serve and conservatism of a very practical scientist, for we see before us a great field in metallurgy and physical science for this invention. For instance, Professor Röntgen took a photograph of a large metal plate which had been broken and afterward welded together, and in the strongest ordinary light showed no sign of fracture, yet under the so-called X rays the line of junction was shown distinctly. Not only in testing important castings and heavy wrought-iron work without unnecessary fracture, but in everyday work, such as approving of steel rails, armor plate, bridge material, etc., this discovery may be of immense value." PROFESSOR RÖNTGEN. Professor Röntgen is comparatively young, being now only about forty years of age. We give our readers a likeness and a short sketch of his life, both from the New York Herald: "Professor Röntgen is of Dutch birth, and his full name is Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen. He studied in Zurich, where he issued a monograph on the way to establish the relations as to the warmth that exists in atmospheric air. When Professor Kundt left Zurich for Würzburg, his favorite disciple Röntgen followed, and later again to Strasburg University, where Kundt and Röntgen held the same position as professor and assistant. In 1873 he taught at Strasburg; in 1875 he became professor of mathematics and physics in Würtemberg at the Agricultural Academy of Hohenheim. But 1876 saw him back in Strasburg at the University, and in 1879 he became professor and director of the University Institute for Physics at Giessen. PROFESSOR RÖNTGEN. "He has been at Würzburg University since 1888. He has written various works, such as a method to fix the isothermal surfaces of crystals, and on the use of the ice calorimeter to determine the intensity of sunlight. Then he turned to electricity, and studied the figures produced in dust by electrical discharges as Professor Kundt showed them, and the curious phenomena shown by electricity passing through various gases. The absorption of ordinary heat-rays by steam and gases generally occupied him also." Tho Professor Röntgen is thus seen to be a man of no mean ability, his discovery of what he calls the "X rays" may be said to have been accidental, and it is only wonderful that some other experimenter did not happen upon it before. The rays have been produced thousands of times in nearly every physical laboratory in the world, and it needed only the neighborhood of a sensitive plate to register and reveal them. WHAT BECOMES OF THE MICROBES? THE HE old question, "Where do all the pins go?" would seem easy of solution beside the same inquiry with regard to the germs, beneficent or disease-producing, that grow and multiply by myriads in soil, air, and water. The Hospital gives us an answer, so far as those are concerned that effect an entrance into our systems-no small number, as will be seen from the following quoted paragraphs. The sum and substance of it all is that if the bodily health is good, the bacteria perish in the digestive organs, otherwise-so much the worse for us; and from these facts an entirely obvious moral is drawn. Says the article referred to: "We hear so much of microbes, and are so constantly assured that the air is full of them, that it becomes a matter of no small interest to ascertain how we are protected from them, or, in other words, how it is that, living as we do in the very midst of a cloud of micro-organisms, which we know by experience are able very quickly to reduce to putrescence substances which, so far as chemical composition goes, are like unto ourselves, we still remain protected from their attacks. The vulnerable point clearly is the mucous membrane of the air-passages and the digestive organs. As regards the latter, we may well believe that in health we are protected by the activity of our digestive processes; but in reference to the air-ducts, over the moist surfaces of which the foulest air is constantly drawn, it is a problem of the greatest interest to decide whereabouts the microbes, which we know are continually entering, are stopped. The recent researches of Dr. St. Clair Thomson and Dr. Hewlett, of the Bacteriological Department of the British Institute of Preventive Medicine, throw much light upon this question. They say that on an average about 1,500 micro-organisms are inhaled into the nose every hour; while in London it must be a common event for 14,000 of them to enter during one hour's tranquil respiration. Expired air, however, is practically sterile, and it would seem that this purification is not, as some have imagined, performed in the air-tubes of the lungs, for it has been found by repeated observation that they have vanished before reaching the trachea, the mucus from which is sterile. Evidently they are caught in the nose, for on testing air from the naso-pharynx they were found to be practically all gone. Nevertheless, the mucus in the nose does not appear to be itself a germicide. It does not kill the microbes, but it prevents their developing; and as microbes are only harmful by their monstrous power of multiplication this is sufficient. Meanwhile they are rapidly swept on by the cilia toward the digestive tract, where doubtless they share the common fate. The moral of all this is breathe through your nose and keep your digestive organs in good working order, then the microbes, pathogenic, saprophytic, or whatever they may be, will meet their doom." WASTE OF ENERGY IN LIGHT PRODUCTION. I' T has long been known that there is a great waste of energy in all methods of artificial illumination at present in practical use, but tho we know just where this waste is-namely, in the necessary production of a great amount of useless heat before we get to the temperature that gives us our light-no method for obtaining the light alone has yet been devised. It is a great step, however, to be able to state the problem in definite terms, and this has now been done, so that many enthusiastic workers are toiling for its solution, with some prospect of success. The situation is well summed up by Prof. John Cox in a lecture before the Royal Society of Canada. We quote below parts of a summary from The Journal of the Franklin Institute (Philadelphia, January) : "To begin with, he [Professor Cox] points out that in practise not more than from 7 to 16 per cent. of the energy of the fuel used can be realized through the engine, and theoretical considerations establish a limit at about 30 per cent., beyond which it would seem to be hopeless to expect to pass in any form of heat engine. This he terms one of the unsolved problems. "It is, however, not unsolvable if we can devise some means of extracting the energy of coal otherwise than by heat-say in some such manner as that in burning zinc in a voltaic battery. That this is not beyond the scope of our present scientific knowledge the recent experiments of Borchers and others bear strong evidence. "In the second stage of the operation of producing the electric light, the dynamo is already so nearly perfect that hardly any heat is lost in its conversion into current. "The third stage brings us to the lamp, with some 7 per cent. of the original energy still available. The only means thus far available for producing luminous energy is to heat the molecules of some substance, and in this operation we are compelled to waste the greater portion of our available energy in producing heat before we obtain the light rays. Here, then, is the second unsolved problem, since even in the incandescent lamp and the arc lamp not more than from 3 to 5 per cent. of the energy supplied is converted into light. Thus, of the original store in the coal less than three parts in a thousand ulti mately become useful. In the last six years, however, some hint of means to overcome the difficulty has been obtained from the proof by Maxwell and Hertz that light is only an electric radiation. Could we produce electric oscillations of a sufficient rapidity, we might discard the molecules of matter, and directly manufacture light without their intervention. To do this we must be able to produce oscillations at the rate of 400,000,000,000 per second. Tesla has produced them in thousands and millions per second, and Crookes has shown how, by means of high vacua, to raise many bodies to brilliant fluorescence at a small expense of energy. ... These are hints toward a solution of the problem, but give no solution as yet. Professor Langley states that the Cuban firefly spends the whole of its energy upon the visual rays without wasting any upon heat, and is some four hundred times more efficient as a light-producer than the electric arc, and even ten times more efficient than the sun in this respect. Thus, while at present we have no solution of these important problems, we have reason to hope that in the not distant future one may be obtained, and the human inventor may not be put to shame by his humble insect rival." Influence of Odors upon the Voice.—“It is well known to singers," says Popular Science News, "that perfumes influence the voice. The violet is regarded by artists as the flower which especially causes hoarseness. The rose, on the contrary, is regarded as inoffensive. M. Joal, who has studied the subject, says he does not believe that the emanations of the violet prevent free vibration of the vocal cords, and thinks that if this flower has any injurious effect upon the voice, the rose and other flowers must have the same action. There is in fact, nothing fixed or regular in the influence exerted by the perfume of flowers. It is a matter of individual susceptibility. Some are affected by the lilac; others by the mimosa. Others, again, are in no manner affected by flowers, musk, amber, civet, or the various toilet preparations, but experience obstruction of the nose, hoarseness and oppression, from the odors of oils, grasses, burnt horn, and the emanations from tanneries and breweries. It is very difficult, adds M. Joal, to furnish an explanation of these peculiarities, and we must content ourselves by regarding them as examples of olfactory idiosyncrasy. It can not be denied that odors may occasion various accidents and vocal troubles, especially in persons of nervous temperament and excessive sensibility." Problems Solved in Dreams. —At a recent meeting of the American Psychological Association, as reported in The American Naturalist, February, "Prof. W. R. Newbold narrated informally three cases vaguely described as 'Dream Reasoning,' which had occurred in the experience of two of his colleagues. Dr. W. A. Lamberton, Professor of Greek in the University of Pennsylvania, when a young man, after giving up as insoluble a problem in descriptive geometry upon which he had been working for weeks by the analytical method, awoke one morning several days later to find an hallucinatory figure projected upon a blackboard in his room with all the lines necessary to a geometrical solution of the problem clearly drawn. He has never had any other visual hallucination. Dr. H. V. Hilprecht, Professor of Assyriology in the University of Pennsylvania, some years ago dreamed an interpretation of the name Nebuchadnezzar which has since been universally adopted. At a later period he dreamed that an Assyrian priest gave him information about some inscribed fragments that had puzzled him which was afterward confirmed in all points now capable of confirmation. Dr. Newbold offered a psychological explanation of these curious cases." erally hereditary, occurs both in boys and in girls. Delirium tremens has been seen at five years old; and cirrhosis of the liver, with definite history of abuse of alcohol, at three and onehalf years. Children who have suffered from the effects of alcohol are especially liable to epilepsy, hysteria, moral insanity, etc. The prognosis in such cases is bad, the tendency to excess generally persisting." Alcoholism in Children.-Dr. Moreau, in the Annales Médico-Psychologiques, as abstracted in the St. Louis Medical and Surgical Journal, February, records several cases of alcoholism in children. "The tendency is in some cases hereditary; often it is the result of some psychical disturbance. Many cases are due to the ignorance of mothers who quiet their infants, even while at the breast, with wine or spirits. The pernicious habit of parents taking their little ones into public-houses, and there allowing them to share the drinks, is pointed out. The risk of alcoholism must always be considered in ordering alcohol for children; and where there is a history of alcoholism in a child's antecedents it is best to avoid it altogether. Dipsomania, gen Face-Reading.-"In the acquisition of the art of speechreading by sight," says The Popular Science Monthly, “the eye of the deaf pupil becomes accustomed to certain positions of the organs of articulation, and he thus learns to understand the spoken words of others, altho he does not hear them. In teaching this art, Lillie Eginton Warren has found that the forty odd sounds of the English language are revealed in sixteen outward manifestations or pictures, and practise in following them as they rapidly appear in a face enables us to understand what is said. Some faces differ from others in strength of expression, and thus many show less action in the lower part. Nevertheless, there is in all persons a general approach to a certain definite movement of muscles, particularly when in animated conversation, and the trained eye notices what the inexperienced one fails to discover. After attaining a degree of proficiency in this art of expressionreading, persons seem to feel that they hear instead of see the words spoken. Reading our language in this way may be said to be mastery of a new alphabet, the rapidly moving letters or characters of which are to be found upon the page of the human countenance." Tea-Cigarettes.-"The English," says the Revue Scientifique, “are not content with drinking tea at their 'five o'clock tea,' they smoke it. According to several English authorities, who denounce this new mania as a dangerous habit, it has become a fashionable fad. A great number of adepts at this new pastime are women of high education and fine mental endowments. 'Among my patients,' says a physician, 'attacked by extreme nervousness and insomnia, is a young woman of fine education, and I am treating at the same time another woman, well known as an author, whose romances are widely read and who smokes daily twenty to thirty green-tea cigarettes while at work.' At the house of a well-known lady tea-cigarettes are always passed around after dinner, and several celebrated actresses give teasmoking parties twice a week. There is at Kensington a club composed of literary women, formed for the same purpose. One woman spends nearly £2 [$10] a week to satisfy her craving. This habit is becoming so common that some tobacco merchants are already offering packets of these tea-cigarettes to the public."— Translated for THE LITERARY Digest. SCIENCE BREVITIES. "IT is commonly supposed," says Popular Science News, "that the sudden and complete freezing of lakes and water-courses-not an infrequent occurrence in northern regions-must necessarily be fatal to all their inhabitants. Recent experiments by a French scientist, M. P. Regnard, have proved this to be an error. He cooled the water in an aquarium containing live carp to different degrees below freezing. At o° C. the fishes seemed to fall asleep, but were not frozen. At-3° they were apparently dead, but retained their flexibility. The water being then gradually warmed, they revived, began to swim, and showed no signs of suffering. This would indicate that the polar seas, whose temperature never falls below 3o C., may be a congenial abode for creatures inured to this degree of cold.' IN the opinion of Engineering, London, the compulsory adoption of the metric system of weights and measures two years after the passage of a law to that effect, as recently recommended by a Parliamentary committee, will be enormously beneficial. It says: "The time has gone past when it is necessary to furnish arguments as to the advantages of the metric system over present confused methods. Those whose business it is to deal with foreign countries know best how much they lose when they come into competition with manufacturers from Germany and Belgium, from the inability or indisposition of other nations to comprehend British standards." The paper, which is a recognized authority, considers it certain that the metric system will be adopted in England. It says: THE establishment of tea- and coffee-houses as substitutes for saloons is regarded by Modern Medicine as an evil. "The good women who devote so much time and labor to the development and conducting these enterprises are doubtless unaware of the fact that tea and coffee are inebriating substances as well as alcohol, tho they produce a different form of intoxication, and one which seldom results in such outbreaking violence as sometimes arises from the use of alcoholic liquors." THE oldest medical recipe is said by a French medical journal to be that of a hair-tonic for an Egyptian queen. It is dated 4000 B.C., and directs that dogs' paws and asses' hoofs be boiled with dates in oil. THE RELIGIOUS WORLD. STANLEY'S TRIBUTE TO MISSIONARY ENDEAVORS IN AFRICA. IN 1870 there were only two white men in all Equatorial Africa, from the Zambesi to the Nile. These were Dr. Livingstone and Sir Samuel Baker. The first had for years been absent from men's knowledge in the far interior, and no man knew what had become of him. The second had but just arrived in the White Nile region to suppress the slave-trade. Recalling these facts, by way of emphasizing the present hopeful condition of the Kongo Free State, Mr. Henry M. Stanley, in his "Story of the Development of Africa" (Century, February), goes on to recount some events of his own exploration of the Dark Continent, and incidentally speaks of the valuable agency of missionaries in opening up that long-unknown country. Among other things Mr. Stanley says: "I was the only white man during 1876 in Equatorial Africa, but in 1877, when only a short distance from the Atlantic, the first missionaries landed on the east coast in response to an appeal that I had written in 1875 from Uganda. During the years from 1879 to 1884 missionaries followed closely my tracks up the Kongo, and as a hundred influences were in the course of a few years enlisted in the cause of Africa, Nyassa Land and the eastern and southern part of Central Africa began to be studded with Christian missions, and missionaries have continued to enter Africa ever since, until now there must be about 300 of them, and the number is still increasing. They are not all reputed to be firstclass men, but it is wonderful what earnestness and perseverance will do. We have only to think of Uganda, with its 200 churches and cathedral and its 50,000 native Christians, read the latest official reports from Nyassa Land, and glance at the latest map of Africa, to be convinced of the zeal, devotion, and industry of the missionaries. "Mission-houses do not grow of themselves. Gospels are not translated into African tongues, nor are converts spontaneous products of human nature. I am somewhat familiar with African facts, and to me these things represent immense labor, patience, and self-sacrifice; but others expect Africans to fall in love with the missionary's eyes. the Mombasa-Nyanza Railway, 660 miles; the Shire-Nyassa Railway, 70 miles; the German Usambara Railway, 120 miles; and probably the Nyassa-Tanganyika Railway, 220 miles, in complete working order." Mr. Stanley thinks that the development of Africa now in progress is phenomenal. He suggests that if any one will take the trouble to read Parkman's story of the early days in America, and reflect upon what little advance was made in New South Wales during the first twenty years after its discovery, and compare both with what has taken place in the Kongo region after only eighteen years' knowledge of its river and basin, he will need no words of encouragement from any one. As for the climate, he says: "It is no worse than that found elsewhere in tropic lands. The heat is not so great as in India, or as it is sometimes in New York in summer. Fortunately, the coast-belt on both sides of Africa, where the heat is greatest, and where the climate is most unhealthy, is narrow. In four hours a railway train at ordinary speed would enable us to cross it, and so avoid the debilitating temperature. Ascending the sides of the coast-range by the same means of conveyance, we should in two hours reach a rolling plain which gradually rises in height from 2,500 to 3,500 feet above the sea. Here the climate is sensibly cooler, and the white man can safely work six hours of the day in the open without fear of sunstroke, tho he must not count on immunity from fever. In from ten to twelve hours the traveler by train would meet another steep rise, and would find himself from 5,000 to 8,000 feet above the sea, on the broad central plateau of the continent, which varies from 600 to 1,00 miles across. It is in this section that the great lakes, snowy mountains, and tallest hills are found. Here we have cold nights and a hot sun when the skies are not clouded, tho the air in the shade is frequently cool enough for an overcoat; and it is on this immense upland that the white man, when compelled by circumstances, may find a home. "However, no amount of preaching against the climate will retard the development of Africa. Civilization has grasped the idea that it must enter and take possession, and now that it thoroughly realizes the fact that the sine qua non for securing that possession is the railway, I can conceive of nothing that will prevent the children of Europe finding out for themselves whether they can permanently reside there or not." PREACHERS AND POLITICS IN GERMANY. "It is true, tho strange, that for the first six years or so very little visible effect is produced by missionary teaching and influence. The mind of a pagan descendant of innumerable centuries of pagans appears to be for some time impenetrable to the Chris- SHO tian doctrine, and no matter how zealously a missionary may strive with him, he continues to present a wooden dulness, until by and by there is a gleam of interest; he catches the idea, as it were; and the interest becomes infectious and spreads from family to family, and converts multiply rapidly. 'Cast thy bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days.' "I have in my mind, as I write, the examples furnished by the Waganda, Wanyassa, and Bakongo. At the town of Banza Manteka, for instance, one day 900 natives came to Mr. Richards, the missionary, and requested to be baptized by him. He had labored among them many years, but hitherto converts had been few. The missionary imposed conditions on them. He said that they must first assemble their fetishes, idols, and stores of gin, and destroy all in the market-place. And they went forthwith, and did it. "I estimate that there are at present 300 Europeans, inclusive of misssionaries, in French Kongo; 150 in British East Africa; 350 in British Central Africa; 250 in German East Africa; and 1,400 in Belgian Kongo-altogether, say, 2, 500 Europeans between the Zambesi and the Nile. The railways about to be constructed in British East and Central Africa and the German possessions will be the means of attracting several hundred more, just as the Kongo Railway has been the cause of the greater European population in the Kongo State; and since roadless Africa during the last ten years has attracted so many whites, it needs no prophet to predict that where one white traveled during its primitive state, a hundred will travel by railway. There are now only about 130 miles of railway within the limits of Equatorial Africa; but at the end of ten years from now we shall have the Kongo Railway, 250 miles long; the Stanley Falls Railway, 30 miles; HOULD preachers engage in political and social agitations? The Superior Consistory of Prussia, the highest ecclesiastical authority in Germany, has, in an official pronunciamento just issued, declared that the preacher of that kingdom shall not do so. Soon after the dismissal of Bismarck, the present Emperor of Germany issued his program of social reform, and it was repeatedly announced that it was his ambition to be regarded as "the workingman's Emperor." This attitude, so far as it may have been intended to arrest the activity of the Social Democrats, has proved disappointing. Accordingly other sails have been set, and the state seems to be about ready to readopt the Bismarckian policy of suppressing the Social Democracy by force. The pastors of Germany have taken no little interest in the agitation of the social question. Especially has this been the case with the younger and, theologically, more liberal elements. In fact a "Pastors' Social Party" was practically organized, with the influential journal Hilfe as its organ, edited by the skilful pen of Pastor Neumann. The pronounced program was to regain for the churches the masses (who had been lost, it was claimed, by the measures and manners of orthodoxy). In this social movement even many conservatives joined. At the National Christian Social Congress, held every summer for the past four or five years, Pastor Stoecker and Professor Harnack, the former a chief among the conservatives, the latter a prince among the liberals, sat as members of the same committee. The movement had almost attained national dimensions. Now all this has come to an end, according to the official declaration of the Superior Consistory signed by its head, Dr. Barkhausen. The address is a lengthy document, the substance of which is the following: The members of the Consistory have noticed with pain and surprise that not a few Protestant pastors of the country are beginning to take an extraordinary interest in the social problems and agitations of the day. The number of conventions, congresses, conferences, etc., called to discuss these matters is increasing steadily, and the prominence of the pastors at these meetings is pronounced. Especially is this the case with younger men; in not a few cases do theological students and candidates take a leading part in these discussions and deliberations. In view of this the Consistory regards it as its duty to ask the pastors to desist from this work as inconsistent with their calling and profession. It is not a part of their vocation to take part in political and social agitations. Their work is to faithfully attend to their duty as preachers of the Word and as pastors of souls entrusted to their care. It is not denied that Christianity is to be the salt of the earth; but it is not the pastor's duty to take a direct or immediate part in such agitations. Let the pastor in the line of his direct work instruct his people in godliness and in love to their neighbors, and these teachings will then bear their fruit in the callings and walks of life. Not directly, but only indirectly, is it the duty of the pulpit to influence the affairs of political and public life. The publication of these directions, which, in a country like Germany, where state and church are united, are equivalent to a command, has aroused the German pastors thoroughly. The conservative papers on the whole regard the publication as wise and timely, and as a call from the higher authorities for the pastors to be about their real business. But the protests have been decided and loud, evidencing a vigor seldom exhibited in Germany against those in authority. Thoroughly representative in this regard is the discussion in the Christliche Welt, of Leipsic, the most influential liberal organ in the country. It says this: "1. We protest against this declaration in the name of the honor of the German clergy. There has for many years not appeared an official ecclesiastical declaration which has attacked the honor of the ministry as has been done in this case. "2. We protest in the name of the younger generations of the clergy. In no other field of labor have the younger men shown such activity and such success as in the application of Christian principles to the problems of daily life. "3. We protest in the name of the whole Christian social movement. This movement has already its enemies among the unbelieving masses, and it is wrong for the highest church government to place itself on the side of the latter. The whole movement aims at a betterment and Christianization of the people and merits the support of all patriots and lovers of the church. "4. We protest because we love our state churches, as it is the effort of this agitation to convert these into national churches, in which all participate in the blessings of Christianity." Naturally Neumann's Hilfe has been hit hardest, as it is the organ of this party. Among other comments it says: ... "The Prussian Consistory wants to silence the pastors, to pen them up in the pulpit and in their houses, and not permit them to take part in the living problems of the day. We on our part will maintain our rights as Protestants and are comforted by the fact that the power of the address is not absolute. It will be put into force only in so far as the convictions of pastors can be influenced by it. A great many of us will not on this account throw away our arms or give up our program." The political journals are divided in their views as to the merits and demerits of the address. The North German Gazette praises it, because it clearly defines the line of demarcation between Christian charity work and political agitation, and in the latter department promptly calls a halt to the overzealous pastors. It clearly prescribes the limits of the churches' activity and says to politically inclined pastors: So far and no further. The influential Munich Allgemeine Zeitung also approves of the principles expressed, but acknowledges the honesty in the motives of the clergy who have been engaged in this politico-social move ment. Other political journals as a rule condemn the document as interfering with the rights which pastors have and enjoy as citizens of the Empire. PRESIDENT HARPER ON THE BIBLE. THE HE Journal and Messenger (Baptist, Cincinnati) takes President Harper, of the University of Chicago, severely to task for certain of his views which he expressed in a recent interview with the editor of the Texas Baptist Standard. In some prefatory observations concerning President Harper, The Journal and Messenger expresses its grievous disappointment over the position taken by him toward the interpretation of OldTestament history in general. It had expected different things. says that it seems to be Dr. Harper's aim now "to see how little he can leave for the student to place his foot upon with his assurance of its immovability." In the interview reported in The Baptist Standard, Dr. Harper, in reply to some direct questions submitted to him, made statements like the following: It "The story of Adam and Eve is certainly not fiction, and it is certainly not history, in the sense in which we use the word history to-day. . . As these [Genesis] stories appear among the Hebrews, they have been purified and purged, and at the same time filled with a distinct spirit which, from my point of view, can be only explained by assuming a supernatural, divine influI believe that these early stories of Genesis contain the world's earliest ideas, purged and purified by the divine Spirit, concerning the origin of man. . . . The early ideas of these people may or may not be correct. That does not affect the great truth. The essential idea contained in the first chapter of Genesis is shown by all history to have been true." ence. As to the inspiration of the Old-Testament Scriptures, President Harper is reported as saying: "The thing which seems to me to deserve emphasis is the inspiration of the history of the chosen nation. God worked in all history, but he worked in Hebrew history and New-Testament history in a sense in which He did not appear in other history. This was a specially ordered, specially guided history, the events of which were directed, and the great lives of which were so influenced as to produce a history out of which should come these biblical records. Now, inasmuch as the history itself was divinely guided and inspired, the records which grew out of the history, which were occasioned by the history, were thus, in the same sense, divinely inspired and divinely ordered. Whatever supernatural element we find in the history itself, whatever is in the events, that same thing we shall find in the record; whatever one was the other was. The history, however, is the fundamental thing, that is the rock upon which we may stand; and if we can prove, upon scientific grounds, that that history was unique, distinct from all other history, we have a basis upon which our divine inspiration from our Bible can rest." Commenting on these utterances, The Journal and Messenger says: "It seems, then, that in order to a divine record, we must have a divine history; or, rather, we must have a course of conduct ordered and directed by God. In order to have an inspired record of the doings of Satan, we must have Satan divinely directed and controlled. It can not be true that Satan wrought his devilish work upon Job, unless it is true that God directed him in his devices and energized him in the execution of his plans. We must have a divinely directed order of events, before God can put it into the heart and the pen of a scribe to tell the truth about it; and then it must not be expected that his record will be true to the facts. . . 'When asked what are the essential elements in which he dif fers from the 'orthodox' view of the Scriptures, Dr. Harper said: (1) In giving more prominence to the history which forms the basis on which the divine revelation rests. Herein is a marvel. A man tells us that what in the common view is history is not history at all, but simply a conglomeration of traditions, 'purged and purified by the divine Spirit;' and then, in a breath, he tells us that he differs from the orthodox in that he emphasizes more fully the historical basis upon which the divine revelation rests. We confess to utter inability to harmonize these two statements. First, we have no reliable history. It is only a tradition, 'purged N and purified by the divine Spirit;' then, after destroying, so far as he is able, the historical character of the writings, he tells us that he differs from those who believe in their historical character, in that he gives 'more prominence to the history which forms the basis on which the divine revelation rests' (!). Divine revelation resting upon history which is not history at all; a record which is not history, but which bears the evidence of purging and purifying by the divine Spirit! We have to confess to amazement and confusion; and we ask, How can these things be joined together so as to reflect credit upon the president of a great university?" I THE POPE'S AUTHORSHIP AND INFALLI- N our issue of January 4 last we quoted the Riforma, Rome,. accuse us of having deviated from our "usual carefulness." The paper with which the story originated is one of the most reliable Italian publications, and, altho edited on very liberal principles, is not opposed to the authority of the church in purely clerical affairs. We give now the text of a letter written by Father John S. Vaughan to The Scotchman, Glasgow, in answer to a statement that "the Pope must now be fallible and infallible at the same time." Father Vaughan says: A RELIC OF OLD EGYPT. EWS from Cairo confirms the report of the discovery of an object of special interest to Egyptologists. Mr. Jacques de Morgan, the Director-General of Antiquities, has succeeded in clearing away the soil and sand in which the bases of the pillars of the great Temple of Karnak were embedded. The floor of the temple is still six feet below the surface. The alluvial deposits BAS-RELIEF AND COLUMNS OF THE TEMPLE OF KARNAK. "Supposing the facts of the case to be as there stated, the consequences drawn by your correspondent are wholly unwarranted. They are evidently based upon a complete misconception, both as to the (a) nature and as to the (b) range of the Catholic doctrine of papal infallibility. Perhaps you will allow me to remark-Firstly, that infallibility does not extend to statements made by a Pope before his election to the Chair of Peter; secondly, that even after his consecration his infallibility does not cover books and treatises which he may write, even while Pope, but as private doctor or theologian; thirdly, that infallibility in no way safeguards the 'Congregation of the Index' in their selection of the books or other writings to be placed upon their black list, known as the Index of Prohibited Books. From this it will be readily seen that the amusement arising from the supposed conflict between the facts you mention and the dogma of papal infallibility is, as our American cousins would say, 'just a little previous."" Mgr. Merry del Val, "Private Chamberlain of H. H. Pope Leo XIII.," publishes a statement to the effect that the book in question was really written by Canon Carlo Paoletti, an excellent, well-meaning man, but not always of sound mind, whom Cardinal Pecci patronized. Mgr. del Val declares that Father Vaughan is right in the distinctions he makes, but that his defense of the Pope is not necessary in the present case. It remains only for us to remark that the Riforma still maintains its assertions. THE German-Jewish papers are publishing a list of wounded and deceased Jewish soldiers in recent German wars in order to disprove antiSemitic charges. brought by the Nile have been undisturbed for three thousand years, and the work of clearing all away will take a long time. Herewith is a picture of one part of the temple as it appears now, that the lower part of the columns is laid bare. The Christian Herald, from which we take the foregoing facts, says: "There are still standing 134 of these beautiful columns, rich in sculpture and bearing inscriptions of inestimable value to historians. It is necessary to proceed with the work with extreme caution, as in some instances the bases of the pillars have crumbled, and unless they are repaired they are liable to fall with the immense monolithic blocks which rested upon them. It is believed that Seti I., whose cartouche is the oldest yet found in the Temple, was not its builder, but that it dates back to Amenophis III.. who reigned about fifteen hundred years before Christ. It was a magnificent pile, covering three acres. Besides the columns there were two hundred sphinxes, and long and stately flights of steps leading into the various courts of the Temple. The walls were covered with hieroglyphics and bas-relief sculptures of great beauty, delicately chiseled and vividly colored. One of these exquisite bas-reliefs is shown in the lower panel of our illustrations. It represents the heathen goddess Isis, whose tears, according to the myth, caused the overflow of the Nile. She is pictured holding on her knees her son, Horus, who in Egyptian mythology represents the sun and the three great planets. Two thirds of the chief wall on which the bas-reliefs are cut was thrown down by an earthquake near the beginning of our era, and the work of devastation was carried further by the Persian army of Cambyses, but sufficient remains to indicate the subjects the |