There are a few further points I should like to add.

In the first place I think that the whole of the payment of a Bishop as of the other Diocesan officials should come from the Central Funds of the Church. That will make it much easier for the officials to take part in raising Diocesan Funds to increase the stipends of the clergy. They will not in any way, directly or indirectly, be dependent upon them. It is probably desirable, as has been suggested, that the income of the Bishops should be divided into two portions. He should have, first of all, a personal salary; secondly, there should be a Fund for Bishop's expenses, for which he should have to account to the Diocesan Board of Finance, who should administer the Fund provided for the payment by the revenues of the Ecclesiastical Commission. That should include the payment to a Pension Fund, the payment of Queen Anne's Bounty, if this is continued, the repairs, upkeep, rates and taxes of the Palace, an allowance for travelling, for Secretaries and Chaplain, for hospitality, and probably also a Fund at his disposal for charitable administration. As to the amount that each Bishop should have, there should be a Commission appointed to reassess the stipends of the Bishops. The stipends of the Bishops and the upkeep of their Palaces should be a first charge upon the revenues of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. As regards the Palaces, the same Commission which reports upon their incomes should report as to whether the house assigned for the Bishop's residence is suitable for its purpose or whether another should be substituted for it. I have no doubt that the historical Palaces of the older Sees are of definite value to the Church of England, but the upkeep of them and the cost of their maintenance should not be a charge on the private resources of the Bishop. In the same way, an adequate stipend, which should vary from £1000 to £1200, should be assigned to those Suffragans which are considered necessary for the different Dioceses. They in like manner should be paid out of the Funds of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. They should not be a charge on the Diocesan Board, nor should they be paid by livings; the last method is a singularly unfortunate one, because

it implies that they will have conflicting duties, particularly on Sundays, and it is on Sundays especially that they ought to be engaged on Diocesan work. Every Archdeacon, in the same way, should receive a stipend from £600 to £750, unless he is paid by a Canonry, and in Dioceses where there is no regular Suffragan Bishop, one of the Archdeacons should be in Episcopal Orders.

I believe that if a scheme such as the above were adopted, the administration and organization of the Church would be carried on quite efficiently. At any rate, what seems to me important is that the Church should make up its mind what it desires to do with regard to these points. We should settle how many Bishops we want. We should not look upon the creation of new Bishoprics as something which is to go on continuously and to be a perpetual drain on Charitable Funds. Let us get our Bishoprics settled, let us have an efficient but not extravagant organization, and then we can turn our attention to the stipends of the Parochial Clergy and the general development of the work of the Church.

A. C. GLOUCESTR:

DR. SCOTT HOLLAND ON THE FOURTH GOSPEL.

The Fourth Gospel. By the Rev. HENRY SCOTT HOLLAND, D.D., late Regius Professor of Divinity in the University of Oxford. (London: John Murray. 1923.) Price 6s. net. CANON RICHMOND has been well advised in presenting to the world the results of the late Dr. Scott Holland's many years of study of the Fourth Gospel in such a small, compact and inexpensive volume as we have before us now under review. The writer was pre-eminently suited both by temperament and by training to enter into the mind and spirit of the Johannine Gospel. In spite of his book being merely of a fragmentary nature, it is surprising to find the light he sheds, in a page or two, on many a subject which other writers have failed to do to the same extent in attempts of very great length.

Two instances may be given. At the very outset the difficulty confronts us of having to decide whether the Gospel in its entirety is to be regarded as one book, or as a composition put together from various sources. The latter view has found many supporters, Wellhausen and Spitta having made noteworthy attempts in this direction.

The former of these has written on the text of the Gospel, and what he has to say is contained in not less than one hundred pages of closely packed matter, whilst the latter scholar requires considerably more than four times that amount of space to effect the same object. To consider either in detail would require a volume in itself. But the reader of what Dr. Scott Holland has to say upon the mind of a Jew,1 and in particular his remarks about the author's style, from which we cannot refrain from quoting, will more than ever be reluctant to break up the Gospel into fragments.

'But our author never argues, never co-ordinates, never dissects or unravels. Neither his style nor his thought suggests continuity. He omits all connections; and discloses no inward logical movement. His mode of presentation is not excursive and explanatory, but intuitional, abrupt, assertive, cataclysmic. Single, living, vivid phrases leap out like stars. They stand there as fixed points.

1 The Fourth Gospel, p. 69 ff.

Emphasis is given them, not by elucidation, but by reiteration. It is a child's method of making a thing emphatic by threefold repetition. "He confessed, and denied not but confessed." The fact which is brought before us is to be held, faced, contemplated, brooded over, until its reality passes into us. It cannot be analysed, or transposed into logical argumentation. It can only be repeatedly presented from this side and from that, so that the thought may perpetually recur to it in some slightly varying context. So the meaning grows. The intensive impression gains ever new intensity. The words assume the force of personalities that we are in living contact with. But positive argument there is none.' '

Our second instance is the Evangelist's debt to Philo, about which the most diverse opinions are held. Not only are Dr. Scott Holland's conclusions exceedingly judicial and well balanced, but in what happier phrasing could the conclusion of the whole matter be summed up than in the following short paragraph?

But so far as he' [i.e. the Evangelist] 'himself went there is no sign that Greek speculation ever won its way inside him.' 2 Turning now to the more positive side of Dr. Scott Holland's book, his main position may be partly summarized in his own words: The Synoptic story . . . does not account for itself. Still less does it account for the religion that adopted the story as its own. It cannot explain the actual historical Christianity as we find it existing in the earliest form of which we have any record.' 3

In other words, the first three 'leave off at a point where it is impossible to stop.' 4 The Fourth Gospel is the answer to all these obstinate questions.5 Once this argument is accepted, and we shall return later on to see its bearings on the Johannine authorship, our minds are prepared to expect on a priori grounds that someone would arise from the apostolic circle who would fill in the background to the picture which the other three Gospels have presented to the world.

Dr. Scott Holland proceeds in the second of his Introductions to shew that all the internal evidence of the Fourth Gospel points to our surmise being correct. He examines three special

1 The Fourth Gospel, pp. 72, 73.

2 Ibid. p. 74 ff. Cf. Feine, Theologie des neuen Testaments (2nd ed. Leipzig: J. C. Hinrich. 1911), part iii chap. iv: 'John and Hellenism.' In discussing how far the Evangelist is dependent on Philo the following remark is passed: 'Wort und Ausdruck sind gleich, und doch ist der Inhalt ein sehr verschiedener ' (p. 575). 4 Ibid. p. 6. 5 Ibid. p. 27.

• Ibid. p. 12.