Current Literature [pp. 484-487]

CURRENT LITERA TURE.
congregation of Forty-niners, and, after a tedious passage of one hundred days, enters
the Golden Gate in safety. Some amusing
adventures of a harmless nature follow, together with page after page of speculation
upon creeds, church government, politics,
etc. He meets and converses with many
sorts of people, who unwittingly help him
work out his salvation. He writes this passage in his journal: "An American, upon
seeing a copy of the Bible in a miner's cabin,
remarked,'Excellent work that; there are
some first-rate things in it.'" Failing to find
either spiritual peace or temporal profit in
California, he again braves the sea. Loves
a Samoan maid, not wisely. Is half inclined
to forswear civilization. Resolves that "Calvinism and cocoa-nuts can not flourish in the
same latitudes." Then repairs to Australia,
where he is happy in love and free thought,
having found one who is as unsettled in mind
as himself. Marriage and an olive - branch,
together with further speculations upon all
possible topics and unlimited heresy for breakfast, dinner, and tea, conclude his pilgrimage
at the shrine of domestic bliss, and the book
closes in a general metaphysical and fog-like
obscurity, through which the egotism of the
thinker (all thinkers are egotists) shines pleasantly.
The author evidently likes to startle his
readers with such mysticisms as the following:
"I have been seeking for the Absolute. It seems
to me a species of Atheism to say that there is no infallible system, even for playing on,ze."
"The agent in the sudden conversion of St. Paul
may have been a sunstroke, acting on a mind already
in a state of extreme tension, as we know his was."
" Here, then, is the main result of my mental pilgrimage. Men have been led by a certain beauty of
life and manner-around which has clustered, after
the manner of the age, a halo of legends-to think
that the Ideal has once been realized. And they fall
down and worship their own potential self, first projecting it into the Godhead, to avoid the charge of
idolatry."
While at Jamaica, the sight of an African
filled this Pilgrim with amazement. His
Darwinian soul instantly dropped that African into his proper notch in the descending
scale of humanity. An artist, apparently
created for no other purpose, sketches a colossal pyramid of Negroes, capped by a superior White. A layer of apes is, of course,
the foundation of this unique structure. The
unveiling of this picture thrills Mr. Herbert Ainslie with joy. He can regard it as
nothing short of a masterpiece in conception
and execution. Let the conscientious reader
picture to himself this grand companion piece:
Senator Revels and Frederick Douglass on
all-fours, in the august presence of the dear
public; upon their backs the Dumas, father.
and son, who bear triumphantly upon their
shoulders the form of the prophetic Ainslie,
B.A., late student in the Church of England
-his youthful brow bathed in the eternal
sunshine, his inspired lips uttering this closing passage from his "Letters and Journals:
" In Love alone, in pure and unreserving Love,
does all questioning find answer. At once tree of
knowledge and tree of life, fortunate are they who
can eat thereof without trespass and without penalty.
Believe me, my friend, those only who feel, know;
and where Love is, there is no Dogma."
The Pilgrim, having eaten and loved to
his heart's content, is henceforth and forever
guiltless of dogmas, and the kingdom of
Heaven is at hand in the wilds of Australia,
where the Church of England ceases from
troubling, and Herbert Ainslie, B.A., is at
rest.
BOOKS OF THE MONTH.
From A. Roman & Co., San Francisco:
THE MYSTERY OF EDWIN DROOD; and MASTER HUMPHREY'S CLOCK. By Charles Dick ens. Philadelphia: T. B. Peterson & Brothers.
' FROM FOURTEEN TO FOUR - SCORE. By Mrs. S. W. Jewett. New York: Hurd & Hough ton.
A HAND-BOOK OF LEGENDARY AND MYTHOLOGICAL ART. By Clara Erskine Clement.
With Descriptive Illustrations. New York: Hurd & Houghton.
WONDERFUL ESCAPES.. By Richard Whiteing. New York: Charles Scribner & Co.
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