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 'LETTERS,' ETC.

FTER a great man's death the floodgates of biography are opened. First come the press memoirs, often running to the length of monographs, then the magazine articles and the popular lives, and the climax is reached by the official biography; itself, perhaps, to be followed by rival lives, or at least popular summaries. This familiar process is clearly being followed in the case of Newman, and we are now in the midst of the first onrush of the waters. The three books under notice include the first instalment of the official biography, dealing with Newman's life as an Anglican, Mr. Fletcher's popular life, and a revised reprint of Mr. Meynell's excellent magazine articles. The two latter are written from a Roman Catholic point of view, the first from that of an Anglican, and thus

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