134 Rcvieios of Books have twenty-two letters addressed to the administrators of the department which he represented, giving a vivid and interesting account of the occur- rences of that eventful year. In 1793 Christian worship was proscribed throughout France, and in September, refusing to renounce his orders, Le Coz was imprisoned by Carrier, one of the most bitter and cruel persecutors, who was executed in December, 1794, for excessive and lawless cruelty. Le Coz spent over a year in prison, suffering many hardships and indignities which he describes in his letters to his friends. Released in December, 1794, he returned to Rennes only to find his house stripped of furniture and church ornaments, though his library of 4,000 volumes was saved. From this time begins an interesting series of fifty-six letters, to Gregoire, Bishop of Loir-et-Cher, at Blois, the leader of the constitutional clergy. These letters show an earnest, independent spirit, eager for peace with the ijisermentes and for the restoration of friendly relations with the papacy. They tell of struggles against great difficulties, suspicion, ill- feeling, desertion, hunger and poverty due to the rapid depreciation of the assignats and loss of property. They describe the ravages of the Chouans and give some interesting allusions to the influence of English deism and atheism on French writers. For a long time Le Coz did not dare to go outside the city, and it was not until June, 1797, that he made his first episcopal visitation, when he beheld on every side the traces of civil war. In 1797 and again in 1801 he presided at the national church council held at Paris. His letters to Gregoire and others at this period show the desolation and difficulties of the church, the strenuous efforts he is making for peace and quiet, the terrible moral and social effects of the irreligion and lawlessness, and the need of some strong hand to subdue the disorder and lead the nation into peace. After the council of 1801 he remained in Paris to look after the in- terests of the constitutional church. With the other clergy generally he resigned his position in October as a preliminary to the approaching set- tlement under the Concordat. He was soon after appointed Archbishop of Besan^on and wrote to Cardinal Caprara for the bull of institution. He entered his see in May, 1802. Here the letters cease. In 1804 he went to Paris for the consecration of Napoleon and while there he had several audiences with the Pope, to whom he gave in his formal adher- ence in December. He was one of the first to declare for Napoleon in March, 1815, but died on a visitation in May of that same year. „ An Outline of Political Groiuth in the Nineteenth Century. By Ed- .MUND Hajiilton Sears, A.M., Principal of Mary Institute, Saint Louis. (New York : The Macmillan Company. 1900. Pp. xiii, 616.) The result aimed at by Professor Sears in this volume is to " awaken an interest in political study and create a desire for a fuller knowledge of
