Much of the interest of these volumes is owing to the prominence given to Wycliffe, and his contemporaneous work in England. It is strange, indeed, that in those early days, before Europe was crossed with its net-works, not of railways, but of post-roads even, the land which inclosed the fountains that fed the Elbe, eight hundred miles above Hamburg, was closely bound to that distant island, four hundred miles beyond Hamburg, on the western side of the German Ocean. But a royal marriage in England had united that kingdom to Bohemia, and Wycliffe's name was a household word in the lecture-rooms of Prague, and Wycliffe's books were well worn in its libraries. The great work of preparation, the preliminary stirring-up of men's minds, by both of these great reformers, is hardly realized by us. But words had been spoken which could not die in a hundred years, and the public temper had been thrown into a glow which could not cool in a century. The "Morning Star of the Reformation" found its twin lighting up the dark ravines of Bohemia, and when they twain arose the day had begun to break. The Reformation did not begin with Luther. The elements had been made plastic to his touch; all was ready for his skilful hand to mould them into the symmetry of the Great Reformation. The armies of the Lord had enlisted man by man before he came; it was for his clarion blast to marshal them in companies and battalions, and lead them to the battle. We must again thank Mr. Gillett for his timely, serviceable book. It is never unprofitable to look back and see who have kept the sacred fire of Christianity burning when it seemed in danger of extinguishment. And in that fifteenth century its flames certainly burned low. Whenever the Church is on the side of aristocratic power, whenever it is a conservative and not a radical and progressive force in an evil age, when the forces of Satan are in power, the men are truly worthy of immortality who go out to meet death in behalf of Christ and the religion of meekness and purity and universal love. Such was John Huss. He ought never to have suffered himself to be driven from the Church, and when he did so, he committed the unceasing mistake of reformers, among whom Wesley and Zinzendorf stand as the two marked exceptions; but for rectitude, zeal, and a thorough consecration to the great interests of Christ, he merits an even more sumptuous memorial than this excellent book. _Sordello, Strafford, Christmas-Eve and Easter-Day._ By ROBERT BROWNING. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. In his dedication to the new edition of "Sordello," Mr. Browning says,--"I lately gave time and pains to turn my work into what the many might--instead of what the few must--like; but, after all, I imagined another thing at first, and therefore leave as I find it."