will truthfully record that among those results none, perhaps, were more important than the meeting of representative colored Methodists and representative white Southern Methodists from America in City Road Chapel, and the mutual respect and confidence which that meeting produced. We returned home from the pilgrimage to our common Mecca mutually resolved to work side by side in Southern fields for the elevation of both races, and the advancement of our common country.

And now, as the last result of the Conference which we mention, we add that we all returned to our respective Methodisms baptized anew with the Spirit of Wesley's Master and ours, and more than ever persuaded of the possibilities of Methodism. Nor was this persuasion diminished by the fact that Methodism is to-day increasing in many parts of the world— the Old and the New-in a greater ratio than at any period of its history. But the rather were we persuaded that, if Methodism be true to its great mission, before the first sun of the next century shall have arisen from his nightly bath in the waters of Oceanus, Methodism will have become the most prevalent Protestant religion of the world, and will have fully pervaded all its sister evangelical Churches with the spirit of John Wesley and the great Methodist movement of the eighteenth century.

ART. IV.-JOHN KEBLE AND THE TRACTARIAN

MOVEMENT.

A Memoir of the Rev. John Keble, M.A., late Vicar of Hursley. By the Right Honorable Sir J. T. COLERIDGE, D.C.L.

Reminiscences Chiefly of Oriel College and the Oxford Movement. By Rev. T. MozLEY, M.A. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, & Co.

The Oxford Counter-Reformation. By JAMES ANTHONY FROUDE, A.M., in his "Short Studies on Great Subjects."

Keble. By Professor J. C. SHAIRP, in "Studies in Poetry and Philosophy."

MR. MOZLEY'S gossipy "Reminiscences" of the Oxford Movement, and Mr. Froude's "Essay," have somewhat revived public interest in the distinguished writers known as "Tractarians," whose famous tracts shook the Church of England from center to circumference some fifty years ago. It has, therefore, occurred to the writer that a brief resumé of the events connected

with the origin and results of that movement, interwoven with a study of the life and character of one of its leaders, might not be without interest to the readers of the Quarterly.

Among the original Tractarians there was no one of them more highly esteemed than JOHN KEBLE, the author of those sacred lyrics known as "The Christian Year." Mozley pronounces him "a glory to the college," (Oriel ;) "a comfort, and a stay." Of his surprisingly popular work the "Encyclopedia Britannica" says: "It contributed equally with the Tracts for the Times' to the success of the Anglo-Catholic reaction in the Church of England. In those pensive, dreamy, soothing strains we have the logic of the Oxford schools turned into rhetoric. The academic cloister and the Gothic aisle are the 'haunt and main region' of his song. The white Levitical vestment is his singing-robe, and you listen in the dim religious light to a music like the lulling chime of church bells."

The precise relations between great political and religious movements and their various causes are not easily ascertained. Hence it may be that Keble's "Christian Year" contributed equally with the "Tracts for the Times" to the power of the Tractarian agitation. The affirmation is easily made, but where is the proof? The churchly character of its poems does not prove it, since the church, from its altar and priestly vestments to its very floors, is, still more emphatically, the "haunt and main region" of holy George Herbert's song. Yet his influence was, and is, almost exclusively spiritual. The same may be safely affirmed of "The Christian Year" and its influence. It is, doubtless, true that its sad and mediæval tone, and its occasional and sympathetic allusions to Sacramentalist dogmas, made it a special favorite with the Oxford agitators when they began their movement, five years after its publication. But, long before their appearance as agitators, its poetical merits and its value as a help to the culture of the spiritual life had won for "The Christian Year" a warm place, not only in the regards of High-Churchmen, but also in the affections of spiritually-minded Low-Churchmen and Dissenters. It may, indeed, be fairly questioned whether any man not predisposed by his political and ecclesiastical principles was ever made a Tractarian by the study of that book. As we shall presently see, it was not aimed at any such result.

There is an idyllic beauty, not only in the lives, but also in the material surroundings of many ministers in the rural parishes of England. There are, no doubt, numerous hard, disagreeable, poverty-stricken parishes; but ideal ones are scattered in secluded vales all over that highly-favored island. These latter have their ancient church, with the village dead of many generations quietly sleeping around it in the shade of solemn yew-trees. Near by stands the moss-covered parsonage, with its ample lawn in front and its well-cultivated garden behind. Not far off is the parish school, the village street, and, in the distance, the mansions and parks of the neighboring gentry. On all sides, a charming landscape, undulating, green as emerald, fruitful, and watered by babbling streams, fills the observant eye with images which awaken feelings of pure delight. The rector, or vicar, if true to his vocation, which, alas! is not always the case, is treated by both rich and poor with the reverential respect due to a pastor, and is loved by many with the affection due from children to a father. Within such parsonages there is usually abundance, sometimes wealth, the amenities of high intellectual culture, and the still more graceful affectionateness which is the outgrowth of Christian faith. Happy, indeed, is the truly spiritual pastor whose lot is cast in such a home!

It was John Keble's fortune to spend his early life in the "sacred seclusion" of such a home. His father was Vicar of Coln, St. Aldwin's, near Fairford, in Gloucestershire. The poet was born at the latter place in 1792, and was educated by his scholarly and pious father so effectually that when he was only fourteen years and eight months old he was elected scholar of Corpus Christi College, Oxford. No anecdotes of his boyhood were preserved, except the fact that his devotion to study was so voluntary and self-regulated that his father safely left him free to choose his own hours for getting his lessons. It is also said that one of his godfathers, who knew him intimately, designated him by the title of "John the Good." Hence, both intellectually and morally, "the child was father of the man."

Corpus Christi was a small college, seldom having more than twenty pupils, some of whom were resident Bachelor students. Most of its few undergraduates were, like Keble, mere boys. Their habits were inexpensive, temperate, and studious. Their

tutors were gentlemen in manners, accurate scholars, and judicious in their methods of teaching. Keble's tutor, Mr. Darnell, was a man of excellent taste, "one of the ornaments of Oxford," and admirably fitted to develop the mind and character of this shy, home-bred, home-loving, affectionate lad. Under his tuition Keble made a good record in college; albeit, though he wrote for several prizes during his undergraduateship, he was never successful. Two causes, possibly three, may be assigned for these failures: his extreme youth, his lack of public-school training, and chiefly his distraction of mind caused by the preparations necessary to his intention to try for the "first class both in classics and mathematics." In this great effort he was successful, and, in 1810, was placed in both first classes, a distinction which, up to that time, no one had earned but Sir Robert Peel. It was a great intellectual triumph for a lad of eighteen; and it led to his election, the following year, as a Probationer Fellow at Oriel College.

The development of Keble's character was greatly aided by the friendships he formed at Corpus Christi. Three of these were especially intimate, and were life lasting. These three friends-Miller, Cornish, and Dyson-were remarkable for intellectual quickness, simplicity of character, refined tastes, and warm affections. Cornish, like Keble, was reserved and shy, yet genial and humorous when in the company of his chosen associates. All of them resembled Keble in their indifference to Church honors and preferments, except so far as they might offer them fields for usefulness. These sweet and precious college friendships Keble embalmed in the following extract from a short poem he wrote on quitting the delightful associations of Corpus Christi:

"Seat of calm delights, farewell!

Home of my muse, and of my friends! I ne'er
Shall see thee, but with such a gush of soul

As flows from him who welcomes some dear face

Lost in his childhood-yet not lost to me

Art thou; for still my heart exults to own thee,

And memory still, and friendship, make thee mine."

At Oriel, in 1812, Keble won two Bachelors' prizes: an unprecedented honor, achieved only twice since. The next year he was appointed examining master. In 1815 he was ordained deacon. The following year the same bishop, Jackson,

ordained him priest. It does not clearly appear that he entered this high vocation because he was especially moved thereto by the Holy Ghost; neither did he aspire to it for low, mercenary ends. To his mind it appeared as a grand sphere of usefulness, which he entered with visions of brilliant results, "inasmuch," he writes, "as the salvation of one soul is worth more than the framing the Magna Charta of a thousand worlds. ... Can there be, even among the angels, a higher privilege, that we can form an idea of, than the power of contributing to the everlasting happiness of our neighbor?"

He does not disavow the presence of ambition among his motives for entering the clerical office. "On the contrary," he writes, "I have a great deal of ambition-too much, I think, for my profession; ... but I think I see clearly that, as a motive to my clerical exertions, it is either wrong in itself or liable every moment to become so, and therefore I am sure I ought to keep it down as much as possible."

This is the language of a man sincerely desirous of thoroughly knowing himself, and of entering on the duties of his high office in a spirit corresponding to its spiritual dignity. He quickly demonstrated his sincerity by the manner in which he applied himself to the duties of two small curacies which he accepted immediately after his ordination as deacon. A resident near one of his churches told his biographer that after he began his work a great change took place in the village; he commenced a Sunday-school; the church was well filled. A sturdy Baptist attended, stating as a reason that he there heard the Gospel. And this resident adds, "I have myself much reason to be thankful for Mr. Keble's ministrations. Mr. Keble was outside the church what he was in it."

Early in 1818 Keble entered upon the duties of a tutor at Oriel, to which he had been appointed the preceding autumn. He had some scruples at first with respect to this exchange of parish for academic work. But he quieted them on the ground that tuition is "a species of pastoral care," and his affectionate fidelity to the religious, as well as to the intellectual, life of his pupils showed that this was no mere opiate administered to his conscience, but a valid justification of his action. Oriel, in Keble's time, had a corps of tutors equal, if not superior, to any college of the university; and Kęble soon