The Three Things: The Forge in Which the Soul of Man Was Tested. (The Unbeliever).

Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1918. Octavo, tan boards (hardcover), 58 pp. Fine in a Very Good dust jacket with edgewear. From dust jacket: Class pride, utter unbelief in the God of Christianity, and race prejudice -- these were the three big things that grew like rank weed sin the fair garden of Philip Landicutt’s virtues, the three things that were ever the subjects of disagreement between himself and his mother, otherwise perfectly attuned. Of the virtues was passionate pity for the oppressed, the eager chivalry that cannot contemplate a wrong unmoved, and the quick self sacrifice of youth. These led the young American to throw himself into the horrid welter of European warfare, in defense of Belgium. They led him into the trenches, where he lost his class prejudice; left him desperately wounded upon the battlefield, where he found his God, and into a hosptial ward where he leanred that humanity is greater than races. A few months only sufficed for these experiences, but the result occupied the young man for the rest of his life. Rarely indeed is so much of life’’s meaning, so much of power, so much of soul-moving emotion packed into even a long novel as Mrs. Andrews has compressed into this single short story. It is pure inspiration, sincere and straightforward, and without the alloy of a single false note. It is one of those rare messages that goes straight from the heart of the creator to the heart of the reader. “The Three Things” will undoubtedly be pronounced the summit of Mrs. Andrew’s artistic achievements.