak for itself, and has touched lightly on the question which it raises,--a question that is difficult in itself and surrounded by the conflict of strong convictions. She has associated the record of scientific investigations with letters, which, in marked contrast to the reserve of his published works, reveal her husband's gifts of affection and loyalty of nature. Conspicuous among these letters are those which pass between him and Darwin. Here the discussion of great scientific subjects is irradiated by the warmth of friendship. It is to this correspondence, doubtless, that many readers will in the first place turn. But the 'Life' will not remain in the hands of anyone merely as a storehouse of Darwiniana.' Those who buy it for the sake of the master will learn to value it for the personal and scientific worth of the pupil. In itself the disciple's attitude is touching. Those who love others generally command love in return, and the ideal affection which Romanes felt for Darwin prepares us for the warmth with which his own memory is cherished by his surviving friends.

We do not propose to review in detail the features of a book which many of our readers will already have studied for themselves; neither shall we dwell upon the history of the special scientific work which Romanes did in regard to mental evolution and the completion of the Darwinian theory. Our purpose rather is to trace the central stream of his mental history, which represented a current of recent thought so strong that, with obvious reservations, it may be called the movement of the age. He represented its earlier-we hope that he also foreshadowed its later-progress.

The age has been one of exultant physical science, justly exultant and splendidly laborious ;-an age of great and greatly appreciated savants. Romanes was a true man of science, thoroughly at home in its world, better acquainted, probably, than any man now living with the whole range of biology, and

in special regions of it a hard and successful worker. He had the true scientific temper, insatiable in the appetite for facts, eager to put all statements to proof, resourceful in devising fresh lines of enquiry. Exact in defining the conditions of research, jealously watchful for failures in methodical verification, he was also confident in that use of hypothesis which has borne so eventful a part in modern science. The age has been physiological by preference, speculative even when most anti-metaphysical, Darwinian when most rebellious against authority. Romanes was the loyal friend and disciple of Darwin, a speculator, who sought to extend the doctrine of evolution in ground which his master had left unoccupied, and, both in the old and in the accepted sense of the word, a physiologist.

But the age has also been one of faith, or at least one of religious enquiry and discussion, intensely interested in efforts to state everything in terms of its new knowledge, eager to settle, whether by reform or extirpation, the relations between its science and its creed. Romanes was a religious enquirer, more earnest than any tendency of thought or mode of literature can, even by a figure, be said to be. He longed, as only individuals can long, for certainty and for the knowledge of God,— for God, if so it might be, but, at any price, for certainty. He was a man, not of religious thought only, but of faith,-of faith which, through the strain and stress of inward conflict, fights out its own place among the living. Here, too, we may hope that he was like the age, which has discovered that faith is a hard, and even a rare, thing, but which will not conclude that. the act of belief is less likely to be real, because its difficulties exact from us the fullest use of all our powers.

In other points the course which Romanes followed resembled that which is pursued by the age. His mental progress may, we think, be distinguished by four stages, more or less clearly defined.

Starting from a traditional orthodoxy, he, in the first place, parted from his religion on a supposed theoretic necessity. The impression created by a selection of things was allowed to overpower the effect of the whole; the deepest convictions of the mind were sacrificed to a criticism of one of its expressions; the fortunes of Christianity were staked on an argument from design which seemed to be contradicted by enlarged knowledge. Secondly, like modern thought, Romanes looked for a new religion which should be on better terms with modern science, -a religion which might stand to reason and by a process of elimination might be purged of offence. Like modern thought

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again,