1. Since a great deal of wealth cannot be productively employed by its owners, it must be either lent or spent.

2. If a tax upon loans be imposed, it must be paid by either the borrower or the lender.

3. If the borrower refuses to pay the tax the lender must pay it. If he does not he must either consume his wealth or lend it in some way that is not taxed.

4. If all lenders choose to lend upon notes to escape taxation, their competition may reduce the market rate so that their return will be no greater than if they lent upon mortgage and paid the tax themselves.

5. If four per cent. is the market rate for money and mortgagers pay seven per cent., it is fallacious to infer that "the only effect of taxing loans is to raise the rate of interest." The effect of taxing loans may be, as shown in (4), to lower the rate of interest. If there were no mortgage tax the mortgager would not necessarily borrow at four per cent. The greater profit to be derived from loans would so encourage borrowers that mortgagers and all would have to pay five or six per cent. (This is a modification of the received theory of political economy that is of great importance, and has not, so far as I know, been previously noted.)

6. The question whether the borrower or the lender shall pay the tax upon loans is settled by the prevailing rate of productiveness of labor. If profits are very high, borrowers will consent to pay high for their loans. If profits are low they will not consent to pay more than a given rate, and if that rate is above the minimum return that will content the lender, he may consent to pay the tax rather than let his wealth lie idle.

7. If a certain amount must be raised by taxation, and all taxes are paid out of the returns of productive labor, whatever sum is raised now by taxing loans must be raised in some other way, if the loan tax is abolished, out of the returns of productive labor, i. e. out of wages or profits.

8. Before new taxes are imposed the decision must be made whether they shall come out of wages or profits. If out of wages, it is necessary to show that the workingman will be better off then than he is now. If out of profits, it is necessary (for reasoners occupying Mr. Adams' ground) to show how the capitalist will be prevented from transferring the tax

to the shoulders of the workingmen. It will be worth while also to enquire whether all taxes are not paid in the long run by real estate. In that case how would the workingmen be bettered by a change?

9. Since a tax upon loans secured by pledges enables those who borrow on the security of their good faith to do so at an advantage, and furthermore is an inducement to every one to work with his own wealth rather than live in idleness, would the results of the abolition of the tax be altogether good?

10. Since the great extension of credit results in violent fluctuations between prosperity and adversity, is it desirable to encourage borrowing any more than it is at present encouraged? On these last three heads I do not express any opinion.

The truth of the matter is that we are brought face to face with a tremendous question of public policy. It is a question that is alarmingly pressing in India. It looms up in Rumania. It shook the city of Rome so long ago that only vague accounts of the disturbance have come down to us. It was treated in a drastic fashion by Solon of Athens. The question concerns the position of the State in relation to the incurring of debt by the laboring classes. To say unhesitatingly that as soon as the workingman has saved five or six hundred dollars, every encouragement should be given him to buy a home for himself on mortgage, and "pay off the debt by instalments," is to decide a great question too easily. The aim about which all are agreed is to create good citizens. Certainly the possession of land is the best means to this end. But the failure to retain land on which an instalment has been paid, to be sold out, to lose money and labor and home;-good citizens do not arise from such experiences, or from the sight of such experiences. But so long as business is done on credit, so long will there be times of activity and dullness, high prices and low prices. And so long as human nature remains as it is, it will believe in the time of high prices, that the high prices are going to last, and will enter into obligations accordingly, which in the time of low prices it will be unable to meet. This perennial infatuation, this inability to represent to the mind the pains.

and hardships of future payment, is certainly a fact to be considered before the state undertakes to encourage borrowing by

the poor.

ARTICLE XI.-NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS.

THEOLOGICAL AND RELIGIOUS.

CHRISTIAN EVIDENCES.*-In the First Part of this volume the Principles of Induction are discussed, with copious illustrations from various sciences. The subject of the Second Part is Theism and Christianity. In this part the author considers the personality, omnipotence, wisdom, and benevolence of God; the congruity of miracles in the Christian system; the character and power of Christianity; and the imperative character of probable evidence on such a subject. In the Third Part he gives a resumé of the specific evidences of Christianity. Mr. Wright is favorably known as an author by timely and instructive articles on the relations of science and religion, and has shown himself well qualified to handle the subject of this volume. The presentation of the argument is forcible and convincing, and the book is instructive and suggestive. The author expresses the hope "that none of it is beyond the reach of plain men and women of thoughtful turn who make up their lack of school privileges by increased assiduity in their private reading and study." We think it well adapted to this class; and to meet the coarse assaults on Christianity, through the press, which are industriously circulated more widely than ministers and Christian people are generally aware. It will be valuable to ministers as giving in compact form the result of much reading and thought by a vigorous mind on the recent aspects of scepticism.

In the opening chapter the author tells us that the phenomena of finite mind are products of the forces of nature, and thus excludes finite mind from the supernatural. This logically leads to agnosticism. The only knowledge which we have of personal being or spirit is that which arises in our knowledge of reason and free-will in ourselves. If the reason and free-will of finite minds is included in nature and excluded from that which is above nature, then, though we may believe that something unknowable exists transcending nature, we cannot say it is God, and cannot *The Logic of Christian Evidences. By G. FREDERICK WRIGHT. Andover: Warren F. Draper. 1880. pp. xiii. and 312. New Haven: E. P. Judd.

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have any knowledge what it is. And not only so, but our Agnosticism must be positive and dogmatic in affirming that the unknown supernatural is not a person endowed with reason and free-will in any sense to which we can attach any meaning; and thus must agree with Spinoza in saying that intellect in God is no more like intellect in man, than the constellation The Dog, is like a four-footed dog on earth. In the same connection he uses the word universe as including both matter and finite mind, and that supernatural which transcends both. But this leads to Monism: God is included in the universe. Whatever the series of sequences in nature, and whatever the acknowledgment of God at the beginning, it is God as the first term in the series and a part of it, not God who transcends the series and on whom the series itself depends.

He begins his proof of the personality of the First Cause with this sentence: "The inference that God is a person rests upon a prior inference concerning the fact of design in nature.” (p. 75). On this argument he rests his proof of God's personality, omnipotence, wisdom, and benevolence. He does not mention the more profound objections against the validity of this argument. We do not doubt its validity; but no theist is justified in representing that the truth of the personality of God depends on this argument alone.

In the same connection he says: "Theism is a genus. From it as a center diverge in opposite directions deism and pantheism. We had supposed theism to be in direct contradiction to pantheism.

DR. ROBINSON'S STUDIES IN THE NEW TESTAMENT.*-These twenty-seven papers, each with a text prefixed, might be mistaken for sermons and would have made very good ones, but they were originally prepared as articles on the international Sunday-school lessons and published in a religious newspaper. They are now published in a volume in accordance with the wish of many, who had been interested in them, to have them in a permanent form. The papers are not minutely explanatory of the text but are rather the explication, illustration, and discriminative application of the spiritual thought in it. The style is simple and direct;

*Studies in the New Testament; by CHARLES S. ROBINSON, D.D., Pastor of the Memorial Church, New York City. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 743 and 745 Broadway. 1880. viii. and 316 pp. New Haven: E. P. Judd.

some of the illustrations are striking; and the whole is rich in the knowledge of the human heart, in spiritual wisdom, and discriminating application of truth to life.

SWEDENBORG AND THE NEW CHURCH.*-This volume is a series of lectures delivered in response to a desire, often expressed to the author by many intelligent persons, for a brief and clear statement of the principal teachings of Swedenborg. In the opening lecture we have a sketch of Swedenborg's life and work, and a brief vindication of what the author regards as the highest claim which can rightly be made in his behalf, "that he was a truly enlightened expositor of Scripture and therefore the herald of a new dispensation of Christianity." The remaining lectures present the Swedenborgian doctrine on the sacred Scriptures (including the doctrine of Correspondences); the Divine Nature and Providence; the Incarnation and Redemption; the Holy Spirit and Regeneration; the Spiritual World; Death, Resurrection, and Judgment; and Marriage. On Redemption the author says: "the divine effort, never for a moment intermitted, is to lead man, by every means consistent with his entire freedom, to depart from evil and do good, and so to become an angel" (p. 60). On Regeneration: "The process is not unlike that by which the fruits. of the earth are produced. When the farmer's barns are

full, of what has he to boast? Did he cause the grain to grow? Did he infuse the spirit of life into a single kernel of it? . . . He has done little or nothing more than to avail himself of the power of nature. He knew it was lurking in the sunlight and rain. and the bountiful earth, awaiting an opportunity to operate, and he gave it opportunity.. .. Did Jehovah bring the children. of Israel out of Egypt? Assuredly he did. take every step of their own free volition? tarily submit themselves to his guidance? of it. In like manner if we take the corresponding spiritual journey, it will be because we freely consent to do so" (pp. 94, 95). We commend this little book as a favorable presentation of Swedenborgianism as now taught and of the elements of spiritual power which it contains.

But did not they Did they not volunThere can be no doubt

* Swedenborg and the New Church. By JAMES REED, Pastor of the Boston Society of the New Jerusalem. Boston: Houghton, Osgood & Co., Riverside Press, Cambridge. 1880. 143 pp. New Haven: E. P. Judd.