First Number of Theological Review

G. A. Gordon '81, an Overseer and Preacher to the University, has written the following comment on the new Theological Review:

"The first number of the Harvard Theological Review was issued last week, and the CRIMSON will doubtless take pleasure in according to the Review a hearty welcome. This Review has been partially endowed by the bequest of the late Miss Mildred Everett, made in order to carry out a plan suggested by her father, Charles Carrol Everett, deeply respected and widely influential as scholar and teacher in Harvard University for more than thirty years. In advance of his generation, and through his wide survey of the spiritual life of mankind, Professor Everett recognized that religion has been man's supreme interest. He saw, too, that the degeneration of this interest has been man's deepest affliction. He deplored equally the isolation of reason from faith, and the isolation of faith from reason. He devoted a life of uncommon power and loftiness to the illumination of religion by the intellect, and to the inspiration of the intellect by the ideals and passions of pure religion.

"The Harvard Theological Review comes, we may be sure, as the servant of the cause dear to Professor Everett. Professors G. F. Moore, W. W. Fenn, and J. H. Ropes, are the Editorial Committee. They have the hearty support of their colleagues in the Faculty of the Divinity School, and it may be added, that they have the good wishes of all serious-minded men, in their endeavor to make this Review the servant of religion pure, catholic, and universal.

"The first issue promises well, from the initial article by Professor Peabody on 'The Call to Theology,' to the last on 'The Divine Providence by Dr. C. F. Dole. As one might expect from a glance at the names of the several contributors, the pages of the Review are marked by able and serious discussion of questions of present and pressing moment.

"In the welcome accorded to the Review, two motives may be expected to exert their influence. The first is the interest excited by suspicion. We have heard of the Presbyterian Elder who usually slept during the sermon when his own minister was the preacher, but who, when a stranger occupied the pulpit, remained wide awake and keenly alert. He gave as his reason for this change of attitude, his assurance of the soundness of his minister, and his conviction that when a stranger came, he needed watching. There are many dormant minds to whom this Review with its new and unknown character and possibilities will supply a wholesome awakening stimulus; and doubtless, their critical attention will be a stimulus to the Review. The second motive comes from the mood of expectation in which multitudes of our worthiest men face the future. It was said of Emerson that every new person to whom he was presented was greeted by him as if this person might prove to be the friend for whom the seer had been looking, but whom he had hitherto failed to find. The expectation of the serious part of the community today, from the research of the scholar, the insight of the philosopher, and the vision of the prophet working upon the world laid open in the life of the saint, is vast, and it may be, that the Harvard Theological Review will answer this expectation in a new and in a great way."