Book Notes

186 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY son's credit that his book reflects these important differences of emphasis and that he has tried to keep open all of the possible avenues and pursuits which may contribute to a philosophy of the social sciences. Within the explicit limits of the book, with its concentration on philosophical issues as they arise in the field of sociology, Natanson has provided useful suggestions for t~dditional reading on each of the major topics: "Science and Society," "Theory and Practice," "Concepts, Constructs , and Theory Formation," "Objectivity and Value," and "Philosophical Perspectives." His extensive bibliography of twentieth-century writings is a good if selective guide to the large and rapidly growing literature in this field. JAMESF. DOYLE Claremont Men's College BOOK NOTES Desiderius, Erasmus. Christian Humanism and the Re]ormation. Selected Writings, with The Life of Erasmus by Beatus Rhenanus. (Translated and) Edited by John C. Olin. New York, Harper and Row (1965). ix + 201 pp. ----Harper Torchbooks, The Academy Library, TB 1166. Paperbound $1.95. The volume of selections gives an exceptionally good intellectual ~ortrait of Erasmus; the selections are well made and well edited. Professor Olin includes in nis own Introduction the biographical context of the selections and then adds the autobiographical sketch of 1524 and the early biography (1540) of Beatus Rhenanus. The Letters are all newly translated, most of them by the editor himself, and are provided with critical historical notes. The bibliography is useful. Though these selections are taken from what is called the Opuscula, they give a better introduction to Erasmus' mind and times than would fragments from the larger works. ,$ ,, They at last give to English readers the kind of introduction to the Christian humanism of Erasmus that has been available to French and German readers since the 1930's. The Paraclesis, Erasmus' introduction to his edition of the Latin and Greek New Testament, is especially important, since it reveals how piously, despite all his humanistic learning, he accepted Holy Scriptures as "the living image" of Christ's "holy mind." Erasmus writes (pp. 95-96): "This kind of wisdom, so extraordinary that once for all it renders foolish the entire wisdom of this world, may be drawn from the few books of the New Testament as from the most limpid springs with far less labor than Aristotle's doctrine is extracted from so many obscure volumes." "This teaching has come not from Egypt or Syria but from heaven itself." What a contrast to modern "hermeneutics"t What a contrast also to the scholasticism of Erasmus' time which did not find Aristotle "obscure"i --H. W.S. U. C. Knoepflmacher, Religious Humanism and the Victorian Novel: George Eliot, Walter Pater, andSamuel Butler. Princeton, N.J., Princeton University Press, 1965, Pp. 315. $6.50. According to the author, these three Victorians, George Eliot, Walter Pater, and Samuel Butler, had this vital purpose in common: to recast the partly rejected Christianity of their time and to express their new philosophical, scientific, and religious humanism through fiction. --PAUL T. F U I ~ R M A N N Maurice Blondel, The Letter on Apologetics and History and Dogma. Texts presented and translated by Alexander Dru and Illtyd Trethowan. New York, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1964, Pp. 301. $6.95. This is the first of Blondel's volumes to appear in English. The work of Blondel (1861-1949) was a continuous struggle against a naturalistic cult of science in the name of the inner demands of the religious life. Blondel accepted the supernatural as a datum of philosophy and sought to vindicate a God of liberty, present and living in the conscience of men. On the other hand and consequently, Blondel was dissatisfied with the ancient formulations of Christian beliefs. If dogmas were fixed formulae, they would be now outmoded and false. For Blondel dogma is truth in the making, a symbolic expression of the inner life which is a perpetual becoming. Tradition is a living synthesis. There is no doubt that Blondel did not struggle in vain and that to a large extent he prepared the Roman Catholic revival which we are witnessing in our day. --P.T.F. ...