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Contents.
WILLIAM COXGREVE (Sonnet). Marian Mead . . 135 BOOKS OF THE COMING YEAR 135 A FRENCH VIEW OF AMERICAN COPYRIGHT . 136 IBSEN'S TREATMENT OF SELF-ILLUSION. Hjalmar H. Boyesen 137 COMMUNICATIONS 140 A Columbian Celebration a Hundred Years Ago. James L. Onderdonk. AN OLD HOPE IN A NEW LIGHT. W. M. Payne 141 THE VEHICLE OF HEREDITY. Henry L. Osborn 143 THE RECONCILIATION OF HISTORY AND RE- LIGION IN CRITICISM. John Bascom ... 146 Lillie's The Influence of Buddhism on Primitive Christianity. Harden's An Inquiry into the Truth of Dogmatic Christianity. Beach's The Newer Re- ligious Thinking. Mead's Christ and Criticism. Horton's Verbum Dei. Cone's The Gospel. Miil- ler's Theosophy. BRIEFS ON NEW BOOKS 149 Hunting on the Western Plains and Mountains. Two new volumes of Columbus literature. The Se- cret of Character Building. A French protest against materialism in France. A typical English School fifty years ago. An appreciative and judical life of Napoleon . ANNOUNCEMENTS OF FALL BOOKS . . 151 LITERARY NOTES AND MISCELLANY 157
WILLIAM CONGREVE.
Master of words ! thine was the perfect art
To catch the living phrase, no coin of thought,
But thought's bright self, that, clear and roundly wrought,
Distinct in air and sunshine, sends a start
Of fresh delight through the worn sense. Apart
From common ways of fumbling speech, where naught
Rings true, thy crystal bells pure-toned are fraught
With bliss for thrilling nerves. . . . But for the heart ?
Potent the flow : nor flashing, pouting smiles
Of Millamant can witch away the shame
And hardness of her world. Yet while we blame,
While our need craves some sterner, sweeter bard
Whose trumpet-cry more than all joy beguiles,
Thy keen truth leaps to flame, and night is starred !
MARIAN MEAD.
BOOKS OF THE COMING YEAR.
A considerable portion of the space in this
issue of THE DIAL is devoted to the regular
annual list of classified announcements of forth-
coming books. The list is a long one and
would have been much longer had it not been
thought best to exercise a certain discrimina-
tion and to omit many titles of minor interest.
It is believed that everything of real import-
ance thus far definitely included in the an-
nouncements of American publishers will be
found comprised. Certainly, the list offers no
evidence that the general commercial depres-
sion of recent months has extended to the pub-
lishing business ; it rather indicates, if any-
thing, that the business has made more exten-
sive plans and assumed a broader scope than
usual. It is, however, true that the effects of
commercial depression would require some time
to become manifest in publishers' lists. Books
are taken in hand long before they are pub-
licly announced, and the close of one season
finds the work of the next well under way.
In the department of historical literature,
several noteworthy works are promised. Per-
haps the most important are a work on Massa-
chusetts, by Mr. Charles Francis Adams ; a
study in geographical discovery in the interior
of North America, by Dr. Justin Winsor ; a
history of the English town in the fifteenth cen-
tury, by Miss Alice Stopford Green ; and a
three-volume translation of the memoirs of the
Chancellor Pasquier. In biography, we must
mention first of all the life of Lowell which
Professor Woodberry has been writing for the
" American Men of Letters " series. The
author is sure to bring both scholarship and
literary grace to the work, and we will not
quarrel with the fact that the biography is to
fill two volumes, although such extended treat-
ment is probably disproportionate to the scope
of the series. While on the subject of Lowell,
we must not forget to mention the two prom-
ised volumes of letters, edited with loving care
by Professor Norton. Other promised biog-
raphies are a life of Jared Sparks, by Profes-
sor Herbert B. Adams ; of Dean Stanley, by
Mr. K. E. Prothero ; of Edwin Booth, by Mr.
William Winter ; of Cardinal Manning, by
Mr. Edmund Sheridan Purcell ; of William
