the essence of Pope Leo's policy. The dreams whose disappointment turned Pius IX. into an intransigeant had no place in his successor. Perhaps no clearer indication of Pope Leo's attitude in this respect can be found than in two of the most interesting acts of the later years of his Pontificate the letter to Cardinal Gibbon's on Americanism, and the formation in 1901 of the Commission on Biblical Studies. We find in the letter on Americanism the utmost sympathy for the peculiarities of national character, the recognition that adaptation of ecclesiastical usage to the times is indispensable, and, on the other hand, a deep sense that the faith "given to the Saints" was given them for all time in such a sense that a civilisation which is whittling it away is so far on the downward path, not the upward, that accommodation, though it may well be an unfortunate necessity, is not likely to be a movement towards higher ideals; and that a Liberalism which makes light of such considerations-which tampers with Christian doctrine, or waters down Christian ethics in deference to the Time Spirit-may sap the very foundations of the Church. But admirable and convincing as are both sides of this view of the situation, it does not deal at all with the deeper problem which has been in the minds of those whose imprudence and excesses are justly condemned. That the advance of secular knowledge —of criticism, science, and philosophy-has in the past greatly modified the intellectual expression of the one ancient faith; that a similar modification is always taking place; that the attempt so to modify it is constantly in its earlier stages opposed by ecclesiastical authority at the time; these are facts or suppositions of deep significance to many minds. And the resulting problem-how to combine loyalty to the ancient faith with fidelity to advancing science and increasing intellectual light-is a very real one. It is one whose direct treatment, perhaps, in its nature stands outside Pontifical utterances. At any rate, the letter to Cardinal Gibbons does not show any appreciation of it. Yet perhaps the letter does indirectly help the solution of a problem which it does not directly contemplate. The practical wisdom of the Pontiff helps us perhaps in a question which it was alien to his mind to contemplate speculatively. For it rebukes excesses on either side-the fossil conservatism of formalists not less than the innovation which tampers with the ancient faith. At the same time, by its significant silences it leaves ample scope for the two tempers of mind which the Church must ever allow for; the mind which is alive to the outlook suggested by the advance of knowledge and the mind to which the Christian Revelation is so absorbing as to shut out all lesser lights, as the smaller planets become invisible in the full blaze of the sunlight. To do much more than this-to treat in detail a problem which must wait for the discussions of theologians of both classes, and the researches of specialists before it can be solved-would be practically impossible, even if the special genius of the late Pope had led him to attempt it. Still more remarkable as an illustration of Pope Leo's special temper and gifts was his treatment of the question of Biblical Studies. The Encyclical published nearly ten years ago was distinctly conservative in tone. It showed little or no appreciation of the problems which modern criticism has made so urgent. The Pope's standpoint was naturally that of the contemporaries of his earlier years, in days when the higher criticism was regarded as pure rationalism in the hands of Strauss, Bauer, and Volkmar. But the extraordinary openness of his mind to a new situation, so far as its practical necessities are concerned, was evidenced more than a year ago in the formation of a Pontifical Commission of which nearly all the original members were known to be Biblical critics keenly alive to modern criticism, and entirely opposed to the extremely conservative attitude on Biblical subjects which the earlier Encyclical was popularly supposed to favour. It is understood that facts were brought before the Pontiff which convinced him that a wider outlook was necessary than that contemplated in his earlier pronouncement, and with an adaptability truly marvellous in a nonagenarian, he placed on foot a comprehensive enquiry, committed in the first instance to those who are identified with the best work in critical specialism rather than with the preoccupations of conservative theological views. The simple eye for the welfare of the Church, the saintly sympathy with those souls whose troubles were not his own, and his statesmanlike realisation of the actual difficulties of the situation, here, as in other cases, prevailed. And the old man of ninety charged younger thinkers and scholars with the task of dealing comprehensively with the needs of an age whose intellectual atmosphere was so unlike that in which his own mind had been formed. Leo XIII. had certain qualities which at times made his friends anxious. His great sanguineness and the occasional Utopian schemes which he conceived suggested the fear that he might attempt to realise the impossible. His incessant activity led to some alarm lest his reforming zeal should be too regardless of precedent. His intellectual Conservatism made some thinkers tremble lest a veritably medieval standard should be insisted on in philosophy and Biblical studies. But in the long run his singleness of aim and the sense of fact belonging to true statesmanship won the day, and determined his course. Dreams or prejudices may have existed, but they never practically and permanently misled him. His dreams of reunion with the East and with England have been smiled at, but his critics cannot point to any rash act to which they led him. His ideal of a universal reign of Thomistic philosophy alarmed some of our best thinkers, but it was not, in the long run, pressed to practical excess. His sympathy with Christian Democracy was in his public utterances carefully safeguarded. In the matter of Biblical criticism, if he did not fully appreciate the situation intellectually, his practical action was in course of time guided by the real needs of the hour. I can hardly doubt that history, which will unquestionably rank him among our holy Pontiffs, will also allow that he has steered the Bark of Peter with judgment and wisdom, in a very troublous and difficult time. WILFRID WARD. SOME UNEDITED LETTERS OF (PIOZZI). THE polite and pretty manners of the eighteenth century were probably as rare and valuable as in any other century, but the record of them is more complete. Pilgrimages had been abolished in England, parishioners were obliged to go to their own parish church, and no labourer was allowed to stray many miles away without good reason given, and this stationary state of the rank and file of the English nation helped to make a beautiful and becoming background to the men of manners and the ladies of quality. Quality, not quantity, was the fashion, so to speak; there were but few fine folk, but they were so very fine, and they spent a delightful time in writing and telling one another how charming they were, in the utter simplicity of their candid joy and their almost childish satisfaction in the neatly-fitting compliments they made for one another. It is to this period Mrs. Thrale belonged, and she had a pretty way of using her pen to express her sentiments—and a really beautiful handwriting. One feels, in looking at her notes— written on one side of a card about the size of our post-cards— that they were works of art, pictures of her mind and of the times in one. They are nicely-spaced words, so as to fill in the oblong handsomely, and the writing is larger or smaller according to the depth of her desires. It is smallest when she ardently desires news of her niece's cold, and largest in a formal invitation to dinner. At the back of the card, the name of the place to which it is sent is in letters half an inch high. One feels these cards would be handed to the "Servant" (always mentioned with a capital letter) to put in his wallet, and be jogged off on the horse to their destination with proper ceremony and respect. 66 On one occasion Mrs. Thrale, in her husband's name and her own, invited some relatives to dinner-a young couple-desiring the favour of their Company to Dinner on Fryday next, when they will meet some agreeable friends. 4 o'clock." Four o'clock would require extremely agreeable friends to make it possible to dine at such an hour now! Our whole day would have to be re-arranged for the sake of that particular repast. An extraordinary air of leisure is cast over the invitation by this hour being appointed. The day's work must have been done, and nothing left for an evening post to demand attention. Six solid hours before ten o'clock! Many of them would be spent over that meal, as in one of the lengthy Virgilian feasts, and for the same reason, namely, because there was time enough and to spare. At ten o'clock tea-drinking would begin, and if Dr. Johnson were there, poor Mrs. Thrale-who was only twenty-four when Johnsou first knew them-might have to sit up till two or four in the morning, pouring out those historic bowls of tea. If he took twenty cups of tea, it was, however, only at the rate of three and a half an hour! Some of the tea-cups of that period are preserved in the family of those young people so coaxingly pressed to come to an afternoon banquet, and to whom they were presented by Mrs. Thrale as a wedding gift. They are wide and generous cups, without handles, and with large saucers. The well-drawn willow pattern is in dark blue on a white ground, and they form a very handsome ornament on a recessed shelf in the modern drawingroom. Perhaps Dr. Johnson used one or all? They were worthy of the honour, as their air of humble but distinguished pride appears to show. It must be something in the ample curves of even the smallest among them that mysteriously suggests their personal importance! Mrs. Thrale's vivacity is always marvellous, perhaps—like a cascade leaping down marble steps-it gained force from dashing against the solid comforts of her domestic life. She had a round dozen of children, four of whom lived past childhood, and of her two sons one died an infant, and the other whilst still a boy. Even this large family was not enough to employ her sufficiently, and she herself tells us that she resorted to writing fiction and poetry to fill up the time. The Three Warnings haunted collections of verses for a century afterwards, several generations knew Old Dobson from their schoolroom days as if he had lived in their native village. Yet had she not poured out those cups of tea for the great lexicographer we should not have been obliged to become acquainted with the sprightly lady. She was a type of her time, and complete as a type; but it was a middle-class type, owing to her marriage with the well-to-do brewer, whose occupation at that date was only pursued by the middle-class. And this in spite of her proud Welsh descent, and her intimate acquaintance with the maiden names of her four great-grandmothers, that test of a good Welsh descent which she herself claims in her autobiography! Her handwriting is firm and pointed with finely attempered flourishes where required, and it possesses a little biography of its own. Mrs. Thrale had a strong hand, counted to be like a man's hand, and, spreading it out one day, she said: "I believe I owe what you are pleased to call my good writing to the shape of this hand, for my uncle, Sir Robert Cotton, thought it was too manly |