them it follows at once that there must be a Law of Nations binding on conscience, just as there is a law of men binding on conscience. Nor can that Law of Nations be merely what is called International Law, "rules accumulated in the precedents of diplomatists, whether they be founded in justice or not." Such rules are just as transitory as the men that made them. They have no binding power whatever. Nor are they thought to have it. They are allowed to subsist just as long as they are found convenient.

The Law of Nations, then, may be taken to be a Divine Law imposed on nations by the Creator of nations. But where is that law to be found? The general opinion is that it resides where what is called the Natural Law for individuals resides, in the consciences of men. The natural law, the law written in the human heart, tells that such or such conduct from one individual to another is wrong. But what is wrong from an individual to an individual is wrong from a state to a state. The common law of right and wrong is therefore the Law of Nations.

There is in this theory one fundamental mistake which renders it as a theory untenable. It is the mistake of thinking that the natural law is complete. The natural law is no such thing. Nothing of course is lawful which it distinctly forbids. But many things may be unlawful, against which it says nothing; and many things may be permissible, about which it is equally silent. As a matter of fact, to the natural law God has added other laws which the law written on our hearts sanctions of course, but oftentimes only by giving no opposition. Now, as God has not left individuals dependent for a rule of conduct upon the natural law alone, it is very likely that He did not leave nations in a similar state of dependence. There is thus created at once a probability in favour of the theory that the Law of Nations in its completeness will be found to be what theological writers call a Divine Positive Law. Lord Arundell does not visibly follow this line of reasoning. But he appears to have had an idea of doing so when he wrote at page 385:

If conversely you say that the Law of Nations, as we find it, is purely the work and elaboration of legists and the conclusions of abstract reason, put it to this test: bring all the legists of the world into a congress-such a congress is much needed just now-with instructions to create a new code on abstract principles and upon the basis of the rejection of custom and tradition, and see what they will accomplish!

But besides this à priori probability there is yet another intrinsic reason for thinking that as God gave the Decalogne to rule individuals, so also He gave some Divine positive law for the ruling of nations. That reason is found in the occasional inapplicability of

the same law to both individuals and states. What are known and universally admitted to be portions of the Law of Nations are not clearly, are perhaps not at all, discernible in the natural law of individual consciences. We shall explain what we mean by a familiar example. It is universally agreed-though, as we have already seen, not universally acted upon--that before one state invades another state it is bound to make a formal declaration of war. That principle is supposed to be binding in every conceivable case of invasion, no matter how just the war may be on the part of the aggressor, and no matter what his cause may suffer from a previous notification of his intention to commence hostilities. But there are cases where the natural law, per se, does not clearly demand, or does not demand at all, that an aggressor should preface hostilities by a declaration of war. Suppose a case of robbery and subsequent retaliation. Peter, a powerful highwayman, armed to the teeth, meets Paul, an unarmed and unwarlike trader. Paul is beaten and robbed, and Peter goes on his way rejoicing. But soon after Paul recovers his strength, finds arms, and follows Peter. Before he makes an attack on the highwayman is he bound to give that gentleman notice? If the natural law says so at all, it says so very indistinctly. It says it so very indistinctly that there is no obligation of minding the saying. Apply that to the case of states. A Frenchman may at once argue that when France finds herself equal to the occupation of Alsace and Lorraine, she may attempt the reoccupation without giving any notice to Germany. But such conduct would be surely proclaimed to be in defiance of the Law of Nations. There is, therefore, a case where what the natural law of right and wrong seems to permit, the Law of Nations prohibits. And a similar line of reasoning might be pursued in respect of forced and unjust treaties, where, namely, a beaten state is driven to purchase peace at a price that would never be paid except for the logic of blood and iron. Some of the first reasoners of the time have laughed at the idea that such treaties bind. We are not saying that these reasoners are right. But there is a serious probability that they are right, if the sole Law of Nations is the natural law.

These arguments go merely to show that the Natural Law is in respect of states what it is in respect of individuals, incomplete and indecisive. There is thus a reason for suspecting that the Natural Law is not the true and complete Law of Nations. These arguments go so far and no farther. But Lord Arundell's argument goes very much farther. It goes to prove the existence of a Law of Nations, positive and external to the human conscience; not indeed found, like the Decalogue, in authoritative documents, but tradited, and preserved in the general memory of mankind. If this doctrine of our author is true, the position which he assumes with regard to "the

perception and judgment of right and wrong" is simply unassailable. In that position the judgment of right and wrong is not the law of nations, but only a test of the law of nations; and "what is of usage and custom will be the criterion of what is right until the human intellect has shown that what has been held to be permissible was founded in a precedent of iniquity." And hence Grotius, the greatest of all profane writers on the general subject of law, found the Law of Nations in "the sayings of the poets and orators of the world," these two classes of men being the best witnesses to the old traditional feelings of humanity. Grotius understood

thoroughly that it is not human reason but Divine legislation which makes the law by which states are to determine their conduct towards one another. And the Divine legislation he sought in its only existing abode, the memories of nations.

But does Lord Arundell prove the existence of the law of which he speaks? Its existence as a complete code, he does not prove, and could not prove directly; but its existence as a complete code he makes very probable. And the existence of one of its most important precepts he establishes beyond all cavil. We cannot, however, do more than advise the reader to study carefully the last two chapters of our author's volume. These two chapters make it very certain that a law of nations was given to men before the Dispersion, and they leave no doubt that all nations have preserved with the greatest minuteness the memory of one of these Divine national precepts,—that, namely, which regards the Declaration of War.

But, even if Lord Arundell be admitted to have proven the existence of a traditional law of nations, the question may fairly be asked, cui bono? For, first of all, the law, though known to be existing, has to be discovered; but its discovery will require a whole army of legal Livingstones. "Quod semper, quod ubique, quod ad omnibus," is here, as in higher things, a theoretical truth; but it is not here, as it is in higher things, a good practical rule. The famous expression of Vincent of Lerins would, in respect of Ecclesiastical dogmas, settle very little were it not for the existence of one central authority to which approach is easy and whose pronouncements are clear. But there is no such central authority to help Lord Arundell. Lord Arundell feels the difficulty. He therefore suggests that there ought to be some supreme tribunal to determine what is and what is not a part of the law of nations. He points to the Pope as the one person whose voice in these matters should be decisive. Most readers will think that he does so because he himself is a Catholic; but they will think so unfairly. He has on his side the greatest of English statesmen, a Protestant of the Protestants, Pitt.

"On more than one occasion," wrote Pitt in 1794, "I have seen the Continental courts draw back before the divergences of opinion and of religion which separate us. I think that a common bond ought to unite us all. The Pope alone can be this centre. . . . . We are too much divided by personal interest or by political views. Rome alone can raise an impartial voice, and one free from all exterior pre-occupations. Rome, then, ought to speak according to the measure of her duties, and not merely of her good wishes, which no one doubts."

We are not quite sure of Pitt's sincerity in asking Rome to speak according to the measure of her duties. Nor do we perceive many signs that indicate the near realization of Lord Arundell's idea of a cosmopolitan Amphictyonic Council with the Pope as its president. The Geneva arbitration holds out a hope that some time or other the war-drum will throb no longer and the battle flags be furled, in verification of the prediction in "Locksley Hall." But the hope is a rather small one, and it is accompanied by a circumstance that almost changes it to despair. One of the arbitrators, Mr. Stampfli, holds there is no such thing as a law of nations at all. Another of the arbitrators, Sir Alexander Cockburn, contends that the articles which determined the Geneva Judgment were directly opposed to the Law of Nations. We are not, therefore, very sanguine that Lord Arundell's anticipations will be found to be correct. But we are convinced that if ever nations rise up out of the barbarism which permits war among states as it used to permit duels among men, it will be by the adoption of some plan like that proposed by our author. Not only must nations have a law, but they must have some supreme authority to explain and enforce it. But the time when they will acknowledge either the law or the authority does not seem to be in very pressing proximity.

There are many other portions of Lord Arundell's volume upon. which we should like to speak at some length. More especially on that part of it which inquires into the origin of society, should we wish to delay. But we have already exceeded our available limits. We can only, in conclusion, record our opinion that Lord Arundell's book is a genuine addition to our English literature, and that whatever questions Lord Arundell discusses are discussed with more than ordinary power and with admirable erudition.

ART. VIII-RIO'S MEMOIRS ON CHRISTIAN ART. Epilogue à l'Art chrétien. Par A. F. Rio. Paris: Hachette & Co. 1872.

TH

HE name of M. Rio is by no means unknown to our readers, who may still remember our review of his learned and eloquent work on Christian Art in Italy. Since its publication, a few years have elapsed. Stupendous events, doleful revolutions have taken place, and the whole face of Europe has undergone a thorough change. And yet, notwithstanding the whirlwind of conquest and revolution, under the fury of which every head was bowed in fear, that work has made its way among an intelligent public, so that at present every real amateur considers it as an indispensable rade-mecum, when he turns to study the wonderful productions of the old Italian schools. In fact, it could scarcely have been otherwise, considering that there exists no other so complete, so exhaustive of its subject, as this production, which cost its author thirty-three long years of arduous labour.

M. Rio now comes before us in another shape at the close of a laborious and chequered, though upon the whole a fortunate career, he wishes to tell the reader how he was drawn by degrees to a pure and deep love for the ideal of Christian Art. It is a true and almost an impersonal picture of the difficulties he had to contend with at the very outset, both on account of his own primitive ignorance of the matter as well as the stolid indifference of his countrymen as to a subject so utterly beyond the usual range of their own thoughts. It is no less a picture of eminent men and manners about thirty years ago-in England, Rogers, Macaulay, Carlyle, Gladstone, among others. Again in Germany, the author lived on terms of intimacy with Schelling, Baader, Joseph Gærres, Dollinger, &c., then in the very blaze of their celebrity, -whilst on the other hand, we constantly meet with such names as Albert, Olga, Eugénie, and Count de la Ferronnays, all so mournfully familiar to the readers of the "Récit d'une Sœur," for M. Rio was the bosom friend of the head of that truly remarkable family.

Thus we have in the form of personal memoirs or autobiography a panoramic view of this age from its very dawn; and when once you have opened the book, you cannot leave it before you have come to the very last page. No wonder then that, notwithstanding the late events, it should have met in France and elsewhere with such universal approbation, nor that an English translation should